Author Topic: Need Help With Winamp (Read 7850 times)

mouse_clicker · « **on:** June 13, 2004, 04:28:45 PM »

I have Winamp 5.03 Pro and an extensive media library. I have over 100 albums on my computer and each one has its own playlist in Winamp. Having so many, though, makes it a pain to scroll through them all to find the one I want. Is there any way I can create a folder for my playlists in the media library to better organize them? Ideally I'd like a folder for each band and have it contain each album by that artist I have. I've looked on the official Winamp website for plugins- it was a very unpleasant experience I would not like to repeat. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Berny · « **Reply #1 on:** June 13, 2004, 04:42:22 PM »

Get a Mac? I dunno. I don't even know what a winamp is.

EDIT: Mkay, "A FRIEND" explained winamp to me. Your problem can easily be solved. As suspected your problem is PCI (Personal Computer Iterosisisisisisisis) You need to throw it away immediately, buy a Mac and have fun with iTunes which organizes your music however you want. I'll take a screenshot if you like.

Molobert · « **Reply #2 on:** June 13, 2004, 06:44:41 PM »

"buy a Mac and have fun with iTunes"

Or keep your PC and download the PC version

Shift Key · « **Reply #3 on:** June 14, 2004, 04:06:09 AM »

Hmmm, sounds like a predicament. You're looking for a way to sort out your files through Winamp. *screwed up face*
I've always had folders for each artist, and then folders within for each album. Using CDex allows me to do that by default. Individual playlists? Bleh, I have one supersized one and just jump and enqueue whenever I feel.

That and Media Library is a heap of garbage. Rescan folders? Get nicked I say. The only feature I like from that is the "Most Played" list, the rest of it is just trimmings. Oh well.

Winamp Free + CDex is the system I'd recommend for encoding CDs to MP3. Have a look at it here because I can't recommend it highly enough.

EDIT: One of the features of CDex I did not know of is to "Create PLS and M3U playlist files" so if you decide to abandon the mess and start afresh, CDex can help you with your playlist fetishes also, mouse

Berny · « **Reply #4 on:** June 14, 2004, 05:00:01 AM »

Quote
Originally posted by: Molobert
"buy a Mac and have fun with iTunes"

Or keep your PC and download the PC version

Okay, I didn't know until yesterday that there WAS a PC version. But since there is that will have to suffice. But buy a Mac!

S-U-P-E-R · « **Reply #5 on:** June 14, 2004, 06:16:28 AM »

Quote
Originally posted by: Berny
You need to throw it away immediately, buy a Mac and have fun with iTunes which organizes your music however you want. I'll take a screenshot if you like.

I'd like to discourage this kind of posting

Berny · « **Reply #6 on:** June 14, 2004, 02:07:29 PM »

What, pro-Mac posting? Nevar! I'll break TEH RULZ!

(Fine, no screenshot.

)

Famicom · « **Reply #7 on:** June 14, 2004, 02:32:41 PM »

Well you can always skip the Winamp media library and just create your own neat and elaborate set of folders in Windows directly. Then after getting stuff the way you want, just link to it by adding a toolbar folder to your taskbar (Right click the taskbar, highlight Toolbars-->New Toolbar and select your Music folder). As long as you don't stretch out the toolbar to show the folders directly, everything should be accessible with a little arrow on the taskbar, and a click away, in the order you specified. I've been using this method to access my music for years, and I haven't found any other method more convient.

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #8 on:** June 14, 2004, 06:52:27 PM »

Quote
Originally posted by: Berny
What, pro-Mac posting? Nevar! I'll break TEH RULZ!

(Fine, no screenshot. )

LMAO! Man, you seem to have picked up right where I left off. That's a totally awesome response.

But that being said, I very much dislike the lack of expansion possible with iTunes. I play music regularly in about 10 different file formats. iTunes is great if all you listen to is AC3, MP3, and CDA... but I just find that cutting off other music types akin to blowing away half your foot.

Plus, I just like the simplicity and speed of Winamp. iTunes doesn't hold a candle to it in those terms. Since you are a Mac user, of course you can't use Winamp itself. But since Mac OS X is very close to *NIX systems, you might want to try out XMMS sometime. It's not as full featured as Winamp, and it's a fair bit slower, but I think that it would at least give you some grounds upon which to rag on Winamp, if you so chose. =P

http://www.macosxapps.com/article.php?story=20010824090429860

You can find it there.

Berny · « **Reply #9 on:** June 14, 2004, 07:03:43 PM »

Jesus H Christ. Not only does Grey Ninja make his return to PGC but now he's complimenting me? I'm so honored! ^_^ Just for that I'll check out your XMMS. I don't listen to many of the crazier sound file types, but I'm open to new things (despite the fact that this new music player does not in fact have the letter "i" in front of it and I therefore already have reservations about the quality of this product thanks to brainwashing techniques implanted in each Apple application that have cause me to purchase anything with a partially eaten two demensional apple on it.) I'm blathering. \/\/007.

And if I REALLY wanted to try out this.... winamp, I could get Virtual PC. But I would never so profane my precious (i)pooter.

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #10 on:** June 15, 2004, 02:49:05 PM »

You know, a lot of people have been saying stuff like that to me recently. You would be AMAZED at how many people in the last couple of weeks have told me that I am just acting a lot nicer than normal, or being more optimistic. I wish you would all just lay down and die. =P And that's BEFORE I tell them that I quit drinking. (yeah, I like to kick people when they're down.)

Man, I still can't believe it actually. There are 2 Windows programs that are ALWAYS installed first thing on a reformat of Windows. One of them is Winamp 2.xx, and the other is Mozilla Firefox. A distant third would be Trillian Pro. You insulted one of the most universally accepted GOOD Windows programs, and I cheered you on.

What's this world coming to? Man, I tell ya. If I was just a little bit younger, I would have scalped you and eaten your entrails for breakfast. Now, here I am about ready to hug you for taking up the software fanaticism where I left off.

Where the hell is my rascal? I have to go throw bread at the pigeons and yell at the kids in the park.

But yeah, keep up the good work mate.

Shift Key · « **Reply #11 on:** June 15, 2004, 04:24:07 PM »

Quote
And that's BEFORE I tell them that I quit drinking.

*falls off chair in surprise* HUH?

Syl · « **Reply #12 on:** June 15, 2004, 05:10:22 PM »

Couldn't you just make the actual CD's individual playlists? I don't see how that'd be that difficult.

Of course, I have a single winamp playlist over a thousand songs long and i don't mind scrolling up or down to find everything, but its all alphabetical for the most part anyway.

mouse_clicker · « **Reply #13 on:** June 15, 2004, 06:05:40 PM »

That's what I do, Syl.

I have a playlist for each CD/album I have on my computer. The problem is, though, I have over 130 albums on my computer, and with a playlist for each one of those my Winamp media library is quite cluttered. What I would like is to make a folder to store my playlists- ideally I'd like to organize my media library by band, having a folder for each band and have the folders contain the individual playlists for the albums.

Syl · « **Reply #14 on:** June 15, 2004, 07:02:44 PM »

You could do that outside of winamp, take some time (as your aware) but you could easily just make a hierarchy of folders for them all. you can set winamp so that it always searches in the same place for the playlists to begin with, and just make the hierarchy through whatever directory you want it to start at.

Shift Key · « **Reply #15 on:** June 15, 2004, 11:49:05 PM »

I think I understand what you're looking for, and it sounds like you're work is cut out for you. Did you want to move all the music files around, or just the playlists? I donot understand

Berny · « **Reply #16 on:** June 16, 2004, 09:38:29 AM »

I like the new Grey Ninja. Don't go back. ^_^ But I suppose I am more of a software fanatic. It all started with Firefox. Well Firebird actually, but then they had to change the name for copyright reasons.

But worry not. I shall continue to fight the good fight for all that is soft, ware, and good.

Speaking of which....Mouse. iTunes. Smart Playlist. Do it. Be happy. I thought I explained this, but I'm willing to hand draw pictures of what menus to open to make a smart playlist since SUPER obviously doesn't want me posting screens. :/ I'm not guaranteeing GOOD hand drawn pictures or even pictures that look remotely like iTunes, but I will draw them.

mouse_clicker · « **Reply #17 on:** June 16, 2004, 10:01:36 AM »

The smart playlist thing would be cool and all, but I already have the music files themselves organized into folders by band and album, so all I need to do to fill a Winamp playlist with an album of music is choose to appropriate directory. I really want a way to organize my playlists themselves, though.

Grey Ninja suggested writing a script to make shortcuts to all my playlists and organize them into folders, which would work great, but I don't know enough programming to do that.

Berny · « **Reply #18 on:** June 16, 2004, 11:32:00 AM »

Well I'm sorry to hear you say that mouse cause that means I wasted my time on this. Meh, whatever. Have fun with your precious little Winamp.

Metaphysical Spirit · « **Reply #19 on:** June 16, 2004, 03:42:34 PM »

Hey Mouse Clicker. I had a similair problem like that before. The easiest way was for me to just organize everything myself. I created a folder on my desktop called "Music" and inside would be more folders of different genre. Then when you would go in.. It would have all the artists that I would have, and when you go into their folder, it would have all their CDs. Any extra songs that aren't on CDs or live from concerts or what-not.. I would leave in that Artist's Folder. In each Album Folder, I would have a save WinAmp Playlist file of the whole CD. So now when I open my winamp, I neatly go through my folders, and drag each WinAmp Playlist files I want into enquery. So that if I dragged 3 playlists, I would have 3 albums already organized already. It is a lot of work at first, but now it's very easy for me. I never use the Media Library. Ehh, Maybe you can find a better way. I just like doing it this way becuase not only are my files and folders very organized and easily reachable (Quickbar hit the Desktop Button, Open Folder, Drag).. but it also makes it easy to back things up.

To Berny. We all don't like Macs. WinAmp is the best tool for me for music. It's very customizable. There are soo many skins, so no matter what you can have the colors fit your desktop. Always a must for me. The plug-ins for it are amazing, and there are just SOO many. The Visualization Center is an awesome tool where you can DL tons, or they even let you make your own. It's also a good program for watching videos, though I use my WMP and DivX more. I read someone said when they format their computer, thats the first tool they put on with a few others. Well, the same 3 tools they said are the same I install when I reinstall Windows. Mac is an awesome computer for Video and Music, but when it comes to Windows... WinAmp beats any program hands down. So maybe you need to do your own organizing.. but if you have your own personal computer, you should have it organized anyways.

Berny · « **Reply #20 on:** June 16, 2004, 04:29:01 PM »

Quote
Originally posted by: Metaphysical Spirit

We all don't like Macs. ... Mac is an awesome computer for Video and Music, but when it comes to Windows... WinAmp beats any program hands down. So maybe you need to do your own organizing.. but if you have your own personal computer, you should have it organized anyways.

I am aware that "we all don't like Macs." That is why I am so "openly Mac" with everyone. ^_^ I would never trade in my Mac for a PC. I'm sure Winamp is fine, but I'm still gonna give you 73h 5h17 for owning a PC. I'm just cool like that.

Although I believe the Mac equivalent of Winamp in that it plays EVERY freaking file type in existence (other than Ninja's XMMS of course

) would be VLC. Don't know what that stands for but if you have a Mac you should get it. I got it when Quicktime of all apps stopped playing avi movies.

Yeah, so that sucked.

ANYWAYS, that is enough Berny Banter for today. Hope you enjoyed.

Metaphysical Spirit · « **Reply #21 on:** June 16, 2004, 06:35:57 PM »

Heh, I just wanted to say I apoligize if I seemed harsh. The college I goto, lol we argue about what's better, Mac or PC. I guess I got my daily habits in the way. Heh. I don't have macs, but I also wanted to say WinAmp can basically open any file type that is Audio/Video. Well, Besides DivX but that's because of all the CodeC that goes into it. The thing I do like about Mac is that it's not always a constat fight to update your system and keep 100% Operational.

Berny · « **Reply #22 on:** June 16, 2004, 07:09:35 PM »

^_^ Well I'm afraid I too owe you an apology. I never get mad about these things. I realize you PC kids are really attached to your pieces of....oops sorry. I'm regressing. Anyways, I get a lot of the PC vs. Mac stuff in high school too. Except...I'm fighting a lonely, losing battle. There are some 250 kids in my class and there are some 249 PC kids in my class. So yeah, I'm really used to it, and that's why I call myself, "openly Mac." ^_^

And yes, Macs are VERY convenient in that respect and MANY others.

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #23 on:** June 16, 2004, 07:35:09 PM »

Berny, just thought I would show you something.

http://people.uleth.ca/~dave.brady/screenshot.png

Winamp.

I think what you really fail to understand is the entirely different concepts between iTunes and Winamp. Winamp was truly the work of a single man. A classic old school hacker employed by AOL. Like all good programmers, he believed in svelt simplistic code, and blazingly fast results. His pinnacle of creation was Winamp. Quite nearly the ultimate piece of software from a programming perspective. (And Firefox is closing in on it, as it is programmed with the EXACT SAME style...)

When it ships, it plays all the basic media types that you might expect a music player to play. But it has a powerful extension API, so a clever programmer can extend it to do pretty much whatever he/she wishes. And given the userbase of Winamp... there are a LOT of programmers interested in doing just that. There are plugins to control a blinking array of LEDs, control floodlights, and hell, there's even plugins to make the lights on your keyboard blink in time with the music.

But personally, what I like most about Winamp is the wide array of music input plugins that there are. If it's a music file of some sort, there IS a Winamp plugin to play it. It's really that simple.

By the way... the tracks you see in Winamp there are PSFs. They aren't mini PSFs, so they are larger than they need be. But the entire soundtrack is about 2 and a half hours long. (But you can change the length of the songs arbitrarily as you see fit, without adjusting file size). Total size on my hard drive is 13.7MB (unzipped... which they honestly don't need to be)

------------------------------

But that being said... If Apple were to port Mac OS X to PC, I might just jump ship anyways. Mac OS X is about the most desktop friendly *NIX distro that there is. The problem I have is that if I move to a Mac for real, I am trapped in the architecture that Apple wants me to have. Now this is kind of the dual edged swords that Macs have to bear. On the one hand, knowing what sort of hardware is going to be in the computer allows Macs to optimize things almost to the point of a Mac being more akin to a console than a PC. But on the other hand, it is intended to be a general purpose computer. Not allowing users to fully customize their rigs is a huge turnoff to a lot of PC users (myself included). With my PC specs... I have trouble even getting Linux running.

But seriously, try out XMMS sometime. It's the *NIX version of Winamp. It's halfways compatible with Winamp... it uses Winamp 2.xx skins (as in the one in the screenshot above), but as *NIX variants don't use DLLs, the plugin system is completely different. Nevertheless, plugins for the more common music formats are easy to come by.

Metaphysical Spirit · « **Reply #24 on:** June 17, 2004, 03:00:54 AM »

I hear you on that Bernie. My school is a type of techinical college, Full Sail is the name of it. It majors in Film, Recoring Arts, Show Production, Game Design and Development, Digital Media, and Computer Animation. The school is kind of split when it comes to Mac vs PC. The Film, Recording Arts, and Some Digital Media students love Macs becuase with what they use the computer most for. The rest are PC based.. especially Computer Animation and Game Design... Computer Animation being the field I'm under. The biggest problem with the Mac I have is just like Grey Ninja said. The PC is an all around machine, that I can go into myself and do whatever I want. I do have to worry about going to the store and worrying about a program or game not being able to run under a Mac. Though, that is getting less and less.

On a second note.. The new Apple's are very powerful machines. The G5s are an awesome tool. Though Intel right now is working on Artifial Diamond Proccesors. Since the silicion can only reach the max heat of around 110 degrees... That is our biggest problem. In the next 5-7 years, the compitition between Mac and PCs will be an amazing thing to watch. I can honestly say I can't wait to see what comes next. The stability of a Mac is just awesome too.

Anywho, back to the topic. To just get everything in a nutshell. WinAmp is just one of those programs that EVERY PC owner makes sure they have on their computer. Even people who know nothing about computers use WinAmp. Heh, Grey Ninja was right about WinAmp too about how simple the code is, and yet how universal it can be to be edited with. I have this awesome skin called MMD3 and the things you can with it for just being a skin is awesome. I like the Light Up LEDs. =0)

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Author Topic: Need Help With Winamp (Read 7850 times)