If you are a mover and groover and just cannot live without that funky music while you are at your computer, you probably already know about Windows 98's CD Player. This handy tool gives multimedia-capable PCs the ability to play a compact disc directly from their CD-ROM drives.
But even the most funky PC users do not always realize that they can adjust the CD Player to fit their personal needs. So grab your favorite CD, pop it into the CD-ROM drive, start the CD Player, and get ready to jam. Launch CD Player by clicking Start, Programs, Accessories, Entertainment, and CD Player.
The Name Game.
CD Player lets you place all the important information from your CD's case into its memory. This means if you enter the name of the artist, the title of the CD, and all the song titles, the next time you pop in that CD, the information you input into the CD Player will reappear.
To enter your CD's information, select Edit Play List from the Disc menu. At the top of the CD Player: Disc Setting dialog box, type the artist's name and title of your CD. Then go to the Available Track section, which is a list of all the tracks on the CD you currently have in your CD-ROM drive, and click the first track. Next, go to the Track field at the bottom of the dialog box and highlight the field information. Type the song title and click the Set Name button. Continue to follow this process until you have entered the title for each song on your CD.
Setting A Play List.
Once you know what track stands for what song, go to the Play List section of the CD Player: Disc Setting dialog box. Here you also can easily change the order in which the CD Player plays your CD's songs. The Play List section contains the play order of the tracks on your CD. You can change this order by adding, deleting, or moving the tracks within the Play List.
•Add. To add a song to your Play List, either highlight a track by clicking it and then clicking the Add button, or highlight a track in the Available Tracks list and drag it to the Play List.
•Delete. To delete a track from the Play List, highlight it by clicking it, and then click Remove.
•Rearrange. You can reorder the tracks currently in the Play List by highlighting a track and then clicking and dragging it to its new position in the Play List.
If you do not like the new play order of your songs, click the Reset button to place the tracks in their original order.
Seeing Things.
The View menu in CD Player is the best way to customize your viewable options in the CD Player window. You can choose to show or hide the Toolbar, which includes buttons for the Track Time Remaining and Continuous Play commands; Disc/Track Info, which includes the name of the artist, title of the CD, and the song playing; and the Status Bar, which includes the number of minutes for the current track and the total play for the CD. To turn on one of these options, go to the View menu and select the option by putting a check by it; to turn it off repeat the process.
In addition, the View menu lets you choose whether you want to view the Track Time Elapsed, Track Time Remaining, or the Disc Time Remaining. You also have the option to change the Volume Control settings.
Everyday Use.
You can select the Preferences command from the Options menu to customize the everyday use of the CD Player. In the Preferences dialog box, you can choose to:
•Stop CD Playing On Exit, which means that any CD playing when you close the CD Player will stop playing.
•Save Setting On Exit, which means you want to save anything you change during your CD Player session.
•Show Tool Tips, which means you want to see the descriptions that pop up when you hold the cursor over a toolbar button.
To activate these options, click the box next to each one. To inactivate an option, click its box to uncheck it.
Finally, the Preferences dialog box even lets you change the amount of time CD Player pauses between tracks. You can change the Intro Play Length by typing the number of seconds you want it to pause, or by using the arrows in the field to increase or decrease the amount of time. It will not let you go below five seconds or above 15.
The CD Player has almost as many options as your home stereo. Go ahead and get comfortable. It will make your computing (and listening) experience more enjoyable.
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