Tag Archives: Windows Media Player

Add Global Hotkeys Support To Windows Media Player With WMP Keys

by on
1
Microsoft has been struggling for a while now, to get more people to use its Windows Media Player application. The application isn't used by many people anymore due to lack of features that are usually found in other third-party apps like KMPlayer and VLC, both of which handle audio as well as video files much better than Microsoft's offering. Yet, many casual users still rely on WMP because it comes with Windows and requires no further installation. Those of you who use it as their default app to play media files would be aware that it doesn't support global hotkeys by default. Global hotkeys aid in quickly navigating the app via keyboard shortcuts without having to bring up the player's window and use the mouse; for instance, you wouldn't have to bring the app into focus in order to change a song or turn down the volume, with the appropriate hotkeys. WMP Keys is a Windows Media Player plugin that enables this feature. It  doesn't boasts a truckload of options, but it still gets the job done and does it fairly well. Read More

How To Install Lyrics Plugin For Windows 8 Media Player [Tip]

by on
1
Windows Media Player is widely used to not only manage huge music collection, but also to create and share music playlists across the Homegroup users. Although Windows Media Player provides an easy way to organize music playlists, share media files with network users and automatically manage music files in pre-defined categories, it doesn't come with an option to automatically download and display lyrics of songs. If you've been looking for a lyrics plugin for Windows 8 Media Player, give Lyrics Plugin a try. It's lightweight lyrics plugin for Windows Media Player that also supports the latest version - Windows Media Player 12. Unlike other media player lyrics plugins, it doesn’t require following a lengthy process to integrate the plugin; just run the installer and it will automatically add the plugin to Windows Media Player. Read More

Run Multiple Instances Of Windows Media Player At A Time

by on
4
Even though some users like to replace the Windows Media Player with a third party media player as their default choice, some simply like to stick with it, as Windows Media Player is also a very decent choice for accessing and organizing your media collection. Moreover, Microsoft is also on the continuous improvement and enhancement of Windows Media Player features, with every new iteration. The main reason for people switching to other media players is that it lacks various advanced features and codecs that are available in powerful players VLC, Winamp and KMPlayer, by default. For this reason, it is quite common to see someone using a third party player for watching movies and using Windows Media Player for listening to music. One of the very interesting features lacking in Windows Media Player is the ability to run multiple instances of the application at a time. This means that, using Windows Media Player, you cannot run multiple media files at one time, a feature that most third party media players have. If you are an absolute Windows Media Player fanatic, and want to have multiple instance feature at your disposable, then give Multiple Windows Media Player a shot. It is a portable application that lets you run multiple instances of Windows Media Player 12 on Windows 7. Every time you launch Windows Media Player, will open up in its own window, letting you select different media files for each. Read More

Stealth Player: A Hotkey Controlled Music Player Without An Interface

by on
6
Listening to music while working on the computer is pretty common among regular PC users, but with all the flashy interfaces that come with the latest audio players, getting distracted from your work is a major issue. Other than the interface, some audio players, such as the native Windows Media Player, hog too much memory, and might interfere with ongoing work. Stealth Player is an open source audio player that takes care of all these problems by providing users with ‘nothing’! That’s right, the music player doesn’t host an interface; instead, it just has a system tray icon, with playback being controlled through hot keys. More on Stealth Player after the jump. Read More

MediaKeys – Register Global Hotkeys For Popular Media Players

by on
1
Many media players have built-in option to register hotkey combinations, so that you can quickly use their provided functions and features, such as, play/pause media playback, shuffle playlist, sort playlist items, jump to next/previous track, etc, but it becomes quite tiring to specify shortcut keys in each media player for performing more or less same type of actions, such as, play, pause, stop, etc. MediaKeys offers a one-stop solution by allowing you to register global hotkeys for a range of media applications, including, Windows Media Player, Winamp, iTunes, foobar2000, and MediaMonkey. You can control these media players with same set of registered hotkey combinations. You switch between supported media players from the system tray in order to use specified shortcut keys. Apart from controlling media playback, you can also set global mouse click behavior and keyboard numpad + / – keys to control volume across all the media players. Read More

How To Set An Image As Windows Media Player 12 Library Background

by on
1
Windows Media Player 12, despite its excellent features, provides very few customization options. The only changes that you can make to its visual appearance are perhaps the available Media Player skins. WMP12 Library Background Changer is a portable application that allows changing library background images of Windows Media Player 12. An earlier version of this application was released some time back which merely allowed switching between 5 different backgrounds. However, in the newly released version, you can make any image as your Media Player’s library background. Read More

Sync User Ratings And Play Counts Between iTunes And Windows Media Player

by on
1
Windows Media Player and iTunes are both very capable, comprehensive and user-friendly music management solutions. Both support features like comprehensive libraries, smart playlists, etc, and they monitor your listening patterns to generate their own playlists. They also like to track your favorites, based on ratings you assign. If you’re using both WMP and iTunes at the same time, chances are you’ll run into the frustration of your playing preferences not being in sync. Orzeszek Ratings is a portable, free application that lets you sync track ratings and play counts between both these music management solutions. Read More

Mirro: Beautiful Aero CD Art Display Skin For Windows 7

by on
9
CD Art Display is a free application which supports a long list of widely used media players including Windows media player, Media Monkey, iTunes, Winamp and lot more. Recently Mirro (a skin for CD Art Display) intruded our attention with its brilliantly designed layout. It is one awesome looking Windows Aero-glass supported skin that will give you a whole lot of new breezing experience of listening to your favorite music. Read More

Fix wmpnetwk.exe In Windows 7

by on
73
So I asked a friend to get Windows 7 and the first complaint was that wmpnetwk.exe is taking too much system resources. In some cases the resource consumption goes up to 90%. According to Microsoft, this was a small bug in RTM release but should not happen in the official public release. Read More

Lyrics Plugin For Windows 7 Media Player 12

by on
126
Lyrics Plugin is a free plugin that adds Lyrics in both Windows Media Player and Winamp Player. The plugin works perfectly with Windows Media Player 12 in Windows 7. After you have installed the plugin, simply play a song in Windows Media Player and it will show you the lyrics in the Now Playing mode. Read More

Fixing ‘Cannot Play This DVD’ Error Message In Windows Media Player

by on
Leave a comment
How many times have you seen that whenever you play a DVD movie it gives the following error, “Cannot Play This DVD” in Windows Media Player? It is the most annoying message I have ever seen in Windows and to be honest, I really hate it when this message pops up. No, I am not an old fashioned person and I don’t use Windows Media Player anymore. The best way to fix this problem is to download VLC player(I use this media player personally, since it plays all formats). The problem arises when my family members still prefer Windows Media Player due to it’s ease of use and also because they are reluctant to move to a new media player, so I have to fix this error for them. Read More