Different Audio Players

[Nick B]

Here's my beef with audio players. You have a bunch of songs saved to your phone/computer/whatever. I generally have them grouped by type ... rock ... jazz ... etc. I generally play them on random shuffle, so the player decides what comes next. There is a setting that allows me to play "most played songs", but I want a setting that lets me play "least played songs", because I'm damn tired of hearing the same stuff pop up when it's supposed to be random shuffling. There's stuff saved that I never hear on the shuffle.

Streaming is great, but has it's limitations. Roon can do much more than JPLAY, but JPLAY sounds better and so I am sticking with it now. Playing CDs individually was so limiting before that I gave up on it years ago.

[steve]

Steve,

I used VLC years ago when I was running Windows. My recollection is it was not near audiophile quality. Have heard good things about Foobar, but haven't used it.

Hopefully someone else here has much more information.

Nick

I just found out that there are some important Settings that need to be changed with VLC for optimum audio.
I was wondering if you made the adjustments as I clearly thought VLC was also inferior until
I made the Settings changes.

After making the changes, I find VLC is clearly superior to media player, windows media player, and even
foobar 2000. If I set foobar from 2x to 8x oversampling, it became closer to VLC but VLC sounded cleaner, more
natural, live sounding while foobar had a smidgen more bass, but also less live sound.
Your results may vary though, system dependent. 

cheers
steve

Steve,

I haven't used VLC in quite a while. Just no need for me nowadays. Glad you found the best settings. It's the first time I've ever heard anyone mention that it can sound that good 👍

Hi Nick,

I also started a string at another website after reading an article mentioning several
media players and a couple of posters mentioned VLC was excellent. So I tried it.

Thanks Dave. I will check out Audirvana.

cheers

steve

Hi Steve,

As VLC is free, this turned out great for you. Not sure what  Audirvana costs. I took a look on the Apple apps store for comments about VLC, and it wasn't rated well at all. So apparently the issue is Simply having the right settings in place. When I used it years ago with windows, audio quality wasn't important for me.

Nick

I found about half a dozen settings improved the sound quality of VLC immensely.
I also downloaded foobar2000 and found they were quite close sounding after Hal's
suggested settings. Thanks Hal.

I could live with either. And both were clearly superior to Media Player and Windows
Media Player.

I found that Audirvana is ~ $5.50/mo and $6.99/mo.

I am thinking strongly of testing AIMP, will have all three players on board at once.

cheers

steve

Thanks for the update, Steve. I have not heard of AIMP, so if you get around to testing it, please let us know your thoughts.

Nick

Hi Nick,

Yes, I was able to test AIMP and it sounded quite close to foobar2000, so I stuck with foobar.
VLC has a little more mids on up than foobar/AIMP, is slightly cleaner, bass slightly tighter
on my system, so it is individual taste which to choose.

Cheers
steve

[Nick B]

Steve,

I used VLC years ago when I was running Windows. My recollection is it was not near audiophile quality. Have heard good things about Foobar, but haven't used it.

Hopefully someone else here has much more information.

Nick

I just found out that there are some important Settings that need to be changed with VLC for optimum audio.
I was wondering if you made the adjustments as I clearly thought VLC was also inferior until
I made the Settings changes.

After making the changes, I find VLC is clearly superior to media player, windows media player, and even
foobar 2000. If I set foobar from 2x to 8x oversampling, it became closer to VLC but VLC sounded cleaner, more
natural, live sounding while foobar had a smidgen more bass, but also less live sound.
Your results may vary though, system dependent. 

cheers
steve

Steve,

I haven't used VLC in quite a while. Just no need for me nowadays. Glad you found the best settings. It's the first time I've ever heard anyone mention that it can sound that good 👍

Hi Nick,

I also started a string at another website after reading an article mentioning several
media players and a couple of posters mentioned VLC was excellent. So I tried it.

Thanks Dave. I will check out Audirvana.

cheers

steve

Hi Steve,

As VLC is free, this turned out great for you. Not sure what  Audirvana costs. I took a look on the Apple apps store for comments about VLC, and it wasn't rated well at all. So apparently the issue is Simply having the right settings in place. When I used it years ago with windows, audio quality wasn't important for me.

Nick

I found about half a dozen settings improved the sound quality of VLC immensely.
I also downloaded foobar2000 and found they were quite close sounding after Hal's
suggested settings. Thanks Hal.

I could live with either. And both were clearly superior to Media Player and Windows
Media Player.

I found that Audirvana is ~ $5.50/mo and $6.99/mo.

I am thinking strongly of testing AIMP, will have all three players on board at once.

cheers

steve

Thanks for the update, Steve. I have not heard of AIMP, so if you get around to testing it, please let us know your thoughts.

Nick

Hi Nick,

Yes, I was able to test AIMP and it sounded quite close to foobar2000, so I stuck with foobar.
VLC has a little more mids on up than foobar/AIMP, is slightly cleaner, bass slightly tighter
on my system, so it is individual taste which to choose.

Cheers
steve

Hi Steve,

Thanks for the update. I looked up a little bit of information about AIMP and found that it's also available for Android. Also checked the Apple apps store and it's not available there, although VLC is.

Nick