MediaMonkey4: Awesome FREE Music Management Tool

Be honest...how much music is on your computer? Yes, I want you to include the flagrantly illegal downloads you pretend you don't have in that figure. Hundreds of songs? Thousands? Tens of thousands? More?

We all have some kind of device in which we can expand our musical library. From our PC/laptop to smartphones or digital media players and tablets, most of us have several. Because of the wide accessibility our libraries have grown, as well. It isn't uncommon to collect hundreds of gigabytes of music alone.

The moment I realized how large my personal collection had become was when I was loading up my 32gb music player. I couldn't even get a quarter of my music onto it. I had to pick and choose, leaving a ton out. I regularly switch it out so I can get through my huge library files. I recently moved it over to my larger external harddrive so I could stream it through my house without going through the hassle or transferring it.

Lately I have become obsessed with music management tools to help me keep track of it all. I feel as though I have tried everything, from Winamp to VLC. Both of which I enjoyed, by the way. Not to mention the always popular iTunes and super simple Foobar2000. None of them got it quite right for me, though.

It was a friend that pointed me to MediaMonkey4, a program I had never heard of before. At first I was skeptical, like I am about all applications, especially free media software. But I have to say: wow! This genuinely surpassed all of my expectations to such an extent that it might as well have drop kicked them into a bottomless pit.

Features

• Able to hold more than 100,000 songs.
• Has basic download features for multimedia, such as video clips.
• Records CD's, though I am not sure of how helpful that is these days.
• Thorough tagging system that lets you put in IDv3 tags while editing in lyrics, CD details and several other things.
• An auto-tagger that looks at the context of your songs and lets you select an option for it to tag them for you. Which makes it so much easier if you are like me and seem to have become an audio hoarder.
• Volume normalization that will let you put all of your songs at the same volume level (avoiding the annoying way that files can go in and out), or the ability to individually change the levels of tracks.
• File conversion software for MP3, M4A, OGG, FLAC, WMA, WMV, MP4, and AVI.
• A great file system that lets you create different libraries, and then playlists within those libraries.

There are plenty of other features, but those are the ones that got me the most.

The Interface

At first I was a little iffy about the interface of this application. It isn't that it is bad, but it is one of those massive list formats almost identical to iTunes. Which I was never a major fan of, being more fond of compact, minimalist designs.

But to its credit, it manages to look professional and it is easy to view. The features are simple to navigate, the lists are clean looking and you have pretty much everything you need right there, ready to use without searching. Even if you have never used a music management system before, you will be able to master this one in minutes.

The Cost

They have a free version that has everything you will probably need for casual use. That is the version that I use, as I never saw much reason to go for the Gold license.

But for those who are interested in the more extensive manager - as many more serious audio collectors will be - you have two options. The first is a lifetime license that applies to all future versions, which costs $49.95. The second is a limited license for the current version only, for $24.95.

If you are going to shell out the cash for Gold, I would suggest getting the full license that covers all future updates.

Conclusion

I don't usually get so excited about music management programs. But this one really did impress me, especially with the separate libraries and the ability to level all music at the same volume. Both of which are lacking features in most programs.

If you are looking for a good media manager, this is it.