Poweramp App Instructions - How to do stuff...?

[derwhite]

Are there any instructions on how to do various things in the Poweramp app? or online? I can't add new music files to my Playlists, I just go round and round, and accomplish nothing. Some instructions or how-to's would be most helpful!

CW

[Magadaner]

This forum may be used as a manual on Poweramp, about playlists you may add new songs to it or create new one by using Poweramp main screen and tapping on the song name then when you are in tracks list just tap and hold on a track to get option Add to Playlist.

[jskinner]

can anyone tell me why I'm getting downloads from the game apps like soundbites loading into my music player

[jskinner]

man this is confusing, I'm like a dog in around room Tryin to pee in the corner.

I don't know where to look at where to turn

[andrewilley]

Go to Poweramp's Menu, select "Settings", then select "Folders and Library", then "Music Folders". You can choose which folders Poweramp is allowed to use for music playback, and untick anything you don't want. You may need to then do a "Full Rescan" (in the same menu) to fully update the song list.

Andre

[jskinner]

Go to Poweramp's Menu, select "Settings", then select "Folders and Library", then "Music Folders". You can choose which folders Poweramp is allowed to use for music playback, and untick anything you don't want. You may need to then do a "Full Rescan" (in the same menu) to fully update the song list.Andre

okay thank you

[sepulchre]

Yes, I think the player is Great! But how do I stop a song playing? I don't see a stop button. And every time I plug in my headphones/ear buds one of my songs immediately starts playing. No, no! So I'll check settings but I'm not hopeful.

[andrewilley]

3 hours ago, sepulchre said:

Yes, I think the player is Great! But how do I stop a song playing? I don't see a stop button. And every time I plug in my headphones/ear buds one of my songs immediately starts playing.

Press the Play/Pause button in the main player screen (the big one in the middle of the screen, under the cover artwork area) to stop/resume playback. There is also a smaller play/pause button on the right-hand side of the mini-player box which is displayed at the bottom of library screens if you want to control playback while you are browsing music. 

To disable headset auto-resume, untick Settings > Headset/Bluetooth > Resume on Wired Headset.

Andre

[sphinx780]

Gah. I've had Poweramp set the way I want for so long, I can't remember how to edit the widget. Reset the phone without backing it up, can a fella get a quick reminder on how to edit the widget?

[Bencherished]

Just go to your phone home screen, press and hold an empty area then select add widget, look for Poweramp widget and choose the one that best suits you that's all. 

[andrewilley]

Then adjust the appearance of the chosen widget before completing the process.

You can edit it again later by pressing top-right of the widget.

Andre

[sphinx780]

25 minutes ago, andrewilley said:

Then adjust the appearance of the chosen widget before completing the process.

You can edit it again later by pressing top-right of the widget.

Andre

Thank you, apparently with a Samsung that becomes pretty darn tricky.  I had to quick double tap the corner several times before I beat Samsung to the widget resizing choice. That'll drive a dude nuts. All good now though. 

[andrewilley]

@sphinx780 It's just a normal tap in the top-right, not double-tap or long-press.

Andre

[sphinx780]

17 hours ago, andrewilley said:

@sphinx780 It's just a normal tap in the top-right, not double-tap or long-press.

Andre

Wish it had been that easy. Not sure if it makes a difference but running a Galaxy S20. Tap opens the widget resizing tool first and gives me the option to remove the widget...or it opens up Poweramp directly. Took quite a bit of finagling to get the edit menu to open. There were times I could see it for a fraction of a second, then get an error stating Poweramp stopped or it would go to the resizing menu. When I was using a Pixel, it opened right up IIRC. On the Samsung it was a PIA.

[andrewilley]

@sphinx780 I use a Galaxy A70, but with Nova Launcher. On mine, a long-press is needed to trigger resizing/deleting/etc on homescreens, so a single tap never goes into that mode. Glad it's just a one-off task anyway, once done you can just leave it and forget it.

Andre

[sphinx780]

 Yeah, it's a once every few years thing, at most. It'll definitely help me remember to back up the settings, lol. Very much appreciate you replying to help! There's still nothing that compares to this app imo. 

[Jamie45]

how do you change play speed for songs,

[andrewilley]

6 minutes ago, Jamie45 said:

how do you change play speed for songs,

Go into the Equalizer screen (second icon from the left on the bottom row of the player) and on the second page of controls (swipe left) tap the 'Tempo' toggle control to turn it on/off, and then adjust the knob. Available values between 0.5x and 3x speed.

Andre

[Cpo]

I keep my entire music library on my Synology NAS. 

I have a Music Server on the Synology NAS.  

I would like to access it with Poweramp while I am on the road.

How can I do this?

[andrewilley]

@Cpo Sorry, you can't. Poweramp is a local file music player, not a streaming system. While it can play shoutcast-style online radio stations, there is no way to scan and play from a file structure in a remote location (whether that be Google Drive, Dropbox, or your own server). Unless your system has some method to mimic your remote server as a symbolic link within the local Android file system anyway, such as an SMB or CIFS share, but that's generally only while you are connected to the same LAN:

Andre

[Eric Marsh]

The interface is non-intuitive and there's no manual. I can't believe it.

Evidently it's a good app if you can figure out how it works.

[andrewilley]

@Eric Marsh t's a heavily-featured app, and like all 'power' apps verisons, there can be a learning curve for some of the more advanced stuff compared to the basic out-of-the-box music players that come pre-installed on Android devices. There is a Help feature which provides usage hints for the controls on the main pages.

What are you trying to do that you are having problems with?

Andre

[Eric Marsh]

Andre, I guess the problem is that I don't want a power app so much as something that just works. I've been using PlayerPro for years but I just got a new phone and while setting it up I finally decided to get another music player because PlayerPro stops playing at the end of an album instead of jumping to the next one and that is a problem when I'm on my motorcycle and don't want to stop to select new music. So I figured it's a good time to find an app that suits me better.

As I said before I'm finding parts of the Poweramp interface non-intuitive. I have set up all my music files in a hierarchy of directories (they've been like that for years) and I generally will select a track in some album, let the album play out and then move onto what ever album is next. So for example if I want to listen to a bunch of Pink Floyd I select a track at the beginning of one of their albums and since all my Pink Floyd is in the same directory I'm good to go.

What's bugging me right now is the whole "select" thing. Evidently it selecting some albums or tracks will create a queue and store and/or play it depending on which button I chose. But I don't seem to be able to select a few tracks from one album and then more from another one. When I do a swipe to go up a level so that I can drop down into another album everything I've selected disappears. And the truth is I may not want to create a queue which I will have to delete later. 

Ultimately though it comes down to documentation. Before I retired five years ago I was a pro software developer since the mid 80s. I get a little religious sometimes about ease of use. My wife was a tech writer for decades too. So when I had questions I went out to find some docs that would give me some answers so that I don't have to bug people and ask them the same questions that others no doubt have asked many times before. I couldn't find any real documentation. On YouTube there's some amateurs who try to do intros to the app but for every one of those it seems like there's five videos explaining how to get around having to pay for the app after the free period expires. So I've spent an hour or two looking for what I ought to be able to just chase down in a couple minutes, read it and understand it. That's my bitch.

No doubt if I keep tinkering with the app I'll get a handle on it. But I shouldn't need to.

Anyhow, thanks for the reply.

[Guest]

If your wanting it to jump to another album after it's finished and have everything in order turn on advance category with shuffle off. This will prevent using queue. You can't select from multiple albums at once for queue. Add from one then go to next. 

[andrewilley]

@Eric Marsh This FAQ might help to understand the basic playback methodology of Poweramp, which at its heart is based on progressing song-by-song through a 'Category' that you have chosen from your music library. Categories are selected from the main top-level Library View (which you get to by tapping the Library icon, lower-left of player screen) and you can then drill down to see the contents of various categories such as Folders, Artists, Albums, Composers, Genres, etc.

Note: some categories are hidden by default (so the library view doesn't get too complex) but if you tap on the three-dots menu icon at the top-right of the Library view you use 'List Options' to select which ones you'd prefer to show or hide.
 

Within any given Category you can then drill down one or more layers until you get to the actual songs (e.g. open several layers deep of Folder Hierarchy until you see the songs in the folder that you want to listen to). At each level, you can use the three-dots menu icon and select 'List Options' to adjust how that layer is sorted (e.g. by Title, Filename, Year, Last-Modified Date, etc) and some other properties of that view such as the list or grid size (which you can also change by pinching to zoom).

There are several ways you can commence playback. The simplest is just tap on the first song you want to hear. Or you can use the 'Play' or 'Shuffle' icons at the top of the view to start either playing the currently displayed list in its pre-defined (via 'List Options') order, or play randomly.
 

In your case, you probably will start in Folders Hierarchy view and once listening has commenced, playback will continue to the end of each folder and then continue on to the next folder in sequence - again, as defined by the List Options sorting orders - and so on until you run out of music in your library.

Note: This assumes the 'Repeat' icon on the player screen is set to its default 'Advance Category'. You can also set Poweramp to stop at the end of the folder ('Repeat Off'), repeat the folder ('Repeat Category') and some other options. For more info on how the Repeat and Shuffle options work, please see:

 

If you don't want to listen to music continuously in the pre-chosen sequence, you can use the 'Queue' to build a temporary list of songs to play, or use a 'Playlist' if you want to make something more permanent that you might want to revisit later. Choose any folder(s), album(s), songs(s), etc and after you've completed your selections, tap the '>>Queue' or '+Playlist' icons at the bottom of the screen and those selected items will be added. If you make a mistake, you can return to the Queue or any Playlist in the Library view and edit, re-order, or delete songs.

The main difference (apart from permanence) is that when the Queue finishes, playback drops seamlessly back to your normal category-based listening wherever you last left off. A Playlist on the other hand will continue on to the next Playlist in the Library, because 'Playlists' is actually a fully-fledged Category just like Folders or Albums.
 

I think I'll stop at this point and let that lot digest and give you a chance to catch up with the FAQs. There are oodles more options in Settings, but for now I suggest you familiarise yourself with the default modes and then start looking through the tweaks.

Andre