Today, AOL launched a new version of Winamp (5.3) that adds two major features, a bunch of minor ones, and a few bug fixes.
The dashboard feature seems inspired by the dashboard in Mac OS X. If you install Winamp 5.3, you can access the widgets screen by clicking the Media Library button and then the Dashboard link in the left nav bar. You can customize the Winamp dashboard with web feeds from 35 sources, including Rolling Stone, Digg, AOL Music Now, and other sources. Other widgets perform functions on your local library, such as bringing up your most played or most recently added tunes.
AOL's idea is to make this the dashboard feature community-powered with the upcoming addition of an "open module" that will let anyone create dashboard widgets. As John McKinley, President of Digital Services and CTO for AOL, put it, "Winamp is AOL's first open platform, and dashboard is another extension of that."
The remote control feature is somewhat reminiscent of another of today's announcements – Mercora's M service, which lets you access the music on your Windows computer from supported smartphones running Windows Mobile 5.0 or PocketPC. Winamp doesn't let you access your music from phones, although that feature should be added soon. It runs using technology from Orb, rather than Shoutcast, although it does stream MP3s.
To use Winamp Remote, click Online Services in the left navigation bar while looking at your Media Library (click the ML for that). You'll need to log in with your Winamp ID and then install the Winamp Remote server software on your Windows PC. Then, you can log in from any computer at winamp.com/remote to access your music. AOL plans on adding video and photo access, and will not charge Winamp users to use Winamp Remote.
Other new features in Winamp 5.3:
- When transferring music files to a portable device, Winamp can now transcode to a new format if needed.
- Videos can now be synced to portables. Gapless playback for new iPods has been added.
- You can copy music from your portable device onto your computer. Optional 24-bit playback and EQ has been added.
- It features improved variable bit rate encoding and better encoding of AAC and AACPlus files.
- You can now play back the music on PlaysforSure devices over your computer using Winamp.
