Music and Video player

[sim085]

Hi,

In my endless search to fill up my 2GB CF card with software - I am now looking for the best Music and Video players for Workbench 3.1 out there.

Also I was wondering what music and video do these players play?

Regards,
Sim085

[sim085]

I found AccessiblePlayer (2.22) and EaglePlayer (2.1) from Aminet. I found the source code for EaglePlayer 2.4 as well but no download link I think EaglePlayer seems to have much more support - altough I can not understand many of the additions.

Additionally, from previous research I made I found out that is next to impossible to play mp3 music on a 68000 processor.

Is this true? and if yes then what type of music can I play?

[Daedalus]

What kind of CPU have you got? There are some good MP3 players, plenty of MOD players and some decent video players... But MP3s require a decent cpu - video even more so. As a start, SongPlayer (the older version - written in assembler for speed) is very good for MP3s, CDs, WAVs etc., though the newer version is a little slower. DeliPlayer & HippoPlayer are apparently good for MODs (don't listen to them much myself though), and Action from OS3.9 (think its shareware name is different) does a reasonable job of video for a classic.

Edit: Just saw your post... Yes, a 68000 simply can't crunch numbers fast enough to decode MP3 at all! ideally you want a 68060 for full quality, though you might get away with an 040. Mods should be ok on a 68000, and you might try a hardware decoder such as the MAS Player to play MP3s, but even that will struggle with higher bitrates on a 68000...

[sim085]

Thank you for the information - yes mp3 was always out of the question for me! Maybe I can find some songs I like in Midi or Mod format

I guess there is no video under a 68000 processor either right!?

[Daedalus]

Nope... Video is more processor-intensive than MP3, mainly as the video needs decoding as well as the audio, and the audio alone is too much!

[Cammy]

You can play CDXL video on a 68000. It's uncompressed, so it depends more on the speed of your drive than anything else. If you're playing it from a CF card, you should be able to get decent sized HAM6 CDXL videos playing on your screen. You'll need to download some CDXL playing software from Aminet, and scour some CDTV/CD32 discs for some videos, or you can make your own by converting MPEG/AVI videos.

You can also use a program to convert your MP3s to WAV or IFF 8SVX, then you can play them in SongPlayer or one of the other music players, and it will sound as good as Paula can sound, but won't be CPU intensive to play.

The files all end up being larger and lower quality than the original compressed formats, but the fact that you CAN make a computer from 1985 play full-motion video (in 4,096 colours) and fully digitised songs is still pretty impressive.

[sim085]

Thank you cammy - I was wondering if I could convert MP3 to any format accepted by an amiga music player, but had no idea that WAV was accepted!

Regarding video - that is what I was thinking, as much as I know the CDTV was made to play video and the CDTV is based on the A500 and therefore I was expecting I could maybe play some video here and there.

I will try to play some music first and then turn my attention to video

Note that I do not need this stuff for work or anything like that - I just like to experiment here and there

[Daedalus]

Yeah, I guess that's true about the CDXL animations - might well be worth a try! As I said earlier though, SongPlayer will play many formats, and anything uncompressed should be playable. WAV is supported by pretty much everything, as is AIFF...

[Cammy]

If you would like to download a CDXL clip to test out on your Amiga, I made this one a while ago as a test. In the CDXL software, you need to set it to double the height of the video, so then it will be in the right aspect. It's a widescreen film clip, and was designed to run from a 2X CDROM, but should have no problems streaming off of a CF card.

Here's a link to the file - http://home.exetel.com.au/amiga/HAM6.CDXL
And here's a compressed archive of the file for quicker download - http://home.exetel.com.au/amiga/HAM6.rar (you will require UnRAR or similar software).

[sim085]

Thank you for the replies and the link. I am downloading it right now.

Regarding Songplayer; is the version on Aminet the old one or the new one? I am asking because that version only works with a 68020 processor. If so, is there any other music player that plays .wav files?

[Piru]

If so, is there any other music player that plays .wav files?

http://aminet.net/package.php?package=mus/play/hippoplayer.lha

[CountRaven]

hmmm and which software should we use to play CDXL video on the Amiga?

[sim085]

http://aminet.net/package.php?package=mus/play/hippoplayer.lha

When I try to play WAV music using hippo player I get an error message telling me "not enough memory". I am trying this on WinUAE with 2Mb ChipRAM and 8Mb FastRAM on a 68000 processor. Should I maybe convert the music from mp3 to something else?

[Cammy]

Oops, I accidentally renamed the 256 colour version HAM6, so it won't work on OCS/ECS Amigas. I'll upload the real HAM6 version in a minute. I'm sorry about that.

[Piru]

When I try to play WMV music using hippo player I get an error message telling me "not enough memory". I am trying this on WinUAE with 2Mb ChipRAM and 8Mb FastRAM on a 68000 processor. Should I maybe convert the music from mp3 to something else?

wmv isn't mp3.

I suggest you consult HiP.guide for the supported file formats.