J. River MEDIA CENTER

J. River Media Center is the ultimate in, not just playing music, but in creating music and audio libraries, editing MP3 tags, filenames, and even the music itself.

There's not a lot of difference in how PC-based music players make your tracks sound. Speakers are a lot more important. What really makes a difference in the software are the tools for organizing a music collection and a player's versatility.

Media Center steals the show on both counts. The "Media" in its name is significant. It puts the same organization into photo collections, movie collection, and even your TiVo. It's the only sane way I've found to manage an iPod. I'm not sure why Media Center takes a backseat to Winamp and Microsoft's Media Player. Perhaps it's because its name sounds too much like Media Player. Whatever, give your ears and your sense of organization a treat with this jukebox hero.

This is a $40 Shareware program.

--Ron White