skipping mp3s
 

I dont think this directly applies to winamp3, but it is the mp3 player I use on my computer. My problem is, I have gigs of MP3's and at first they all worked perfectly and all of a sudden I notice more and more of the songs developing this permanent skipping in parts of the song. Does anyone know how this is happening or how it can be fixed?

I am thinking it maybe hard drive related? but then I dont think it could because I run all the tests on the hard drive and it comes back clean. Here is a link to the kind of skipping sound I get - here and just forward to 2:24 and you can hear it. I think over time all my mp3s may turn out like this if I dont do something, but I dont even know where to start. Here are my specs, if you need anymore let me know:

iWill motherboard
amd athlon 1 ghz processor
512 ram
on board audio
Windows 2000 server Service Pack 3
80 gb maxtor hard drive, ntfs
all drivers are up to date

i got that skipping-problem, too
..i never had any problems using the previous versions of winamp...i tried also the windows-media-player, but that skipping occurs only with the new winamp 3....i think there must be something wrong... i play only mp3s i ripped myself and they are all 128+ kbps

my system: amd t-bird 1300 on a gigabyte board, 512mb ram, yamaha-soundcard, 60GB IBM-HD, running on Win XP-Pro


ps: i think, i will return to the 2.8x of winamp-even, if i like the new skins better...

I dont think it has anything to do with the player because they skip in everything, even when I put them on CDs.

My winamp2 worked perfectly and still does. I installed winamp3 and i got the skipping problem, skips would occur and diff parts, the mp3s were fine. Then I got a SB live and my problem went away. My old card was a SBPCI 128.

Here's what MIGHT fix your problem:

CTRL+P -> DirectSound -> Increase the buffers to the max
If that doesn't help, decrease buffers all the way. There's been some reports that buffer size is reversed on some soundcards. Finally, if this still doesn't help, uncheck "Enable DirectSound Output".

Keep in mind, you need a quality soundcard to keep resource usage to a minimum. Winamp3 uses DirectSound for all audio playback, so if your soundcard doesn't support DirectSound through hardware, it will use the CPU to decode audio. This will drastically increase load on the CPU. Disabling DirectSound output (outlined above) will cause Winamp3 to revert to waveOut. This may help decrease CPU usage.

thanks, but what do you think would cause it to permanently have that skip there, like the above link I posted?

Do your mp3s skip at exactly the same point within the song? Or are the skips at random times, never twice at the same point? I'm trying to find out whether your mp3s are 'corrupt', meaning if i were to play them on my computer that has no problem, would they skip?

If your mp3s are ok, that means your it's your system. You can try going to 'display properties'(right click on desktop and go 'properties'), then goto 'settings' and lower the 'color quality'. Tha COULD fix your problem.

You could try removing your sound card from 'device manager' then rebooting or clicking refresh and windows would reinstall the soundcard drivers with the default settings....

It's also posible that you have way too much stuff running in the background. Check what you have loading up when windows starts by going to 'hklm\software\microsoft\windows\currentversion\run' in the windows registry(regedit.exe).

Quote from login211Good point. And the best way to determine that would be if shermanpro could email you one of the skipping MP3's in question. If it DOESN'T skip on your system, chances are the problem lies strictly with a fault in shermanpro's system, and NOT Winamp3. That at least would eliminate Winamp as the problem, narrowing the field of possibilities.