I've noticed that support for non-square album art seems to have gotten worse in Windows 7 than from Windows Vista. In Windows 7, as well as Windows Vista, album art when browsing through albums would be resized into a square. However, in Windows 7, unlike in Windows 7, album art shown when playing an album is also resized into a square. At this point, it looks like the only place where non-square album art is shown in its proper dimensions is the menu when an album is selected (such as when showing the track listing).

Is this expected behaviour? Is there a known workaround, or do I have to crop everything outwards to be a square picture? If that's the case, is there any support for transparency, so that I don't end up with (for examples) seas of black?

Thanks!