Recommend me a music player and a video player?

[SpectrumDT]

Hello. I am a Linux newbie, having recently installed Linux, and now I am looking for good programs to fill the shoes of the various programs I used to used in Windows.

Among other things, I need a good music player and a good video player. It can be a single program that does both, or two different ones, I don't mind. I do, however, have some requirements.

1. Both players must have the "skip N seconds back/forward" feature. (In Windows, WinAmp and GOM player have this, but most other players, AFAIK, do not.) Bonus points if you can customize the interval N.

2. Both players must have the option to set up global hotkeys, so you can pause, play and skip from anywhere without having to find the program window.

3. The music player must have the option to minimize to the system tray or equivalent (and still play, of course).

Can anyone recommend me some players that fit the above requirements?

Thanks in advance.
- Spectrum

[Bslagowski]

For music player I'd say consider using MPD and GMPC as a front end.

1. This feature MAY take a bit more work. I know you can "seek" ahead a certain amount of seconds via mpc and the command line. I'm surprised this feature isn't already in GMPC (perhaps it is and I'm just not aware!). I'll get back to you on this.

2. In GMPC go to Music->Preferences->Multimedia Keys. Works great.

3. Simple again. Go to Music->Preferences->Interface and check the "Hide on Close" box. It will show up in the system tray. You can pause, play, go forward/back by right-clicking on the icon. You can check this out too, it may do more - not sure. http://mpd.wikia.com/wiki/Client:Mpd-applet

su -
yum install mpd mpc gmpc

Once installed check this for configuring:
http://mpd.wikia.com/wiki/Configuration

If you need more help, post back. I can't offer much on video players. I know for a fact totem has "go" feature that you can customize the amount. Not sure about hotkeys though .. I'd imagine it would.

su -
yum install totem

[SpectrumDT]

Thanks for the reply. I tried GMPC, but I couldn't get it to work. It kept giving me "cannot connect" errors, and I was unable to find documentation explaining why it had to "connect" to anything in the first place.

But I found Amarok and so far am liking it. I think I'm going to stick with that, unless I find something better.

Thanks anyway.

[leigh123linux]

Originally Posted by SpectrumDT

Thanks for the reply. I tried GMPC, but I couldn't get it to work. It kept giving me "cannot connect" errors, and I was unable to find documentation explaining why it had to "connect" to anything in the first place.

But I found Amarok and so far am liking it. I think I'm going to stick with that, unless I find something better.

Thanks anyway.

For video try Xine

su
rpm -ivh http://rpm.livna.org/livna-release-8.rpm
yum erase totem totem-mozplugin
yum install totem-xine totem-xine-mozplugin xine-lib-extras-nonfree xine-lib-extras xine libdvdcss

[Bslagowski]

Is the "cannot connect" error appearing in GMPC? If so that's because you didnt install (and configure) MPD properly. MPD is a client/server setup. You can create a central server which other clients (computers) in your home can connect to, and all play the same music off of there. Or you can use it one just one computer, like I do. But if Amarok works for you that's cool. It seems to be many users music player of choice.

If you decide you don't like Amarok and you don't want to fiddle with MPD consider checking out Audacious. It's a fork of a project whose goal was to essentially create a compy of Winamp. It might have all the features you wanted, and in addition it will have a familiar look.

[forkbomb]

Originally Posted by Bslagowski

Is the "cannot connect" error appearing in GMPC? If so that's because you didnt install (and configure) MPD properly. MPD is a client/server setup. You can create a central server which other clients (computers) in your home can connect to, and all play the same music off of there. Or you can use it one just one computer, like I do. But if Amarok works for you that's cool. It seems to be many users music player of choice.

If you decide you don't like Amarok and you don't want to fiddle with MPD consider checking out Audacious. It's a fork of a project whose goal was to essentially create a compy of Winamp. It might have all the features you wanted, and in addition it will have a familiar look.

Other players similar to Amarok include (these may not be what you're looking for, but take a look): Exaile, Banshee, Rhythmbox, gtkpod.

I'm really liking the concept of XMMS2 which uses the client/server model for a music player, but you'd probably have to look around for a frontend with the features you're looking for (I think XMMS2 - the server or backend - supports those features you're looking for).

Unfortunately, I don't think either XMMS2 or its frontends are in the repositories so you'll have to install from source code.
http://wiki.xmms2.xmms.se/index.php/Main_Page

As for video players, can't be of much help there. I swear by VLC (it's in the Livna repository) but I don't know if it has the features you're seeking. I don't watch a lot of video.

If you haven't so far, install yumex (yum install yumex) - it lets you sort all the programs available in repositories into categories for convenient browsing, and shows package descriptions in the same GUI. Nice for browsing around.

[PsychoTrauma]

I use audacious for audio and mplayer for video.

Audacious in my opinion in the best lean audio player around since it has support for more audio formats and is actively developed using latest versions of software.

Mplayer is hard to beat when it comes to videos since anything the internal decoders won't play there is win32 codecs for.

[imfromwales]

Originally Posted by leigh123@linux

For video try Xine

su
rpm -ivh http://rpm.livna.org/livna-release-8.rpm
yum erase totem totem-mozplugin
yum install totem-xine totem-xine-mozplugin xine-lib-extras-nonfree xine-lib-extras xine libdvdcss

I could not play .avi in firefox before, i ran this code and it now plays .avi. Thanks a lot

[SpectrumDT]

Originally Posted by leigh123@linux

For video try Xine

Thanks. Does Xine support the features I asked for above? (I can't immediately find them in the menus.)

[leigh123linux]

Originally Posted by SpectrumDT

Thanks. Does Xine support the features I asked for above? (I can't immediately find them in the menus.)

I think so ( if you look in the xine menu they are listed , see screen shot )



If xine doesn't fit the bill try mplayer with the smplayer front-end

su
yum install mplayer

Then get smplayer from the link below

http://forums.fedoraforum.org/forum/...d.php?t=172405

[SpectrumDT]

Thanks for the replies, everyone.

I think Xine is the best I've found so far.

[Firewing1]

I like totem xine, features of xine through a nice UI. You'll need Livna to install it though. VLC is pretty nice, too. For audio I prefer rhythmbox or exaile.
Firewing1

[SpectrumDT]

Originally Posted by Firewing1

I like totem xine, features of xine through a nice UI. You'll need Livna to install it though. VLC is pretty nice, too. For audio I prefer rhythmbox or exaile.
Firewing1

Does it have the skipping feature that I need (as described above)?

[Bslagowski]

Xine is just the backend. Totem should have all the features. Here's a bunch of frontends.

http://xinehq.de/index.php/releases

[Firewing1]

Originally Posted by SpectrumDT

Does it have the skipping feature that I need (as described above)?

It has skip to, but not skip n seconds.
Firewing1