Why is everybody sayin' that Winamp 3 sucks? Why is Winamp 2 better? I would appriciate some real reasons.

Thx.

winamp 2 is:

· less CPU & memory intensive
· lots of plug ins
· lots of skins
· less bloated
· more stable

That's what I think at least.

Maybe because all the people here is only using Winamp for listen music...

I commented on that here..

Windows AMP (amplifier). What does an amplifier have to do with VIDEO?? I DON'T WANT to use video with winamp. There are many other good programs for that, that are better, my favourite is Zoom Player which with no doubt is FAR better than Winamp 3 for video.
What IS this bullshit? I'll tell you what, AOL wants Winamp to have video support, so Winamp 3 has video support, that's just about it.

Anyway, many other reasons Winamp 2 is and will always be better.

I have to agree with witchboy. However, the only reason why I use winamp is because of its stable plugins and its allround stability.

Winamp 3 has some very unstable plugins at the moment!

I know a lot of people will disagree with me on what Im about to say, but I am sticking with winamp2 for the same reason why Im sticking with windows 2k, which is better allround stability, and a lot more streamlined.

- faster
- more stable
- no fancy crap



Windows AMP? I suggest you read the winamp faq. :-)

OK. I'we just switched to WA3 today, because of a really cool skin I found for it. I know it takes a little more memory, but I didn't noticed any stability or any other problem. YET. Of course I didn't installed video player & crap.

Why do u say it's bloatware?

Im guessing you havent installed any audio pluggins like aac, mpc, or 5.1 channel plugins!

Well, I prefer Winamp 3.
The playlist is a lot better than the one in Winamp2 and the media library is very practical. I also prefer the look and the technics behind Winamp3.

IMHO it isn't bloated, you don't have to install the Video component etc. Winamp3 has been very stable for me, but this might depend on the Plug-ins you have to use (I use MPC). It starts a little bit slower, but still fast enough (Usually I start it once and let it run for some hours..).

If I just want to listen to a file, I take Winamp2. But for serious listening I usually take Winamp3.

Remember that this is the first final release, it will become better with further releases.

btw. I recommend this downloads for Winamp3:

http://www.winamp.com/components3/detail.j...ponentId=119523
lets you configure many things you can't by default

http://www.blorp.com/~peter/
Download the latest Winamp3 Plug-ins (critical updates) and the Replaygain Component - if you want.

http://www.saunalahti.fi/~cse/mpc/winamp/
MPC Plug-in (I use 0.92a Alpha - works perfectly)

This is my opinion

winamp2 is stable - winamp3 not
winamp2 has a quick start up - winamp3 not
winamp2 doesn't stress cpu very much - winamp3 does
winamp2 has a lot of nice plugins - winamp3 not
winamp2 plays tracks perfect - winamp3 not. eg: start playing one single song and switch repeat on. you'll see that both songs fade into each other. that really sucks
winamp3 has video support that nobody wants - win<AMP>2 has nothing to do with that video shit
all my input plugins are working very well with winamp2 - there are none of them found for winamp3
winamp3 has cool skins - winamp2 has not. at least not that good. but they are perfekt for audio playing. if u want skins you could have used MS WMP years ago.

May I ask what's wrong in MPC plugin?

For me WA3 IS stable, it does have a quick start & it doesen't stress my CPU (a little bit maybe). Those were the first things I was checking out after I installed it. + memory consumption <- sucks at this. yepp. i must agree.

Please, don't give me the WMP crap. Thx.

"Windows AMP? I suggest you read the winamp faq. :-)"
Couldn't find anything about it.. I always thought amp stands for amplifier. What else could it possibly stand for?

And Xenion, you said that Winamp 2 doesn't have cool skins, HMMM.. I'll prove to you that people made some great looking skins for Winamp 2, no Winamp 3 skin that i've seen up till now is better than any of those Winamp 2 skins i'm gonna add to my future site.
Some Winamp 3 skins may look cool, but almost all are HARD to understand and use, simply not comfortable. I like style AND comfortability.

And i agree with everything else that you said .

I cant remember which 1 it was but when I installed all of them together, I was not able to play aac in 5.1 format or was it wav in 5.1 format?

WA2 is able to play my music format to my satisfaction.

No need to fix something not broken yet!

AAC plugin prevents all other formats from working.

When i tried it with WA3 it didn't prevent me to play mp3's, it's, xm's and wav's... didn't try other formats though. Not going back to Winamp 3 ANYTIME soon either .

fixed.
supports listening to internet radio/shoutcast, but not broadcasting yet.
thanks for the correction Sawg.

Uhhh... Winamp3 supports SHOUTcast and Internet Radio. There is no component for broadcasting yet, but you can listen.

What's that name again?
Winamp. Not WinAmp, nor WinAMP. It's not just for Windows any more and it hasn't used AMP in years. Though for Winamp 3 you do usually see it written as Winamp3. If you add any more capital letters in there don't be surprised when the Hired Goons show up at your door.

PlayMedia - AMP

I know it's written "Winamp", what's wrong with you? I used AMP to amphasize.
And yeah, it WAS WinAMP, and i sure bet it meant Windows AMPLIFIER. YES, it's not just for Windows anymore, but that's what it meant and i'm pretty sure that "amp" is amplifier. If not, then please tell me WHAT it stands for..
Winamp. It really whips the llama's ass!

It probably has worked sometimes, but couple of latest builds from Roberto's page have been problematic. If AAC plugin is installed only AAC works, all other natively supported formats cause Winamp to crash immediately.

Well, since it's not 'Windows AMP' anymore, it can now play videos. :-)

pffff give me a break
To me it will always mean win amplifier, win not necessarily meaning Windows the OS. Many user enviorments are windows like, and Apple did "windows" before "Windows" ever existed.
But it's an amp, justin never meant to create a video player, especially not a video player called "WinAMP"...
I'm sure that the majority of people don't care for video support in WINAMP.
I think this all video thing is dumb. Winamp will never be the best video player, it IS though the best AUDIO player, so why make it just another "jukebox"?
And again, i answer my own questions.. AOL.

I remember that once they asked the users how Winamp for Mac should be called. "Should it remain Winamp?". Well it remained Winamp, and a good thing it did.

Actually, video was a pretty common requested feature. Besides, you do have the choice not to install it. It's only an extra 200K (cnc_dshow.wac and video.wac) which also covers WMA support. Of course, if Nullsoft didn't make it it wouldn't take long for someone else to though.

I am testing out Winamp 3 right now and here are my observations...

Do not pick one of the huge skins...not only are they VERY fancy, huge, and not that easy to use, they take a ton of memory that really slows everything down. Instead, pick one of the "compact" skins...they look great, are small, and take up very little memory. Honestly, with one of the compact skins, Winamp takes about 10MB on my system. Winamp2 takes around 5. Not much of a difference except winamp3 has a bunch of improvements. Also, by picking the right compact skin, you will also have a well thoughtout user interface (check out the RemoteSensing skin, my personal favorite).

The playlist and media library are big improvements and I like them a lot.

I haven't really found any major bugs and it hasn't crashed once on me yet. MP3, Musepack, and Ogg Vorbis works well. Wish the Musepack plugin had dither, but that's ok.

The negatives...Winamp3 does take a little time to startup. Some of the more powerful features (such as ReplayGain when you install the plugin) and kinda buried unless you know what your doing. Preferences are kinda weird to use.

If you take the time fool around with Winamp3, you can customize it to how you like to use it. Once you do that, it is very powerful and great to use.

ordinarily, i might say that wa3 doesn't really suck, it's just a matter of taste. but actually, they had to rush it out, so i think in this case, i can safely say that, as a final product, it does indeed suck. as far as i can tell, it's still beta. sure, it works great on many people's computers. on a sizable number of computers however, it's not so great. but really, i suppose that's just a matter of taste too... in any case, it doesn't really matter whether other people say it sucks or not. i mean, it's free($$), so why not just try them both out and come to your own conclusions?

since i feel hypocritical... i, for one, neither need nor want the media library or the "improved" playlist or any of the other "goodies". i just start the player playing music, and then leave it alone. wa3 is a bit overkill for that sort of thing. and no, i haven't really given wa3 an honest go of it. all knows is that it's a might slower than i'd like. something like maybe 30 ms or so delay when i want it to do things, which i'd rather not have, if possible.

Old version outputted normal PCM audio like Winamp 2 plugin and there was config where dithering could be enabled, but new version outputs floats and dithering/replaygain are now handled by separate components. You can change dithering settings from "Float to PCM converter" config, accessible with Configurification registry.

You are wrong. Actually, the AMP part came from an old (the first freely available, indeed) MP3 decoding library, called AMP®.

http://www.playmedia.hr/decoders.htm


Winamp used the AMP decoding engine up to version 2.6, dubbed "Nitrane”. By then, PlayMedia labs decided to start charging for licensing. Legal battles started, and Nullsoft ended up licensing the FhG decoder - which was good, because AMP/Nitrane was/is terrible.

Lately, there have been some suggestions on dubbing the AMP part = “AOL Media Player”. Some GNUish pals even suggested “Winamp Is Not Aol Media Player”

Regards;

Roberto.

Obs: On a related subject, FreeAMP became Zinf because “AMP” is a registered trademark of PlayMedia.

Wow, thanks for the information Roberto!
I had no idea that Nitrane was actually not made by Nullsoft. And that AMP came from AMP.. I was aware of the switch to FhG and then back to Nitrane and then FhG again. But THIS? Shyaoo..

There was more info on this mess in the mp3.com forums, but I’m having a hard time finding the thread. I think it’s gone.

Thank you anyway, that's more than enough for me !

If I remember correctly, it was WinAMP, for Windows Audio Media Player. (j/k)

Long, long time ago it meant Audio MPEG Player

After using WA3 for 3 days, I dumped it. I had no crashing-problems with no reason, nor any other bugs. Here is why I dumped it:
-If you try to use older skins (some of which r preety good) it crashes
-Even if I deselected the video-playback stuff at the installation, it still overwrited my file types. Then I deselected video formats from WA3 Prefs, but nothing happened. When I tried to play a video file, it started WA3, and then nothing again...
-Memory use is about 4 times like WA2. (3/4 swap 1/4 RAM)
-Maybe i'm crazy, but it seems to me that WA2.80 sounds a little bit better.
-It leaks a lot of features that are implemented in WA2.

So, I know that sooner or later the majority will switch to WA3. But, IMHO, it wil take time for WA3 to grow into a great player like WA2 is. Maybe at WA 3.50? Don't know. For now, I'll just stick to WA2 for now. I miss the free-form skins, tho...

Many people say shit about winamp3.
Then it turns out that they smell like shit.

Winamp3 is totally customizable, you don't want video? no need, just remove the video component.

you dont want something else? no problem, get to the wacs dir and clean it wize guy.

Nullsoft have'nt posted the lite installers yet, but they will probably do so with Winamp3.01 which will be much much better than 3.00!



[edit]Personal flaming edited away. No personal flaming please.

winamp3 is stable enough, i don t understand all of you that say that its not stable, what do you want it to do? solve mathematical equasions? look for aliens?

it DOES play music.

Winamp3 doesnt have a fast startup, but it will get fixed.
You are talking about the FIRST version of a product, it will have many bugs.

Winamp3 will (and already has) better plugins. Winamp3 is unstopabble.

About the playing tracks, if you are referring to the crossfading, then just turn it off.
About the gapless playback, well that's how it works, there's a 'plugin' that allows you to specify a delay between songs.

you dont want winamp3? nobody asks u, use winamp2..

Heh.
"Wize guy" eh?
Listen to me. Winamp 3 IS NOT as good as Winamp 2, period. And will not be as good when it comes to memory consumption. Ease of use, more good features, it might.
Delete video support, and what do you get? Nothing really, just a lack of ability to play videos. Winamp 3 still has the video features in the gui after you delete it. Just won't play videos.
I don't say shit about Winamp 3.
Winamp 3 is not as fast and as efficient as Winamp 2. When it comes to technical stuff, Winamp 2 wins.
So, Winamp "3.01" will be much much better? OK, believe what you will, "dumbass".

"Winamp3 will (and already has) better plugins. Winamp3 is unstopabble."
Stop writing nonsense.

"You are talking about the FIRST version of a product, it will have many bugs."
It is not the "first version", there have been many alphas and "betas". Winamp 3 is being developed for years now.
Yeah of course it will be BETTER.. But how much better, and when.

"you dont want winamp3? nobody asks u, use winamp2.. "
What the hell?...
What the fuck is your problem man?! Relax!

Lovely.

http://www.winternet.com/~mikelr/flame81.html

Heh, i know this site.

Caleb, SK1: Please, can you guys discuss in civilized manner here..

Roberto: Imo that link wasn't very appropriate in this situation either.

Thanks.

Maybe this link is better.

Sticking with Winamp 2 until Winamp 3 actually lures me away with something fantastic! Winamp 2 practically has almost everything you need in it anyways.

All the complaints above, and one more:

No customized Ogg Vorbis tags! Why did they have to remove that nice feature? It makes it so much easier to have a nice looking playlist

sexy WA3 but I want Lite no video bullsh*t.

WA3 will roxxor my soxxor sooner or later..
Right now it's not really meeting my demands.
but I'm hoping for my wishes to come true soon v3.1 perhaps
my volume algos are already implemented (Thanks Peter)
Now I just want "dB" display instead of "%", in steps by 1dB and .1dB with Shift held down
this is stuff that's impossible to do with WA2, along with other things limited in WA2's old code.

Not sure where I first read it, and can't find it now, but if my memory serves, Winamp originally stood for "Windows audio media player".

Regards,
Madrigal

http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index.....=25#entry36272

All I know is that wa3 slow my system. I can easily feel it on my slow computer. I have to produce much less load to make the sound skip (also it very fast starts to hiss (maybe that's not the right word....sounds like radio with a bad connection)).

I fancy using Winamp3, but most of my MP3s are whole CD rips, complemented with a CUE sheet, which I play using the mp3cue plugin.

Until Winamp3 supports CUE sheets, NOTHING will lure me away from the perfectly adequate Winamp2