foobar2000 0.9.5

[Lashiec]

One thing I absolutely love about New Year's Day (apart from insane partying and sleeping 'til night ), is that every year a new version of a software application gets released, and a version that absolutely knocks the socks off. And they never failed to disappoint me.

2008 does it again, with the release of the final version of foobar2000 0.9.5, which has been mentioned briefly by other fellow members. I'm absolutely blown away by this update, because it literally puts foobar in another level, bridging the gap that existed between it and the competition, while retaining the customization possibilities for which foobar is so loved. What are those impressive features that makes foobar so attractive to a user like me you may be wondering? Exactly one, a new default user interface, check it out:

foobar2000 0.9.5

Peter Pawloski (foobar2000 main developer) managed to design a flexible and attractive frontend, heavily inspired by the 3rd party plugin ColumnsUI, not as powerful, that's for sure, but much more easy to handle for the mainstream user, thanks to the addition for a wizard that lets you choose from a predefined set of appearances, without messing with 'Tagz' (foobar's scripting language) but still giving you enough choice to find something it accommodates your tastes. The addition of other elements of customization, very easy to use for anyone, further lets you customize the chosen look, again without messing with code. The new customization system used by the interface also lets you add new UI Elements (akin to ColumnsUI panels), which already spawned interesting possibilities, like Facets.

The list of improvements around the program is really big, feels almost like a major new version. Check out the changelog, the release notes, further explaining what's new in 0.95, with screenshots, and a screenshot gallery.

[vegas]

If you haven't given foobar2000 a try, you owe it to yourself to do so.  I've been using all of these betas up to the final and not only have they been awesome, but the program is more powerful than ever.  So much easier to use than I ever thought, once I started to dig around inside the preferences.

[f0dder]

That new default layout sure looks nice.

One of my pet peeves about FooBar was that it's scripting language sucks, and that you needed scripting at all to have a usable/attractive interface... and that those scripts got insanely complex, as well as hogging CPU badly. But with a default interface like that, well... let's give it a go.

[nontroppo]

Ah, Foobar 0.9.5 makes it almost worth firing up my windows XP VM! 

[Armando]

I've installed winamp 5.5 after reading all the good comments.
I tried foobar a long while ago... How does it now compare to winamp, or even to KMPlayer for example?

[Nighted]

What F0dder said...Foobar's a massive pain to configure the interface. Look at the thousands of Winamp skins. Double click and you're done.

[nosh]

Winamp is a massive resource hog compared to Foobar. Try doing some medium to heavy multi-tasking with Winamp playing - if your system can handle it and you don't get any stutter, stick with Winamp. 

I use KMPlayer only for video so I really can't compare the two, Foobar is a dedicated audio player though so it has a lot more going for it in that department. I used to love Winamp but after switching to Foobar I can only feel contempt for all that code bloat under an attractive shell, I wish I'd made the switch a lot earlier.

[Armando]

Thanks Nosh and Nighted.

I don't know, I never found that winamp was that bloated. I think it depends on the skin you use but it never takes more than 20MB of RAM on my system (but usually between 7MB and 20MB, much less if it's minimized), and CPU is often between 0 and 1%. Multitasking is not a problem. My laptop is an Inspiron 6400 with dual core (first generation) CPU, 1.8mgz.

I just installed foobar. It IS lighter. But not dramatically. I'll play a bit with it later and see.

[Nighted]

I got a chance to play around with it today. It's A LOT better than it used to be, at least from the perspective of it's interface.

I'll stick with Winamp though.

[Armando]

I'm sticking with Winamp too (I just find it very ergonomic, pleasant to use and, after all, not that resource hungry), but will keep foobar for certain situations -- when I'm impatient and need to hear a wav file instantly...

[lanux128]

just like Opera, foobar2000 is another of those well-known programs that i never got to try out because i'm too comfortable with my current program. good to hear some nice things about it, though..