Amazing next to Windows Media Player 12

Despite the fact that some applets will be excluded from the delivery of Windows 7, Windows Media Player will remain part of the operating system, although it will be updated to version 12. Fortunately, until this number is a damn dozen, the new version of the player is endowed with some new features.

The program interface itself has become lighter and brighter than its predecessor. Some controls were moved to another place, but in general, the interface should be familiar to users of version 11 of the media player. One of the most notable changes is the rejection of the “Now playing” button, which used to take the user to the current playlist.


This change was made in connection with an attempt to completely separate the management of the library and the currently playing songs. All this resulted in the appearance of two separate modes: “Now Playing View” (“Played”) and “Library View” (“Library”). The library management mode contains all the features familiar to users of the player’s 11th version, and “Now Playing View” contains a playlist, visualizations and video. Library viewing mode (click on the image to enlarge) The video viewing mode has become minimalistic and, in fact, is just a window with the contents. However, the first impression may be misleading: the video controls remain in place.












The content control panel (that video, that audio), as you see, has not changed much, but the playlist itself has undergone minor cosmetic changes. Playlist control buttons (save and clear) are brought to the fore.



You can now look at the covers while enjoying visualization.



Also, Windows Media Player 12 supports mini-previews directly from the Windows 7



taskbar. Jump List player support is also associated with the same taskbar. Looking at it, it seems that Windows Media Player is trying to guess all possible user jumps in order to catch it in the right place.



In addition to dividing the player into two modes, the rest works the same as in its predecessor. Of course, the developers added some minor improvements, such as automatically listening to a song (when you hover over a song, its first 15 seconds are played). The library is now able to display all types of media, and not each separately, as it was before.



The main drawback of many media players, and Windows Media Player is no exception, is the lack of the right set of codecs right out of the box. Of course, the Windows media player can itself download the necessary codecs over the network, but this is the least that it can offer. Now the player supports H.264, AAC, Xvid and DivX in addition to the existing version 11 supporting MPEG2, WMV, MP3 and other formats. Support for these formats will make version 12 of the player capable of reproducing the largest amount of media found on the Internet right out of the box.

Another area that has been worked out in detail in the new version is work on network protocols. With the previous version of the player, the user could browse libraries of other users on the local network (if they also use Windows Media Player). The new version will have the ability to view not only the Windows Media Player libraries, but also the iTunes player, and with support for H.264 and AAC - and calmly play most of the media for iTunes. Yes, it is the “majority” because Apple will never license FairPlay DRM to third parties, so Windows Media Player will not be able to play DRM-protected iTunes Store media.

In addition to improving the library, the new version works more reliably with audio and video on remote devices (a new feature called “Play To”: it can send streams to other computers in your home group. Thus, you can view your library on a laptop that’s on in fact, an HTPC connected to your sound system is connected.In



addition to supporting streaming to remote PCs, the player also supports the management of Digital Living Network Alliance v1.5 (DLNA) devices. ripping audio and / or video. So, in addition to supporting HTPC, you can work with Sonox , for example. Each such device has its own playlist and playback settings; they can be controlled from a small window.



If the device does not support the stream format, it will be converted to an understandable device on the fly.

Despite the fact that version 12 of the player is very similar to version 11, it nonetheless contains something new. Instead of ignoring the success of iTunes and denying the existence of media formats not developed by Microsoft, Microsoft decided to recognize this reality and tried to do everything to make the user as comfortable as possible with the player. This position provides us with the opportunity to assess the changes in Microsoft's policy, its fresh look at some things that were previously done in a completely different way. As a result, an improvement in Windows Media Player. Such steps of Microsoft are useful both for the consumer and for the corporation itself. The main thing is not to stop there. We wish them good luck.