When the panes were introduced into MC I thought they were interesting but not compelling, and pretty much a waste of interface space. The most recent versions have caused me to start looking for another music program to replace MC. Having the primary navigation scheme be altered or disappear depending on a search string is wrong and annoying. This would not be so bad if I could just hide the panes and use a tree, but that doesn't appear to be possible.
Some time ago there were statements to the effect that J River were trying to maintain a balance between newbie friendliness and power-user options. I feel like the focus has shifted to the latter during the 9.1 beta. I don't find MC to be a comfortable app to explore or browse. Rather, MC now feels like a media search app that happens to play files, and can do slideshows if one follows a Byzantine procedure every time.
Frankly I just don't see MC getting better in significant ways. I've given up trying to use MC for ripping, burning, image browsing, DVD playback, or anything besides music. Sometimes user requests get addressed immediately, sometimes it takes one or two mega-threads in the forum, sometimes they appear to be ignored forever. Splitscreen is an excellent example of the lattermost behavior. I could have lived the rest of my life without panes, but I've been cursing the absence of splitscreen daily for more than a year.
Major problems with ripping, burning, drive access, and movie playback are unresolved for me. The usual responses to queries on these topics are
1)Try the next build
2)It's not us, something must be borked on your machine
But the next build never fixes these things, and my machine happens to rock with nearly ANY other software which attempts the same functions.
I know this post is a bit of a ramble, apologies for that. But I don't bear a disappointment well, and that's what MC is slowly becoming for me.