Alterative to windows media player

For years I have used Windows Media Player. I use it to play the media stored on my PC.

I like the fact that I can open it up, set it to random, and it finds all the media on my PC and plays it.

Is there any other programs that will play all music in the Windows Music folder randomly? I ask because of late Media Player has crashed on several occasions and I would like to switch.

I have used this player for many years http://www.videolan.org/vlc/ I'm sure there will be several members here that will also recommend it.

We can try and help you with the crashing

mawallace said:

Is there any other programs that will play all music in the Windows Music folder randomly? I ask because of late Media Player has crashed on several occasions and I would like to switch.

Welcome to TenForums @mawallace

Although Windows 10 still includes Media Player, Microsoft's recommended app for playing music is now Groove Music. Open it, select 'My Music' and 'Songs' (if you wish, set a filter and a genre) then click 'Shuffle all'.

+1 for VLC, quite useful for playing videos downloaded from YouTube and other such sites. Works with a variety of audio and video files.

Yes I use (and like) VLC too, but @BaconTime @swarfega and @Berton - does it do what @mawallace requires?

...open it up, set it to random, and it finds all the media on my PC and plays it...

As far as I can see, if you run VLC and use it to open the Music folder it plays everything it can find (including in subfolders) but in alphabetical order, not a random shuffle. Is there an option I've missed?

Groove Music does at least offer the same 'random' playback as the old Media Player (which it was designed to replace).

swarfega said:

Yes it does, you can open a folder of say music and then press random button.

Ah, thank you - I did indeed miss seeing the option. It's on the toolbar at the bottom, I was looking in the menus at the top :)