QCD-Winamp5 comparison

[niqo]

In view of recent Winamp5 release, hereby I’m trying to compare these two of the best media players (my favorite – QCD & and the most popular – WA) to discover how can QCD profit from adopting new features / improving old ones.

Sound

Anyhow seems to me, on a cool music center Winamp sounds slightly better. And vice versa, QCD is better on cheap and moderate dynamics. I don’t insist on this point, ‘cause don’t have that good hearing. However I had an opportunity to try it all out.

Playback plugins

Crossfade

QCD has a huge number of settings, many of them are either unclear or useless. Anyway even turning it off requires a lot of clicks. Managing its settings is a nightmare. The Buffer is automatically extended if needed, but never automatically decreased. This especially disturbs when I want to try new EQ or DSP settings.

Winamp provides a simple and fast control. I like it. Moreover, I like Winamp crossfade transitions between songs more.

However, seamless playback is a feature, originally not supported by Winamp, u need to install a special plugin. From my point of view, QCD needs crossfade being the default plugin with some controls on the main interface, so you can adjust it without opening preferences-> crossfade options. Buttons for crossfade duration (exactly like in WA), button to switch on seamleesness.

If you switch between playback plugins in QCD, any playing song will be stopped. In Winamp you can switch it without playback interruptions.

Skins

I have no idea, how skins are created, but I like this vast choice of color themes for the main skin (as well as for other skins) in Winamp. I don’t think this would be that hard to realize in QCD. I’ve read, experienced qcd users are annoyed by the green face of the default skin.

By the way, my opinion is that the skin of release 4.0 was much better, than the current one.

Remove that dirty-red record button. It’s disgusting. Or change its color.

Playlist

This is already trivial, but it would be “a bit” more convenient, if playlist windows could be resized.

Just discovered a great thing in Winamp. Generate HTML playlist – creates an HTML file with all songs currently loaded. COOL thing. Suppose improvement – HTML with links to all files.

Winamp playlist window is showing selection duration/playlist duration. This is really useful.

QCD has more options for sorting the playlist, and there were discussions how to improve these. Keep on!

Media Library

Not that I need this feature that much, I keep my music in order. However I’d also like to see all my media systemized by player. Friends claim, this is why they are using Windows Media Player or WA. Quick Track is great, but it CANNOT substitute media library.

Visualizations

I don’t care of them, however some new vizs would be appreciated.

Misc

Notifications in lower right corner of the screen, shown by Winamp on track change, pauses etc. are really nice. Have already got used to’em. Suppose, it would be great in QCD too.

Controls. I like the Winamp stile, that when I press play button, the song is replayed, and previous button plays the previous track, not the beginning of the currently playing one.

Disabling of screensaver when QCD window is active should be optional.

Bottom Line

QCD and Winamp5 both are the greatest. Their advantages and disadvantages are mixed, so I cannot point at a better one. The above is my point of view, how we can make QCD be the best ever. Your thoughts?

[#The fREaK!]

Playlist

This is already trivial, but it would be “a bit” more convenient, if playlist windows could be resized.

This is implemented in the latest and the previous developement build.

And when it comes to sound quality, According to my tests, QCD always sounds better, and the MAD plugin even better. Then you can use the MAD plugin with both Winamp and QCD...

[hedge]

you can now use winamp's mp3 input plugin in qcd through the winamp input plugin manager plugin anyway, so if you think it has better audio quality... use it.

a few points id like to add...
tagging is FAR superior in qcd (autotagging, filename parsing, multitagging, renaming files according to tags)
encoding is integrated more cleanly and for free in qcd
in terms of skins... the dev build default skin is AWESOME...
skinning is easier in qcd through the mapping system... and doesn't require advanced scripting knowledge
there is the alpha blending debate.... but that may yet come to qcd...
The media library is alright in winamp, but itunes still has a better one...
This is one area where winamp wins over qcd at the moment.... but one can survive without one...

[niqo]

This is implemented in the latest and the previous developement build.What do you mean? U mean, I can download something, that will enable playlist resizing?
And what is MAD plugin?

a few points id like to add...
tagging is FAR superior in qcd .............
Hey, this is to discuss how to improve QCD, not how to upgrade Winamp...))

I understand, QCD is made with more care and love, Winamp is more buggy. But for now WA seems to be more innovative.

[DeltaGuy]

Well, it's the first release of WinAmp that never crashed my computer, so that's a start... ;)

[matty28carter]

Re-sizable playlists are available on the latest development release http://www.quinnware.com/development.php (re-sizable playlists however are skin dependant, so old QCD skins won't support it, and at the moment there are only a few that do). The MAD plug-in is a high quailty MP3 decoder available from the plug-ins page http://www.quinnware.com/plugins.php (to use it just have the MAD MP3 plug-in activated on the input plug-ins options).

[greatfujimori]

One thing about WA5 that I don't like - when I imported all my WMA files into the media library, with the filename format "song title - artist.wma", Winamp wasn't smart enough to look at the tag information in the files, but instead just assumed that they were all in the format of "artist - song title", so now it thinks I have a new artist for each song. THe media library doesn't help that much when it's that stupid. It even messes up when it's on "smart" detection mode for song information.

Also, I find the Winamp interface too cluttered. It's practically a full-screen program if I want to do everything I want to do, whereas I can control nearly everything I want in QCD from the winshade mode of the MMD3 version of the development build.

I haven't looked around yet at the various skins and plugins for Winamp, but I still suspect that I'll like QCD more.

[deusdiabolus]

I think WA5 may still be a little too bloated, because the thing bogged my system down when I ran it the first time. And the second time. And...you get the idea. I have yet to have that problem with QCD. Nice, neat, functional, flexible, intuitive. If I figure out it was something stupid that was making WA5 bog like that, I'll try it again and let you know. But right now, I still prefer QCD.

[Rex_Mundi_Incarnit]

QCD has all the features i could ever dream of. Why, then use another player :)

[DeltaGuy]

QCD has all the features i could ever dream of. Why, then use another player :)
Curiosity???

[Young Twig]

Winamp 5 is an excellent player... I'll give it that. But I prefer QCD, especially the ease of skinning.

[Hanzo]

I am so happy with QCD that I won't even bother to look at Winamp.

They might have come to the point where the program is regaining what it was at the beginning but with their new "pro" option, they might be throwing away users. I think there is no market for a "shareware" media player, no matter how good it is.

[Jencatd]

What I liked about Winamp 5 was that it still supported all my old Winamp 2 skins, and some of my old plugins for formats QCD doesn't support at present. What annoyed me was the fact I had to reinstall a Winamp 2 ogg plugin, because the in_vorbis plugin Winamp 5 came with wouldn't read my ogg files (even newly encoded ones).

The new resizable playlist coded into the development release of QCD sounds good, and I am curious about how it could be worked into skins. I love the multitagging option in QCD for renaming a whole group of files by the same artist (or songs from the same album) all in one go, and the parse file option is good if I'm feeling lazy. In Winamp all the files have to be edited individually, which is time-consuming and annoying when doing a mass rename.

[Rex_Mundi_Incarnit]

They might have come to the point where the program is regaining what it was at the beginning but with their new "pro" option, they might be throwing away users. I think there is no market for a "shareware" media player, no matter how good it is.

If you look at the winamp forums, there are actually quite a number of people that want to buy it or have bought it. It is quite literally unbelievable :confused:

[matty28carter]

If you look at the winamp forums, there are actually quite a number of people that want to buy it or have bought it. It is quite literally unbelievable :confused:
especially the fact that players like QCD rip MP3 and other formats for free, it may not be able to burn audio by default but if you have nero the QCD Nero plug-in works rather well. I'm not saying that winamp is a bad player (i may not like it, but its not that bad, i'm giving it another go) however it still doesn't sound nowhere near as good as QCD even with the Winamp MAD plug-in. Its media libary isn't all that brilliant either (not as good as i-tunes anyway). I'm being picky now arn't I... better stop. There is one thing i like about it the defualt skin in winshade mode its a bit like the QCD default skin remote but better.

[pravardhan]

I think Winamp 5 is good. Since, i recently found out that it supports the Equalizer for a AudioCD. QCD does not have a MIDI default plugin & when i downloaded the plugin & used it, The QCD was closed by Windows. QCD does not have a default video player.

THEREFORE, WInamp 5 is the BEST!

[Rex_Mundi_Incarnit]

THEREFORE, WInamp 5 is the BEST![/QUOTE]

Why dont you post that in the winamp forums?

[Tokelil]

QCD does not have a MIDI default plugin. QCD does not have a default video player.Great !!! Those things should be support through plugins IMO. Just like QCD does it!
(All are entitled to their oppinion and this is mine... You clearly doesn't agree. Fine, but you probably wont find many that agrees that WA5 is the best in this forum.)

[Hanzo]

I think Winamp 5 is good. Since, i recently found out that it supports the Equalizer for a AudioCD. QCD does not have a MIDI default plugin & when i downloaded the plugin & used it, The QCD was closed by Windows. QCD does not have a default video player.

THEREFORE, WInamp 5 is the BEST!
Whatever. You won't be really appreciated for that comment here. It's a QCD forum. I tested WA5 but did not liked it. I might be biased, but hey it's me and you can't change that. I don't like WA and won't like even if they manage to create a way to control my fridge thru their GUI.

Winamp is definetly very far away from being the best...

[Todd The Kiwi]

THEREFORE, WInamp 5 is the BEST!

Why dont you post that in the winamp forums?[/QUOTE]

that comment can be let to slide ONCE. perhaps he though this was the llama forum? . QCD WHIPS WINAMPS ARSE !
qcd don't use animals to advertise ( q-shirt idea ? )

[niqo]

Why dont you post that in the winamp forums?
Why would he, actually? There are obviously lots of WA-fans in WA forum. We got now one here. Let's welcome him!
Especially since WA is really great! I stay with QCD yet, because I got used to it and don't have time to test, which player is better. But as soon as I present my diploma, I'll spend some time to compare them more attentive.

And now, guys, lets try to find out, what to steal from Winamp! This thread wasn't supposed to discuss, whether WA is worse than QCD and why. So please give up all those "Winamp sux". We know, it doesn't.

In my first message i've pointed at WA features, I'd like to see in QCD. Do u agree with it? Don't u? Would u like to point at something else?

Summary
The following I'd like to be imported from WA to QCD:
I still think, WA's playback is better
More simple crossfade plugin, accessible from the main skin
Playback plugins switched without playback interruption
Generate HTML playlist feature
Display of selection duration/playlist duration in playlist window
Media library
Notifications in lower right corner of the screen, shown on track change, pauses etc.
Disabling of screensaver optional
Any comments on the above?

[Lich]

I still think, WA's playback is better.
Here are lots of people saying what QCD sound quality is better than WinAmp's. I believe it's question of soundcard+acoustics first:) More simple crossfade plugin, accessible from the main skin.
Simple?! No way, man. It should be even more complex, like SQRsoft plugin does…
About accessibility from skin: do you really need to swith output plugins so frequently? Playback plugins switched without playback interruption.
Hmm. Just to compare how they're sounding?:) There's good plugin called Resumer, which can solve this reqest partially:) Generate HTML playlist feature.
NowPlaying plugin? Display of selection duration/playlist duration in playlist window.
Good thought. Maybe status message area can be used for this? Media library.
I pet some more ideas how to create ML from QuickTrack:) Notifications in lower right corner of the screen, shown on track change, pauses etc.
Billboard plugin. Disabling of screensaver optional.
Hmmm… What's purpose?--

Please, don't take this polemics as offense:)

[Hanzo]

I have a couple of question regarding the points that you state:

1. What features of WA's playback make you feel that WA's playback is better than QCD's playback?

3. What's the benefit of changing plugins without gaps. Can WA accomplish this?

8. Do you really stare at your player while you are playing music that you need the player to disable the screensaver?

All the other remaining points I agree with Lich.

[Roj]

I'm a "no" vote on the "do you like Winamp" question. I used it (with MAD - the native decoder stank) and ditched it when CoolPlayer came along. When that died, I found QCD (again with MAD). The bugfest that was and is Winamp is far in my past and will remain so.

[brian]

I hope Matt will take up my suggestion of having a section in the Community part of the forum dedicated to discussing players other than QCD, so that the main parts of the forum can concentrate on what I believe they should be doing, namely improving and supporting QCD and its plugins and skins.

[niqo]

I hope Matt will take up my suggestion of having a section in the Community part of the forum dedicated to discussing players other than QCD, so that the main parts of the forum can concentrate on what I believe they should be doing, namely improving and supporting QCD and its plugins and skins.
This thread was supposed exactly for the above mentioned purposes.

1. What features of WA's playback make you feel that WA's playback is better than QCD's playback?
3. What's the benefit of changing plugins without gaps. Can WA accomplish this?
8. Do you really stare at your player while you are playing music that you need the player to disable the screensaver? 1. I don't know. It seems more soft and of more fidelity. Maybe it's a matter of EQ setting (although i imported them from QCD through EQF file). But for instance drums are a bit more like drums, less muffled.
3. Since crossfade plugin requires a long buffer, it need to be reset, whenever I want to modify EQ or try a DSP or whatever. Since any resetting of QCD crossfader requires a lot of clicks, it's easier to simply activate another plugin... If only this wouldn't stop playback.
8. I don't stare at the player. That is why I want the screensaver to appear. But (maybe the case only on my computer?) whenever QCD window is active, the screensaver is disabled. No matter haw much time passed, or if the music is playing. It wouldn't appear.
More simple crossfade plugin, accessible from the main skin.
Simple?! No way, man. It should be even more complex, like SQRsoft plugin does…
About accessibility from skin: do you really need to swith output plugins so frequently? Esier switching between crossfade and gapless playback would be highly appreciated

[Roj]

This thread was supposed exactly for the above mentioned purposes.

1. I don't know. It seems more soft and of more fidelity. Maybe it's a matter of EQ setting (although i imported them from QCD through EQF file). But for instance drums are a bit more like drums, less muffled.I play flat. The way the music was engineered. Winamp *needs* "prettying up" with an EQ to bring out the "ptingg" factor or sharp instruments and also has a tendency to smear slightly - QCD doesn't. The "softness" you're referring to translates to "less definition" and "more boomy" on a quality set of speakers and a decent sound card. This is also not new - Winamp has *always* had this problem. It only became aparrent when one was exposed to other players (a blind man who has always been blind never misses the magnificence of a sunset he has never seen).

Not for me...

Mind you, I'm known to be notoriously picky and unforgiving when it comes to sound... :D

[Draders]

ive always used winamp but recently got mad at it since nullsoft still doesnt want to add uni-code support and i noticed QCD has it, though it seems to only work on certain skins. so far my only gripe was not being able to resize the palylist, but thats been implemented in the new build.

Just a question, is there a mirc plugin to get currently playing track information?

[Tokelil]

Just a question, is there a mirc plugin to get currently playing track information?
Take a look at the AMIP plugin: http://www.quinnware.com/list_plugins.php?plugin=70

[Todd The Kiwi]

And now, guys, lets try to find out, what to steal from Winamp! quote niqo

you go right on ahead with that one man.
:rolleyes:

[Todd The Kiwi]

I hope Matt will take up my suggestion of having a section in the Community part of the forum dedicated to discussing players other than QCD, so that the main parts of the forum can concentrate on what I believe they should be doing, namely improving and supporting QCD and its plugins and skins.

and skin rips and plugin rips and winamp bashing . NOT
:rolleyes:

[Vladimir]

Those guys who are perfectly sure QCD better then WA, could they explain me why QCD CD digital playback doesn't work with my cd-rom, WA does work since WA3 (and not only WA3)

Regards
Vladimir

[Rex_Mundi_Incarnit]

Those guys who are perfectly sure QCD better then WA, could they explain me why QCD CD digital playback doesn't work with my cd-rom, WA does work since WA3 (and not only WA3)

Regards
Vladimir

it works on my machine with QCD, and ironically not with WA :D Sorry, i cant help you.

[chicubs]

Those guys who are perfectly sure QCD better then WA, could they explain me why QCD CD digital playback doesn't work with my cd-rom, WA does work since WA3 (and not only WA3)

Regards
Vladimir

cause you have an f'd up cd drive

[Draders]

Take a look at the AMIP plugin: http://www.quinnware.com/list_plugins.php?plugin=70

Thanks alot, works great!
/me offically switches over to Quintessential Plater

[MadRocketeer]

The reviews in this thread are a bit biased. I think that if someone is to give a really unbiased review, we should get someone who is a complete newby to MP3 players, or atleast to Winamp-QCD affairs. I know of such a person

The review should also be based on the actual player that is downloaded, without the extras; skins, plugins and components are out, cos any player beat the crap outa each other endlessly with their plugins and skins.

Don't look at me, I am one of the most un-fussy people out there. I don't really notice much difference between QCD and WA5 in terms of sound quality - they play MP3s, and for that I'm thankful. Besides, I usually slap on EQs, Crossfaders and DSPs which pretty much conceals the original sound quality anyway.

As for the crossfader, I disagree with both niqo and lich. I think the crossfader must be limitlessly customizable, yet easy to use. I think the crossfader controls should be divided into two shells; the Newby Shell and the Advanced Shell. Newbies can get straight into crossfading with the few, nice and simple options and presets the Newby Shell offers, while the tweakaholics out there can delve themselves into tweaking heaven by pressing the "Advanced Mode - Newbies beware" button, which unleashes the full glory of incomprehensible computer-gibberish. There, the perfect compromise.

pravardhan,

Not wise. Your statement will only get you into much of the same situation as cheering for the Celtics in the middle of down-town Detroit, or shouting "Aussie! Aussie! Aussie! Oi! Oi! Oi!" in the middle of a "temporalily painted black" Jade Stadium.

Todd, Rex, Hanzo,

Let him be. He'll learn, so let him be...

Vladimir,

:confused: Never heard of such a thing...

[Hanzo]

Those guys who are perfectly sure QCD better then WA, could they explain me why QCD CD digital playback doesn't work with my cd-rom, WA does work since WA3 (and not only WA3)

Regards
Vladimir
I'm starting to think that you are the only person in this whole forum that cannot play back a standard CD with QCD. Who knows what kind of weirdo driver / kernel corruption you have that only WA can understand. Anyways, I'm an active QCD enthusiast and I have converted many people from Winamp to QCD just because it's easier, faster and all the other compliments. But that is not the point of this thread, neither discussing your particular issues with QCD.

Yours truly
Hanzo

[Vladimir]

I'm starting to think that you are the only person in this whole forum that cannot play back a standard CD with QCD. Who knows what kind of weirdo driver / kernel corruption you have that only WA can understand. Anyways, I'm an active QCD enthusiast and I have converted many people from Winamp to QCD just because it's easier, faster and all the other compliments. But that is not the point of this thread, neither discussing your particular issues with QCD.

Yours truly
Hanzo
1. I don't have statistics if I the only person who can't playback a CD (BTW I meant digital playback), but I know that QCD IMHO the only which can not do this on my pc from those that have such feature. WA can, Roxio can, get tied to seek another examples.
2. I really do like QCD, I've been using it since 3.XX, don't remember, but for ripping I used WMP, some wav format played with a gurgling, if mp3pro stream get stuck it blocks my work, to many issues for the one prog on a single pc :-) LAST NIGHT installed WA501, I didn't like some it features and I still don't like now some of them, but it closed all my issues.
3. What would you say and do if you were me, guys?
Thanks,
Vladimir

[Heigar]

1. I don't have statistics if I the only person who can't playback a CD (BTW I meant digital playback), but I know that QCD IMHO the only which can not do this on my pc from those that have such feature. WA can, Roxio can, get tied to seek another examples.
2. I really do like QCD, I've been using it since 3.XX, don't remember, but for ripping I used WMP, some wav format played with a gurgling, if mp3pro stream get stuck it blocks my work, to many issues for the one prog on a single pc :-) LAST NIGHT installed WA501, I didn't like some it features and I still don't like now some of them, but it closed all my issues.
3. What would you say and do if you were me, guys?
Thanks,
Vladimir

3.Do what you have to do,whatever works run with it.

[Rex_Mundi_Incarnit]

1. I don't have statistics if I the only person who can't playback a CD (BTW I meant digital playback), but I know that QCD IMHO the only which can not do this on my pc from those that have such feature. WA can, Roxio can, get tied to seek another examples.
2. I really do like QCD, I've been using it since 3.XX, don't remember, but for ripping I used WMP, some wav format played with a gurgling, if mp3pro stream get stuck it blocks my work, to many issues for the one prog on a single pc :-) LAST NIGHT installed WA501, I didn't like some it features and I still don't like now some of them, but it closed all my issues.
3. What would you say and do if you were me, guys?
Thanks,
Vladimir

Have you checked whether windows is using digital audio extraction?

Go to system properties -> Device manager ->
DVD/CD-ROM drives -> select properties of your CD-ROM -> click on properties tab and see if "enable digital CD audio for this CD-ROM drive" is checked.

[Vladimir]

Have you checked whether windows is using digital audio extraction?

Go to system properties -> Device manager ->
DVD/CD-ROM drives -> select properties of your CD-ROM -> click on properties tab and see if "enable digital CD audio for this CD-ROM drive" is checked.
Yes, I checked this property, I even have wnaspi32.dll in my system directory and checked if my cd-drive support digital playback. No doubts!

Thanks,
Vladimir

[Hanzo]

1. I don't have statistics if I the only person who can't playback a CD (BTW I meant digital playback), but I know that QCD IMHO the only which can not do this on my pc from those that have such feature. WA can, Roxio can, get tied to seek another examples.
2. I really do like QCD, I've been using it since 3.XX, don't remember, but for ripping I used WMP, some wav format played with a gurgling, if mp3pro stream get stuck it blocks my work, to many issues for the one prog on a single pc :-) LAST NIGHT installed WA501, I didn't like some it features and I still don't like now some of them, but it closed all my issues.
3. What would you say and do if you were me, guys?
Thanks,
Vladimir

I'm sorry to hear that. Anyways been the only person that cannot use the digital playback feature of QCD should be disastrous. Still, the point of this thread is not to troubleshoot QCD on your PC. Perhaps, you could start another thread and get some help on it.
Then maybe QCD is not working properly on your machine. I think like Heigar. Use whatever works good on your system. It's your choice, and if you spend half of your day listening to music (like I do) then better have music player that is up to your expectations.
That is your call.
Yours truly,
Hanzo

P.D.: Why are we signing off like if we were writing a letter? :confused: