Professional Jukebox Software...what's your opinion...

[Sinner]

I was a local arcade supply company and they had a bunch of jukeboxes they were converting to PC based music players...the software they were using would display covers and album info...used touch screen...had random settings for when there was nothing in the play list...etc...I liked it a lot...seems like something I would like to have at home...
Does anyone have a preference for a software with a professional look and feel?

[Knievel]

I use Touchtone in all my jukes, has all the features you mentioned.
I find most of the jukebox software out there looks too 'Windows' like. Touchtone doesn't: http://www.mp3touchscreens.com/

[billf]

I use Touchtone in all my jukes, has all the features you mentioned.
I find most of the jukebox software out there looks too 'Windows' like. Touchtone doesn't: http://www.mp3touchscreens.com/

In their screenshots on the Touchtone website they show a "menu bar" running below the Touchtone Audio System title.  This to me looks very much like windows.  Can the screen layout be modified to remove that?  With that in place it looks very "windowsy".

[Knievel]

That bar is normally not there, it can be turned on when you want to tweak the various settings.

Here's a look at Touchtone running on the juke in my livingroom wall. You can also view your albums by covers. Looks cool but if you have a large collection it takes time to scroll through them. Everything on the screen is skin-able..colors, fonts, etc.

I put Touchtone on all the arcade cabinets I build, works well with a trackball as well.

[billf]

Ah, that makes sense now.  Looks better without the bar.

[str1der]

Here's the one I use. Has all the features you could ask for. Best of all it's free.

http://www.freeboxjukebox.com/

[digitaldj]

Any screenshots for freeboxjukebox and is it able to use buttons?

Touch tone looks like a windows program!

Jukeman

[JackTucky]

Here's a look at Touchtone running on the juke in my livingroom wall. You can also view your albums by covers. Looks cool but if you have a large collection it takes time to scroll through them.

Why does it take long to scroll?  I think viewing album covers is the most important thing.

Jacktucky

[NinjaEpisode]

Any screenshots for freeboxjukebox and is it able to use buttons?

Touch tone looks like a windows program!

Jukeman

Here's some older shots of Freebox: http://freeboxjukebox.com/about.htm

You can head over to the forum at freeboxjukebox.com and see some of the updates that Barcrest is doing.  The guy's a freak when it comes to putting out updates.  He's constantly tweaking and making it better.

[Chris]

Any of the "fully skinnable" jukes are as professional looking as you decide to make them.

[digitaldj]

This is only my opinion of coarse but one has to realize what the function of the software is. If it is for a jukebox then you don't want it to resemble anything that makes it look like something from windows. I myself want the look and feel of a old style jukebox where others want touch screen and i hope they don't want it to look like something from windows either.

Jukeman

[Barry Barcrest]

Personally i don't think freebox does look like windows, but that is just my opinion. There are several skins availble for it and there are no obvious windows controls on display apart from the options screen that the end user should never see anyway.

The reason i am not a big fan of touchtone is the amount of scroll bars in use on the main screen. These are a pain on a touchscreen system and not a personal favourite of mine. However feel free to try all the options and make your own mind up.

[Knievel]

I think Chris best answered the original question.

Barcrest I just gave your software a spin with the stock skin and it looks good. That being said I much prefer scroll bars to flipping through endless pages of albums to find what I want.

If you're having a problem working scroll bars then I think you either have an issue with your touchscreen or the settings for it are incorrect.

[NinjaEpisode]

I think Chris best answered the original question.

Barcrest I just gave your software a spin with the stock skin and it looks good. That being said I much prefer scroll bars to flipping through endless pages of albums to find what I want.

If you're having a problem working scroll bars then I think you either have an issue with your touchscreen or the settings for it are incorrect.

The problem I typically have with scrollbars on my touchscreen are as follows:

- The up/down buttons are in the upper and lower extremities of my touchscreen and my fat fingers just can't get them to activate consistently.

- Developers tend to make them too small to be useful in a touchscreen situation because of peoples fat fingers.

Sure you can press/touch and drag, but the finger prints are bad enough on a touchscreen as it is.

Touchtone doesn't appear to have this problem because the buttons aren't in the extremities of the screen, but I don't like that Windows bar across the top.

[Knievel]

Yes Touchtone was developed specifically for touchscreens, from what understand. All of the buttons and scrollbars are plenty big.

If fingerprints drive you nuts you should get a matte finish screen. My upstairs one doesn't show any prints.

Which 'windows bar' is bothering you? Personally I love the look of Touchtone but I'm into high-tech. I agree that it would be out of place on a vintage looking juke but running it in my wall, on my Metal Station/Neon Mame or my arcade machines I think it's a perfect fit.

[NinjaEpisode]

Just the Title Bar across the top with the "Touchtone Audio System"  If that was able to be hidden, it would look better to me.

As far as the vintage vs. modern thing, let's face it, if you're putting a touchscreen or a monitor in general into a box with the express purpose of emulating a 40 year old jukebox, you're really not going for that vintage look. 

There was a guy here that stuck came up with a way to take a vintage jukebox and use the pushbutton system and make up new labels to make a selection and have the jukebox play that way.  I think he had a small 2 line screen integrated into the front so that he knew what was playing but otherwise, it looked authentic.

[Knievel]

Not sure if you can turn that off completely but I know you can customize the text to whatever you want. I suppose just blanking the text would give you the same effect.

I guess the thing I like most about Touchtone is that everthing is on-screen at once.
I can add a song to the queue in 3 touches or less, and having the album art for the song playing is a nice visual feature. It can be adjusted to take up as much of the screen as you want.

[Barry Barcrest]

In the screen shot i can see a few things wrong.

1/ I can see the mouse pointer.
2/ There are windows Close and Minimize buttons on the title bar (I think this is what Ninja is on about).
3/ Scroll bars everywhere.

Ok maybe scroll bars work for some people but IMHO they just do not lend themselves too well to the touchscreen environment. As for looking Hi-Tech personally i think it looks pretty dated, it's mainly a text display with very little in the way of graphics. It just looks like 3 list boxes to me, maybe thats just because i am so used to seeing them but that look just doesn't work for me.

[Knievel]

1)Normally not there, I turned it on to do some other things. Not an issue.
2)There is a Party Play mode that blanks the windows buttons. Not an issue.
3)I've already defended the scroll bars. They work great and they get you to a song much fast that page flipping. Not an issue for me, an advantage actually.

IMHO opinion it looks very high-tech.

I'm just trying to help people here, I am in no way affiliated with Touchtone. I spent a lot of time testing juke software and I found it to be the best for me.
Obviously you have put a lot of work into your software and you're giving it away for free...kudos to you.

[Barry Barcrest]

They were just my opinions. I wasn't trying to have a dig at you at all, or your choice of software hopefully i have not cause offence.

I have to agree, having a list of artists/albums is quicker than page flipping through 100's of covers. I added a jump to letter and dare i say it a scroll bar (Ermm...) to jump to letters to speed up this process.

Maybe i have been harsh on touchtone, i will download it again here at work and take another look at it.