Section 7.2. Windows Media Player


7.2. Windows Media Player

In the beginning, Windows Media Player was the headquarters for music and video on your PC. It was the Grand Central Terminal for things like music CDs (you could play 'em, copy songs off 'em, and burn 'em); MP3 files and other digital songs (you could sort 'em, buy 'em online, and file 'em into playlists); pocket music players of the non-iPod variety (fill 'em up, manage their playlists); Internet radio stations ; DVD movies (watch 'em); and so on.

Media Player still does all that, and more. But it's no longer clear that this is the program you'll use for these activities. Gradually, the Media Player audience is splintering. Nowadays, a certain percentage of people is using alternative programs like:

  • iTunes . If you have an iPod, you use Apple's iTunes software to do your music and video organizing.

  • Zune software . If you have a Zune music player, you have to use yet another jukebox programthe software that came with itfor loading up and organizing your player.

  • Media Center . Many of Media Player's functions are now duplicated in Windows Media Center , a specialized program (included only with the higher-priced versions of Windows Vista) that's designed to be operated with a remote control while your PC is hooked up to your television.

Still, most of the Windows world continues to use Windows Media Player as their music-file database. It's worth getting to know.

7.2.1. The Lay of the Land

Down the left side of the window is a Navigation tree, just as in Photo Gallery: a list of the music, videos , and playlists in your collection. The flippy triangles next to the major headings make it easy to collapse sections of the list. Under the Library headings, you can click Artist, Album, Songs, Genre , or whatever, to see your entire music library sorted by that criterion (Figure 7-12). (The Navigation tree isn't visible in some viewsmore on this in a moment.)

Figure 7-12. When you click a label at left, the main portion of the window changes to show you your music collection, using the actual album-cover artwork as their icons. It's very visual, but not especially stingy with screen space. Fortunately, you also have a more compact list view availablechoose Details from the View Options pop-up menu identified here.


Media Player's top edge, as you may have noticed, offers several primary tabs, which cover the essential functions of Media Player. Here's a quick overview:

  • Now Playing . Click this tab while music or video is playing from any source. This is where you can see a list of songs on the CD, a graphic equalizer, and a wild, psychedelic screen saver that pulses in time to the music. Here, too, is where you change the volume and other audio settings.


    Tip: To start playing a song, album, playlist, or whatever, just double-click its name . You can use the Space bar to pause or resume playback.
  • Library . This screen lists every piece of music or video your copy of Media Player " knows about" on your hard drive; use the Navigation tree to sort and group the lists. This is also where you can sort your songs into subsets called playlists .

  • Rip . Use this screen to copy songs from one of your music CDs onto your hard drive, as described later in this chapter.

  • Burn . After transferring some songs to your hard drivefrom the Internet or your own music CD collectionyou can then burn your own CDs. This screen is the loading dock.

  • Sync . Here's where you line up music or video that you'd like transferred to a portable music or video player, if you have one that Media Player understands.

  • Urge . This page is a rabbit hole into Alice in Marketingland. It's the gateway to online music storesMTV's Urge store is, obviously, the featured onewhere you can buy songs for $1 each, or download all you want for $15 a month, with the understanding that you're just renting them; when you stop paying, you lose them all.

7.2.2. Playing Music CDs

For its first trick, Media Player can simulate a $25 CD player. To fire it up, just insert an audio CD into your computer's CD or DVD drive.

If this is the first time you've ever taken this dramatic action, you see the dialog box shown in Figure 7-13. It asks how you want Windows to handle inserted CDs. Do you want it to play them? Or rip them (start copying their songs to your hard drive)? And if you said "play," do you want to use Media Player or Media Center , if you have it?

Figure 7-13. Top: Windows may ask what you want it to do with a music CD. If you accept the " Play Audio CD using Windows Media Player" option by clicking OK or pressing Enter, Media Player opens automatically and begins to play the songs on your CD.
Bottom: Most of the menu commands you'll need are hiding under the names of the main tabs (Now Playing, Library, and so on); click the tiny buttons to open the menus . There is, however, a proper menu barits just hidden. Tap the Alt key to make it appear. Or, if you ache for the comfort of the traditional menu bar, press Ctrl+M.


For now, click "Play audio CD using Windows Media Player."

Media Player opens and the CD begins to play automatically. The screen even fills with a shimmering, laser-light show (called a visualization) that pulses along with the music.

7.2.3. Ripping CDs to Your Hard Drive

You can copy an album, or selected tracks, to your hard drive in the form of standalone music files that play when double-clicked. The process is called ripping , much to the consternation of sleepless record executives who think that it's short for ripping off .

Having CD songs on your hard drive is handy because you can listen to your songs without having to hunt for the CDs they came from. You can also build your own playlists (sets of favorite songs) consisting of tracks from different albums. And you can transfer the songs to a portable player or burn them onto a homemade CD.

If you're sold on the idea, open the Rip tab's pop-up menu. Inspect your settings. For example, unless you intervene by clicking the Change button near the top, Windows copies your song files into your Personal Music folder.

Note, too, that Microsoft has designed Windows Media Player to generate files in the company's own format, called Windows Media Audio (.wma) format. But many people prefer, and even require, MP3 files. For example, most recent CD players and portable music players (including the iPod) can play back MP3 filesbut won't know what to do with WMA files.

If you'd prefer the more universally compatible MP3 files, Rip Format MP3 (Figure 7-14).

Figure 7-14. Using this submenu, tell Windows how much to compress the song files (and sacrifice sound quality). If you don't need MP3 compatibility, Windows Media Audio (Variable Bit Rate) maximizes quality and minimizes file size by continuously adjusting the data rate along the song's length.



Tip: If you have a stack of CDs to rip, don't miss the two commands in the Rip menu: "Rip CD Automatically When Inserted Always and "Eject CD After Ripping." Together, they turn your PC into an automated ripping machine, leaving nothing for you to do but feed it CDs and watch TV.

Finally, the Rip Bit Rate submenu controls the tradeoff , in the resulting sound files, between audio quality and file size. For MP3 files, most people find the 192 Kbps setting (on the "Audio quality slider) to produce great-sounding, relatively compact files. Let your ears (and the capacity of your portable music player) be your guide.

Here's how you rip:

  1. Insert the music CD. Click the Rip tab in Media Player .

    The list of songs on the CD appears.

  2. Turn on the checkboxes of the tracks you want to copy .

    You've waited all your life for this: at last, you have the power to eliminate any annoying songs and keep only the good ones.

  3. Click Start Rip .

    You'll find this button at the lower-right corner of the window.

    Windows begins to copy the songs onto your hard drive. The Start Rip button changes to Stop Rip, which you can click to interrupt the process.

7.2.4. Organizing Your Music Library

Every CD transferred to your hard drive winds up with an entry on the Library tab. You can sort your collection by performer, album, year released, or whatever, just by clicking the corresponding icons in the Navigation tree. Whenever you want to play back some music, just double-click its name in this listthere's no need to hunt around in your shoeboxes for the original CD the songs came from.

But that's just the beginning of Media Player's organizational tools; see Figure 7-15.

Figure 7-15. To create a playlist, just start dragging tracks or whole albums to the Playlist pane. Switch views, or use the Search box, as necessary to find the tracks you want. Drag songs up and down in the Playlist pane to reorder them. Use the pop-up menu (where it now says Untitled Playlist) to scramble, sort, rename, or save the playlist.


7.2.4.1. Playlists

Microsoft recognizes that you may not want to listen to all your songs every time you need some tunes. That's why Media Player lets you create playlists folders in the Navigation list that contain only certain songs. In effect, you can devise your own albums, mixing and matching songs from different albums for different purposes: one called Downer Tunes, another called Makeout Music, and so on.

To create a new playlist, start on the Library tab. The Playlist pane, at the right side of your screen, is empty. It says, "Drag items here to create a playlist." Well, heyit's worth a try. See Figure 7-15.

Once you've created a playlist, click Save Playlist at the bottom of the pane. Type a name for your playlist, and thrill to the appearance of a new icon in My Playlists "category" of the Navigation tree.


Note: To create another playlist right away, close the first one by clicking the X beside its name.

7.2.5. Burning Your Own CDs

The beauty of a CD burner is that it frees you from the stifling restrictions put on your musical tastes by the record companies. You can create your own "best of" CDs that play in any CD playerand that contain only your favorite songs in your favorite order. The procedure goes like this:

  1. Click the Burn tab. Insert a blank CD .

    On the right side of the screen, the Burn pane appears. If your PC has more than one disc burner, click Next Drive until Media Player identifies the correct one.


    Note: If you've inserted a rewriteable disc like a CD-RW, and you've burned it before, right-click its icon in the Navigation tree, and then, from the shortcut menu, choose "Erase disc" before you proceed.
  2. Specify which songs you want to burn by dragging them into the Burn List (where it says "Drag items here" in the Burn pane) .

    You can add music to your CD-to-be in just about any kind of chunk : individual songs, whole albums, playlists, random audio files on your hard drive, and so on; see Figure 7-16.

    Figure 7-16. Use the Navigation tree to pull up the display you want. For example, to see a complete list of your songs or albums, click Songs or Albums, and then drag individual songs or albums directly into the Burn list. To add a playlist to the Burn List, drag the name of the playlist right across the screen from the Navigation tree. To add a file that's not already in Media Player, drag it out of its Explorer window directly into the Burn List.


    As you go, keep an eye on the "time remaining" readout at the top of the Burn List. It lets you know how much more your CD can hold. If you go over the limit, Media Player will burn additional CDs as necessary.


    Tip: Media Player adds two seconds of silence between each song, which might explain why you may not be able to fit that one last song onto the disc even though it seems like it should fit.
  3. Click Start Burn .

    It takes a while to burn a CD. To wind up with the fewest "coasters" (mis-burned CDs that you have to throw away), allow your PC's full attention to focus on the task. Don't play music, for example.

7.2.6. Copying Music or Videos to a Portable Player

If you have a pocket gizmo that's capable of playing music (like a SanDisk Sansa or a Pocket PC) or even videos (like a Portable Media Center), the process for loading your favorite material onto it is very similar to burning your own CD. The only difference in the procedure is that you do your work on the Sync tab instead of the Burn tab.

Just connecting the player to Media Player brings it up-to-date with whatever songs you've added or deleted on your PC. As your library grows, shrinks, or gets edited, you can sleep soundly, knowing that your portable gadget's contents will be updated automatically the next time you hook it up to your PC's USB port.

7.2.7. Online Music Stores

Right from within Media Player, you can search or browse for millions of pop songs, classical pieces, and even comedy excerptsand then buy them or rent them. (You can pay $1 per song to own it, or about $15 per month to download as many songs as you want, with the understanding that they'll all go poof! if you ever stop paying the fee.)

At first, the Online Store tab features Urge, which is MTV's music store. But with a little effort, you can also access Napster, eMusic, XM Satellite Radio, and other music and movie stores.


Note: Two stores you can't get to from here are iTunes and Zune Marketplace. You have to get to those using the software that came with your iPod or Zune, as noted earlier in this chapter.

To look over your options, open the Urge menu and then choose Browse All Online Stores. Now Media Player window ducks into a phone booth and becomes a Web browser, filled with company logos. Anything you buy gets gulped right into your Library, ready for burning to a CD or syncing with an audio player, if the store's copy-protection scheme allows it.

Songs from most online stores are copy-protectedgently. For example, the $1-a-song sites generally permit you to play the songs on up to five computers at once, and to burn a playlist containing the songs 10 times.

The $15-a-month rental (subscription) plans generally don't let you burn CDs at all.

7.2.8. Internet Radio

The 21st century's twist on listening to the radio as you work is listening without a radio. Media Player itself can tune in to hundreds of Internet-based radio stations all over the world, which may turn out to be the most convenient music source of all. They're free, they play 24 hours a day, and their music collections make yours look like a drop in the bucket.

For radio, use the rightmost tab (the Online Stores tab). Click the button; from the menu, choose Media Guide.

Media Guide is a window onto www.windowsmedia.com. It's a promotional/news site that plugs new movies, songs, movies, videos, and so on.

Ohand it lists radio stations. See Figure 7-17 for details.

Figure 7-17. Top: In the list at the right side of Media Guide, click Internet Radio. Bottom: Click through the music genres to find what you're up for. Click a station that looks interesting, and then click the little Play button beneath its listing. (The higher the number in the Speed column, the better the sound quality. Note, though, that 128 Kbps is generally too rich for dial-up modems, and may sputter.) Wait for your PC to connect to the Internet site, and then let the music begin!



Note: Unfortunately, there's no easy way to capture Internet broadcasts or save them onto your hard drive.



Windows Vista for Starters
Windows Vista for Starters: The Missing Manual
ISBN: 0596528264
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2007
Pages: 175
Authors: David Pogue

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