Coming In Your Ears (Winamp)

Member Name: utero

Product:	Winamp
Date:	03/11/09 (53 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Free, Great audio quality from radio

Disadvantages: None

A nice bit of music breaks the silence of being a keyboard warrior. But taking your pic from your collection of MP3's can soon get tiresome and samey. That's where listening to the radio comes in. Now I'm sure I'm not the only one who can't stand the inane witterings of some of the new Radio 1 presenters during the daytime, I mention no names of course but some make me want to put 'cotton' in my ears.

Anyway I digress, if you have broadband connection then internet radio is the way to go, there's an amazing array of music out there streaming 24/7, you just have to know how to capture it.

My new weapon of choice is Winamp. This free piece of software has been around for several years now and I remember having a copy back in the day of MP3 infancy and when Napster was all the rage. The software allows to to play back MP3's, compile playlists and basically works like Itunes but it looks a little sexier and less memory consuming.

Playing back cd's and video etc is pretty much a given for most media players and this one is no different. As long as your music plays fine then there's not much more you can ask.

Nope what I like about Winamp is it's online radio channels that I've been really getting into over the past week. Right now I've been listening to an alternative rock channel and so far I've had Red Hot Chili Peppers offering up a track from the Coneheads soundtrack before melting into the sublime Wicked Game from Chris Isaak. The choice is incredibly diverse but there's bound to be something to suit your mood.

Accessing the radio output is simple. I clicked on the channel, in this case AOL Radio, you get a brief advert for an American drug before the music kicks in. The sound quality is frankly fantastic. The audio is clear and almost CD quality and I've had no buffer problems on my connection. Winamp also tells you what is playing, who the artist is and what album the track is available on. So far I've come across music from artists I've never heard of but it's caught my attention.

All genres are pretty much catered for although most are inclined towards the American market. But no matter, music is international and as background noise I'm very happy with what I've been hearing. No DJ chatter, only the occasional advert, just music and nothing more.

You can download Winamp from www.winamp.com. C'mon give your ears some aural pleasure!

Summary: A great piece of software for accessing loads of music while you work

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