XMPlay – The iTunes Companion

One of the drawbacks of iTunes (at least in Windows) is that all tracks are played at the sample rate set in Quicktime. If you have a high res file, you have to change the sample rate first in Quicktime. And if you have a collection of high res files at different sample rate, then you’ll have a real good time switching sample rate on a per track basis.

I came accross a minimalist music player called XMPlay. It is a real small download and it requires no installation. It plays AIFF format straight out of the box as well as WAV.

For full iTunes compatibility you can download the ALAC plug-in and the AAC plug-in. For compatibility for many hires download sites, also download the FLAC plug-in.

You also download the WASAPI plug-in so that the player can work in Exclusive mode. Since the player requires no installation, you just put all the files you download in the same folder.

Enable Exclusive mode and set “Use Source Resolution” as shown in the following two screen captures.

Since I am using the Musiland USB interface, in order to allow automatic sample rate change (even though in Windows Vista/7 the Auto SR option is not available) you set it to 192KHz as shown below

That’s it. When you play a song, the sample rate will automatically switch to match the source sample rate. How do I know? If it weren’t for the Sample Rate display of the Buffalo II DAC, It would had been very difficult to figure that out…

You can even put the player and a collection of tracks in an SD card and play out of it!

NOTE: iTunes can also play through WASAPI but it cannot operate in exclusive mode, only in shared mode