AlbumPlayer 5.3e

Overview

If you’re looking for a modern, stable and complete media player that can manage your music collection then AlbumPlayer is what you need. It includes most features that all popular media players have, including party mode, Auto-DJ, equalizer, custom library creation and others. It also has a unique way of accessing your music, which is by navigating through the album covers.

Installation

You don’t have to worry about anything during the installation, as all the steps are very easy and the whole process is pretty much straightforward. No harmful or any kind of additional software is included in the installation package.

Supported operating systems are Windows 2000, XP, 2003, Server 2008 and 7.

Interface

When you run the program for the first time you will be asked to select the directory where the database will be stored. The window that will open afterwards asks you to choose a skin for the program and also pick your input device (mouse and keyboard or touch screen). After doing so, the main window will open. Regardless of the skin you picked, the program’s features and functions remain the same. At the top of the window you can see a toolbar and at the bottom are the playback controls and media information. The main area of the window has a panel on the left which shows the album cover and tracks. Next to this panel you can see the rest of the albums in your collection with their respective covers in thumbnail view. You can change the screen to view album artists instead, or sort the collection by other types.

Pros

AlbumPlayer focuses on the visuals a lot, and the result is not bad at all. There are many skins for the interface, and all the custom music collections you create look just like a real CD case. The album cover of the current song playing is shown in a noticeable, medium-sized box in the player. When you select to view an album’s info a small window will appear that resembles a booklet, which is split into 4 pages. In the first one you can see the album art and the included songs, in the second you can view information about the album, on the third you can find information about the artist and on the last page you can rate the album and each of its tracks.

This program also supports ASIO (Audio Sound Input/Output), which is basically a way for music to reach your soundcard output untouched, since normally it would have to go through a series of audio processing steps (normalization, crossfading, DSP effects etc.). This guarantees the highest audio quality possible.

If you have a touch screen then you can control AlbumPlayer with your fingers, which is faster and cooler.

You can add pictures of an artist in the database so that when a song of that artist is playing, a slideshow with his/her pictures will start.

When your computer is used to play music in parties, you can use Party Mode. It locks your computer and its files (with a password) and allows guests to only change the playlist so that they don’t mess with the rest of your files.

Cons

No cons here.

Alternatives

Some alternatives are JetAudio (paid), iTunes (free), Winamp (free and pro versions available) and MediaMonkey (paid). Winamp is actually one of the best and most popular players when it comes to music with loads of features, plugins and skins available to its users.

Conclusion

AlbumPlayer is an awesome media player with many features that is recommended to everyone. The demo version is not very limited and will give you the chance to explore all of its functions for free, so give it a try today!