getmusicbee.com
General => Beyond MusicBee => Topic started by: ma_t14 on March 22, 2013, 06:27:50 AM
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In the music players section MusicBee is king, no room for argument there, but what about other areas?
I would be interested what software everyone uses everyday, be it freeware or not and maybe reason for their choice. I always was, and still I'm, a software junkie and love uncovering those not so well known gems. It's been some time now since I settled on a carefully selected few that I find indispensable but I'm keeping my options open :P
So here's my list
Indispensable software:
* MusicBee - best music player hands down free or paid
* PotPlayer - best video player hands down free or paid (imo). Very frequently updated. English version found here: http://www.videohelp.com/tools/PotPlayer where you can set up an update email notification as well. EDIT 28/04/2016 - I have been playing around with MPC-BE recently. MPC-BE/HC have come a long way and I'd say is up to you what you use. Especially on older hardware they have the upper hand.
* Launchy - Very good, open-source, program launcher, no need for a start menu (especially now with the horrendous Win 8 start screen), desktop icons, quick launch bar... You'll instantly become more productive. Note that it uses indexing, if you don't like that try Find and Run Robot which is even more flexible and tweak-friendly.
EDIT 28/04/2016 - Replaced with KeyPirinha. This is the launcher we have been all waiting for since the demise of launchy (still perfectly fine but development has stopped since a few years). If you don't mind fidling around with text files for the settings (ala Sublime Text) this launcher is already one of the best at what it does in spite its young age. One to watch, definitely!
* Everything Search - extremely lightweight free search utility and more importantly gets results instantly. Once you start using it you will wonder how you manged before that . Found at www.voidtools.com
* Listary - type-to-locate done right, free but pro version available. Gets better and better with every release. It may replace everything search for me in the future but for now searching is not what I use it for.
* ArsClip - best clipboard manager IMO, free, how can anyone live without one is beyond me EDIT 28/04/2016- Replaced by Ditto. Both are feature complete, as far as functionality goes they are at the top in this category. What made me switch was Ditto's easy to access search function plus better performance/responsiveness (in my experience).
* Opera browser - still loyal... The new Opera is based on Chromium (basically uses the same engine used by Chrome). It feels like a lighter more snappy version of Chrome with some additional features in some areas while missing some elsewhere. Developer stream/beta versions can be found here (that's what I use): http://blogs.opera.com/desktop/ (the last few builds look very promising for things to come)
EDIT 28/04/2016 - Replaced by Vivaldi. Old Opera (< v.12) spirit lives on.
Secondary List:
* Process Hacker - powerful open-source task manager
* Uninstall Tool - unfortunately not free but its the most straightforward and well designed uninstall manager I found. Home page: www.crystalidea.com
* Tixati - most tweak-happy torrent client available, open-source. Don't expect anything fancy but functionality-wise its second to none
* AMPWinOFF - advanced timed shutdown utility, free
* ShareX PicPick - one of the two best free screen capture utilities, the other one is Screenshot Captor. I was searching for a utility that could automate the process of uploading images right after capture. Luckily I stumbled upon ShareX, an open source utility that not only is feature complete its flexibility is immense. I'm in love with this program especially because it makes uploading screenshots on the forums a breeze. For example, with a single key press the program allows me to capture a region, save the image to disk, upload the image to imgur, copy the image url to clipboard as bbcode and copy the image to clipboard as well. And this is just a very basic example.
* Autohotkey - Really powerful automation and macro-creation tool.
* DeskPins - simple utility to make any window stay-on-top, free EDIT 28/04/2016 - Now use an AutoHotkey command instead bound to keyboard key combination.
* BandiZip - the only freeware archiver that does everything I wish (after making the move from WinRar), their other programs are decent as well.
* Fastone Image Viewer - free image viewer/manager, quick, stylish, feature rich. All you could ask for EDIT 28/04/2016- Replaced by HoneyView (from the makers of BandiZip. Much more straightforward, simpler and mainly snappier for my simple needs.
* Freemake Video Converter - I think the interface is geared mostly towards novice users but still, its easily one of the better free video converters
* Jing - free and basic but all you will ever need for quick video captures of your screen. Made by the same guys behind Camtasia and SnagIt
* Sublime Text - extremely fast, productive and feature rich programmer's notepad. Steep price but can be used freely as nagware. It's class leading in terms of productivity. These video tutorials should give you a better idea why I say that: http://net.tutsplus.com/articles/news/perfect-workflow-in-sublime-text-free-course/
* CCleaner - Everyone is already using this probably, and for a good reason. Cleans unnecessary files with a single click.
Now let me hear your choices :)
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I rely on Picard/Musicbrainz for all my tagging needs. Picard is bare-bones, but I kind of like that about it. I've written up custom scripts so that my files are tagged exactly the way I want, and aside from making sure that the appropriate releases are in the database I've almost got it to the point that I can throw some files in there, hit lookup, and save without worry. Almost. :) I don't think there'll ever be a truly automatic tagger.
Gimp is my graphics program of choice, and Audacity for editing audio files.
I don't use this very often, but it's invaluable when I do. Remove Empty Directories, which does exactly what it sounds like: http://www.jonasjohn.de/red.htm.
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Everything Search is brilliant.
- I used to use Xplorer2 because it has the ability to show dual panes and folder size (I've no idea why this is such a problem for Windows 7) but I've gone back to using Q-Dir recently and I really love it.
- MPC-HC with madvr. Just so much better quality than VLC, I was very sceptical at first but with a bit of fine tuning with madvr you can get excellent results.
- 7zip. I can't imagine not using it.
- Flux: changes the colour of your monitor depending on the time of day, not just making it dimmer but actually changing the colour tones. There is apparently some science behind it but once you start using it for a while you don't notice it until you turn it off, and then it's like looking at the sun.
- Calibre. I couldn't live without this, fantastic ebook manager.
- Irfanview. I just like the fact that you can do a fair amount of light editing in it.
- WinDirStat. Only just started using this but it has been very helpful trying to see what my space is being swallowed up by.
- Variety of Sound VST plugins. I can't say how much I love these plugins, they're just beautiful and work wonders - https://varietyofsound.wordpress.com/vst-effects
I can't think of much else really.
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I rely on Picard/Musicbrainz for all my tagging needs. Picard is bare-bones, but I kind of like that about it. I've written up custom scripts so that my files are tagged exactly the way I want, and aside from making sure that the appropriate releases are in the database I've almost got it to the point that I can throw some files in there, hit lookup, and save without worry. Almost. :) I don't think there'll ever be a truly automatic tagger.
Gimp is my graphics program of choice, and Audacity for editing audio files.
I don't use this very often, but it's invaluable when I do. Remove Empty Directories, which does exactly what it sounds like: http://www.jonasjohn.de/red.htm.
Nice call on the empty directories. That is something I never heard of and would love to try.
As for me, the usual (some are the same as you guys) that I install on any fresh build
-VLC (loyal to it and it's never given me issues, feel no need to switch to Potplayer)
-7zip
-Firefox
-Thunderbird (yes, I still use a desktop email client)
-SumatraPDF (extremely lightweight and does its job, no questions asked)
-Flux
-LibreOffice
-GIMP if I need it
-Spacesniffer for finding out what is taking up HDD space
-XBMC for media- especially nice now that all my media is properly tagged with .nfo and all that
-IMGburn (for burning ISOs or just copying to DVDs, etc.)
-Notepad++ if I need to edit code or something
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So, here is my list:
1.) Surfing + E-Mail + Security
a) Firefox
b) Thunderbird
c) MailStoreHome (free; sorry, only available in German) - for storing my E-Mails from Thunderbird
d) Avira Antivir Free
e) SuperAntiSpyware Free Edition
2.) System Maintenance
a) CCleaner (free)
b) TuneUp Utilities (Payware) - huge package of tools for system maintenance
3.) Utilities
a) UltraDefrag (free)
b) Revo Uninstaller (free)
c) AdvancedRenamer (free, portable Version)
d) MultiCommander (free, portable Version) - better alternative to the Windows Explorer with 2 windows-view, similar to Xplorer2, I think
e) NitroReader (free) - PDF Reader and Creator in one
f) 7-Zip
g) PicPick
4.) Video
a) MPC-HC
b) XMedia Recode (free, portable Version) - for encoding video clips to different formats; only for advanced users
c) MeGUI (free) - for encoding my DVDs to MP4/H.264 + AAC
d) VirtualDub (free) - for joining/cutting AVI (DivX/Xvid) video clips
e) asfbinwin (free) - for joining/cutting WMV video clips
5.) Audio
a) MusicBee - We all here know what this is for!!
b) Streamwriter (free - portable Version) - for recording Internet Radio Station streams
c) Exact Audio Copy (free) - ripping my CDs to MP3
d) mp3directcut (free) - cutting recorded Internet Radio Station streams to appropiate length
e) MP3tag (free) - tagging my MP3 collection together with discogs database
So, as you can see, the software I use is all Freeware except one, but I sometimes make donations to projects (MusicBee and Streamwriter).
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- Flux: changes the colour of your monitor depending on the time of day, not just making it dimmer but actually changing the colour tones. There is apparently some science behind it but once you start using it for a while you don't notice it until you turn it off, and then it's like looking at the sun.
I tried this a while ago but found it really strange. Do you use a desktop monitor that is very bright or something?
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- Flux: changes the colour of your monitor depending on the time of day, not just making it dimmer but actually changing the colour tones. There is apparently some science behind it but once you start using it for a while you don't notice it until you turn it off, and then it's like looking at the sun.
I tried this a while ago but found it really strange. Do you use a desktop monitor that is very bright or something?
Don't have to. It's mainly to simulate the rising and setting of the sun. Bright screens at night tend to distort sleeping patterns and f.lux works to alleviate that. The only time it is noticeable is at night when the color dramatically shifts on mine (not sure why, maybe I need to tweak it.)
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I tried this a while ago but found it really strange. Do you use a desktop monitor that is very bright or something?
No, just a laptop. My monitor isn't very bright and I didn't start using because I had any issues, I just thought it sounded like a good idea and decided to try it. It is strange at first, especially if you have it set too far to the left but you get used to it very quickly and don't notice it at all. My screen only seems bright when I disable it at night and you can see instantly how harsh the normal monitor colours are in night light.
The only time it is noticeable is at night when the color dramatically shifts on mine (not sure why, maybe I need to tweak it.)
There's a setting to make it change slowly over the course of an hour rather than 30 seconds, make it much less noticeable.
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Not all used every day but the software I couldn't live without includes the following:
Firefox - Well known browser
EAC - CD Ripping king (Sorry MusicBee)
F.lux - Mentioned above - adjusts screen colour according to time of day
µTorrent - Well known torrent client
mkvmerge - Video encoding software - I use it mainly so make simple changes to downloaded MKVs so they stream correctly on my blu-ray system
WinSCP - Used to SSH into my iPhone on occasion
mIRC - Well known IRC chat client. Not used often but Brilliant when I do
MediaInfo - Simple little tool to perform it's name. Show various media encode information - video/music bitrates/encoder/container etc etc
LastPass - Firefox extension to manage passwords
CCleaner - Browser/Registry cleaner
dBpoweramp - Used mainly for transcoding FLACs to MP3 V0 for importing into my MB library.
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I tried this a while ago but found it really strange. Do you use a desktop monitor that is very bright or something?
No, just a laptop. My monitor isn't very bright and I didn't start using because I had any issues, I just thought it sounded like a good idea and decided to try it. It is strange at first, especially if you have it set too far to the left but you get used to it very quickly and don't notice it at all. My screen only seems bright when I disable it at night and you can see instantly how harsh the normal monitor colours are in night light.
Hmm, I might give it another try and stick with it for a few days this time then.
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Hmm, I might give it another try and stick with it for a few days this time then.
The idea is not to go crazy low on the reddish tones. You just want to lower it so that it feels comfortable. If well adjusted, after a while the setting you use at night will look better than the default one which is damn too bluish. During the day with sunlight, however you want that colder (bluer) temperature to make your screen look nice and white. Hence Flux. I love it, and set it around 5900-6000K on my monitor.
You can also change the transition speed to slow (60m) so that it changes gradually.
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Has anyone here made use of a screen scraper program? Is there one you recommend?
Update: I'm testing out this software now: http://www.irobotsoft.com/ Not sure exactly how it's going yet, but I think I've almost got something working.
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I tried this a while ago but found it really strange. Do you use a desktop monitor that is very bright or something?
No, just a laptop. My monitor isn't very bright and I didn't start using because I had any issues, I just thought it sounded like a good idea and decided to try it. It is strange at first, especially if you have it set too far to the left but you get used to it very quickly and don't notice it at all. My screen only seems bright when I disable it at night and you can see instantly how harsh the normal monitor colours are in night light.
The only time it is noticeable is at night when the color dramatically shifts on mine (not sure why, maybe I need to tweak it.)
There's a setting to make it change slowly over the course of an hour rather than 30 seconds, make it much less noticeable.
Found it, thanks. Much, much better now.
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When I restrict myself to audio related software, I should name 'Spectro' :
(http://i.imgur.com/HfgoKnpl.jpg) (http://i.imgur.com/HfgoKnp.png)
(http://i.imgur.com/Ga5euaPl.jpg) (http://i.imgur.com/Ga5euaP.png)
and 'Lossless Audio Checker'
(http://i.imgur.com/qDVWOCGl.jpg) (http://i.imgur.com/qDVWOCG.png)
to help in detecting fake lossless files.
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MusicBee of course.
Spotify - For exploring new music
MediaPortal - Best media center in my opinion. Compared to XBMC etc. you need to play around with more settings to set it up, but I can customise it to be just like I want.
Potplayer - Best video player for whatever I don't watch in MediaPortal
Lightroom - Not essential, but good for organising and editing photos.
calibre - Not perfect, but the best option for e-books.
Skype - Essential as my girlfriend is 1000 km away :)
Excel - Essential
Any backup program! - Doesn't really matter too much which one. Just want to point out that backup is essential! I lost 2 HD's before I started taking this seriously.
µTorrent - Getting more bloated in the last versions, but still the best. Use this guide if you want to remove all the new shit:
**********************
How to Make the Latest µTorrent Less Bloated
We all know that there's a lot of bloat going on with the latest versions of µTorrent. Before all the comments of "use µTorrent 2.2.1 (build 25302) instead" some people prefer to have the latest installed. Okay, so forget about that now.
At the moment of this post I'm using µTorrent 3.2.3 (build 28705).
As some of you have noticed, there's a few major parts that are especially annoying that are removable and I'll show you how:
Featured torrent
µTorrent Plus ads
Portable devices
Some of them are harder to remove than others. We'll start with the "hard part".
Go into Options > Preferences > Advanced
Use the filter to search for these:
offers.left_rail_offer_enabled
offers.sponsored_torrent_offer_enabled
gui.show_notorrents_node
offers.content_offer_autoexec
gui.show_plus_upsell
The easier part is obviously a bit easier, we'll just go through a few settings that will change the appearance that isn't needed by the advanced menu. These are also more personal for your own liking. I'll go through what I use:
Click on Options
Below you'll what I have checked in and unchecked
? Show Toolbar
? Show Detailed Info
? Show Statusbar
? Show Featured Content
? Show Devices
? Show Plus Information
? Show Apps
? Compact Category List
? Icons on Tabs
How it looks:
(http://www.anony.ws/i/2012/12/26/pa5gy.png)
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µTorrent - Getting more bloated in the last versions, but still the best. Use this guide if you want to remove all the new shit:
********* Stick to final 2.2.1 build by clicking here (http://filehippo.com/download_utorrent/9859/[/url) *************
FTFY
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I see you didn't read it :)
Before all the comments of "use µTorrent 2.2.1 (build 25302) instead" some people prefer to have the latest installed.
The guide was for people who want to use the newest version. In between all the added rubbish it has some good improvements too (improved handling of magnet links etc.).
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I guess, that's one piece of software that it doesn't make sense though to 99% of file sharers (read µTorrent uers)
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recently switched to qBittorrent to replace µTorrent after the latest versions started to get annoying. no ads, no bloat, good stuff. can't see myself going back.
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My list:
Chrome - pretty perfect, also love how it syncs with chrome on android.
Musicbee - obviously.
Evernote - the more you embrace it the more you wonder how you lived without it. Remember everything!
Clover - Adds chrome style tabs to windows explorer. Why windows doesn't have this natively is mind-boggling.
Ant Movie Catalogue - Not perfect but the best movie database I have yet found. Good IMDB integration and customisability.
Lightroom - Expensive but pretty essential if you have a dSLR.
Faststone Image Viewer - Much prefer this to XnView and IrfranView. Quick, simple and deceptively fully featured and powerful.
KeePass - Simple but effective password safe. Never forget a password again.
Advanced SystemCare Free - Possibly not the best system maintenance tool out there but keeps things simple enough for me.
IOBit Uninstaller - Prefer this to Revo.
7-Zip - Essential.
Launchy - Haven't used the Start menu since I installed it. Great little program.
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Launchy - Haven't used the Start menu since I installed it. Great little program.
Thanks a lot for this tip! Much quicker than Start button plus typing.
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Sublime, Bandizip and FastStone.. thanks for these! I've been looking for each of those types of utilities for a while now. 7Zip is great but wasn't really cutting it for me, Notepad++ and Notepad2 are both feature packed but IMO unpolished.
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Sublime, Bandizip and FastStone.. thanks for these! I've been looking for each of those types of utilities for a while now. 7Zip is great but wasn't really cutting it for me, Notepad++ and Notepad2 are both feature packed but IMO unpolished.
You are welcome :)
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can anyone recommend a program for opening and editing xmlc files.
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I just found this handy program for changing file type icons in Windows 7: http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/file_types_manager.html
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Advanced Disk Catalog - Basic and fast for knowing what i have in any cd/dvd
FSResizer - For batch editing pics. I used it for changing the colors of the buttons for skinning with very good results
SuperFlexible synchronizer - synchronization between differente disk, ftp, web, etc
Autohotkey - Scripting, macros, hotkeys manager, really useful software, highly recommended.
Spek - Spectrogram for local files
Spectrogram 16 from visualization software - Spectrogram for what you are listening in the speakers. Know the quality of music before downloading.
14arenamer - A really good oldie for renaming files
Tag&Rename - Advanced tagging of mp3 files. Together with 14arenamer i use it to rename the files.
F.Lux - For decreasing color temperature at night
Notepad++ - A very good text editor
Sandboxie - A sandbox for testing software
XnView - For browsing pics, is the one i can configure nearer to the classic ACDSee 3.1. The zoom interpolation can be disabled for watching real pixels instead of added ones. Lightweight and fast to start disabling unneeded plugins
BWmeter - Check the network usage, shows different alerts, very useful for 3G connections
Proxomitron - Freedom... :)
Synthesia - Learn playing piano with any midi file
Emu48 - For my beloved calculators Hp48 and Hp49
Microsoft Mathematics - Very helpful for trigonometrics and graphical drawings
Native Instruments Traktor 2 - Mix your favourite songs
Mixmeister BPM analyzer - Add the BPM count to your files, is not very precise. Sometimes it doubles the real BPM. Very helpful for mixing songs or creating smartplaylist with different purposes
Speedfan - Reduce the noise of your fans while watching the temps
Tthrotle - Reduce the speed of your cpu to keep the temperature to some level
Firefox addons: about:addons-memory, brief, Cookie whitlist-with buttons, flash video downloader, imglikeopera, leechblock, memory restart, pop video, rss icon for brief, toggle word wrap, undo close replacement, click to play switch, sun cult
@Iasc: As far as i know xmlc files are not editable. They are compiled skins created using Skincreator from Steven. Would be nice having that possibility...
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can anyone recommend a program for opening and editing xmlc files.
these can only be updated with the skin creator tool
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can anyone recommend a program for opening and editing xmlc files.
these can only be updated with the skin creator tool
didn't realise that. thanks Steven and lnminente
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Forgot to mention ManicTime, with it i track the use i do with the computer, software, documents and webs
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***ALL OF THEM ARE FREEWARE***
Calender/Reminder: Vueminder Lite
CD-DVD Burner: BurnAware
Copy Utility: FastCopy
Desktop Search: Everything
Dictionary: WordWeb
Disk Defragmenter: Defraggler
Disk Partioning: EaseUs Partition Master
Download Manager: Free Download Manager
File Archiver: Haozip
File Recovery: Recuva
IM Client: Pidgin
Image Viewer: Fastone
Media Player: PotPlayer
Music Manager: MusicBee
Office Suite: Kingsoft Office 2013(Brilliant tabbed UI. You'll understand why I don't use MS Office when you've used this)
PDF Reader: Foxit
Portable Launcher: Portable Start Menu
Registry Cleaner: Wise Registry Cleaner
Screen Capture: Screenshot Captor
System Information Tool: HwInfo
Torrent Client: Tixati
Uninstaller: IOBit Uninstaller
Video Chat: ooVoo
Video Converter: xviD4PSP
Virtual Drive: Winarchiver Virtual Drive
Website Ripper: HTtrack
Web Browser: SRWare Iron (privacy enriched Chrome)
-----------------------------------------------------
Security Softwares
-----------------------------------------------------
Antivirus - Avast
Antispyware - MalwareBytes
Disk Image - EaseUS Todo Backup
File Cleaner - CCleaner
Firewall - Tinywall
Folder Lock - Wise Folder Hider
Software Update Checker - SuMo (Download only Lite/Zipped version]
Software Virtualization - Sandboxie
System Monitor - Winpatrol
USB protection - Panda USB Vaccine
Browser Security Extensions (SRWare Iron/Chrome)
Web of Trust - Determines trusted websites through user ratings
Adblock
Lastpass
NotScripts
HTTPsEverywhere
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Lot of great tips so far. Here's a few I use that I haven't seen mentioned yet:
PDF Reader: PDF X-Change
Registry Cleaner: Glary Utilities
Antivirus: Microsoft Security Essentials also sometimes use - F-Secure Online Scanner
Firewall: Comodo (has it's own sandboxing feature)
Privacy browser extension: Ghostery (Use it in Opera and Chrome)
Edit - not really sure about that SRWare Iron app. Downloaded it and made the mistake of clicking on the update media player link [seems an obvious bad move, in hindsight, on my part but at the time I thought it was a browser extension]. Found myself trying to get out of installing all kinds of mods to the browser. Also didn't find it helpful that the browser's blog is in German. The uninstall seems to have worked but it left the shortcuts on my desktop; so buyer beware & YMMV....
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Edit - not really sure about that SRWare Iron app. Downloaded it and made the mistake of clicking on the update media player link [seems an obvious bad move, in hindsight, on my part but at the time I thought it was a browser extension]. Found myself trying to get out of installing all kinds of mods to the browser. Also didn't find it helpful that the browser's blog is in German. The uninstall seems to have worked but it left the shortcuts on my desktop; so buyer beware & YMMV....
Not sure what you're talking about here, SRWare Iron is a browser that doesn't have the privacy intrusions that Chrome does. It's not an application. What's the update media player link you're talking about?
It's (English) homepage is here: http://www.srware.net/en/software_srware_iron.php
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Freemake Video Converter , this is my choice.
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WaveShop - (GPL/portable/x86,x64) can be used as external audio-editor for MB (its like mp3DirectCut)
for mp3 encoding you need to download the requested dlls (libmp3lame 3.99.5)
and place them in the WaveShop-folder. The colors can be changed.
http://waveshop.sourceforge.net/index.html
http://www.rarewares.org/mp3-lame-libraries.php
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WaveShop - (GPL/portable/x86,x64) can be used as external audio-editor for MB (its like mp3DirectCut)
for mp3 encoding you need to download the requested dlls (libmp3lame 3.99.5)
Edits to MP3 files require the output file to be re-encoded, so in that respect it isn't like mp3DirectCut.
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But it says " Editing a portion of an audio file only affects that portion" in the second line in http://waveshop.sourceforge.net/index.html
I downloaded it yesterday and looks very promising, very useful for audiophiles like us :) Thanks Orb
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I just added another piece to my software list. It's a new and upcoming download manager called EagleGet that just recently hit stable status.
I've never been big on download managers since I always found them overly obtrusive and the download speed improvement was usually negligible. But this one is different, you can set it up to be completely silent and unobtrusive, integration is flawless with all the major browsers and there's is a certain elegance in the way it operates I have never seen in any other download manager up until now. You definitely need to try this to see what I mean.
Can be found here: http://www.eagleget.com
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Thanks, ma_t14, for mentioning this download manager.
Well, I used a few in the past but I've never been satisfied with them. I'm now using Eagleget for three days and it looks promising to me.
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thanks indeed ma_t14, I'm trying eagleget also :)
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Just uninstalled EagleGet :
1) it couldn't get the size of a remote drive therefore deemed it not worthy to download to
2) it couldn't download YT vids that are presented using html5 and not flash in ie10
3) it downloaded html instead of a file at the other end of a redirector
it has to grow more, i'll perhaps try again next year if I remember.
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Just uninstalled EagleGet :
1) it couldn't get the size of a remote drive therefore deemed it not worthy to download to
2) it couldn't download YT vids that are presented using html5 and not flash in ie10
3) it downloaded html instead of a file at the other end of a redirector
it has to grow more, i'll perhaps try again next year if I remember.
I had to uninstall as well, it dowloaded a file with wrong extension (similar to your case) and there is still a bug with how duplicate downloads are handled. But more importantly when reporting bugs at the eagleget forums I felt the support is, to put in mildly, lacking. Anyway it's a promising project and I might give it another chance in the future when it matures.
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I can now say from experience that if you need to recover data from a dead hard drive, you want the free program PhotoRec: http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec. It can work miracles when combined with this thing: http://www.newertech.com/products/voyagerq.php
I had three days to recover files before I had to send the drive back to the manufacturer, and I wasted two of them fighting with another program before I stumbled on PhotoRec.
Meanwhile, everybody remember your backups! My last one was two months ago, and I failed to appreciate how much I'd done in just that time until it was gone. Reconstructing is gonna be fun, but at least I have MusicBee to help. :)
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I can now say from experience that if you need to recover data from a dead hard drive, you want the free program PhotoRec: http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec. It can work miracles when combined with this thing: http://www.newertech.com/products/voyagerq.php
I had three days to recover files before I had to send the drive back to the manufacturer, and I wasted two of them fighting with another program before I stumbled on PhotoRec.
Meanwhile, everybody remember your backups! My last one was two months ago, and I failed to appreciate how much I'd done in just that time until it was gone. Reconstructing is gonna be fun, but at least I have MusicBee to help. :)
That's why you rarely showed up recently. Glad to hear you got it recovered!
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That's why you rarely showed up recently. Glad to hear you got it recovered!
Thanks! I'm going through now to see which of the recovered files are actually useful. I figured not all of them would be, especially since a good percentage of them are likely to be files I deleted before the crash. I'm on a borrowed work computer for now, but I may continue to be scarce until I get my computer back in working condition...
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Sounds lots of work... Good luck!
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One of the little programs I use are "Unlocker". This nifty little one will find what processes are "using" empty folders, etc. and give you the option to kill them and then rename, delete, etc. the folder (or file). True that's it's only purpose, but it's a hellovalot easier trying to figure out what process is using "This folder cannot be deleted because it is being used *insert no information ever here*". :P
http://www.emptyloop.com/unlocker/
For documenting, I use LibreOffice. At first I was loyal to OpenOffice, but then I read up somewhere that they've had problems and a "history". Whatever that may have meant, I just didn't really trust it anymore. That and the fact that it added another process to the windows start up list, in which helped OpenOffice open "faster". Btw, from what I feel, LibreOffice opens faster and it doesn't even use that kind of process. :P
https://www.libreoffice.org/
For making my taskbar look neat-o, I use AreoBlend. This application has a few settings to be had, but I use the option that uses the average colour of the desktop to apply it to my windows theme. It's little thing, but I like it a lot. [: It's really nice when you have a bunch of wallpapers that rotate. Now your taskbar and unthemed windows will match your wallpaper. [:
http://www.carthagosoft.net/AeroBlend.php
Types... This being the hardest damned piece of software to find if you don't back it up or remember the url is, nonetheless, pretty great. I use this application to edit file type associations (and sometimes remove completely because 'No windows, I didn't want to use notepad as the default to open .flac files', but thanks for having that check box automatically checked'. Also, I hate it when you change the association and Windows goes full lazy and displays the logo as that bent piece of paper with the programs .ico on it. So I use Types to change that too. :P
http://izt.name/apps/types/
WinDirStat is a pretty cool utility. Have you ever wanted to see how big a file is or how big a folder is compared to the rest of your drive? Well than you'll like this utility. Although it has no tools to optimize, clean, sort anything it's nice to just put into a visual representation of how big something is. After seeing that, you can decide yourself whether or not "do I really need this file?" :P
http://windirstat.info/
And of course, last but not least, MusicBee! What can I say? MusicBee is the only music player I have ever liked and enjoyed using. (: So yeah, if you don't have that yet, get it! (:
http://getmusicbee.com/
And here's a list that might come in handy for all of you who like to keep their music under control and clean. :P
- Bulk Rename Utility | This could be used for more than just renaming music files, but I haven't found that purpose yet. I also don't use it anymore because of the next program on the list (that and it was a bit advanced and confusing to learn how to use).
- mp3Tag | I have to say.. I LOVE this application. I use this now to re-name my files because it's just faster and more convenient! You can edit all the tags, get the tags from Amazon music, MusicBrainz, etc. Add/remove album art and on and on. It's a really nice tool!
http://www.mp3tag.de/en/
- mp3Gain | I use this because I hate it when I have one song that's kinda quiet so turn it up up just a little.. And then the next song is VERY VERY LOUD OMFG GAH EAR EXPLOSION DEAD. You get the point.. xP But yeah, this software allows you to change the dB of .mp3 files (I don't know if others are supported).
http://mp3gain.sourceforge.net/
And here's a list of other softwares:
PDF view/creator: FoxIt | http://www.foxitsoftware.com/downloads/
Antivirus: Avast! | http://www.avast.com/en-us/index | Although recently it's been pissing me off, thinking about trying Avira and if not that, just going back to MSE (Microsoft Security Essentials).
And that's all. Sorry for the super long post or if any of these were up elsewhere, I only skimmed through everything. :P
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My brother is constantly trying to make me switch to Linux but there are some programs that stop me ;)
Tag&Rename - A fantastic program that I could not live without. It is payware but ONCE you get free upgrades for life!!
I bought 1.1 and today I got 3.8 :) I have 10 TB so it's userdefined renaming and the ability to check the files against FreeDB is reallyfantastic. Try it!!
There is a 30 day version at softpointer.com
Adobe Lightroom - Everything that you need to optimize your pictures (if you are not into faking things) and you can play around to your hearts content without destroying your picture. You can always go back to ANY point because the program does not alter the file it just adds a script to the file sothere is no need to "save as" because you don't save ;) You export the file to be printed as a JPEG but the original RAW is still there!!
Agent - For email. I got it ca 1995 when it was still beta (I'm an old geezer ;D) and would almost die if someone took it away from me. It is really safe because you have to open HTML manually if you have not told the program it's a trusted sender so there is no risk of accidentaly getting a trojan or something like that.
And of course MB!!! The only program that can handle the amount of files that I send it :-*
There is no match for those in any other operating system (you can get Lightroom for Mac) so my brother will hope in wain for my transfer to Linux ;)
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Just changed my screenshot capture program of choice from PicPick to ShareX. I added a description to the original post. I am really impressed with the capabilities and flexibility this programs offers, everything is just on point. The last time I felt about a program like that was when I discoverd MusicBee. Highly recommended to anyone who uploads screenshots frequently as it makes the whole process extremely straightforward.
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MicroBin (http://www.e-sushi.net/software/) - This places a small recycle bin in the system tray, so that you no longer need the desktop icon. Right-click it and you get a menu where you can open or empty the bin or just double-click it to empty it. It's free and there's another free version called MiniBin that has more options.
Driver Booster (http://www.iobit.com/driver-booster.php) - This scans your PC then tells you if your drivers are up to date. If not, you can update any outdated ones with a single click. It has various options, such as the option to only install drivers that have passed WHQL testing. There's free and paid for versions, with the latter having more options.
LICEcap (http://www.cockos.com/licecap/) - This basically gives you a resizeable frame that allows you to capture an area of your screen directly to an animated GIF. You can move the frame around while you're recording. It's free.
Icaros (http://shark007.net/tools.html) - By default Windows will only show thumbnails for certain audio/video files if property handlers are present for those file types. Icaros adds in the ability for Windows to generate thumbnails for other files types, such as MKV, FLV and FLAC. You can customise which file types you want to show thumbnails for and you can select how far through video files that thumbnails are generated using a slider. It's free.
WizTree (http://antibody-software.com/web/software/software/wiztree-finds-the-files-and-folders-using-the-most-disk-space-on-your-hard-drive/) - This is a handy tool that allows you to see how much space files and folders are taking up on your drives. It will also give you a list of the top 1,000 largest files on your system. It's really fast and it's handy if you've suddenly lost a bunch of drive space and can't figure out why. It's free.
ShellNewHandler (http://sourceforge.net/projects/shellnewhandler/) - This is a free tool that allows you to clean up the "New" right-click context menu in Windows. It often gets cluttered up with stuff that you don't need. It uses a checkbox system, so you simply uncheck the boxes next to the items you want to remove from the menu and if you later change your mind you just go back in and re-check them.
Sumatra PDF (http://blog.kowalczyk.info/software/sumatrapdf/free-pdf-reader.html) - This is a free, fast and very lightweight PDF reader. It's only got a basic feature set, but if all you want is to read, search and save PDFs - including in your web browser - then this is great. It can read a few other file types too, such as ePub and CBR/CBZ comic book files.
Mp3Tag (http://www.mp3tag.de/en/) - A powerful and free tag editor. What I love about this is the ability to create actions, so, for example, in 1 click I can tag an album based on the folder and file names, embed album art, set all of the words to the correct case, remove underscores etc. and it also supports pulling in metadata from several different services.
DriveSort (http://www.anerty.net/software/file/DriveSort.php) - This sorts files on a drive based on their name. It's handy if you have a car stereo that you can plug a USB stick into, as typically, the car stereo will scroll through the list of files based on the date they were added to the stick, so you're not browsing in alphabetical order. This is a free way to fix that so you can browse alphabetically.
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I've just been pointed to here - http://samplerateconverter.com/content/how-work-sigma-delta-modulation-audio - in another forum.
The article is a brief description of a software developer's work to convert various audio files. At the bottom of the article is a download for a trial version of the software he created. It converts all files, including mp3, dsf and 384kHz PCM. The paid versions range from $30 - $200, and the free version is limited, .dsf conversions are limited to 3 minute tracks, but as a batch converter for more standard files I've found that it works very well.
I can't guarantee the quality or security, but it appears to use FFmpeg where possible as well as proprietary code for the higher-res files.
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If anybody's looking for a good wallpaper manager for multiple monitors, I found this after trying several things that didn't work nearly as well:
http://windowbox.me/multiwall/
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If anybody's looking for a good wallpaper manager for multiple monitors, I found this after trying several things that didn't work nearly as well:
http://windowbox.me/multiwall/
When it's about wallpapers and multi-screens, i've never found a better software than Wall Switch, it's free and can handle tons of thousands of pictures all the way, with profils and shortcuts.
I tried a real lot of softwares for this purpose, still updated and still the best for me.
http://wallswitch.codeplex.com/
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Cool, I'll give that a try. The problem I ran into that caused me to go looking for something in the first place was that a lot of these programs, including Windows itself, don't deal well with monitors of different sizes.
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Cool, I'll give that a try. The problem I ran into that caused me to go looking for something in the first place was that a lot of these programs, including Windows itself, don't deal well with monitors of different sizes.
I'm running on a tri-screens display, 1920 x 1200, 2560 x 1440 and 1920 x 1080, Wall Switch manages it perfectly.
I chose to have different pictures on each monitor, no problem with that. You can also have a smooth transition between pictures changing.
In my personnal case, the problem i had with the other softwares, was that no one was able to manage huge collection of pictures in "random / shuffle" mode.
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I'm running on a tri-screens display, 1920 x 1200, 2560 x 1440 and 1920 x 1080, Wall Switch manages it perfectly.
I chose to have different pictures on each monitor, no problem with that. You can also have a smooth transition between pictures changing.
Hmm. I'm not getting it to do different images or different sizes effectively. I have it set to Full Screen, Random, Fill, and Separate Image for Each Monitor is selected, but I get the image from the first monitor tiled on the second monitor. Any ideas?
The developer seems responsive, so I will ask there as well.
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I'm running on a tri-screens display, 1920 x 1200, 2560 x 1440 and 1920 x 1080, Wall Switch manages it perfectly.
I chose to have different pictures on each monitor, no problem with that. You can also have a smooth transition between pictures changing.
Hmm. I'm not getting it to do different images or different sizes effectively. I have it set to Full Screen, Random, Fill, and Separate Image for Each Monitor is selected, but I get the image from the first monitor tiled on the second monitor. Any ideas?
The developer seems responsive, so I will ask there as well.
That's wierd, i tried with those settings, even with "fit" rather than "fill", each picture remain on its own monitor without spanning.
I have never seen any pictures overflow from one screen to an other, whatever the display mode is.
Are you "randomizing" through several pictures ? How many ? What kind of size ?
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I just found this awesome screencapture program (via Lifehacker, natch):
http://www.picpick.org/en/
It has replaced my old screencap program, my color picker program, and GIMP all at once. (I'll keep GIMP around in case I need to do something fancy, but mostly I've been using it for cropping screencaps.)
I can already tell this is going to make getting screencaps for the wiki WAY quicker.
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I just found this awesome screencapture program (via Lifehacker, natch):
http://www.picpick.org/en/
It has replaced my old screencap program, my color picker program, and GIMP all at once. (I'll keep GIMP around in case I need to do something fancy, but mostly I've been using it for cropping screencaps.)
I can already tell this is going to make getting screencaps for the wiki WAY quicker.
Actually pickpick was one of my recommendations in the origal post (i still mention it somewhere i think) but I have since moved on to ShareX as it also has features for automatically uploading this screenshots based on very flexible criteria. But picpick is excellent as well, even slighly better if you solely want to take screenshots.
I suggest you read the list again, there might be more useful programs you might have missed ;)
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You may be right. I was using ShareX, probably based on your recommendation. But for what I need, PicPick is definitely the better choice.
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You may be right. I was using ShareX, probably based on your recommendation. But for what I need, PicPick is definitely the better choice.
Out of curiosity, what do you like better about PicPick?
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The #1 thing is that it makes it possible to select exactly the area of the screen I want, to the pixel. The colorpicker is a nice bonus.
I wish it had the capability to upload to a particular imgur account, but I just copy & paste into imgur when I'm done doing anything I want to do in the editor, which is actually probably fewer steps in the long run.
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The #1 thing is that it makes it possible to select exactly the area of the screen I want, to the pixel. The colorpicker is a nice bonus.
I wish it had the capability to upload to a particular imgur account, but I just copy & paste into imgur when I'm done doing anything I want to do in the editor, which is actually probably fewer steps in the long run.
ShareX can select the exact area to the pixel as well though and it has the ability to upload to an imgur account, as well as copy the imgur link automatically to the clipboard. All in one step. It includes a color picker as well, are you sure you were using the same program? ::)
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I don't know, I guess I never discovered those features. Does ShareX have the pixel zoom that allows you to see exactly what you're selecting?
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Been a long time user of Duck Capture, but from the description, I might have to give ShareX a try.
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I don't know, I guess I never discovered those features. Does ShareX have the pixel zoom that allows you to see exactly what you're selecting?
Yes.
I suggest you go to the shareX website and click on the Screenshots section at the top. It gives a nice overview of the features.
https://getsharex.com/
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Hmm. So I see. I'm not sure why I missed this stuff, since I'm usually pretty good at looking at all the option in program. I'll give ShareX another try.
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It's a arguably a little less user friendly than PicPick but once you get a good grasp of it I think it's better
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I tested it out by getting new screencaps of MB settings. The only thing so far I can't find a way to do that picpick does (at least it claims to, as do some other programs including Duck Capture) is capture areas that have to be scrolled to show the whole thing.
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I tested it out by getting new screencaps of MB settings. The only thing so far I can't find a way to do that picpick does (at least it claims to, as do some other programs including Duck Capture) is capture areas that have to be scrolled to show the whole thing.
Yes, that's the only major feature, in my opinion, that is still missing but I only needed to use it 1 or 2 times before so it's not that important, at least for me.
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Is their any similar software to MusicBee, just instead of managing music to manage pictures?
I've tested very much of these (http://www.heise.de/foto/artikel/Portfolio-791433.html), but they did not meet my expectations. I would like such tagging and filtering functions that are common at MP3-Manager-Programms. The problem on the software I've tested is, that the filtering function is organised by drag-and-drop-directory-like filters insted of metadata (tags).
The optimal thing I can remember is a MusicBee, without Music, only Covers ^^
(I also played with the thaught to use dummy-mp3 files and assign them the picture I want as cover, but .... no ^^)
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Maybe AcdSee but not sure about your expectations, and this software isn't free.
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Is their any similar software to MusicBee, just instead of managing music to manage pictures?
I've tested very much of these (http://www.heise.de/foto/artikel/Portfolio-791433.html), but they did not meet my expectations. I would like such tagging and filtering functions that are common at MP3-Manager-Programms. The problem on the software I've tested is, that the filtering function is organised by drag-and-drop-directory-like filters insted of metadata (tags).
The optimal thing I can remember is a MusicBee, without Music, only Covers ^^
(I also played with the thaught to use dummy-mp3 files and assign them the picture I want as cover, but .... no ^^)
I don't know anything like MB but you could try Zoner Photo Studio (free version) & XnView.
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Wow, there are a lot of great suggestions here...
I'm familiar with a few like -
Launchy - this is a great time saver.
Auto Hotkey - awesome macro and win dev tool. I've actually created some nice utilities of my own to help manage my library.
PicPic - l use on some machine but will check out Sharex soon.
I have questions about some like -
mp3tag - have people found this better than Tagscanner and the godfather? I find Tagscanner incredibly powerful and would love to hear from someone that's used it but chose mp3tag.
jaangle - while MB is my formal music player I wonder if anyone had used jaangle in the past and what ever happened to it?
Media Monkey - does anyone use this player?
JMedia Center - does anyone use this player?
Lastly - has anyone found a tool to help prepare and process audio files "to be" added to your library? Over the years I have spread my collection about multiple drives and want to undertake a consolidation effort. I like a tool that would help review files to be added, check to see that they don't already exist in the library and move them to a staging folder ready for a merge. Along the way it would also address a whole list of other validations: complete or partial album, bitrate, audio format, artwork, etc.
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Lastly - has anyone found a tool to help prepare and process audio files "to be" added to your library? Over the years I have spread my collection about multiple drives and want to undertake a consolidation effort. I like a tool that would help review files to be added, check to see that they don't already exist in the library and move them to a staging folder ready for a merge. Along the way it would also address a whole list of other validations: complete or partial album, bitrate, audio format, artwork, etc.
In my experience, there's no quick fix for this. My current process is something like this.
I have a main library and a to-be-added library. I started by creating a temporary library, putting absolutely everything in there, and running MB's duplicates tool. This got rid of a fair amount of dead wood. I then load up my main library in an MB process opened in Sandboxie (the only way I know of to get multiple MBs open). I then load up the other library in a normal MB process. For each artist, I do a full search of the TBA library including filename. I only ever search by artist, to make sure that I'm not missing any songs spelt incorrectly. I compare the TBA library to the current one, delete any more duplicates, then tag the files in the TBA library and send them to the HDD where the main library is stored. Having done this, they get deleted from the TBA library. I do this for all artists in the main library. Then (and I've not reached this stage yet :P ), I'm planning on doing the same for all the artists in the TBA library, making use of MB's identify file by sound signature and then, if that fails, Shazam/Soundhound or similar.
When the files are in the main library, I use Album Artwork Downloader to search for HQ artwork (1000*1000 only), making edits as needed in Paint.net. I have Auto-Organise turned on in my main library, and thus files are sent to the correct folder when they are moved out of the inbox. Then, I have two separate filters in my main library - one for tracks I'm happy with, and one for tracks that need more editing. That last filter has a large number of conditions, and I research all my track tags thoroughly (using a combination of Wiki/Discogs/Allmusic/Bandcamp/And-if-that-fails-a-desperate-Google-search). I also make sure at this point that the files are in MP3 format (my current preferred format - not looking forward to the switch to FLAC when I have to do it!). To make sure of this, I have a highlight rule that highlights only tracks that aren't MP3s.
The final steps are to run the main library through Mp3Val and Mp3Diags (in that order) every few weeks/months. That highlights actual file issues which can be fixed, and is also a good way to spot files which are missing embedded artwork. And then, I do a search on Google Play to see if each track exists. If I don't know where the file has come from (highly probable), if it's a vinyl rip (also relatively likely) or if I know that it's from an old CD and a newer remaster is available, then I'll convert the file to 320kbps if it's available on Google Play and then upload it. Hopefully, Google Play recognises a match and I then download a 320kbps file from the best master available, and replace my current file with that using MB's Folder (Replace) command. If it doesn't match it, I do some dodgy MP3 recording or downloading to try and get a file that does match (which I think is justified given that I do actually already own the file and I don't pirate music). I also make sure that Media Source is present on files so I know where I've got them from!
Hope that helps give you some ideas for how to proceed. I'll warn you, library maintenance is a long term task if you want to do it properly. I'm currently on ~14000 correctly tagged files with around the same to go... Hopefully be done in about three years time (by which I'll have inevitably acquired a lot more music of course).
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mp3tag - have people found this better than Tagscanner and the godfather? I find Tagscanner incredibly powerful and would love to hear from someone that's used it but chose mp3tag.
I've been a long term mp3tag user and found it to be the best for a large music library restructure/reorganisation project.
I tried TagScanner briefly, but got frustrated by its modal "Renaming/Editing/Processing" approach. I want to be able to do whatever I need, whenever I need to without having to worry about which screen I'm currently looking at.
I tried The Godfather too, but the current screenshots don't look familiar, so it may have had a revamp since then. It looks pretty comprehensive, so may be a better alternative to mp3tag if you're already familiar with it.
The best thing about mp3tag for me is being to create custom actions. When I first acquire new music, in one step I can clean up existing tags, remove unwanted tags, set values for custom tags that I've set up in MusicBee... I'm not sure if The Godfather has anything similar, but it's such a time saver that I wouldn't use any program without it.
jaangle - while MB is my formal music player I wonder if anyone had used jaangle in the past and what ever happened to it?
Media Monkey - does anyone use this player?
JMedia Center - does anyone use this player?
From the screenshots, jaangle looks pretty basic and hasn't been updated since 2012, so is probably abandoned.
A lot of forum people have mentioned they are migrating to MusicBee from MediaMonkey and JRiver for various reasons. I doubt many of them go back. :P One complaint about Media Monkey is that it requires payment to get the same features available in MusicBee for free.
Lastly - has anyone found a tool to help prepare and process audio files "to be" added to your library? Over the years I have spread my collection about multiple drives and want to undertake a consolidation effort. I like a tool that would help review files to be added, check to see that they don't already exist in the library and move them to a staging folder ready for a merge. Along the way it would also address a whole list of other validations: complete or partial album, bitrate, audio format, artwork, etc.
Looks like Pingaware said the same - sorry, I skimmed the lengthy post - but MusicBee is great for that. It's (unique?) Inbox feature means you can add all of your tracks en masse, and only when you're happy with their tags etc. move them to your main, organised, music library.
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Zak, great comments. Thank you for the candid insight. I'll have to give mp3tag another look.
How do you approach, with tools or process, the task of merging two drives together?
I have been pretty loose with my files over the years and while I thought I was creating my own divided storage plan, HA, I know don't know if the content on one drive mirrors the content on the other. I'm looking for a tool that can read a directory structure (Artist / Album /Title) on one drive then go seek the same on the other. If found move the files to a staging Recycle folder then move on. Any heard or seen of such a thing? (I have more than one Compare program but none of them seem to do this.)
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I don't know if this does what you want, but it's what I've used at work when trying to sort out duplicates:
http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/File-Management/Duplicate-cleaner.shtml
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How do you approach, with tools or process, the task of merging two drives together?
I have been pretty loose with my files over the years and while I thought I was creating my own divided storage plan, HA, I know don't know if the content on one drive mirrors the content on the other.
There are programs that will scan file tags and try to identify duplicates, but that requires your files to already be tagged and named reasonably well.
My task was to merge three large collections together, one of which was mangled by having been passed through iTunes auto-organiser more than once. :( Call me crazy, but in the end I decided the best way - if not the fastest - was to do it manually.
I created folders A-Z for artists and separate folders for compilations, soundtracks etc. Then I moved almost everything from all three sources into them. It was a horrible mess at that point, but from there it was much easier to identify duplicates myself. It would be a painful thing to do in Windows Explorer though. Use a dual-pane file manager (Just Manager or XYplorer are both good and free) so you can more easily compare files and folders side-by-side.
I guess it depends how "perfectly" you want your music to be organised, and how much time you're willing to spend to get it there.
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I guess it depends how "perfectly" you want your music to be organised, and how much time you're willing to spend to get it there.
Considering how many tracks I have "perfect" may never happen.
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* Everything Search - extremely lightweight free search utility and more importantly gets results instantly. Once you start using it you will wonder how you manged before that . Found at www.voidtools.com
I can't thank you enough for recommending this. It's changing my life!!
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* Everything Search - extremely lightweight free search utility and more importantly gets results instantly. Once you start using it you will wonder how you manged before that . Found at www.voidtools.com
I can't thank you enough for recommending this. It's changing my life!!
Glad it was useful. Everything Search, Launchy and ArsClip are the 3 main utilities I cannot do without. Once you get used to them and incorporate them into your work-flow anything else seems "inefficient".
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If anyone else is using Cheetah Sync for a "two-stage" sync to mobile device, I just switched to BitTorrent's Sync app. It's a little more confusing to set up, but it's super fast to configure/change/run, and based on my short experimentation so far, seems to do a better job of tracking changes.
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If anyone else is using Cheetah Sync for a "two-stage" sync to mobile device, I just switched to BitTorrent's Sync app. It's a little more confusing to set up, but it's super fast to configure/change/run, and based on my short experimentation so far, seems to do a better job of tracking changes.
Yes, I've been using Cheetah for about a year and have found it suitable for my needs. But as the directories get larger, Cheetah is slowing down. Which is understandable. But I'll be checking out BitTorrent's app shortly. Thanks for the tip.
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Let me know if you have any issues. I tested with some smaller folders first, but when I added my music folder it seemed to run through and recognize all the files that were already there and didn't need an update, and it updated the playlists when I changed them.
I set it up to only sync manually unless it's charging. The history window on the desktop end is very helpful and one of the big improvements over cheetah.
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Let me know if you have any issues. I tested with some smaller folders first, but when I added my music folder it seemed to run through and recognize all the files that were already there and didn't need an update, and it updated the playlists when I changed them.
I mainly use Cheetah for copying photos taken with my cell over to my PC. For syncing music there's a great app call MusicBee that I've been using for years and it syncs quite nicely.
But what I really don't like about the BitTorrent Sync is that it's constantly connecting to a BitTorrent server and a GetSync server, along with what my firewall tells me is an "unknown" server. I've never seen Cheetah connect with anything outside my LAN. If BitTorrent Sync is only supposed to be syncing files between my devices, then why is it contacting all these other servers? One reason (I suppose) is the Cheetah only works on my WiFi network and BitTorrent may allow me to sync from my phone to my PC when I'm away from my home WiFi. I'm not sure about that, but I am uncomfortable with those potentially nefarious connections.
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Fair enough. I don't know about the remote sync functionality.
Update: I take it back. It has been remote syncing today (when on wifi). Wow.
Update 2: It looks like you can disable the remote servers in the Preferences. http://help.getsync.com/hc/en-us/articles/204754349-Can-I-force-Sync-to-do-local-network-LAN-syncing-only-and-not-sync-via-the-Internet-
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I thought I'd make an update since the original post was 3 years old in case anyone is interested to see what changed in the meantime (not that much actually).
Here are the changes:
*Launchy replaced by KeyPirinha
*Added MPC-HC/BE as an alternative to PotPlayer
*ArsClip replaced by Ditto
*Opera browser replaced by Vivaldi
*Added Autohotkey
*Deskpins replaced by an autohotkey command.
*Fastone Image Viewer replaced by HoneyView
Original post has been updated to reflect these.
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*ArsClip replaced by Ditto
++1
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* Listary - type-to-locate done right, free but pro version available. Gets better and better with every release. It may replace everything search for me in the future but for now searching is not what I use it for.
Neat-o, thanks for that!
Random question - neither my trusty old foobar, nor the old 2.5 or shiny new MusicBee 3 seems to have a good way for this - I want to see my whole library's ID3 tag versions on each file in column view, i.e. I want to see which file still has ID3v1/ID3v1.1 tags written, and most likely remove altogether, or, if it were the only ID3 info, move to ID3v2.4 UTF-8.
mp3tag does show the ID3 version info as needed, but it's less ideal as it's meant to work/be edited in batches, not on the whole library, and I don't really get warm with its GUI...
Churs.
c.
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neither my trusty old foobar, nor the old 2.5 or shiny new MusicBee 3 seems to have a good way for this - I want to see my whole library's ID3 tag versions on each file in column view, i.e. I want to see which file still has ID3v1/ID3v1.1 tags written, and most likely remove altogether, or, if it were the only ID3 info, move to ID3v2.4 UTF-8.
mp3tag does show the ID3 version info as needed, but it's less ideal as it's meant to work/be edited in batches, not on the whole library, and I don't really get warm with its GUI...
You could formulate this as a wish in the wishlist.
I'd support it.
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If anyone else is using Cheetah Sync for a "two-stage" sync to mobile device, I just switched to BitTorrent's Sync app. It's a little more confusing to set up, but it's super fast to configure/change/run, and based on my short experimentation so far, seems to do a better job of tracking changes.
@psychoadept Are you still using the Bittorrent sync app (now Resilio Sync)? I was going through old posts and stumbled up yours. Thinking of giving it a try.
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Yes, I am. Working great for me, although the "selective sync" setting has caused issues. I just turn it off.
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New to MusicBee, (A refugee from Media Monkey) reading through the forums, and thought I'd weigh in. I notice I have some apps not mentioned earlier, and this way I can feel like I'm contributing.
My job is mostly Support in a Microsoft shop, so I'm stuck in Microsoft land. I'm almost exclusively Windows 10 at home, with Windows 7 at work. Compatibility with work, and needing to know Microsoft keep me out of other operating systems; I just don't have as much opportunity to play any more. I used to use free office suites at home, but found that when I had to work on things from work, it was never pretty. I gave up, and started paying for an Office subscription. It's a great deal if you have a kid in school, and a wife who needs to do stuff for work too.
Notepad++ - I just leave it running because somehow I always need it. I find a lot of open tabs with information, or text I just needed temporarily. Literally, the first thing I install when I get a new computer.
OneNote - I used to use Evernote, but OneNote works seamlessly across all my personal devices with less fuss. The best part is how well it works in the browser while I'm at work.
LastPass - Used to use KeePass, but it was a major pain to use while I was at work. LastPass with the FireFox plugin is almost perfect. I don't even know what most of my passwords even are. I use the paid version, and can't imagine life without it.
XMarks - I always hated trying to keep track of favorites. Now, I don't have to unless I'm on an unfamiliar computer, and even then, I can get to my favorites from the website.
Lightroom - Is there anything better for keeping and processing pictures from your DSLR camera?
Private Internet Access - Because it's nobody's business but my own where I go on the internet. Inexpensive, fast, and easy to use. I install it on my laptop for when I'm out and about, and have it on my Linksys router for when I'm not. It's also handy for those times I run into a YT video that isn't available in my country. Quick couple of clicks, and suddenly I can watch that video.
Photoshop Express - For the times I'm on my tablet and want to work with some pictures.
Fruity Loops - Because I also sometimes like to pretend that I am a musician. Since I don't use this as often, I appreciate the fact that it's a lifetime license.
Bamboo Paper - I often use this on my Windows 10 tablet, because sometimes you just want to be able to free-form draw to get a point across. This is the fastest way I've found to just start making marks on a blank background.
Free FileSync - For backing up data to external drives. (No one likes taking backups, but everyone loves a restore.)
Greenshot - For screen capture when I'm on a personal computer. It's free, and makes it easy to capture an entire window. There's a better app on the Work computer that I can't remember the name of, but that one is expensive, for not many more features.
AutoCad 360 - Great tool for 3d design. Once I get a 3d printer, I'm told it's possible to get from this app to a piece of plastic. I'm in the third year of a student license, and Autodesk is changing their licensing, so this may be changing in the near future. It looks like "Fusion 360" is where I'll end up.
Mp3Tag - I used to use this back in the day when I got new music. Now, I find I'm back in it to fix the damage to my tags caused from years of Media Monkey abuse. I've had the Monkey off my back for week now, and regret I didn't move sooner.
I do use other software, but this is all the stuff that gets installed when I find myself in a fresh Operating system. Anything else gets installed if I need it.
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At clean-installing a new PC, I decided to re-evaluate what software (beyond MusicBee) was still essential to me.
After trying some alternatives here and there, I stayed with most software choices that I have been using before.
Except for one. (see below)
Here is my current list of 'essential' software. (that at least has some relevance to using MusicBee)
Windows enhancement:
AutoHotkey
Ditto
f.lux
FileLocator Pro
OpenShell
SyncBackPro
Total Commander Directory Opus
Text and images:
Album Art Downloader
FastStone Image Viewer
Instant Colour Picker (for skinning)
Notepad++
PNGGauntlet (for skinning)
ShareX
Audio:
Audacity
CUETools
dBpoweramp
foobar2000
MP3 Diags
Picard
SomethingWithABeeForAnIcon
Spek
Tag & Rename
Most of these have been mentioned in this thread before and are used by many others.
But I did stumble upon a piece of software that is a serious candidate for my list of essential software that I think hasn't been mentioned before in this thread:
QTTabBar
(http://qttabbar.wikidot.com/)
It's a great extension for Windows Explorer and makes navigation a whole lot easier and very versatile.
Everything about it seems extremely well thought-through, and the amount of options and tweaks is incredible.
It's probably a keeper and will make me ditch Total Commander.
update:
I ran into some issues with QTTabbar, and after looking at several fora for solutions, it seems that the developer isn't active, and doesn't respond to requests, bugs or suggestions. So I looked elsewhere. With great success:
Directory Opus is my new holy grail as a Windows Explorer replacement.
I've been road testing it for a week or so, and both the program itself as the support are awesome.
It's a keeper for sure.
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But I did stumble upon a piece of software that is a serious candidate for my list of essential software that I think hasn't been mentioned before in this thread:
QTTabBar
(http://qttabbar.wikidot.com/)
It's a great extension for Windows Explorer and makes navigation a whole lot easier and very versatile.
Everything about it seems extremely well thought-through, and the amount of options and tweaks is incredible.
Something tells me Bee-liever would probably also like it ;-)
(https://i.imgur.com/8o6dSWzm.jpg) (https://i.imgur.com/8o6dSWz.png)
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Increasingly basic, on Win 7, 10 or both:
Daily or nearly so:
MusicBee
Spotify
Microft Edge and Vivaldi browsers
Microsoft Office Professional 2007 -yes, still
OneNote
Regular or frequent:
Macrium Reflect and RealTimeSync
PaintShop Pro 2021 Ultimate
FastStone Image Viewer
PHOTOfunSTUDIO
Nitro Reader 5
Skype
Zoom
Occasional only, still essential:
Notepad ++
Minitab
Tableau
Zune
Windows Media Center
Windows Media Player
I also have a Fire 10 and 7 tablets with their own apps that I also use daily for Kindle, Sudoku, Washington Post access, and selected browsing
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Love GIMP as a free alternative to photoshop. Use it mainly to edit my paintings and drawings.