iTunes alternatives for Mac OS X

[Currawong]

I posted this on HF, after a bazillion threads appeared about the latest players. Seems like a few random, and some not so random developers have come out with iTunes alternatives. Here is a list of the players currently available that I know of, along with some basic information about them. I figured there'd be some interest in this here as well. Note: I haven't included Cog, as it is no longer being developed and doesn't work properly with 10.6.

Amarra by Sonic Studio

http://www.sonicstudio.com/amarra/

Commercial, demo available for download.

Comes in three flavours: Amarra, Amarra Mini and Amarra Junior with varying features and prices. The player integrates with iTunes, or can be used stand-alone importing tracks into a playlist with one click from the Finder or iTunes. For people with a lot of RAM in their computer, it can be used in cache mode where the files are loaded into memory before playback. Includes iZotope resampling software. However, the licence either requires an iLok USB key or the software is locked to a single computer which can't be transferred.

audirvana (Open Source)

Free

http://code.google.com/p/audirvana/

The first player to offer a window that looks like a piece of hi-fi gear, it offers device "hog mode" and up-sampling by default. The feature list is otherwise very basic at present.

Clementine Player

http://code.google.c...mentine-player/

Free (Open Source based on Amarok 1.4)

This multi-platform player is more of a music organiser than anything, with features geared in that direction (such as having LastFM support), rather than having any audiophile settings. Thankfully, unlike other multi-platform applications, it isn't Java based (using Qt instead), so the user interface is fast.

Decibel by Steven F Booth

http://sbooth.org/Decibel/

Free, so far, but possibly commercial later on.

The developer of Play produced a basic, high-quality music player known as AyreWave in conjunction with Ayre. This has now dropped any association with them and has been renamed Decibel. The software itself, while basic, allows one-click importing from files selected in the Finder or iTunes, "hog mode" and, best of all, is free, at least for now.

Ecoute by PixiApps

http://www.pixiapps.com/ecoute/

Comercial

With iTunes integration, including song rating and metadata support, this is the player for people who want a slick, theme-able one-window interface and want to share your listening habits on Twitter, Facebook or LastFM. It also supports the Apple remote control.

Fidelia by Audiophile Engineering

http://audiofile-eng...ng.com/fidelia/

Commercial, demo avilable for download.

With a main window that looks like a piece of high-end hi-fi gear, but far more classy than that of audirvana, it has the ability to play music directly from iTunes playlists without needing to have iTunes running. Also included are a selection of on-the-fly resampling methods, including iZotope and remote control software for the iPhone and iPod Touch available in the App Store. The developer is also extremely responsive.

Play by Steven F Booth

http://sbooth.org/Play

Free.

Until recently, almost the only alternative to iTunes if you wanted a simple music player and nothing else. Allows access to the built-in Mac OS X audio effects filters, which can be very handy if you want a 31-band equaliser, high-pass filter or the like. Since all this is incorporated into Decibel it is probably more worth it to download that instead.

Pure Music by Channel D

http://www.channld.c...usic/index.html

Commercial, demo available for download.

Based upon Pure Vinyl and using its own playback engine, like Amarra, integrates with iTunes, running in a window alongside and can re-sample music on the fly. Unlike Amarra, it requires iTunes to be running to select tracks, but offers a considerable slew of other options.

Songbird

http://www.getsongbird.com/

Free.

More a multi-platform internet connected media library project by previous Firefox, Netscape and Winamp developers, it might be easier to consider Songbird to music what Thunderbird is to email, yet a lot more, with online integration.

Vox by Alessio Nonni

http://www.voxapp.uni.cc/

Free (donations requested).

Much the same as Play, a slowly developed app that does little more than just play music with a minimal footprint. Like Play, it gives access to in-built Mac OS X audio effects filters.

Amarra, Audirvana, Decibel, Fidelia, and Pure Music seem to be geared towards audiophiles. Clementine, Ecoute and Songbird focus on functionality as full-on alternatives to iTunes, though Ecoute uses your iTunes library for organisation. Play and Vox aim for simplicity.

I reckon the sound is very slightly different with all of them. I sold my Amarra Mini dongle off as I felt I could get just as good an improvement with Fidelia and Decibel. They don't seem to make a dramatic improvement, but a subtly pleasing one with my gear. YMMV and all that.

The usual question that comes up is, how can these players sound better? Some possible answers are a combination of: The sample rate being switched automatically to match the track's sample rate. Hardware exclusive/hog mode, where the software takes complete control over the output and, in some cases, caching the track into memory so disk reads aren't necessary. I would guess then that their supposed benefits come from mimimising the interaction of music playback with other hardware and software in the machine as much as possible. Fancy upsampling algorithms, where enabled, may sound better as well.

Edited February 22, 2011 by Currawong

[CarlSeibert]

Do you know off the top of your head which ones will run on PPC hardware, or for that matter which ones will run on OS 10.5?

I mourn the passing of Cog, not that it matters, since it does work on my machine and that's what really matters. Hog mode would be nice, though.

[Currawong]

Fidelia shows up as a Universal app, as does Pure Music and Vox. Clementine and Decibel do not. The others I've deleted off my computer.

Decibel is my pick for sound quality, followed by Fidelia. I can't be bothered analysing why, simply that I seem to be enjoying the music most using those two. The differences, if any, are extremely subtle.

[The Monkey]

Good info here, Amos, thanks. Trying to figure out which one to go with, if any. Sample rate switching on the fly would be very nice.

Are the OS X audio effects filters at all useful?

[CarlSeibert]

Fidelia shows up as a Universal app, as does Pure Music and Vox. Clementine and Decibel do not. The others I've deleted off my computer.

Decibel is my pick for sound quality, followed by Fidelia. I can't be bothered analysing why, simply that I seem to be enjoying the music most using those two. The differences, if any, are extremely subtle.

Thanks

[blessingx]

Been testing recent builds of Audirvana and Decibel. Without doing extensive testing, I was enjoying Audirvana since several RAM playback changes. Unfortunately, they now handle sample rates kinda differently. "Upsampling" on/off in Decibel adjusts based OS setting (off leaves as OS), Audirvana on track (I believe this has changed over time - have asked developer, but not heard back). So OS at 44.1 with track 96 in off positions will product 44.1 output in Decibel and 96 in Audirvana. Audirvana gives nice 'only 2x/4x' and 'maximum upsampling' options (Decibel just 'for best quality'), but effectively eliminates the downsampling capabilities - not so great for those of us with 16/20-bit DACs. So ideally, I'd be using Audirvana (which also happens to be the free option), but not with how sample rates are currently adjusted (no 'true' off). For those with 24-bit DACs I'd consider Audirvana.

Never tried Fidelia.

EDIT: Just got notified of an Audirvana update. Will retest the above (have to move DACs around), but beautiful new interface.

DOUBLE EDIT: Downloaded Fedelia. Audirvana still has the missing downsample functionality (if you consider it a missing feature - may be a plus depending on what it avoids in CoreAudio). Fidelia joins Decibel in allowing OS X midi control.

Edited March 14, 2011 by blessingx

[Currawong]

Good info here, Amos, thanks. Trying to figure out which one to go with, if any. Sample rate switching on the fly would be very nice.

Are the OS X audio effects filters at all useful?

I use the 31-ban EQ for experimenting with FR. You can draw curves in it by holding down the control key.

[tim22]

Awesome, thanks Currawong. Its cool that there's some that are open source. Do you know of any people/forum fiddling with the source codes? Could be something fun to do.

[Torpedo]

I know, I know, this is necro-bumping... Anyway, anyone having updated to Mountain Lion is using any of these programs? Audirvana on 10.6.8 worked very well for me playing 24/96 FLAC files. Wondering if trying Amarra, now that it plays FLAC too, is worth it.

Audirvana won't open on OSX 10.8

Edited August 4, 2012 by Torpedo

[shellylh]

Haven't tried Amarra with ML yet but I think it is supposed to be compatible. They have a free trial - you can just download it from their website.

[Torpedo]

Listening through Decibel right now. The DA-11 reads as 96KHz despite this warning

Decibel is compatible with Mac OS X 10.7 (Lion). Exclusive access (hog mode) works correctly, however audio is not sent in the device's native format due to an architectural change in Apple's USB audio driver.

Which leaves me a bit hesitant, definitely unsure any of these programs is sending the info to the DAC in the very same sampling/bitdepth format as the original file is.

[eggil]

Fidelia works without problems with Mountain Lion.

It has FHX (extra 49.00) with a crossfeed and "headphone mode". In addition, you can use up to 3 plugins. I use the DDMF EqPro and Ambiance, plus any of the Apple plugins and reverbs or whichever you want to buy.

[Torpedo]

I tried Fidelia on 10.6.8. Worked well, but didn't notice anything really useful worth the price.

[Torpedo]

Just discovered that going to own's Audirvana website it's possible to get the Plus version (not free, but 14 days trial) which is 10.8 compatible. Downloaded and testing now. It installs and is managing to create a long playlist from a whole directory. Not bad.

[Currawong]

Amarra works fine. So far I've only encountered two issues with it: The first is switching devices to one with a different sample rate set can result in chipmunks or whales, but it has a window with an option to sync the rates of all devices, which is handy. The second is that it can crap out when switching devices that use custom drivers. I have the ULN-2, Audio-gd NFB-16 with new Tenor chipset and Apogee Duet along with the Audiophilleo and between them and their drivers they can make Amarra cry easily.

[Torpedo]

Thanks for the comment Currawong. I've been comparing Adirvana vs Decibel. Soundwise there aren't many differences I had been able to find. I've noticed that Audivana can change computer's output sampling frequency to the DAC, matching that of the reproduced files, so when playing a 24/88, OSX's Audio MIDI says the output to the DAC is going at 88. Then when reproducing a 24/96, Audio MIDI sampling also changes. This doesn't happen when using Decibel, but I have yet to see what's going on. I need to check the input SF at the DAC. Checked and DAC's input follows what Audio MIDI says.

Looks like it's all a matter of configuration. If you set up Decibel to get "maximum" (not just "high") and tick "adjust sample rate for best quality" then it preserves the file sampling rate. Audirvana + seems easier to configure.

TBH both sound great, A+ playlist and user interface look a bit more attractive. But it's more expensive. Feeling lazy to test Fidelia too, but I should do while Decibel is in demo period.

[blessingx]

We should probably add Korg's AudioGate to the list. Seems to play most formats, but mostly associated with DSD. Free as long as you let it Tweet when exporting/burning. Yea, kinda irritating.

Edited August 8, 2012 by blessingx

[Currawong]

Interesting. Will have to have a play. Audirvana Plus supports DSD if you have a DAC that can accept it. I think Pure Music does as well.

Torpedo: All the players I've tried can change the sampling rate to match the track (if they aren't set to up-sample in some way). I found though that if, in Audio Midi Set-up the output was set to 16-bit and not 24-bit, this would fail. It's also worth setting "Play alerts and sound effects" to something other than the output being used for music playback.

Audirvana Plus also has found a way in Mountain Lion to directly access some DACs. I still prefer using Amarra for its very subtly different "sound". They had a "tell a friend" special on it for ~$60 recently too. I'm pondering asking them if they are up for that again for here or HF if there is interest.

[Torpedo]

I've tried an unofficial Amarra Demo on ML and it was a bit buggy. Fidelia is a bit buggy too, but only if you try to create a library from files over the WLAN. Once set up plays well. Audirvana and Decibel behave better.

Regarding sound, once everything is set up for "best" results, all they're quite similar listening with headphones (007, 009 and HD800) using the DA-11 on USB. Maybe on long term use I would be able to tell what I like better, but I'm not sure I really want/need to keep comparing them. Same could be said if I used speakers on that system, but it's too darn hot for tube amplifiers here.

I think I'll end up getting Audirvana+ (I like the interface a bit better than Decibel's, but this is also good an inexpensive), but I wouldn't mind joining a group buy if Amarra can be purchased at a sensible price.

[HeadphoneAddict]

I'm listening to Amarra 2.4 on my Retina Pro with ML right now, and doing all kinds of things with no skipping or other issues. I'm afraid to let it upgrade me to a newer version in case there are new bugs. But for what I do, which is playing my iTunes playlists through Amarra > DAC of choice, it's great.

[Torpedo]

Try Audirvana, Jacob.

[shellylh]

I had trouble finding the free version of Audirvana when I was looking for it. That said, I like the plus.

[Torpedo]

I'm using the plus. I tried it, compared it to Decibel, Amarra and a couple more, then decided it has a decent price-performance ratio and paid for it. I don't use iTunes--just to feed the iPod--, and have a good lot of DSD, 24/88-96 and FLAC files, so it filled well quite some needs.

[Torpedo]

Cool

[Currawong]

There is Bit Perfect on the App Store too. $10, which I don't think was around when I first wrote the article. Good if you, say, want up-sampling but not DSD or multi-channel features, which I think the latest Audirvana Plus has.