Filed under: Audio, Software, Open Source
Cog: open source audio player
Lots of people bemoan the fact that iTunes doesn't offer support for some of the more obscure audio formats (most notably Ogg Vorbis). Most people who care about Ogg support tend to be fans of Open Source software, and probably aren't thrilled with using iTunes anyway. Luckily for them there is Cog. It is an open source audio player for OS X that supports a boatload of audio formats, though its feature list isn't quite as long as iTunes.
I suppose you get what you pay for, oh wait, iTunes is free as well (though decidedly closed source).
[via HiFi Blog]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Dave Barnes said 12:53PM on 9-06-2006
Cog is an excellent product for playing FLAC. I rip (using Max) to FLAC and AAC (256kbps). I use Cog to check my FLAC versions which I am storing in an archive. My AACs go into iTunes.
The developers of Max and Cog have a very helpful forum at http://www.sbooth.org/forums/
,dave
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Billy K said 12:56PM on 9-06-2006
iTunes has become so slow and bloated, I find myself using Cog quite a bit just to simply play a bunch of songs when I don't want to go through the hassle of launching iTunes, waiting for it to update my iPod, dragging MP3s into the app, etc.
iTunes really is getting bloated. Cog is definitely not. It still crashes a lot, though, and I really wish it had an Equalizer. other than that, good app!
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Slava said 1:12PM on 9-06-2006
I want to pay and receive a maximum from that that have bought.
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sdfjkl said 1:43PM on 9-06-2006
You can add Ogg Vorbis support to iTunes by simply installing the official xiph.org QuickTime components: http://www.xiph.org/quicktime/download.html
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Lunchbox said 2:38PM on 9-07-2006
I'm glad I'm not the only person who likes the arcdade fire.
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C said 9:49PM on 9-06-2006
Does the quicktime component allow ipods to play vorbis too?
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djSyndrome said 3:00PM on 9-06-2006
Cog's nice and all, but I really dig the choice of music in the screenshot. Funeral is one of the best albums I've heard in years.
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Adrian said 6:22PM on 9-06-2006
As stated above, there's an ogg quicktime component which enables iTunes to play ogg files. I don't really think iTunes audio format compatibility is that bad.
Here's a compoment for flac:
http://damien.drix.free.fr/qtflac/
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Mike Howerton said 10:20PM on 9-06-2006
I have tried Cog twice now as a way to quickly play flac or shn files without having to convert them and load them into Itunes.
It has crashed continually, both times I tried it.
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Tracer Hand said 8:27AM on 9-10-2006
Guys, the big deal for me about Cog is that it can play GAPLESS PLAYLISTS. Yes. If somebody's sent you their indexed DJ mix, for instance, or if you forgot to turn on the "full CD rip" option or whatever when you were ripping "Dark Side of the Moon" it DOESN'T MATTER because Cog will play it with no gaps. To me this is huge. Coupled with the nice and simple interface and the fact that it doesn't squirt out little subfolders all over your Music folder, Cog is the only thing I use to play music these days.
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Anthony said 3:44PM on 9-22-2006
The thing with those OggVorbis and FLAC components for iTunes is that 1) FLAC still doesn't work, and 2) they don't support ID Tag info.
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Paul said 7:24PM on 11-02-2006
OGGdropX allows you to put the OGG files into itunes and play them there; but they can't be downloaded to your ipod; and after palying them, any changes you have made to the track data (such as names for the track/artist) get reversed, and the track times get chnaged to 3 seconds. It still plays the music, though.
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