Foobar 2000 isn’t what it sounds like

Lifehacker has instructions on how to customize the freeware media player Foobar 2000 to suit your own tastes.  This might be the answer you’ve been seeking instead of iTunes or Windows Media Player.

Foobar 2000 is an advanced freeware audio player:

Features

• Audio formats supported natively: MP1, MP2, MP3, MP4, MPC, AAC, Ogg Vorbis, FLAC / Ogg FLAC, WavPack, WAV, AIFF, AU, SND, CDDA, WMA.
• More audio formats supported through optional components, official or third-party.
• Full unicode support.
• Customizable user interface layout (new in version 0.9.5). View screenshots…
• Advanced tagging capabilities.
• Support for ripping Audio CDs as well as transcoding all supported audio formats using the Converter component. Read more…
• ReplayGain support - both playback and calculation.
• Customizable keyboard shortcuts.
• Open component architecture allowing third-party developers to extend functionality of the player.

The Lifehacker instructions include some favorite add-ons for the program to customize it and add functions.

Bluetooth headphones?

I noticed some Bluetooth headphones while shopping… hmmm…. maybe I need to get Bluetooth capability so I can go wireless on my headphones, I thought.

But wait — Bluetooth converts files to a “lossy” codec, meaning data is lost, when sending wirelessly.  Since most codecs such as MP3 are already “lossy” formats, you are losing a lot more data.  So, the sound may be well below the quality you want to accept.

Wired headphones still deliver the best sound, in most cases.

Recommended by PC Magazine, June 2008.

HandBrake for converting DVDs

Need to convert a DVD to a computer format?

HandBrake can convert video from a number of sources, including a DVD and a DVD image, and audio too, including MPEG audio tracks. It can convert to a digital file in a variety of formats, including MPEG-4, AVI, OGM for video, or AAC, MP3, and Ogg Vorbis for audio.

You can select individual DVD chapters, get subtitles, and have plenty of control over your recording, including selecting the bit rate, maximum file size for video, and bit rate and sample rate for audio.

MediaCoder to convert audio and video files

“MediaCoder is a free universal batch media transcoder, which nicely integrates most popular audio/video codecs and tools into an all-in-one solution. With a flexible and extendable architecture, new codecs and tools are added in constantly as well as supports for new devices. MediaCoder intends to be the swiss army knife for media transcoding in all time…”

Features In Brief

• Convert to and from many audio and video compression formats and re-multiplex into various container formats in batches
• Full control over transcoding parameters, you can learn about audio/video encoding and play with various codecs
• Strong decoding capability for partial or corrupted contents
• Simplified UI for popular mobile devices (e.g. PSP, iPhone/iPod)
• Fully standalone, no dependance on system codecs/splitters
• Extension (scripting language) infrastructure to expand user interfaces and improve user experience

Typical Applications

• Improving compression / reducing size for audio/video files
• Converting for audio/video playback devices (digital audio player, MP4 player, mobile phone, PDA, PSP, VCD/DVD player etc.)
• Extracting audio tracks from video files
• Ripping audio/video discs
• Reparing corrupted or partial downloaded video files

Mashable list of essential music and audio links

Mashable.com has a list of 90+ essential music and audio websites.

These cover music discovery tools like LastFM and Pandora, social networks, and more.

Pick a station, any station….

TUN3R.com has an interesting method of connecting you to web radio stations….

You slide the orange needle around, or click on one of the innumberable graphics, and find all sorts of broadcasts.

Who knew there was a station called “Secret Agent: The soundtrack for your stylish, mysterious, dangerous life. For Spys and P.I.’s too!” or “Radio Zs - The Hungarian Jewish Radio” or all these others?

If you can’t find something here to listen to, you’re not trying!

thePickApp for handy utilities

thePickApp is loaded with handy utilities like a free iPod video converter, a free audio CD creator, and many other useful items, many covering media but also some like a Registry cleaner.

How to record streaming media

Gizmo Richards’ TechSupport Alert newsletter has an article on how to record streaming media.

Note that while this may be possible under fair use for students in a one-time use for a paper or presentation, it is not appropriate for more than one use if the material is copyrighted.  A better way is to embed a link in your presentation that will download and play the media at the right time.

Comparing media players

Wikipedia has an entry with a big comparison of media players for audio and video files.

If you want to know what’s free and what’s not, what operating system it runs on, what features are in which players, and what formats each player covers, this looks like a pretty comprehensive list. It even gives the versions of the players evaluated. An impressive effort!

Fox Magic Audio Recorder for your own MP3 recordings

Ever wish you could record directly to an MP3 file, instead of having to convert from a wav file which you just recorded to an MP3 file?

Fox Magic Audio Recorder is a freeware program that promises to let you choose either wav or MP3 format for the result of your live recordings.

Case of the squalling modem

So, you use a telephone modem to get on the Internet, but every time you connect, you first have to suffer through a sound like cats fighting in a barrel….

Internet Fixes offers advice on how to connect without the sound FX.

Wavosaur for music editing

Wavosaur is an open source, freeware sound editor, audio editor, wav editor software for editing, processing and recording sounds, wav and mp3 files. Wavosaur has all the features to edit audio (cut, copy, paste, etc.) produce music loops, analyze, record, batch convert.

Recommended by Clif Notes Newsletter.

Create music tracks and mixes yourself

TrakAx “TrakAx empowers you to create professional music and video mixes in an easy-to-use and fun environment. Whether you are creating a music track for your MySpace page or a video for YouTube, TrakAxPC is the most powerful FREE application on the web.” Has trakPacks by sound types and instruments.

[Note: this was not tried by the recommending eletter; use at your own risk.]

Real Alternative to Real Player

Real Media files are normally intended to be played by Real Player, and might not be playable on Windows Media Player or other players.   However, you don’t always have to get Real Player installed.

Real Alternative is another way to play Real Media/Real Player files.

Recommended by Smart Computing, January 2007.

Pandora lets you try out music

Pandora is a great way to try out new music, based on what you’ve liked in the past. The Music Genome Project classifies music by a variety of parameters, and then compares what you tell it you like to other music that has similar parameters. You “train” Pandora by accepting or rejecting what it finds. Rather like “computer dating” for music, the system can find new music along with your favorites, and open you up to new groups and artists. You can also divide your likes into certain types of music (”Stations”), so if you want to listen to vocals, or instrumentals, or jazz, or classical, you can set up what you like in your custom “station” group, and choose your preference for the moment (for example, you might not want to listen to rap while trying to type a research paper!).

OpenPandora Open Pandora is a Windows desktop front end for the Pandora music scheme. Features include: hide to tray; popup tray notification balloon; full control from tray icon; control with multimedia keyboard; global shortcuts; mini Player; integration with Last.fm; integration with Microsoft Messenger; integration with Xfire; lyrics, and more. (recommended infopackets newsletter)

Lifehacker has 15 Ways to Get More Out of Pandora, with add-ons, tips, and links to software.

Zamzar goes for the conversion

Zamzar will convert a number of formats to other formats, for free, and email you a link to the new format’s file.

Zamzar does documents, images (graphics), music (audio/sound), video, and compressed formats — far too many to list. Check the list for all the current files.

While you do have to wait for the email to get the link to your converted file, it’s free and will convert things like Real Player files to mp3, and Windows .wma to mp3, and so on.

It will also convert YouTube videos to formats that work in PowerPoint.

Recommended by Tech Support Alert newsletter.

MP3, WMA, other music file players - some are compatible with certain devices, services, files, while others are not. Find what you can use with which software and hardware at PlaysForSure.com and avoid buying or using the wrong ones together.

Super converts media files

Super is a freeware program whose name is an acronym for “Simplified Universal Player Encoder & Renderer.” It’s recommended by a number of sources, and looks like a handy tool for converting files for use in one application to another.

The site warns: “Do NOT purchase a copy of SUPER © from anyone, whether they are providing it on a CD/DVD, by email, by indicating a download link or by any other means. SUPER © is 100% FREE to download and to use. Any attempt to sell SUPER © such as on eBay, is THEFT. Violators will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. SUPER © is a FREEWARE that cannot be sold under any circumstances.”

What it can do:
* SUPER © IS UNIVERSAL as it supports a wide variety of input/source file format to play
or encode (to & from) without any additional third party software. Supported input source file formats are:

Video formats

• 3gp/3g2 (Nokia,Siemens,Sony,Ericsson)
• asf
• avi (DivX,H263,H263+,H264,XviD,MPEG4,MSmpeg4 etc..)
• dat
• fli, flc, flv (used in Flash)
• mkv, mpg (Mpeg I,Mpeg II), mov (H263,H263+,H264,MPEG4 etc..), mp4 (H263,H263+,H264,MPEG4)
• ogg, qt
• rm, ram, rmvb
• str (Play Station), swf (Flash)
• ts (HDTV)
• viv, vob
• wmv

Audio formats

• aac, ac3, amr
• mmf, mp2, mp3, mp4, mpc
• ogg
• ra
• wav, wma

* AviSynth Script Files: avs. Let you specify advanced encoding commands using AviSynth scripts!

* SUPER © supports the conversion (encoding both ways, to & from ) of ALL the listed formats.

It allows you to extract the audio portion of a video file and convert it to a ring tone for your cell phone, convert your video for use on YouTube or convert YouTube for viewing elsewhere, convert computer game files, convert any video to an animated .gif file, convert RealMedia files (.RM .RAM .RMVB .RA) to other formats, and plays any of these files.

Cleaning up audio files with Audacity

Geeks.com has an article on how to clean up noisy files (such as those converted to digital from phonograph records or audio cassette) using the open source (freeware!) media program Audacity.

MP3 file searching with Clickster

Clickster is a search engine for legally available MP3 files.  Recommended and reviewed in  Clif’s Notes Newsletter.

• Search and Download MP3’s from the Internet (NOT Peer-2-Peer)
• Rip Tacks from thousands of Internet Radio Stations
• Rip Tracks from MySpace Music
• Compile Playlists and embed them, with player, into own pages
• Download Tracks Directly onto iPod or MP3-Player
• Clickster can be run from a USB Data-Stick