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Tried Windows Media Player 11 Beta?

 
 Discussion by mediafork with 34 Replies.
 Last Update: June 10, 2009, 3:47 pm (View Latest)
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Has anyone here tried Windows Media Player 11 Beta? It sounds quite good and i'm in the process of downloading it at the moment but it's just a bit over 20 megabites so it might take a while.

Anyone got any feedback on it? Is it good? Better than the previous versions?

I've been using RealPlayer for a while but I'm thinking i'll just try out this version and if it's any good I may switch back... I'll see how it goes!








   Tue May 23, 2006    Reply         


Hey mediafork, the frst thing I realised when I read your post was - you use Microsoft Windows, and you keep loyalty to thw Windows OS and its components!

Microsoft Windows Media Player was upgraded from version 1 to version 10 till now. And they're still working on version 11 Beta. Doesn't this give you a clue? What does Windows Media Player do? It has got a Media library, it manages playlists awfully, it has got nasty visualizations, it can rip CDs and play VCDs and DVDs. Very good, three cheers for Microsoft!

But there's Winamp. It does everything that I mentioned above, more efficiently and has loads of other features too. Even RealPlayer (What you're using) is not bad. It can do the same things, properly!

What's the point of downloading a stuffed up Microsoft's Media Player when you got loads of others that are better than that one? Another reason for not downloading it is that it is currently in Beta development Stage. Thus, its known to have errors. If the existing so-called stable versions of Windows Media Player crash every now & then, think how well the Beta version would crash!

Trust me, mediafork, Windows Media Player 11 Beta is not worth your bandwidth of 20 MB, really. You can try Winamp instead - just 5 MB.

-Omkar Ekbote (regrets for criticising)

   Mon May 29, 2006    Reply         

Well, so do I, at least in part. But I've got WMP 11 and so far it hasn't crashed once on me. I still am and always have been a fan of Winamp over WMP for audio playback, but i do think that the latest Media Player is an improvement. As I've pointed out before, though, one shortcoming of Winamp is its uneasy relationship with video files. It plays fine on audio, but it's more dicey when it's some sort of obscure or high compression codec video format. Whereas WMP11 does quite a nice job of playing video files. Then, if you're anti-M$ or simply looking for a better alternative, I would recommend VLC player. That can play basically anything, and it's freeware. Can't get much better than that.

   Fri Jun 2, 2006    Reply         


Am going downloading Windows Media Player 11 too so as to give it a shot. The one thing that I do find handy from the Windows Media Platform is i's Encoder. Very often I have to copy sound or video directly off the sound/video card and WMP has sorted this out in it's simplicity.

Winamp has however been my favourite media player just because of the right reasons - simple interface, faster response time. Will give WMP a try just to know what it's like though.

   Fri Jun 2, 2006    Reply         

I prefer windows Media Player as default video/audio player, but I'm quite annoyed by Microsoft's Installation instructions.

You can only install Office 2007 and WMP 11 betas if you have Service Pack 2 installed. Now normally I wouldn't mind, but Service Pack 2 isn't as stable for some workstations as for others. Only caused problems for me, and I formatted C drive 2 days ago as the XP installation failed to boot thanks to SP 2.

If anything changed, ie. if you can install it on SP1, please do let me know :D I'm not going to put back the turd pack that is SP 2.

I do like the new look of WMP 11


vista5231_wmp11.jpg

   Fri Jun 2, 2006    Reply         

I don't know, as I never had any problems with the SP2 crashing my systems. How about extracting the files and running wmp11.exe, then udmf.exe, wmdbexport.exe, wmfdist11.exe, and finally once more wmp11.exe by themselves, not simply clicking on the full installer. I can't try it myself as i don't have a machine without SP2, but it's worth a shot. But yeah, for looks, I'd give the new WMP at least a 9 -- maybe even 9.5

   Sat Jun 3, 2006    Reply         


I never use windows media player, i reckon it's a waste of time.
I use winamp, it's so much better than windows media player and doesn't use that much resources.
It has loads of plugins so if windows media has a feature you like (for example the 'what i'm listening to' plugin for msn messenger), you can just get a plugin for winamp to do the same job, in most cases it does a better job.
The visulizations in winamp are awesome. It comes packed with well over 50 and you can download a new visulization engine if you'd like to get better effects/features.

I think windows media 11 is a waste of download bandwith but i MIGHT get it to see what it's like (Maybe when it's out of beta)

-HellFire

   Sun Jun 4, 2006    Reply         

You're definitely right about the visualizations. Even though I use WMP sometimes, I still use Winamp for my audio because it's simply the best there is. Still, if you can afford the bandwidth, and i think everyone here can, you might as well try out WMP and then, once you've tried it, you're free to say what you don't like about it. :(

   Sun Jun 4, 2006    Reply         

No, no, no!

IMO never use WMP at all. It has bad bugs that you never find until you're waist-deep in using it.

Take the bug in WMP 10 for example, where the library is not sorted according to any traditional method. By artist mostly, but when ripping from CDs the songs get randomly placed!

Use iTunes for listening!

   Mon Jun 19, 2006    Reply         

Come on guys, suggesting an alternative is fine but at least give SOME INPUT to the topic if you are just going to bash it (meaning, comment on the differences between 10 and 11, not just that they both suck).

Personally I too don't use WMP as my primary but have never had huge problems with it. I'll probably try 11 beta at some point as the interface does look quite snazzy and they might have fixed some of the things that annoyed me about 10. I think they are starting to feel the heat from competetors so they likely have made some substantial and useful changes, but again just conjecture.

   Mon Jun 19, 2006    Reply         

I had removed all other media players,including Winamp and VLC, from my system and was using Windows Media Player 10. However, I have changed my mind about Media Player as it hangs sometimes and asks for Indeo codecs and so on which are not available on the Microsoft site. I recently re-downloaded the latest version of WinAmp Pro and I am really impressed with its new and better features especially its ripping and burning capabilities.
I cannot say about Beta version of Media Player as I have not downloaded it thanks to the message I get when I click the ``update Media Player icon'' that my version (10) is up-to-date.

   Wed Jun 21, 2006    Reply         

I've downloaded WMP 11, and except for a few scrolling bugs, havent had any problems so far. Of course, I haven't used it that often. But I like the new look of 11 and the way it sorts things. Also changing the song/artist information seems alot easier than it was in WMP 10. It took me forever to change things before. I'll have to look at it in more detail, but so far, I like it.

I've tried Winamp, and except for the visualizations, I don't like it any better than WMP. Maybe it's because its because I'm so used to WMP, but Winamp just confuses me.

   Wed Jun 21, 2006    Reply         

VLC is now a standby on any computer i put software on. it's so simple to just have to use the one player for almsot anything, and not have to worry that you'll be stuck without the codec you need. case in point: i was giving a presentation at a seminar, and my laptop adapter was burned out from a power surge, so i had 4 other laptops to use. 3 of them didn't have the codec i needed to use (latest Xvid) one had divx, and the others only had media player. luckily the 4th one had vlc, and i was able to show the clip, but it was a near disaster. But other than codecs, media player is nice, and whether you use the big skin, which looks cool, or a smaller one, which doesn't take much memory, it's easy and simple to use, as well as looking cool. --which is missing from every other WMP. Winamp is STILL more powerful for audio files, and i don't think it's too complicated, unless you're using a modern abstract skin. just use the basic. Here's what i think about iTunes: it sucks. fine if you've got an ipod and have to have it to transfer stuff, but it's got its system processes it starts and slows down the computer.

   Sat Jul 1, 2006    Reply         

Windows Media Player 11 is just another one in the series. I can see nothing wrong with it, but still cant see the difference between 10 and now 11.

Its still pretty good, has some good features and so far has not crashed on me! Thats pretty good. Shame it only runs on XP SP2.

   Sun Jul 2, 2006    Reply         

What about JetAudio, lots of options, free base version, nice GUI and some of things I havent seen anywhere else.

   Fri Jul 14, 2006    Reply         

yes and it screwed up my windowx XP

   Tue Oct 10, 2006    Reply         

First of all, for all you SP2 objectors: http://slashdot.org/articles/06/10/10/0032245.shtml
I really don't know what there is to object to...
And besides, you can't blame Microsoft for wanting to rely on their updates for their newer softwares. That's like asking all mIRC scripters to have their scripts work on mIRC 5.13. What's the point? And I think your (whoever it was that said his machine rejected SP2) computer is having problems with Windows in general, because I don't Microsoft would go around making updates that ruin support for some types of computers. Yeah, you can blame Microsoft for a lot of things, but asking for SP2 is just general industry behavior.

And yeah, I agree with Jeigh. The person that started this thread was asking about WMP11, not the alternatives. And of course there are going to be a million alternatives for every piece of software on earth, but you must admit that for the people who enjoy using WMP, it does its job in a satisfactory manner. I am still with WMP10, even though I don't listen to my music collection with it, but it's great for opening audio files that I don't necessarily want to add to my iTunes library...

Now I'm going to check out VLC.

   Tue Oct 10, 2006    Reply         

Wmp looks better, the album info is really nice to look at. It's worth getting, not worth using. It freezes any time I try to load more than one song in. Wimanp is just as bad, I use RealPlayer.

   Tue Oct 10, 2006    Reply         

My girlfriend just downloaded Windows Media Player 11 a few days ago. There has been no problem so far it hasn't had any problems that I can tell. I still really don't like the way things are sorted. I have no need to see all the album art when I am looking for the songs I want. To me it is a waste of space. And some of the album art isn't even correct. But still it is pretty easy to navigate around. But overall I would have stuck with Windows Media Player 9. I liked the simplicty of it without all the added crap.

   Thu Mar 29, 2007    Reply         

Well, it has been out of beta for a while now. I've been sticking with WMP since v 7 (the one bundled with Windows ME). That was the time, when they really revamped the player. The way it sits on top of the taskbar (WMP taskbar toolbar) comes in real handy, as the entire player doesn't need to be focused for the basic jobs. It has improved album based management, instant search, album info finder and the vista black look, enough to make it my favorite media player. Personally, I don't have any problem with downloading the codecs for out of the block media formats.

It does crash once in a while. But one could attribute that to the growing complexity in the software. And let me tell you, Winamp isn't perfect either. I remember, v 3 not starting at all, on many occasions. Re-installing was the only option back then. The last Winamp I tried was v 5 which was a great improvement to the already impressive Winamp.

   Thu Mar 29, 2007    Reply         

I've had 11 right from the start of the beta, and it just looks nicer, finds album covers (from the hidden pictures in the folders) and etc. Still, RealPlayer ftw, I use VLC for videos, except some only run in WMP (virii probably).

   Thu Mar 29, 2007    Reply         

I don't normally use Windows Media Player as my default player either, I use Media Player Classic and Video Lan Client, however when these 2 fail (and it does happen), Windows Media Player almost always pulls through without a hitch.

   Sat Mar 31, 2007    Reply         

I have to agree with chesso. I guess 95% of the time i use VLC, cause i normally am a brightness & contrast adjusting freek as well as i cant tend to get a good effect of the audio on WMP.

Guess the most needed video playback tools for anyone would be: VLC, WMP or WMP Classic (and a codec pack ;) )

Regards
Dhanesh.

   Sat Mar 31, 2007    Reply         

I use Media Player for most of my installations, simply because I can't afford to spend half an hour answering questions form each person as to how winamp works, where the play button is, how come i can't make a playlist in VLC, etc. So for them, that's the best option. For myself, I used to use VLC as my default video player and winamp as my audio player, but I found that the KMPlayer acts exactly like winamp, looks the same with the proper skin (if you're familiar with Winamp) plays more than VLC, and supports playlists, plus a bunch of filters and tweaking. Also i had trouble sometimes with VLC playing wmv files, it would skip and pixelate quite badly. KMP has no such problems, and is freeware.

   Sun Apr 1, 2007    Reply         

Since Media Player 9 I started to like it, I even called it the sole thing Microsoft made well. I realy don't want to use Winamp anymore, it's like it's been made out of several pieces (wich is good for something like The GIMP, but not for a media player). iTunes isn't one of my favourites either, mostly because it comes with Quicktime (I prefer Quick Alternative, it's much faster). The VLC player is to basic and ugly in my opionion.
Yet I must say I hate WMP11 on Vista, music tend to hang and skipping a song takes up to 10 seconds ... just because it wants to do some DRM check ... even worse, it sucks up more processor time than usual ...
That makes me the man in the middle, I'm stuck, my favourite sucks and I don't have a good alternative

   Fri Apr 6, 2007    Reply         

I love window's media player 11 especially if you have windows vista it's nice to have.

also i have MSN messenger and you can use the "What I'm Listening To" feature if you have window's media player.

Although winamp is pretty cool i already have window's media player and it works really good. if you have a slower computer you might want winamp though.

Also i have a Verizon Samsung mp3 phone and you have to use Window's Media Player to put the songs on to it. so think about that too.

i have a eMachines computer with a 120gb hard drive and 1024mb RAM memory. it also has a kickass ATI Radeon Express 200 graphics card. although i do need a better monitor because i got a 17" CRT and i would like to take my computer places because i record a lot and if a band don't wanna relocate or i can't record drums because of the neighbors i could take it were ever i wanted. i'd really like a 19 - 21" Flat Panel LCD. YEAH!!!


Well any ways Microsoft's Windows Media Player does rock and you only need something else if you are going to need to convert your audio or video files. I use Jet Audio (FREE) for my audio converting and Ultra Video To Flash Converter for my video files (Also FREE!!!) and they work great.

B)

   Mon May 7, 2007    Reply         

I'm not so sure about WMP. I've always had mixed feelings with it. The cons being it's always been a slow responder to 'quick clicks' when it came to just spontaneously choosing music to play. The pros, well, I would have to say the eye candy. Other than that, I can't see anything else that has improved its loading time. I'd really rather stick to WinAmp, it's way more efficient running than the overly large WMP.

   Mon May 7, 2007    Reply         

I am probably not going to get Windows Media Player 11 until it is a full version. Beta things aren't all that brilliant in my opinion so I don't use them much.
I also don't like the look of media player 11.
I'll stick with 10 for now until its a full version.

   Wed Jun 6, 2007    Reply         

QUOTE (wutske)

Since Media Player 9 I started to like it, I even called it the sole thing Microsoft made well. I realy don't want to use Winamp anymore, it's like it's been made out of several pieces (wich is good for something like The GIMP, but not for a media player). iTunes isn't one of my favourites either, mostly because it comes with Quicktime (I prefer Quick Alternative, it's much faster). The VLC player is to basic and ugly in my opionion.
Yet I must say I hate WMP11 on Vista, music tend to hang and skipping a song takes up to 10 seconds ... just because it wants to do some DRM check ... even worse, it sucks up more processor time than usual ...
That makes me the man in the middle, I'm stuck, my favourite sucks and I don't have a good alternative
Link: view Post: 101214



My WMP11 never skips nor does it ever hang, maybe Vista is sucking up too much of ur machine's resources? I actually like WMP11 over any WMPs in the past.

xboxrulz

   Wed Jun 6, 2007    Reply         

QUOTE (wutske)

Since Media Player 9 I started to like it, I even called it the sole thing Microsoft made well. I realy don't want to use Winamp anymore, it's like it's been made out of several pieces (wich is good for something like The GIMP, but not for a media player). iTunes isn't one of my favourites either, mostly because it comes with Quicktime (I prefer Quick Alternative, it's much faster). The VLC player is to basic and ugly in my opionion.
Yet I must say I hate WMP11 on Vista, music tend to hang and skipping a song takes up to 10 seconds ... just because it wants to do some DRM check ... even worse, it sucks up more processor time than usual ...
That makes me the man in the middle, I'm stuck, my favourite sucks and I don't have a good alternative
Link: view Post: 101214


Windows media player 9 is probably one of the worst of media player.
I really hated it. As soon as 10 came out I got that and it was good.

   Thu Jun 7, 2007    Reply         

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