March 9th, 2009
A sneak peek at the Windows 7 Release Candidate
Digital media
15. Windows Media Player 12 now streams to Internet.
ZDNet’s Zack Whittaker deserves props for noticing this new feature and writing it up with more details about the user interface. It’s clear that Microsoft plans to create a channel you can use (in conjunction with a Windows LiveID) to stream music over the Internet, giving you access to your full music collection on a notebook, work PC or, presumably, a mobile device. Exactly how this feature will work, thogh, is still a mystery.
16. A smaller, slicker Mini Media Player.
Windows Media Player has had a mini player for as a long as I can remember. The version in the public beta of Windows 7 is clunky, to put it kindly. The revamped mini-player in build 7048 is much smaller and more elegant. Its playback controls are transparent, and slide out of the way until you move the mouse pointer back into the player window. If you prefer the clunky look, you can still resize the window and customize it (showing the playlist, for example). This image shows the default mini-player at actual size.
17. Radio station presets in Windows Media Player.
Through the years, radio stations have popped up and disappeared in different releases of Media Player. In Windows 7, the Radio Stations link has made a triumphant return to the main navigation pane, where it sits at the same level as Music, Pictures, and Recorded TV. In this build, however, the interface for saving radio stations is still missing, so it’s hard to see how the feature will work when it’s finished.
18. A simpler Now Playing background in Media Center.
When you play an album or music playlist in Media Center, Windows 7 replaces the boring blue Vista-style background with a wall of album covers, drawn from your collection. In beta builds, the wall slides down the screen, refreshing itself constantly. In build 7048, you have the option to make the album wall static or remove it completely; the latter option might be boring but provide a better experience on extender devices with low-powered graphics hardware.
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Ed Bott is an award-winning technology writer with more than two decades' experience writing for mainstream media outlets and online publications. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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| 03/09/09
