Best jukebox that is NOT iTunes?

[ak7]

i've been using itunes for quite a while now - it can be hard to make a switch. are there any players that import itunes settings? for example i have equalizer / volume presets for a lot of my library - will anything import these settings? also i use last.fm - i guess media monkey has a scrobbler plugin? i see musikcube has one.

[Carol Haynes]

I bought a Creative ZEN and installed Creative MediaSource Player on my laptop.  Immediately I experienced the worst crash I've ever experienced.  Thank goodness for XP's rollback feature.

Since the crash, I've been at a loss about how to proceed with the ZEN.  Any ideas?

BTW, I've reviewed relevant threads here and have downloaded mp3tagr and XMplay, which I'll install momentarily.  So much for my other projects today...

-TomColvin (July 15, 2007, 05:50 PM)

I know it isn't helpful but I have never had a problem with the Creative Zen software package - it even auto updates from their website like Windows Update (except that you have to visit).

If you don't want to use the Creative software you don't have to - Zen Players (with Play for sure firmware installed) work fine in Windows Media Player 10 and 11. If you connect the player and open WMP you should find it under the Sync tab. If you don't check the firmware installed in the player and see if there is an updated version available at Creative's website.

[Grorgy]

I was thinking that like Carol, I'd never had trouble, but I have, but I went and got the latest drivers for the sound card and creative media player 5 and all was well again, could be worth a try

[Darwin]

Yes - I've had nothing but good experiences with the Creative Suite. I really like version 5, though I no longer use it (I'm onto MusicIP Mixer).

[moerl]

Funny, how the OP (me!) ended up taking the iTunes train. Not so much by choice but rather by necessity. iPhone doesn't like anything but iTunes :/

I don't mind it so much. It just feels and performs like a bulky piece of software, and something that plays my music should not feel bulky. It should be fast, light, pretty and useful.

iTunes covers the latter two adjectives and fails miserably in regards to the former two. I have no major complaints so far, however. It runs quite fine on my new box under Vista.

[Laughing Man]

Foobar2000 with a customized interface can pull off the iTunes look (though it requires setup work).

Songbird works, though to me it doesn't feel that smooth as it reminds me to much of a web browser.

Amarok (for Linux but version 2.0 will also have Windows support) will pull it off nicely too. But I don't use KDE in Linux so whenever I used it in gnome it was always a bit slow since it had to load the KDE libraries (I doubt this will be a problem in the Windows version though).

[Armando]

iPhone doesn't like anything but iTunes :/

-moerl (August 02, 2007, 12:00 PM)

of course...

[djquan]

I have tried them all and EJukebox is the best jukebox software!
It does everything I need, plays all music and video files, lets me customize the interface how I want and lets me set criteria for random song playback when the playlist is empty.
Plus i discovered if you ask in the audiosoft.net forum they actually add your requests...most of the time to the next EJukebox version.
There is even the EJukebox 2Web feature that lets me use my mobile phone's web browser to remote control my collection.
The EJukebox homepage/download is located here: http://www.audiosoft.net

[JavaJones]

4 years later and there are still no outstanding obvious iTunes replacements IMO. Which is to say, I hate iTunes with a fiery passion, but when I want to put something *else* on a novice user's system that's easy to use and accessible, light on resources, supports all major formats, has "media library" capability, podcast support, ripping and burning to high quality formats at full speed (no limitations like Winamp and MediaMonkey), streaming support, portable music player support, etc., I really don't find any options that I'm truly satisfied with. MusikCube hasn't been updated since v1 in 2006. MediaMonkey is decent enough, but has limitations. Winamp has the same issue, and isn't quite as intuitive for the layman as MediaMonkey I think. I haven't tried SongBird lately. If only Apple would make iTunes not suck on Windows...

Edit: Perhaps Amarok for Windows is the answer? Will have to test. Has anyone tried it?

- Oshyan

[Perry Mowbray]

I've been using Jaangle for some time now and am pretty happy. It's just a player / organizer, so no burning or ripping... but it does the other things well and the dev is quite responsive and accommodating to requests.

Just noticed that Jaangle got top billing at Gizmo:

Best Free Music Player and Organizer

[JavaJones]

Cool, I'll check out Jaangle. For my part I always use separate ripping and burning apps for maximum power and flexibility, so I don't need those integrated. But unfortunately the less savvy average users I often deal with do need more integration, so I'm still looking for that solution...

- Oshyan

[Deozaan]

Personally, I'm satisfied with Windows Media Player or Trout.