Windows Media Player 11
By Jessica Padykula
There's something about music that makes the day go by faster. I work at my desk all day and having music on my computer also makes me feel less stressed. I downloaded Windows Media Player 11 (WMP) because I wanted a simple way to store and organize my tunes. And that's exactly what I got.
But Windows Media Player is not only great for storing, organizing and listening to music. You can also use it to burn CDs, make playlists and even manage other media, such as video and photos.
Getting albums onto your computer is simple. All you have to do is insert a CD and click on the Rip tab in the top navigation pane. The CD starts getting copied immediately.
While having an endless library of albums is great, it can sometimes be hard to find what you're looking for. In the past I found it frustrating when I wanted to play a song for a friend, but couldn't for the life of me remember what it was called. This problem is solved with Instant Search in WMP 11. It allows you to quickly access everything in your digital music collection, simply by typing in the track, album, artist, or even part of a name. Results are returned with every keystroke, which narrows down the choices as you type. No matter how many songs you have, Instant Search lets you find what you want in seconds.
Another helpful feature — Stacking — allows you to see all your albums that share the same characteristics, such as artist, genre, etc. These choices are displayed in virtual "stacks" of CDs, which also tells you how many hours of each category there are on your computer. For example, at the time of writing, I have three hours of Neil Young, and just over 10 hours of the Beatles.
My favourite part of having Windows Media Player 11 on my PC has to be the fact I can create my own playlists to suit my mood or whatever it is I'm doing. You can create playlists in seconds by simply clicking on and dragging songs into the Create Playlist link in the navigation pane. When I'm on a tight deadline and need some motivation, I have a playlist full of high-energy tunes like Gold Lion by the Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs, C'mon, C'mon by the Von Bondies and Off the Record by My Morning Jacket.
You can also create new playlists using the handy Shuffle Playlist feature. This feature creates a new playlist from the tracks which you have given a high rating (You can give each song and album a rating from one to five stars). Clicking the Shuffle Playlist link generates a list of songs with the highest ratings. I love this feature because sometimes all you want to hear are your favourite tunes!
