foobar2000

Are you a Windows user? What media player do you use to play audio tracks? The default Windows Media Player is good enough for you to playback audio tracks but it consumes more resource, especially the latest Windows Media Player 11. I remember many years ago, WInamp is a very popular software to play mp3s. However, that is not really light-weight enough.

Introducing foobar2000 for your audio listening needs.

foobar2000 is a freeware audio player for Windows. It has the following features:

• Audio formats supported natively: MP1, MP2, MP3, MP4, MPC, AAC, Ogg Vorbis, FLAC / Ogg FLAC, WavPack, WAV, AIFF, AU, SND, CDDA, WMA.
• More audio formats supported through optional components, official or third-party.
• Full unicode support.
• Customizable user interface layout (new in version 0.9.5).
• Advanced tagging capabilities.
• Support for ripping Audio CDs as well as transcoding all supported audio formats using the Converter component.
• ReplayGain support - both playback and calculation.
• Customizable keyboard shortcuts.
• Open component architecture allowing third-party developers to extend functionality of the player.

You can check out the screenshots on how you can customize foobar2000. Another thing good about foobar is, you can download additional components to enhance foobar2000 for better experience.

Few days ago, I downloaded some mp3 in .APE and .CUE format. These files can be open by Monkey's Audio or Winamp. I didn't want to install Winamp since I already have foobar2000 installed. Till then, I noticed that there is an additional component meant for Monkey's Audio for foobar2000. After installation, I'm able to playback the .APE audio in my foobar2000 player.


My foobar2000 customization

Another great feature that I love about foobar2000 is, it remembers your last playlist and you can create multiple playlists that will always be available every time you open up foobar2000 (unless you remove the playlist).

Best of all, it's FREE. Download foobar2000 and try out today.