Amarok – A Review | ShiftBackspace

Before my full-time migration to Linux, I always used iTunes for playing my music and managing my iPod. I had always thought iTunes was as good as it could get as far as playing and managing MP3 files, especially when I after testing Linux software such as Banshee and Rythmbox. I have nothing bad to say about these 2 pieces of software, but they just did not seem to have the overall polish iTunes presented. All of this led me to trying the feature of this article, Amarok.

When I began to use Amarok (1.4.5) I immediately noticed a sense of polish and completion. Lets face it, when it comes to media players the interface is what can make or break a program as any player can playback a file by using the necessary codecs.

Personally, I find the interface extremely informative and easy to use. As you can see with the screenshot below there is a general menu at the top, another menu along the left-hand side, a control menu with visualizations at the bottom, and a list of the songs that makes up the bulk of the interface. You may have also noticed the list of artists that makes up about the left 1/4 of the screen. Depending on what left-sided menu item is chosen this area changes and is the focus of some great features that Amarok offers.