why is wmp still here

[valtonray]

i'm not sure why it bothers me but it seems like with the rise of media center that wmp has become outdated and useless. why has ms not just dropped it and switched exclusively to media center? is it really necessary to have both? and for that matter the zune software could just as easily be wrapped up into a media center plug in.

 

[noobvious]

I haven't seen any need for Media Center yet, myself. I have no TV tuner, but I can watch DVD's with Media Player 12, and play back music either with WMP12 or Mediamonkey.

But I am still new to this whole digital video world....my old XP machine wouldn't play video any bigger than this reply box I'm typing in without slowing down and pixellating (sp?). So there may yet be a use for Media Center that I just don't know.

 

[valtonray]

you know until windows 7 came along media center never interested me and i had xp and vista machines that included it as well as having tried numerous other softwares to see what the hype was all about. but 7mc really drew me in to the point that i ended up building an htpc. everyone that comes over and has a chance to play around on it loves it. it just seems to me that now wmp is a wasted useless program since ms built a better alternative into the OS.

 

[Gornot]

See, my opinion is the complete opposite to yours XD
The first irritating thing I discovered in WMC is that it wrecked my TV signal completely, to a point that I couldn't even use the original application to view the stream. Second, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't get the audio working for it, and every time I start watching TV it would stop after a couple of seconds.
Second, why the hell do I need two different places for videos? Make that three: Videos/Movies/TV (assuming that in a dreamland far far away I managed to set up the TV signal properly and be able to record at all).
And of course, the most important thing to me, WMC is just awful for managing music libraries because it doesn't actually have any at all.
Making it fullscreen will prevent me from doing anything else, positioning the window makes it look awful. And not mention that's it's slow. I like all those transitions and he sleek look and crap, but it's nowhere near what I actually need.
I gave WMC a shot a lot of times, but in the end just ended up turning it off and using WMP instead.

 

[swarfega]

WMC is best for watching tv but I wouldnt use it for anything else. WMP is better for watching videos because it has more controls. However I use winamp for music

 

[TimStitt]

I think WMC has a long way to go before it replaces WMP, at least in it's right out of the box Microsoft format e.g. tag editing for one; but I can see what you mean down the track they will eventually merge.

 

[Grimmjow]

I think choises are in question, if there's wasn't WMC, people would ( I suppose ) complaining about it, so its better to have two than one. I'm using WMP for music, WMC for movies, i like that library thing and all that,with posters ect..take your wireless mouse right next to you,find a good position (switching between watching and sleeping)and enjoy. Before I was using WMP and WMP classic,now with sharks codecs, I switched. About that Tv problems,I'm not familiar with them...not watching tv on my pc yet.At least,I'll have someone to ask about the problems that appears with that tv thing
cheers neighbor

 

[AngelProcesser]

WMC is a more robust application intended for HTPC users and owners of higher end equipment, XBox users, Media Extender users...WMC also offers some very nice home network sharing features...The hardware requirements for WMP are the same as W7, the recommended hardware for WMC to use all of it's features is higher which is well documented.

I have posted in about 175 different threads here with my main guidance being to check your hardware and drivers if you are having issues with W7 WMC...I am the last to post on most of them...it's the hardware much much more often than the software...user input errors aside, of course.

So, I guess to answer your question I would say, "WMC = Caddy, WMP = Yugo"...take your pick.

 

[Dom]

Personally I just use WMP.
Never bothered to use Media Centre for all my music, and Sopolias Falst is right about it being slow, there is a small jerk before playing anything.

 

[valtonray]

i've never had any problems with it in 7, but then again in all fairness my rig is a pretty powerful one and well beyond what the average user would need or have. i could see that it is maybe a thing of the future, especially as users begin to get their media from non traditional means. but it's nice having a clean interface and being able to stream media to any tv or pc in my house, and being able to catalouge my video and music collections in an attractive easy to use way. i will admit it could be easier to set up, that took me awhile to figure out how to do it correctly but in the end it's worth it.

 

[sevicetech]

WMC is just a fancy interface for WMP. Same libraries and codecs.

 

[AngelProcesser]

WMC is more than a fancy interface - there is much more functionality that WMP, but yes, under the hood WMC does use the core components of WMP.