[joethebus]

My intention is to put all my music on WMP (in WAV so I don't get irritated by it sounding compressed - memory is cheap!) but I can't get the WMP 11 on my laptop to recognise any of the music on my computer and put it in the library. Laptop is a compaq nx9010 with Windows XP Professional which otherwise seems to work OK.

My PC, also running XP Pro and WMP 11does have a library which works (after a fashion) so I don't think I'm asking it to do anything it shouldn't be able to do.

The message I get on the laptop is
There are no items in this library yet - the player is searching for digital media files in the background. click here to add files to the library now.

I have done the obvious things like look at help, and online help, and on this forum but am getting nowhere. Also I have wiped WMP 11 and re-installed it.

Advice much welcomed.

joethebus

[evilfantasy]

You might try re-installing it again. Be sure to restart in between and maybe even run the Disk Cleaner before restarting. I had some WMP problems once and it took re-installing it 3 times before it started working again.

My real suggestion would be to use another media player though. WMP is a typical MS PITA most of the time (for me anyway). I prefer the free version of www.mediamonkey.com for my music. It goes way beyond WMP.

[joethebus]

Thank you for that advice evilfantasy; I have been using Media Monkey a bit as it happens and have noticed that it does at least work!

What I would like to be able to do is have a collection of CDs in WAV quality that I can access in one directory, album information, artwork, etc., and the ability to rip new CDs simply to that directory.

Also it would be cool to access, in a separate directory, all the motley stuff I have collected over the years and would like to listen to or search through just every now and again. Is that possible?

WMP tends to cut out every now and again when I'm listening to it (by finding a file and asking for it to be played with WMP). Media Monkey seems a good deal more stable, which is a good thing, so I'm not averse to going down that road. On the other hand why can't Microsoft with all their resources put up a media player that works?

My first instinct was to go with software that if produced by the operating software developers ought at least to be compatible with the operating system and in the long term should be more reliable.

Is that naive? Probably. Can you advise me on how to set MM up so it will do what I want, please?

With many thanks

joethebus

[evilfantasy]

The free version of MM is limited as is WMP. The main problems with WMP is they are too concerned with copyright and in turn it degrades the quality of WMP.

It sounds like, for free, you will need to use a mix of different software. A player, a converter and maybe even a separate burner, again, WMP is concerned with copyright so ripping/burning with it can be a pain.

Have a look through http://filehippo.com/ and you will find everything you need.

[joethebus]

Thanks again evilfantasy.

Actually I already bought MM Gold several weeks ago and still have the key number, which should be good and solve some of the problems you mention. Snag is that for some reason now MM is refusing to open. After that started happening earlier this evening (my time in UK) I put in some extra RAM increasing my 532 whatever they are units to 1032 the most the laptop can handle and now nothing at all seems to work.

I don't quite know what to try next. There are boxes at the bottom of this page entreating me to try repair software for WMP. Is that likely to work?

I put off every major computer job as long as I can because it always ends up being a horrible experience and this exercise looks like it is going to be just the same as ever. Hey ho.

As ever advice welcome. I'll have a look at your recomended link now.

With best wishes

Joe

[evilfantasy]

Certainly sounds like you have more issues then just the media player acting up. Maybe someone else will chime in. I'm not sure what to think about that...

[joethebus]

Thank you for your support so far, evilfantasy dude. I'm not that good at quitting when I'm behind, and don't really think what is wrong with my system is terminal or that the whole computer is totally trashed as you seem to suggest. Poorly rather, I'd say!

I have been trying to un-install then re-install MM but of course Windows won't let you actually do that. So when I try to re-load MM after re-installing it still seems to be trying to play a track that I was listening to several days ago. There's no way into MM that I know that will enable me to unravel what's happening so I can wipe that and get it to start again from scratch. But come on. there must be someone out there who has had this problem or similar and can advise on how to fix it?

I haven't even got to my supplementary questions yet.

Or do I accept what the Apple brigade keep telling me. That if I want to listen to music I have to get a Mac!

Nonplussed still, which is not an unfamiliar condition

joethebus

[joethebus]

Quick update. After cleaning off all the stuff I thought I might not need and a C drive defrag I found the Media Monkey forum and read all the stuff I could find about MM; and discovered MM won't work without Apple's Quickdrive (I wasn't so wrong about apple/mac then). So I installed Quickdrive and now Media Monkey works.

Now about what I really wanted to know. How do I persuade the filing system to make any sense and give me album info. without me having to type it all in from the CD sleeves?

I'm sorry I'm such a dinosaur.

joethebus

[evilfantasy]

MM has a tag from the web feature. You do need the song title and usually album name already filled in though.

Apple is just like MS. They don't play well with others...