The media player is an often overlooked part of the operating system. I recall when I was running OS X, I never really needed anything other than iTunes. I can’t stand iTunes on Windows, though, and Windows Media Player doesn’t excite me either. So where did I turn?
Songbird is a media player available for Windows and Mac OS X. It aims to be a free and open application that works well with all modern devices and services. This is illustrated the first time you launch songbird, when it asks if you want to install other add-ons, such as Last.fm or 7digital Music Store. It’s nice to see it different from other media players like Windows Media Player or iTunes in this respect.
Songbird cannot read or write to iPod. At first, I thought this would be a total deal breaker, but they came up with a somewhat unconventional workaround — automatically syncing libraries with iTunes to export your new songs to your iPod, while also importing new songs from iTunes into the Songbird library. Yes, it’s a bit clumsy, but I still appreciate the effort. They must have really worked on optimizing it, because it imported the entire library pretty quickly.
The Songbird UI contrasts with iTunes in terms of color scheme but has a similar navigation bar on the left. The three-column division of genre, artist, and album is also different from the usual Windows Media Player and iTunes layout. The beauty of Songbird’s user interface lies in its extensibility — you can actually choose to download add-ons to tweak the app’s theme and look.
The tabs you see at the top are another way to explore Songbird. When you start looking for new add-ons, a new tab will open and lead you to the Songbird add-ons website. Add-ons are divided into five categories: Appearance, Playback, Web Browser, Content & Explore, and Tools.
Its tabbed browsing system also acts as an internet browser — meaning you can use it to navigate around sites like We Are Hunted to find new music right in your browser.
If you’re a lover of high-quality music, you might find it a bit annoying that iTunes won’t let you import .flac files. I know I’ve found it a pain! Songbird definitely worked in this case, as I could just drag and drop my .flac collection right away and integrate it neatly with the rest of the library.
Discovering and discovering new music is always a pleasure. The default collection of internet radio stations on Windows Media Player and iTunes is mediocre, especially when compared to Songbird’s inclusion of HEREcast. This is what I find to be the beauty of Songbird — it takes the strengths of great services that already exist, like Last.fm and HEREcast, and combines them neatly in the Songbird interface. It’s definitely different from its less open-minded predecessors, and I can say I love this breath of fresh air.
With the arrival of Android, Songbird released a music app for mobile devices. With that, I see it filling the niche as the iTunes of Android devices (and potentially all non-iOS devices). I definitely love this move, and I hope to see it grow! If you want a fast, fresh and open app to organize, discover and play music, check out Songbird.
Categories: How to
Source: thpttranhungdao.edu.vn/en/
