Can WMP 10 display Albums sorted by Artist?

[Jonathon Watkins]

Guys,

I quite like WMP10, but I can't seem to display the albums in the same was as I can in MusicMatch. What I want to do is list all albums, sorted by artist, on the top level like this:

http://www.digitalmediathoughts.com/media/users/90/Musicmatch.jpg

The closest I can get in WMP is this:

http://www.digitalmediathoughts.com/media/users/90/WMP1.jpg

The problem is that I want to see all the albums, sorted by artist, just like you would with your physical CDs. I don't want the extra layer of 'Artist' to drill down to the album. The WMP 'Album' view is no use as you can't sort them by artist, or display the tracks.

Any ideas of settings or plugins that will configure WMP to show the same layout as Musicmatch? Cheers.

[Jonathon Watkins]

Any thoughts guys?

[Darius Wey]

Sorry Jonathon, I don't know why I didn't see this thread earlier...

So what you're looking to do is to ditch the tree view that WMP10 uses in preference for the unified library interface that MM uses?

[Jonathon Watkins]

So what you're looking to do is to ditch the tree view that WMP10 uses in preference for the unified library interface that MM uses?

In a word, Yes. I simply want to view my music as if it was on the shelf.

All Albums, sorted by artist, with the ability to drill down to track level if I click on an album. Is that not logical? It seems like I can't do it thought. :-/

The only reason I am moving away from Musicmatch is that it does not support output from four speakers. With WMP, the sound comes out of 4 speakers with no problem. I have spent many hours trying to set up MusicMatch to do the same, only to find a buried knowledgebase article on the MM site that says they only output to two speakers. Duh! If only MM could output to more I would stick with it.

I tried Winamp & it's kind of OK, if I add in a few plugins etc.

I would just like one player to do it all and can't seem to get that at the moment.

[Darius Wey]

The only reason I am moving away from Musicmatch is that it does not support output from four speakers. With WMP, the sound comes out of 4 speakers with no problem. I have spent many hours trying to set up MusicMatch to do the same, only to find a buried knowledgebase article on the MM site that says they only output to two speakers. Duh! If only MM could output to more I would stick with it.

Interesting. How are you configuring your speaker setup, and more importantly, what sound card are you using? I'm chanelling audio through 4 speakers in MusicMatch just fine.

[Jonathon Watkins]

Interesting. How are you configuring your speaker setup, and more importantly, what sound card are you using? I'm chanelling audio through 4 speakers in MusicMatch just fine.

Have a look here (http://wwws.musicmatch.com/faq/PLAY041.htm) and here (http://wwws.musicmatch.com/faq/PLAY022.htm) in the Musicmatch knowledge-base:

Does Musicmatch Jukebox support surround sound or multi channel playback

Musicmatch Jukebox supports stereo output, but does not currently and has not previously supported multi-channel or surround sound output. While some customers have reported that previous versions of Musicmatch Jukebox supported rear-channel output, there has never been functionality that supported this feature. Instead, hearing rear-channel output during playback with Musicmatch Jukebox is likely a function of the system''s sound hardware drivers, some of which provide decoding functionality to simulate multi-channel output from the stereo signal on the wave channel of the sound hardware''s mixer control. Other playback applications may provide support for surround sound by providing their own multi-channel decoding functionality.

It used to work on version 7 for me on my old computer, but since going from version 8 an up on my new system (with Nvidia soundstorm chipset), it does not work. Believe me, I have tried for hours to get this to work with all possible combinations of speakers in various ports, software settings etc.

Windows Media player just WORKS right off. I have not been able to get sound out of all speakers at all on the new motherboard with Musicmatch. :x

[Darius Wey]

Instead, hearing rear-channel output during playback with Musicmatch Jukebox is likely a function of the system's sound hardware drivers, some of which provide decoding functionality to simulate multi-channel output from the stereo signal on the wave channel of the sound hardware''s mixer control.

That's what I suspected. I've got MM10 running on my desktop at the moment, and four-speaker audio output is working fine for me at the moment (Creative SB Live! 5.1 w/ Live! Drive IR). I'll just assume NVIDIA's chipset doesn't provide for hardware decoding.

What a bummer...

Now to see if WMP can be configured to display library contents like MM... I'll get back to you on that one.

[Jonathon Watkins]

That's what I suspected. I've got MM10 running on my desktop at the moment, and four-speaker audio output is working fine for me at the moment (Creative SB Live! 5.1 w/ Live! Drive IR). I'll just assume NVIDIA's chipset doesn't provide for hardware decoding.

I could go back to by Soundblaster Live, but that's a backwards step from the NVidia Soundstorm. :(


Now to see if WMP can be configured to display library contents like MM... I'll get back to you on that one.

It's worth a go.