Culling my musical herd

July 14, 2010 8:30 AM

Looking for a media player for Windows that can directly delete files.

I have about 120+ Gb of music that I'm dying to go through to filter out stuff I don't want. I'm not the type to rate tracks. If I like something I'll keep it, If I don't, I'll delete it. Unfortunately it's hard to find a good media player that will actually delete the file, not just remove it from the playlist.

I am not a fan of itunes, nor of the zune software (I use a Zune 120gb player).

I am also open to using an explorer-based plugin or explorer wannabe that will integrate playing mp3's into its explorer functions.

Thanks!

posted by sonicbloom to Computers & Internet (9 answers total)

Foobar2000 can do that.
posted by Memo at 8:35 AM on July 14, 2010

windows media player will do this just fine. Either right click and delete from computer or just press delete, and it will ask you whether you want to delete from system or delete from library.

Actually, I think VLC will let you right click/delete as well.
posted by TomMelee at 8:39 AM on July 14, 2010

Media Monkey works pretty well.
posted by .kobayashi. at 8:39 AM on July 14, 2010

As will MediaMonkey. It is also my preferred replacement for iTunes. When you press delete it gives options for delete from library or both library and computer. The default option is the latter, so deletion is very quick with no mouse use needed.
posted by tavegyl at 8:42 AM on July 14, 2010

Pressing shift+delete will do this in a number of players, including the two lightweight ones I use the most, XMPlay and Billy. The files get sent to the recycle bin rather than being deleted outright (I mention this because in Explorer, shift+delete skips the recycle bin).
posted by seikleja at 8:57 AM on July 14, 2010

Response by poster: Thanks for the suggestions. I tried out Foobar, XMPlay and Billy (I had Media Monkey before for tagging purposes before MP3Tag). Love the simplicity of Billy's interface. Great lightweight app.
posted by sonicbloom at 9:36 AM on July 14, 2010

To expand on what TomMelee said above, WMP will do this but you need to mark the appropriate option first if you don't want to be prompted every time you delete something. In WMP 11, it's Tools>Options>Library>"Delete files from computer when deleted from library".
posted by schleppo at 12:52 PM on July 14, 2010

Seconding foobar2000. ALT-D will delete one or many, or you can remap the keyboard shortcut to whatever you like. I've been using it to manage my multiformat music collections for more than half a decade now. It, too, is lightweight but expandable beyond belief with plugins.
posted by tra at 1:33 PM on July 14, 2010

You sound like you want to delete stuff immediately, but I usually just rate it one star (or broken heart on Zune), and then bring all those up and delete them in one fell swoop later. I'm pretty sure that all software allows rating at this point.
posted by timepiece at 2:06 PM on July 14, 2010