Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Get a better Pandora experience right on your desktop with Elpis

Get a better Pandora experience right on your desktop with Elpis:

Elpis ScreenshotElpis Screenshot2
Freewaregenius 5-Star PickIf you love Pandora, as we do here at Freewaregenius, then check out Elpis, a free, open source local Pandora client that can bring the Pandora experience to your desktop in a stylish, ad-free interface.


While other Pandora local clients (such as this one) stay close to the Pandora interface, Elpis makes a huge departure, opting for a very iPhone like interface instead. And it works, brilliantly, delivering simple, intuitive Pandora experience that is significantly better than Pandora in the browser. Familiar actions such as creating radio stations, voting a song up or down, etc. can be done quickly and easily (see the screenshots above and below).


Elpis Screenshot5Elpis Screenshot3


Elpis can also be minimized to the tray (toggle in the options screen), and will display a balloon notification when a new song is being played (see below).


Elpis Screenshot4


The verdict: if you like Pandora, get this one and you’ll like it even better. It even brings media key support to Pandora. The only criticism I have of Elpis is that it can take a long time to launch, initially, which may have more to do with the Pandora service than the desktop client.


Two words’; Simply brilliant!


[Thanks go to reader Panzer for the tip about this one]


Version Tested: 0.9.1


Compatibility: WinAll. Requires Microsoft .NET Framework 4.0.


Go to the program page or the Elpis page on Google Code to download (~ 1.09 megs). Note: if you live outside the US, you can use a free VPN service such as Tunnelbear to access Pandora.


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