I’m currently looking for a replacement to castbox. Castbox us OK, but I want to learn what else good is out there. Bonus points for one that has movement-sensitive sleep timer the way Smart AudioBook Player has.
UPDATE: Testing out Antennapod. Looks nice, and seems to do what I want it to do. I need to experiment with the auto-download a bit and see if it behaves the way I want it to. If it does, we have a winner.
I migrated from Doggcatcher to Podcast Addict a couple years ago. They’re both OK. Most podcast apps are unnecessarily complex, convoluted and cumbersome to me, so take my opinion with a grain of salt.
Lately I’ve been testing Media Monkey - it’s primarily an iTunes-like app for Android. It indexes your own media store, and can sync whatever you choose to your phone. It also has a podcast tool in the desktop app.
Downside is the podcast portion doesn’t seem to have discovery/search like you’d think with a podcast app - you have to manually add the RSS url yourself. Plus to get wifi sync (which is critical to me), you have to buy both the desktop ($35) and Android app ($5). I get it, development isn’t free, and wifi sync really works. I don’t buy many apps, but I paid for both parts of Media Monkey, because I haven’t found anything else that provides media management, playlist, and sync.
Keep an eye on your media volume with Media Monkey. I’ve been using the Windows and Android versions for years, but I’ve noticed that a lot of my music is getting quieter.
I haven’t been able to narrow it down to Media Monkey or something else yet, but MM is the most likely culprit, as it’s the only media player I use.
I’ve ripped CDs with the same settings as other CDs, and the files play back much quieter than the other ripped CDs and the CD they were ripped from.