Ed Bott - Windows 10 Support Secrets

54 CHAPTER 4 | Having fun Groove Music The old Windows Media Player is the software equivalent of a Swiss Army knife, handling playback of music and movies and even throwing in some photo viewing capabilities. The newer Groove Music, as the name makes abundantly clear, is designed exclusively for playing music files. Both programs support common compressed digital music formats: MP3, WMA, and AAC (the format used for purchases from Apple’s iTunes Store). It also supports playback of WAV files. Windows 10 adds support for the FLAC format, which uses lossless compression to save storage space without affecting the quality of the recording. Note In the early days of the digital media revolution, many music tracks were sold with digital rights management (DRM). These restrictions tied that music to specific devices. Today, most digital media files available for purchase from online sources can be freely copied between devices. Files downloaded for offline playback from a subscription service such as Groove Music Pass still use DRM. Anyone with an older music collection might still have some DRM-protected purchased files in that collection, in WMA or AAC format. These protected files can’t be played back in Groove Music. Likewise, tracks that are downloaded from non-Microsoft subscription music services can’t be played back using Groove Music. To identify this type of file, right-click its entry in File Explorer and click Properties. Click the Details tab and scroll down to the Content section, where you’ll find a field with the name “Protected.” An entry of Yes here means the file has DRM applied to it. The Groove Music library can draw from the contents of local folders (by default, this includes any files in the Music folder in your user profile) and from shared network folders. The library can also include compatible music files stored in the Music folder in Microsoft OneDrive. The Groove Music Pass service provides access to an enormous online library (more than 40 million songs) that you can stream over the web. Using the Groove Music app, you can stream albums using a Groove Music Pass or download those tracks for offline use. (Those tracks are restricted to playback on up to four devices.) The user interface for Groove Music brings all those sources together into a single unified library. Figure 4-2 shows the Groove Music home page as it exists beginning with the Anniversary Update, showing recent activity and suggested playlists.