I want to play a CD real quick to make sure it burned correctly. (And before anyone bitches about a CD in 2012, its a collection of sound cues for a community theatre, so fuck you).

I could download a quick and simple CD player program. But why, I mean-- I do have Windows 7, and it comes with MEDIA CENTER! Surely this must be awesome and dynamic way to quickly experience rich multimedia expereinces. Right? Right?

Start up time: nearly 30 seconds, including an opening animation and theme song. What? No, I just want to play a CD.

Now-- select from a list of 5 different options, like Music and Pictures and-- I HAVE A FUCKING AUDIO CD IN THE PLAYER! GUESS!

Okay, drill down to music and-- HUGE PAUSE!  Why? Well, so it can go to the Internet and grab a while list of albums that I might want to listen to. Puke album art onto the screen. I'm sure there's helpful links to some music store.

 No. Play the fucking CD in the fucking CD player you whore.  Finally find the "CD in the fucking CD tray" option. Plays it, right? Right? HAHAHAAHA I LAUGH AT YOU!

No. Two menus to drill down through before I finally reach the track list.  Press play. Thank Buddah-fucking Christ, it actually plays AND auto-advances the track.

Of course, it has to fuck up even this, the most simplest of tasks.  Track 1-- 0:17 seconds. I know that because it displayed it on screen.  Track 2 is 1:01. I know that because I cut the track myself, and Media Center is a lying, bloated whalefucker.

(For reference, I added MULTIPLE arrows, because even if I circled the WTF in red, you wouldn't see it through the background that looks like an epileptic child just threw up his Fruit Loops all over a mutilated cadaver. And that's not ever talking about the fact that the on screen data flies about and changes position ever 3 seconds)

 That's position 0:29/0:17

The iPod: because even if all its features are non-functional, it still has more useful features than your $10000 CD player / space heater.

TRWTF is obviously Windows Media Center [Shameless plug] Why don't you use Winamp. You have to install it once and then it will start playing your CD automatically when you put it in your cupholder... uh drive. It is worth saving your frustration :) [/Shameless plug]

Why didn't you use Windows Media Player? Using Media Center to validate a CD plays is akin to using MS Word to verify a plain text file can be opened.

That is if Word defaulted to Wingdings and tried to tell you cat was supposed to be spelled 'cheeseburger'.

keigezellig:

TRWTF is obviously Windows Media Center [Shameless plug] Why don't you use Winamp SSDS. You have to install it once and then it will start playing your CD automatically when you put it in your cupholder... uh drive rename it to cdplay.exe and type xxsrvg. It is worth saving your frustration :) [/Shameless plug]

SSTFY

Brillant! I've had a similar experience on an Acer laptop trying to play a DVD. The laptop comes with some app from Acer for that precise purpose, but it's just impossible to get it to play the disc. Unfortunately, it opens up the moment you put in a DVD, so you have to force quit it and use VLC or something instead. Horrible. Thank God for OSX.

TGV:

Thank God for OSX.

Oh Please! Worst example! Even VLC is broken in OSX. Thank god for MPlayer

ubersoldat:

Oh Please! Worst example! Even VLC is broken in OSX. Thank god for MPlayer

That VLC is broken on OSX is obviously the fault of ... OSX?

Wow, not sure if I am missing some weird form of satire here. Windows Media Center is exactly that: A media center, like XBMC, mediaportal, appleTV, you name it. It provides a television-friendly interface to index and play back your music and videos. But hey, I understand: If we want to get a specific task done (burning audiotracks to a cd), just launch a random application on your computer, then complain it doesn't do what you want. If only there was a something that would let us look up the best tool for the job *cough*

boe2:

If only there was a something that would let us look up the best tool for the job *https://www.google.com/#q=burn+audio+cd+windows*

I tried your link, but none of the results seemed to talk about playing an audio CD. Fucking google is broken now, too.

MathNerdCNU:

Why didn't you use Windows Media Player?

Would have been my first thought, but I've not touched that in over 10 years so didn't know if later versions of Windows actually includes it.

I used the older cdplayer.exe under Win95/NT4 to play CDs (then found one that worked with CDDB to show the track listings) before using WMP for both audio and video. On a W2K laptop, I found WMP stuttered with MP3s so someone suggested WinAmp which experienced no pops/stuttering so I stuck to that.

keigezellig:

Why don't you use Winamp

 

Some years back I grew to dislik WinAmp - it got bloaty and crashy, as well as having difficulty playing some files unless I installed numerous codecs packs. Someone suggested VLC and it did everything threw at it - including FLVs.

It's not perfect -  it ignored its hotkeys for skipping forwards/backwards, and you experience some tearing if skipping through AVIs but on the whole it's quite lightweight and good for what it does.

(used under Linux and W7 - couldn't get on with Mplayer)

 1) I have Winamp and love it. I've never associated it with audio CDs, since I would put in a CD, and it would wipe out my current playlist. I don't know if it has since changed to open in the Meida section rather than the main playlist. That'd be nice. I couldn't be arsed to find out, since I needed to check one and a half minutes of audio.

2) Whenever I complain about Windows 7, I get told off about how its Teh BEst and most improved Windows EVER and I should be fucked with a blowfish for not using each and every one of its AMAZZING!!!1 features.  And the absolute best and most amazing feature that will work all the time and never fail is the search box in the Start menu.

I had no idea where Media Player is on the new machine. So I did start, and typed in Media. The first and only thing that appeared was, you guessed it, Media Center. So, silly me, I assumed that the Start Search automatiaclly provided results that are only the best and most richest experiences. I also assumed that Microsoft had renamed WMP, since they seem to rename their products on a month basis.

All of this doesn't matter, since the tool they came back to me with can't even properly display the track length on a CD-- a technology first standardized in 1980.

Lorne Kates:

All of this doesn't matter, since the tool they came back to me with can't even properly display the track length on a CD-- a technology first standardized in 1980.

There's your problem you Luddite. Stop using old stuff. Why are you so resistant to change?

boomzilla:

Lorne Kates:

All of this doesn't matter, since the tool they came back to me with can't even properly display the track length on a CD-- a technology first standardized in 1980.

There's your problem you Luddite. Stop using old stuff. Why are you so resistant to change?

 

You can't fuck an MP3.

Lorne Kates:

boomzilla:

Lorne Kates:

All of this doesn't matter, since the tool they came back to me with can't even properly display the track length on a CD-- a technology first standardized in 1980.

There's your problem you Luddite. Stop using old stuff. Why are you so resistant to change?

You can't fuck an MP3.

Check and mate! Take that, Windows 7!

TGV:

Filed under: yoohoo blakeyrat where are you?

At 3:35 AM? You think... sleep maybe?

Lorne Kates:

Whenever I complain about Windows 7, I get told off about how its Teh BEst and most improved Windows EVER

Windows 7 is fucking Windows Vista SP2. Microsoft's marketers discovered that Vista had so much stigma attached to it people would buy Vista with a different name, so they just slapped a different name on Vista and put it on shelves. It's the same thing they're doing with Windows 8/Blue, this time on purpose.

7 is obviously a meaningless shovelware name. It's NT 6.1 and tenth (1.0, 2.0, 3.0, 3.1, 95, 98, ME, XP, Vista, 7) consumer version of Windows. 8 is even moreseo in this regard, granted, because they saved the real name (Blue) for the Mojave rather then the public beta.

ubersoldat:

TGV:

Thank God for OSX.

Oh Please! Worst example! Even VLC is broken in OSX. Thank god for MPlayer

You what? VLC under OS X is working for me right now. In all the time I've used it on OS X, I've only seen one bug (there's this weird limit to reducing the window size where it just stops, although this is at the point where only really strange people want the window smaller, so no one cares enough to make a big effort changing it).

Where's the brokenness?

eh... i get it, the point of this is ranting about media center, but... 1. open tray 2. close tray 3. wait for the autorun prompt 4. select "play with windows media player" 5. joy and rainbowz, it works! so I'd say TRWTF in this case is you, sorry. Media Center, afaik, was meant kind of like the Metro interface, for TVs, before Metro was made...

You'll be happy to know the Media Center isn't in the default Windows 8 install (or so I've read; never installed the default version...)

I used to like Winamp, spent many hours creating visualizations, but it did get a bit crashy; even with visualizations off.

VLC is great for videos (fansubbed anime...), but I use WMP for music.

bgodot:

You'll be happy to know the Media Center isn't in the default Windows 8 install (or so I've read; never installed the default version...)

I for one am not happy about that. I do have a media center PC that I use in conjunction with my PC and hifi installation. I've taken it from XP Media Center Edition, over Windows Vista to Windows 7 now and I guess it will stay like this until it dies.

bgodot:

I used to like Winamp, spent many hours creating visualizations, but it did get a bit crashy; even with visualizations off.

VLC is great for videos (fansubbed anime...), but I use WMP for music.

 

I used Winamp as well back in the days,but I have since switched to foobar2000. Clean interface, no real theme support that I know of (but I didn't search for it either since the default is pretty usable and thats what counts in my book), just works(tm).

 

MiffTheFox:

Windows 7 is fucking Windows Vista SP2.

Pics or it didn't happen.

That's funny, just before reading this thread I was playing an OGG file with VLC and I had the exact same problem (shorter reported length than it actually is).

Just a test? Open Windows Explorer at the drive list, find drive with CD. Right-click, "Play". Let Windows figure out what it plays CDs with. Done.

bjolling:

I for one am not happy about that. I do have a media center PC that I use in conjunction with my PC and hifi installation.

Media Center is a paid add-on for Windows 8 Pro (supposedly it'll cost something like $20), but you can get it for free until January 31st (you can order the key even if you haven't bought Windows 8 yet).
Note that for some reason, only Windows 8 Pro can get the media center add-on - you can't install it on non-pro (home) version, nor on Enterprise.

SEMI-HYBRID code:

autorun

 

You leave this enabled?!?  I suppose that makes it easier to launch your Encarata CD-ROM to look up facts about cassette tapes, so that when you Telix into your friend's BBS, you can post a really awesome response in the Audio Technology discussion. Can you believe some luddites are still using C60 tapes because they sound warmer, when the obviously superior C90 tapes give you more space, and you can't even notice ANY signal degredation when taping an AM broadcast, anyways.

ender:

bjolling:

I for one am not happy about that. I do have a media center PC that I use in conjunction with my PC and hifi installation.

Media Center is a paid add-on for Windows 8 Pro (supposedly it'll cost something like $20), but you can get it for free until January 31st (you can order the key even if you haven't bought Windows 8 yet).
Note that for some reason, only Windows 8 Pro can get the media center add-on - you can't install it on non-pro (home) version, nor on Enterprise.

Confusopoly!

boh:

MiffTheFox:

Windows 7 is fucking Windows Vista SP2.

Pics or it didn't happen.

Run GPEDIT.MSC and look for Policy 34.

 

alegr:

boh:

MiffTheFox:

Windows 7 is fucking Windows Vista SP2.

Pics or it didn't happen.

Run GPEDIT.MSC and look for Policy 34.

Is that related to Rule #34 of the internet?

 

Zecc:

alegr:

boh:

MiffTheFox:

Windows 7 is fucking Windows Vista SP2.

Pics or it didn't happen.

Run GPEDIT.MSC and look for Policy 34.

Is that related to Rule #34 of the internet?

 

There's always one.

MiffTheFox:

Windows 7 is fucking Windows Vista SP2

There was a Vista SP2.  Windows 7 is fucking Vista SP3.  Get it right.

El_Heffe:

Windows 7 is fucking Vista SP3.

Pics or it didn't happen.

Lorne Kates:

SEMI-HYBRID code:

autorun

 

You leave this enabled?!?  I suppose that makes it easier to launch your Encarata CD-ROM to look up facts about cassette tapes

usually when I insert a cd/usb dongle to my computer, I want to open its contents right away. I can either open Explorer window and select the device, or click "Explore the contents of the device" in the autorun popup. 1. autorun method uses 1 click less 2. It's still about the same, time-wise, so I see no reason to waste my time looking for the option to turn it off.

Lorne just came out of the stasis tube. He thinks Autorun still works like it did in Windows 98.

boe2:

not sure if I am missing some weird form of satire here

It's Lorne Kates. Of course it's satire.

blakeyrat:

Lorne just came out of the stasis tube. He thinks Autorun still works like it did in Windows 98.

 

It's not my fault. Someone plugged in a USB key loaded with an autorun command that opened the tubes.

If only I'd gotten the tubes running earlier, they'd be using Windows 95. No USB support. Pity me.

Lorne Kates:

2) Whenever I complain about Windows 7, I get told off about how its Teh BEst and most improved Windows EVER and I should be fucked with a blowfish for not using each and every one of its AMAZZING!!!1 features.  And the absolute best and most amazing feature that will work all the time and never fail is the search box in the Start menu.

I type in Media and get three programs in the results: Media Manager, Windows Media Center, Windows Media Player.  It's not a mind reader, it didn't know that you wanted to play it.  Stupid rant. :P

 If you upgrade a 7 system to 8, you can keep media center.

 

I suspect it's due to Googlrola making patent license noise, maybe MS wants to trim their liability.

Lorne Kates:

You can't fuck an MP3.

Though, if you can fuck a CD, your manhood is not something to be proud of...

Anonymouse:

Lorne Kates:

You can't fuck an MP3.

Though, if you can fuck a CD, your manhood is not something to be proud of...

 

It's not small, it's a compression artifact.

 

 So it's really ugly?

dhromed:

 So it's really ugly?

 

Some women like it blocky.

 

 None of them have come to our minecraft world yet. :'(

dhromed:

None of them have come to our minecraft world yet. :'(

Install this mod.

blakeyrat:

dhromed:

None of them have come to our minecraft world yet. :'(

Install this mod.

 

What's really fun is that someone out there is probably masturbating over that mod.

DescentJS:

What's really fun is that someone out there is probably masturbating over that mod.

something something cutting corners something

blakeyrat:

dhromed:

None of them have come to our minecraft world yet. :'(

Install this mod.

 

I like it!