Hi,

Today visited the deliplayer-site after a long time of not caring about this player. In the meantime, they have finished version 2 of it and there's currently version 2.5 in beta.

Deliplayer is now hot on the heels of fb2k. It supports many things (including tagz-style formatting in some places) for which fb2k is known - and does some stuff better. However, its also lacking some strenghts of fb2k.

Here's a sumarized comparision of the differences between both players (i will not mention features which both players have):

* Deliplayer2 supports more formats than fb2k - but the formats which are supported by fb2k are usually better implemented in fb2k.

* Deliplayer has a much better UI than fb2k - its skinned yet still you can customize it by freely moving ui-elements around and enabling-disabling it - this allows you to create your own ui without being a skin or ui developer. To understand what i mean, have a look here:
http://www.deliplayer.com/tour_panel.html

* Deliplayer supports no advanced masstagging and i found the method for tagging a field for multiple files unintuitive

* Deliplayer supports no replaygain

* Deliplayer comes with more visualizations than fb2k

* both players support plugins, but fb2k probably has a more powerful architecture for it. Thus, deliplayer will probably continue to lack exotic plugins

* Although the integrated detailed info-window for files is nice with deliplayer, i didn't like that it uses the IE-libraries for it, including some scripting done via IE.

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The interesting conclusion, when looking at future-possibilities is that both players have the capability to overcome their disadvantages. Since the UI itself is just a plugin in fb2k, it could theoretically be replaced by something as modular as the deliplayer-UI - although my hopes are low in this regard, since fb2k plugin-devs tend to be less good when it comes to powerful _and_ easy to use UIs. Replaygain-implementation should not be difficult for deliplayer - masstagging.... maybe, i someway doubt the deliplayer devs can create something as powerful as the fb2k-masstagger.

However, it will probably be easier for deliplayer to implement replaygain and powerful masstagging, than it is for fb2k to create a new powerful yet easy to use UI from scratch. Thus, i would say that deliplayer has good chances to surpass fb2k. The good news for fb2k is that it has many very exotic plugins for special use which deliplayer2 hasn't - and maybe even cannot have in the future because of architecture limitations. The thing is that most users don't need these exotic plugins - which could someday lead to deliplayer taking the "poweruser"-crone while fb2k is left with linux-style geeks only.

btw: One funny coincidence is that both players have issues concerning configuration - they both suffer from options-creep - however, i found the grouping and sorting of options to be more clear with fb2k.

- Lyx

Ok, so the 3.9 meg Deliplayer sucks the big one cept for having a decent Winamp3 like skin. Got it.

*sticks with his 0.8.3*

That's not really fair; Deliplayer uses emulation to play back a lot of module formats that neither foobar nor Winamp have any support for and can be be extremely useful in that respect.

It's strengths and weaknesses seems to be just the opposite of what I value, but I would like to try some of the technical visualisations it has.

But, does anyone know if this player can it be installed without getting alot of crap at the same time? I'm trying to keep my computer nice and clean...

Nope. Deli Devs wouldnt allow a lite package.

Meaning plugins and features, or adware, spyware, installing tings all over the place and registry entries? It's the latter group I don't want. Anything that disappears on uninstall is ok...

Edit: As an example (maybe a bad one) I don't care about playing modules, so I don't want it to install 150 such codecs on my system.

It does not install any adware/spyware crap and doesn't need any registry entries.

Thanks, then I'll give it a go

if you dont need the mod-playback, then you can disable mod-support during the setup, which will save about 1,1mb.

Besides, its not quite fair to bash deliplayer for its installer size. The deliplayer installer comes with many features which are only available in the special installer of foobar. So that suddenly makes the filesize difference 2,5mb(foobar) to 3,9mb(deliplayer) - adding support for all the formats which deliplayer supports to foobar, would probably increase foobar's installer to around 3,0mb - add to this a modular skinned UI + more visualizations, and you end up near the size of the deliplayer installer - maybe 0,4-0,6mb less - but around 0,5mb size-difference doesn't justify bashing deliplayer for being bloaty.

The problem isn't installer-size or bloat - the problem is that deliplayer is less modular - you have to install some features which you may not need - with fb2k on the other hand you can only install the features you really need - thats something where foobar has an advantage - but concerning installer-size both apps have a similiar features/filesize-ratio.

- Lyx

I have now tried it a little, and it's a pretty interesting player. If I hadn't know about foobar, I would probably have started to use it. At least for a while.

One thing I missed immediately was replaygain, as I rarely play a full album (I'm a track gain user). I also really like the look and feel of foobar, and alot of it's features and plugins, so it will probably remain my player of choice for a long time.

Anyway, it's good to see that there are alternatives out there. Especially if Winamp won't be around in the future.

Some features I found interesting/liked:
-Playlist displayed as a tree view. But, that seems to be useless unless you buy the PRO version, as it's not saved that way.
-The way the buttons that toggles playback order, crossfading and such works. Nice touch.
-Configurable window. Didn't try it, but looks promissing.

Edit: typo

I'm not touching another player unless it supports replaygain.

Add another negative point to DeliPlayer for using COM, a very cumbersome interface. Writing plug-ins for it should be just as fun as writing plug-ins for DirectShow players. The only difference is, the API is not compatible with DirectShow, so you can decide whether you want to learn a PITA API for one player, or a different PITA API which is supported by over a dozen players and still counting.

LoL, me too.

I *might* give it a whirl just for the heck of it.
one of my favorite features in foobar is the tabbed playlists. although i wish that drag n' drop would work when copying songs to another playlist. also, i'd structure the sub menu for sending songs to another playlist.

as for replaygain as some people have mentioned to be very important, aren't there any plugins that provide automatic volumen attenuation?
my old pioneer reciever has that. it calls it AVC (automatic volume control).

drag n drop to another playlists works in colums_ui; right click drag songs onto a playlist tab and select add here. (don't know about std ui)

replaygain works different from a limiter. check out RG theory at http://replaygain.hydrogenaudio.org if you're interested.

first point: i was not suggesting a limiter. if i did, i did not mean to. /* pause */ alright, so i guess i suggested a limiter. that was done unintentially. attentuating the sound only reduces the volume when it exceeds a certain value. i guess it doesn't help when the volume of a song isn't loud enough.

colums_ui? doesn't that require some fancy settings for it to really to be useful?
I've never used it. I'd love to see some screenshots and sample settigns for it.

O/T @ kalzone:
Try here: http://foobar.nub4life.net/columns/


I also need replaygain for a player to be useful, so no deliplayer.

Columns UI can be really useful, even in it's simplest form. And for those who spend some time getting the various panel extensions for it, the variety of configs is almost limitless. Here's a shot of my config, simple but nice looking and utilitarian.

On topic, I didn't really like the skins for Deli Player, or the fact that it didn't support replay gain. When I think of players that "compete" with foobar2k I think of more minimalistic, Windows UI players. Musik is one example. A decent player, very similar UI to iTunes. Recently added support for APE, MPC and FLAC in addition to the usual suspects, but doesn't support replay gain or M4A AAC files, so it doesn't do much for me. 1by1 the Directory Player is nice and simple. No installer, just a small binary executable. It's pretty simple and supports Winamp input plugins, so I was able to get it to play M4A files, but I still don't think it would support replay gain (didn't try the Winamp replay gain plugin, but I don't see how it could work).

All in all, I've yet to find anything that comes close to foobar for my needs, which I think is due to foobar's community more than anything else. There are a lot of talented and committed third-party developers who respond to requests that the main developer may not have time to address.

Cheers.

edit: as for installer size, anyone ever use VLC (formerly VideoLAN Player)? the installer is almost 10 MB!

edit by ssamadhi97: fixed imageshack link - most messageboards seem to puke on the parameters passed to their my.php when editing a post that already contains such a link; either paste such links into your posts again whenever you edit them, or use the link they propose for hotlinking instead (minus the IMG-tags, of course)

I remember DeliPlayer from old Amiga days (it was originally developed for Amiga only), the days when nobody knew what MP3 is. I gave that new PC version a try yesterday, and I think it pretty much is the same as it was - a player for a bunch of tracker formats. It's a great thing for people who like old school computer tunes - it will play almost every module format you can think of (not neccesarily correctly though). But if you're listening to MP3, OggVorbis, MPC, AAC, etc. then it's nothing special. Actually, I wasn't able to play a MPC file with it, though I made a full install. I just uninstalled it with a tear of nostalgy and then was happy that it didn't alter my files associations.

P.S.: Is there a fb2k plugin which will let me play OctaMED and MusicLineEditor modules?

Don't get me started. Musik is a joke.. a study in bad interface design.

(other points of critique include extremely unflexible metadata support, no replaygain, no gapless playback, and many more. a metric shitload of bugs on top of that. thanks, but NO thanks)

Now excuse me while I write a rant about why DeliPlayer is.. uh.. "not all that interesting" either

I honestly wonder how anyone can call DeliPlayer a contender for foobar2000 (or even "hot on the heels") and keep a straight face.


And as far as I can tell pretty much every single format supported by DeliPlayer but not by fb2k is some obscure amiga/module/chiptune format. Still an advantage, but a lot less significant than you make it out to be.


Well, since none of the skilled developers around here actually need something like that, it might indeed be a long while before anyone becomes bored enough to implement it.

Anyway, while DeliPlayer's user interface might have some flexibility in control placement going for it, the usability of the window configuration itself is bad. Not intuitive at all, and resetting individual windows to (skin) defaults is not possible (unless you reset your entire window config). No much-needed "undo" for this either. True, you don't have to be a ui developer to get it right.. just lucky and extremely patient.

On the whole the player can't even dream of touching the sheer usability of fb2k's default and columns UIs. No playlist tabs, no easy access to components (like the Components and Context menus in fb2k), no DSP queue, config is a mess, config accessibility is a mess (just how #@%$ many configs do you need?!)

Oh yes, unless I really missed something, keyboard accessibility in DeliPlayer is virtually nonexistant.

moot. The per-track volume vis for modules is somewhat interesting, gotta give it that much. The rest would be rather trivial and boring to implement, not much more than a finger exercise for aspiring plugin developers.


At this point the documented part of DeliPlayer's API is limited to input plugins only, so don't expect to see output/dsp/ui/general purpose plugins for it anytime soon.



crone n. An ugly, withered old woman; a hag.

I wonder what you're trying to tell us?

Anyway, here's a tiny list of plugins you consider "exotic": abx, albumlist, bitcompare, columns, convolve, crossfeed, dbsearch, dynamics, freedb, history, matroska, mpeg4u, oggpreview, playlistgen(_ex), pphsresample, quicktag, rgscan, shuffle, soundtouch, tradersfriend, utils, diskwriter (clienc etc). None of these can be implemented as DeliPlayer plugins using the current SDK (and keep in mind that this list is very incomplete.)

Of course this might change once devs add the necessary interfaces, documentation and example code to DeliPlayer SDK

Other random annoyances:
* extremely slow adding of files
* very buggy Shorten seeking and playback (granted, it's a new input plugin)
* and last but not least: shareware

Oh yes, adding this mess of a Shorten decoder (based on the already very ugly reference decoder) / input plugin to the sdk as an example to the DP sdk is the worst idea I've seen in quite a while.

(not to mention that that plugin is in alpha state at best, too)

Oh, did I mention "no gapless playback"?

VLC is more of a video/DVD player than an audio player (the audio player part seems more like an afterthought at this point IMHO) and also the installer size is closer to 6-7 MB not 10 (atleast for 0.8.0), the zip file (the one without the installer) is close to 10 MB but that's because it's zip compress whereas the installer is compressed with either Bzip2 or LZMA (aka 7zip)

I wasn't complaining or comparing. I just remembered it because I had a friend who wouldn't try it because he "didn't need a media player with that big an installer." Seems a lame idea to not try something.

VLC aims at having internal support for a lot of video and audio codecs/containers/streamformats. It also aims at being (very) crossplatform. I think these aspects can account for a bit larger size than some other players.