How to Use the New Winamp Beta Before the Updated Version Drops in 2019
Last week, Radionomy CEO Alexander Sabunjian announced that the company plans to remake Winamp , the classic music player best known as Windows – the first iTunes alternative, to make it more important to our streaming-centric audio world. This version will be released in 2019.
Until then, the old Winamp is back! That is, it is now compatible with Windows 8 and Windows 10, making it a more viable option for people who don’t use older hardware. In truth, despite being an outdated tool in many ways that hasn’t been updated since 2013, Winamp has a loyal fan base of over 100 million monthly users worldwide, according to Techcrunch .
The current Winamp 5.8 beta is the same Winamp you knew before. It’s still an interesting and highly customizable audio and video player that might be worth your time if you’re still collecting gig pirate chips or subscribing to podcasts via its RSS feed.
What does Winamp actually do?
Winamp is a “universal media player”. It plays audio and video files and, more importantly, gives you an easy and visually appealing way to access those files in one place. You can take your CDs and (gasps) pirated music and collect them into a single “your music” directory. Back in the days of specialized MP3 players, you could also use it to manage the files stored on your device. If you still have it – or want to keep your music files on your Android device – go crazy.
During its heyday, Winamp stood out from the competition in that it was highly customizable. At a time when browser extensions weren’t particularly common, Winamp offered a wide variety of software plugins that could give you everything from improved performance and hotkeys to audio streaming .
However, many of his most beloved features were purely cosmetic. You can change player skin by changing browser windows and fonts using thousands of official and custom options. And, of course, there was a visualizer – a tool that turned the sine wave of a song into a kind of laser light show.
Why should I try Winamp (or come back)?
While the average music lover doesn’t usually need an audio library, Winamp is as useful now as it was in its prime for those who still need it. Whether you’re downloading high-quality audio files, wanting to sift through personal audio recordings, or storing podcasts on a desktop or laptop with fewer podcast “applications”, there are many use cases where you can easily sort your audio recordings. useful.
Since buying music is now much less common, the appeal of a music player without a store becomes even more compelling. As a teenager, I used to store my music on iTunes, but Apple’s current sales tactics can seem overwhelming at times.
Technically, the same is true for storing and playing video files. While I think of Winamp primarily as a music player, and with a reboot next year focusing on audio, Winamp doesn’t feel as important in this area.
What about a renderer?
Oh, don’t worry. He’s still here.
What changed?
As we mentioned earlier, Winamp didn’t get updated in five years until last week, so depending on when you last used it, it’s probably not much.
Apart from compatibility with Windows 8 and 10, the biggest change in the latest version of Winamp is the elimination of the paid Winamp Pro app service. Winamp Pro charged monthly fees for better services like the ability to rip high bit rate audio CDs and certain video codecs, and I doubt many will pay for that in 2018.
If you follow Winamp and want a detailed changelog, you can check them out on the Winamp forums .
What will happen to Winamp?
Radionomy will release an upgraded version of Winamp next year. According to Sabunjian, this version modernizes the concept of a “universal audio player”, among other things, by including digital radio libraries and subscription-based music services such as Spotify and Apple Music.
How will it work? Your guess is as good as mine.
If so, life will become much easier for many listeners. Oddly enough, most of my friends listen to music through several music services, YouTube and download podcasts. Some people even still download songs and / or buy records. If Winamp could compile all of these things for every person and make it searchable, it would be a must-have application.
Before you leave … Can you impress me with another one of those cute GIF visualizers?
Rock’n’roll.
Updated Oct 25, 2018 8:48 PM EST : We removed a line from the footage stating that iTunes is adding songs to users’ playlists as a sales tactic. In the past, Apple has recommended songs through the Genius recommendation feature, but not only as a purchase recommendation.