Just last week, Adobe announced a new product designed to offer an alternative to Apple's iTunes software. It's called Adobe Media Player (AMP), and given that we're completely obsessed by the latter, it seemed appropriate to give this new player a quick once-over.

At present, in its current beta form, AMP only supports a limited selection of file formats. When we say limited, that roughly translates to Adobe's own video specification and nothing else. However, by the time the product is officially released, support should be in place for both H.264 and AAC (or, to put it another way, the main audio / video podcast formats).

Here's the obligatory screenshot:

The player works surprisingly well. It's fast, it's stable and it looks damn good. The media catalogue is missing any form of search functionality and it's a shame there's currently no audio support, but both of these are pending updates.

In fact, my only major criticism would be the lack of any planned portable device synchronisation. Video on the go is an absolute must for us.

If you're interested in testing the software, more information is available on the Adobe Labs site. The best way to watch our stuff is through the Blip.tv feed, although video from our main feed will work reasonably well too.