Just under a year ago, we published a review of Snowtape, an internet radio player for OS X. I was incredibly impressed with the polish of the interface, functionality, and the range of features available.
Today we’re pleased to give you a sneak preview of what to expect in Snowtape 2.0 – the second major release of this app. Complete with a brand new icon and a major batch of new features, it’s a release not to be missed if you’re a fan of internet radio. Read on for more information!
Simultaneous Recording
One of Snowtape’s great selling points has always been the ability to record internet radio, automatically splitting and naming tracks as they are saved. This is taken to a new level in the latest release with the ability to record multiple stations simultaneously. Music gathering bliss!
Recording Two Stations at Once
Recording Schedules
If there’s one particular show that you don’t want to miss each week, Snowtape 2.0 makes it easy to set up a regular recording schedule for a specific time each week (or every day, every month and so on – it’s really customisable). The flexibility given here is great, and it’s a vital feature for dedicated radio listeners.
Scheduling a Recording
Snowtape takes control of your Mac if you’d like it to. The app can wake your computer from sleep, record the show, and safely put it back into a peaceful slumber afterwards. No interaction necessary!
Improved Editing and Encoding
If you like the manual control of being able to edit a recording yourself, you’ll be pleased to know that the interface and process has been greatly improved. You’ll see audio waveforms, zooming, scrolling, creating new tracks from a selection, and plenty more.
Track identification is built into the editing process as well – snip out a track you like, and Snowtape will try to automatically identify and tag it for you,
Editing a Recording
Scrobble and Stream!
The beauty of Snowtape knowing the details about each track you listen to on the radio is that it can happily scrobble your playlist to Last.fm in the background. All your listening information is stored away at Last.fm, which feels to turn Snowtape into a real, bonafide audio player.
I love that I can scrobble all my music from Snowtape, iTunes, and Spotify. No matter where I listen to audio, it’s all logged and tracked in one place. Maybe that’s just the geek inside me…
Scrobble Preferences
Streaming is also now supported to your Apple TV or Airport Express, so the radio can echo around your house. In addition, it’s possible to stream to more than one location at once.
Are You a Radio Listener?
My music listening habits are far from steady. I tend to swap and change between iTunes, Spotify, and internet radio from the likes of Snowtape. Spotify has really become my favourite of all these in recent months – the ability to essentially create your own radio station from any music is pretty amazing.
If you’re wanting to record a big batch of new music for your iTunes library, I can imagine that Snowtape is a great solution. Find a station you love with a high bit-rate, hit record, then export the tagged tracks to iTunes. A great way to fill your iPod up with new music you haven’t heard before!
What do you think? Is Snowtape the type of app that can really re-vitalize the radio industry and bring it into the digital age of streaming, recording, podcasting and iTunes? I’d be interested to hear what you think!