I'm taking a fresh look at iPod-enabled music players.  Current candidates include:

  • iTunes
  • Songbird + its iPod-enabling add-on
  • Floola
  • Yamipod

Yeah, I'm Windows, so Mac-only and Linux-only players are out.  I don't want to be further locking myself into Windows, so Windows-only players like Winamp are out.  I'm not a glutton for punishment, so WINE+Linux doesn't count as being able to run a Windows-only player in Linux.

  • Songbird (reviewed 7/15/08)
    • It is a workable media player. 
    • Not portable by default.  MIGHT be possible to run portably.
    • With the iPod add-on, it accesses the iPod pretty well (without requiring the iTunes iPod driver). 
    • I can't seem to copy tunes from my iPod to a specified folder on my PC. 
    • Has some interesting add-ons and skinning.  I don't like the default skin (white text on black background).
  • Floola (reviewed 7/15/08)
    • It is a workable media player.  Simple. 
    • Portable.
    • Copies files to PC with decent file naming options.
    • Slow to exit.
  • Yamipod (reviewed 7/15/07)
    • It is a workable media player.  Simple. 
    • Portable.
    • Copies files to PC with decent file naming options.

I think I'll use Floola.  From what I've read, Floola and Yamipod are both written by the same guy (they look a lot alike, including the readme.txt files), and he's paid more attention to Floola recently.