That's it people, iTunes is over (at least for me). Why? you might ask, well, the answer is "because Songbird, a new open source software that does EVERYTHING iTunes does, only takes less resources, it does it faster and with the possibility to have Add-ons.
I've been hearing about Songbird for a long time online, and today I decided to try it. Typed
Songbird on google and download it from the huge button in the middle of the official website.
It took close to nothing to install and, to my surprise, it allows you to import your library from iTunes (which, even tho I use(d) iTunes, didn't do) and also to just scan your library as iTunes did.
I left it scanning my ~10 Gb music library while I went to the bathroom and after I came back, it was all ready to go!
OK, so I get this iTunes-like program... lets start... TWEAKING!
Everything works pretty much like Firefox, with the Add-ons and so on, so just click on Tools>Add-ons and "Get Exensions". This is was my choice:
- Lyricmaster: This Add-on automatically downloads Lyrics for your songs and gives you the choice to store them on your machine
- The Exorcist: Delete clone songs or find Ghost (missing) songs from your libraries
- MinimizeToTray Revived (mintrayR): this lets you minimize songbird in the system tray with some basic, iTunish options, great tool that I still don't know why it isn't there by default...
As far as themes is concerned ("Feathers" in songbird) I downloaded a few but decided to stay with the default feather (Gonzo)
As I'm typing this, I'm listening to SkyFm over Shoutcast online radio stations, great tool
Songbird also has last.fm related tools (Which I'll start using as soon as I create an account in like... 10 minutes)
Another great tool is "mashtape" which gets album info, singer info and youtube videos from the moment you click on a song.
Here is what it looks like:
PS: it has iPod and iTouch (and iPhone I presume) support, so no excuses from Mac lovers!
