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Linux-based Internet Radio Appliance
sysadmn writes "From CMP Media's Winmag Win Letter, A company called Kerbango has built what it bills as the world's first standalone Internet radio, which can play any of the claimed 4,000 audio streams floating around the Net as well as more conventional AM or FM broadcasts. Tuning is accomplished through the Kerbango Tuning Service, which displays the user interface on a half-VGA grayscale LCD monitor. The radio has
a built-in computer, with an 80MHz PowerPC chip running Linux with 8MB of DRAM, 8MB of flash memory, and a whole bunch of codecs.
It'll be available in the Spring. They're not saying how much.
"
'Kerbango' was the name of the mind altering dish ate from sauce pans by the Psychlos in the L. Ron Hubbard SF novel 'Battlefield Earth' (excellent book by the way). Chances are the Scientologists might just have copyrighted the name (similar to the way Lucas coprighted 'Droids' back in the 80's) and end up suing the company over the name.
Lucas filed a similar suit when FASA released the game (now knows as 'BattleTech') under the name 'BattleDroids' back in the eighties.
Looks like they are looking for a couple programmers in the Silicon Valley area. Check out the Jobs page.
The USB stack from 2.3 has been back ported to 2.2. It's not integrated with the kernel, it's a separate patch. The last time I looked into it, there were a couple of device level drivers that wouldn't work with it because they used other 2.3 specific features, but it was otherwise complete. Wish I could find the URL again.
I'm a geek. This is great for a non-geek, and maybe many geeks would find it appealing as well.
But as a geek I'm very happy to use or configure a general purpose computer to do all of this stuff.
My most likely scenario would be one general-purpose computer _dedicated_ to all of the following, and one general-purpose computer for
general use (web surfing, word processing, etc).
The dedicated one would do:
dvd
tv/vcr (a-la Tivo if only the software were there!)
internet radio (preferably using dsp rather than cpu)
local mp3 storage
file server(?)
As a geek I see no need to buy a dedicated device when I can set up an even better dedicated device myself (and have fun doing it).
The place where I see myself buying a dedicated device where my geekly skills aren't quite up to making my own is a portable device for the car/motorcycle that does (or has modules for) all of the following:
gps w/uploadable mapping
packet radio location system (why not!)
mp3 (using a dsp, not cpu again)
radar detector -- using dsp algorithms like the valentine one, maybe with multiple antennas, etc so that you can set up and mess with the software settings (hopefully even source code) yourself.
weatherproof (for the motorcycle)
low power (yay transmeta!)
All of these things in a small box that plugs into the car or motorcycle would be ideal.
That may be the case, if so it is pretty neat and it is a very cheap device to have a custom drive in it. If that is the case though you should be able to easily do that simply using 2 drives (one reading while the other writes). That might actually end up being more expensive (particularly if you used larger drives, like I would), but that's not really the issue -- the issue is that is fun to mess around. :-)
I realize that Tivo is also partly selling a service which provides listings of all the shows and playtimes, etc which I would be more than happy to pay for independantly.
The real thing is being able to set up/mess around with your own hardware and software.
An 80MHz PowerPC running Linux can do 4,000 audio streams and my old 5200/75 LC(75MHz PowerPC 603) couldn't even play one RA stream(or an MP3 for that matter).
5MHz+Linux = 4,000x better. Spiffy.
I agree with one big exception. A lot of people want to listen to radio from other countries or in other languages. This is a descent sized market for a device like this.
The internet rocks for solving distribution problems like this.
I'm an avid radio listener when I'm in my car. Any other place I won't listen to the radio and I never watch TV or go to the movies. For the life of me, I can't see why anyone would buy such a device!
Because most people aren't freaks who never watch TV or go to the movies, and because local radio blows goats.
Most of us are sedentary couch and mouse potatoes, and the Kerbango Internet radio sounds like a great way to do a little more digital grazing. No longer will I have to sit at my computer and feign productivity while I listen to decent radio stations in other cities. I can sit on my couch and completely dispel any illusions of productivity, and there's even a possibility I can listen from the comfort of my porcelain couch.
Any technology that lets me listen to more baseball games on the radio is a good one. Is Vin Scully still doing Dodgers games?
Rogers Cadenhead (Web: http://www.cadenhead.org/workbench)
Most people are not freaks if they choose not to watch TV. My reasons to actually watch TV are decreasing every day.
Anyone who doesn't watch TV is a demographic freak. Next thing you'll be telling me is that you read books. Shudder.
> Television and digital video are better for sports if that's what you really want.
Radio is the command-line interface to baseball. Television puts a nice graphic user interface on the sport, but if you want direct access to the things that make baseball great, you either go to a game or turn on the radio.
Rogers Cadenhead (Web: http://www.cadenhead.org/workbench)
Seriously...this could be some /cool/ tech, the line fades between radio and streaming audio...when does the car in dash version come out?
-jwb
Just wanted to let you know that I got a fairly decent set-top DVD player for $155 USD here in Pennsylvania.
(slashdot is having problems, sorry if this got submitted more than once)It most likely plays MP3 streams from an Icecast or Shoutcast server (see www.icecast.org).
I run an Icecast server at www.fatfreeradio.net and it's GREAT software.
--hunter
RateVegas.com - Vegas Reviews
and here is the USB HOWTO
Well, if ya head on over to MP3.com and then to there hardware section they say that it will be under 300 dollars, which isn't too bad. They only thing that seems stupid about this thing is that unless the speakers on it are better than my $200 dollar Yamaha's what is the point of buying it? WHo knows, I will probably end up having one, I am a sucker for gadgets like that....
A little box that plugs into the Internet and gives me my radio. A little box that plugs into the TV and lets me play games. A little box that plugs into the cable line and watches my TV for me.
They say the PC is going the way of the dinosaur-- after all, these little boxes are so much cheaper!
Cool, it runs Linux. Cool, it uncrunches streaming MP3. But I've got a PC that does that.
And funny, that very same PC plays games, too. And it can watch TV for me. And it keeps track of my finances and my recipes. You know, all those things I'd've had to buy a $200-300 little consumer-grade box to do. But somehow, those little single-purpose boxes sell.
A hundred bucks gets you into a low-end webtv. Another three hundred gets you into a cheap set-top DVD player. Toss in a hundred for a Playstation, a hundred for a VCR, at least a hundred for this gadget. That's $700-- and we're using last generation's game box, an analog system for watching our TV for us... Switching to a Dreamcast and a Tivo turns that $700 into closer to $1000. And I still can't do my finances, can't do word processing (and I don't have a place to plug a printer in even if I could!) and I can't store my recipes, $1000 later.
And then what we don't get are HDTV cards for our PCs that already have monitors with sufficient resolution to display HDTV.
I don't get it. Why is it these little single-use boxes sell? Is the general public really _that_ afraid of a general purpose personal computer?
-JDF
This raises some questions:
- Can their servers handle the traffic?
- As someone else here has pointed out: "What if the company goes belly up?"
- How does the company decide what category a signal will be filed under?
- What decides the placement? Will they accept payment from the broadcasters?
- What's their policy on advertising. Will any appear on the display? (Or worse, *in the audio*?)
- Will they make an effort to carry *all* streams, or will they focus on the most popular?
- Will they censor any streams that they regard as "inappropriate for a general audience"?
This is not to say that these aren't *answerable* questions. But they need to be addressed...What I'm really interested in seeing is a good "internet transistor radio" (when they finally release palm pilots with both Richochet and an audio jack, I'll be happy... you can squeeze listenable audio over a Richochet modem, high-quality audio can come later). Second to that, I'm sure an "internet car radio" would be of interest to all the people stuck in car commuting. This particular type of gadget is third down the list. Certainly it's a drawback that it's stationary, but a webradio for the bedroom/livingroom that's cheaper than a full PC would still fill a niche. At least it has a quarter-VGA screeen on it that allows for *some* flexibility in what you can do with it.
The great advantage of a web radio would be to get people out from under the corporate conglomerate blandness that the world seems to be sinking under.
The great danger is that in the effort to make it simpler to access web radio streams, they'll take away some of your freedom to choose what you hear.
I could see this selling very well to places
which use cable radio for their consumers. Bars, whatnot could have many more stations available using internet radio... And imagine, you could set up your own streams.... "Hey stevie, gimme a lager, and set the kerbango to irqzero radio".
this space intentionally left blank
If it's half as wide, and half as tall, that makes it 1/4 the area.
First, which PowerPC processor is this? What chipsets are we talking about? Any special chips? I want more technical specs.
:)
Second, what Linux are they running? Is it a modified LinuxPPC? Or is it custom-built? Is it burned onto the ROM? Have they made any changes to the kernel? If so, do they intend to put them back into the code base?
Third, will I be able to telnet into it? To network it like a regular computer? To replace the OS? In short, what is its hack value?
Fourth and last (but not least), how would one go about setting up a Beowulf cluster of these things?
To the editors: your English is as bad as your Perl. Please go back to grade school.
Was anyone else annoyed by the mouse trail effect with the little "k"'s on their front page?
I turn that off for the duration when I work on someones laptop and this page bothered me enough that I emailed them asking to reconsider the "feature".
Oh well, I'm probably a little off-topic, but it does look like a cool box. I don't know if I could get used to paying a subscription service to listen to music.
Russ
War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength. - George Orwell or George Bush?
Bringing the Internet to the radio.
Making multi-media single again.
Bringing you today's technology--yesterday!
More choices through fewer options.
You'll never want to spend the same amount on a simple radio tuner card to get the same effect again!
--
Linux MAPI Server!
http://www.openone.com/software/MailOne/
(Exchange Migration HOWTO coming soon)
According to this comment it will be less than $300.
audioramp
This little thing has a lot of features...
almost as many as the computer it tries to replace. Is there *any* gained functionality of one of these things over using my PC, and its "bigger than 2 watt" speakers?
--
+&x
If they want a separate box for everything then they will get a separate box for everything.
They *don't* want a seperate box for everything. Most don't even know what *everything* comprises. I dunno, this whole appliance craze seems to have its foundations in marketing, not in useful products. I wouldn't want one and I think most of this stuff is too confusing to appeal to the public at large ("You mean I can listen to the radio over the Internet with this?" "Yes" "Do I nee it to do that?" "No" "Then why should I use it?" "Convenience" "But I don't listen now, how will this make it more convenient") Too much too soon, the same reason why 90% of the companies that went public last year will fold the moment their employees vest and jump ship.
--
+&x
I think the Tivo uses a special drive from Quantum that has the ability to read and write at the same time. Most drives can only read or write at any given time.
You'd have to be asleep at the corporate wheel not to know by now that the latest fad is making every computing device resemble this purple device over here. Look at where the kerbango's knobs correspond to the imac's speakers, and we needn't say more about the silly colors. It'll pass, and on some future day in 20 years, someone will take the shell off a Dell machine (with the trunk in the back this time) and slap a colored one on and consumers will snatch them up in a massive coordinated fit of orgasmic nostalgia. I plan to be very cranky when it happens.
"If one is really a superior person, the fact is likely to leak out without too much assistance" -- John Andrew Holmes
This is exactly the pattern I see with my mobile/cell phone. Yes it's nice to use the thing and call your friends all the time, but on the other hand, when the bill arrives, I really wonder if it's worth it.
320x240 is half of 640x480, which is the standard VGA resolution. Anything above that is purely up to the monitor/video card.
These things won't be of much use in a car without some sort of wireless connection to the internet. But as you say, it would make radio listening more attractive out of the car. If these become popular, it could end up improving radio in general, as "local" stations find themselves competing nationwide. It is a lot easier to compete as the second "classic rock" station in a medium size city then it is to compete as the 3956th "classic rock" station available over the internet. If a significant percentage of radio listeners start using these devices, they'll be a huge incentive for these stations to differentiate themselves.
The cake is a pie
That probably depends on how likely you are to want to continue listening to the same stuff.
But anyway, I think one underrealized application for this is to play mp3s off of your own hard drive. The $300 price (if true) is pretty cheap for something of this sort. Though how good the software is will make a big difference.
I've been looking for something exactly like this. Something that would allow me to store my hundreds of cds, and provide jukebox like access to them. I've been in the process of throwing it together myself, but having it all prebuilt would be nice.
It helps, obviously, if you've already got a home network setup.
The cake is a pie
It's a very interesting time to be involved in Internet Radio
While I dig what the Kerbango Radio does, I mean how many of us have hacked together that old PC in the smallest case we could find just so we could have a box dedicated to playing all 30,000 MP3s that we have managed to collect, rip, borrow and 'aquire'. I just have to wonder, who in the world designed the shell for that thing?
It looks like some bad knock off of the Nickelodeon radio alarm clock. What is so wrong with a nice little brushed aluminum case? While Im sure I will look into this device for its function, can we say bye bye old hacked up PC in the pizza-box, I most definetly wont have it displayed in all its day-glow glory in my living room.
www.linux-skunkworks.com
Good... quick... cheap... soon...
:)
Not to be nitpicky, but I think soon is really similar to quick, so "good, quick, cheap, choose two" is about the same as saying "Good, quick, cheap, soon, choose three". The soon is redundant.
Just thought I would be picky today
K]ÏMWý©±Îï$ [½5>VÎG Û 1 ر/M îåMA$ÚT
They forget to mention above that this little thing will play your MP3s accross your 10/100 Network (doesn't say how; samba, ftp or what?) and it already has the network card. It also allows external storage devices to be plugged into it.
This little thing has a lot of features...
--
May contain traces of nut.
That's more or less what I thought at first, but consider this: Radio stations all over the US are being gobbled up by Radio conglomerates, resulting in bland coast-to-coast crap. Variety is, well, your choice between easy-listening :-)
pop-40 or "alternative" crap or country music, with an occasional 60s/70s classic rock station thrown in. College radio is the only interesting medium, but quality and signal strength can vary. If I wanted to hear Pantera on the radio...
I can't. I don;t think internet radio is the answer, but "internet" and "linux" should help their IPO
So you are willing to buy a dedicated device that needs it's own line to access things via wireless internet connections? Wouldn't buying the CDs be a better option?
Slashdot social engineering at it's finest
Because most people aren't freaks who never watch TV or go to the movies, and because local radio blows goats.
Most people are not freaks if they choose not to watch TV. My reasons to actually watch TV are decreasing every day.
Most of us are sedentary couch and mouse potatoes, and the Kerbango Internet radio sounds like a great way to do a little more digital grazing. No longer will I have to sit at my computer and feign productivity while I listen to
decent radio stations in other cities. I can sit on my couch and completely dispel any illusions of productivity, and there's even a possibility I can listen from the comfort of my porcelain couch.
The problem that I see is that eventually even if you are wealthy these little fees could start to add up rather rapidly and no one would ever notice until you actually add them up. Paying over $300/month for various services could start to be common. Until perhaps internet access via this device is as free as common FM or AM radio I think that most people will shy away from it.
Any technology that lets me listen to more baseball games on the radio is a good one. Is Vin Scully still doing Dodgers games?
Television and digital video are better for sports if that's what you really want. Check out something like ESPN or the like.
Slashdot social engineering at it's finest
Here's a nice one.
threadeds blog
Not many people want to power a computer up, rattle keys, whizz a mouse around and all the attendant house keeping. They want to get home from work, crack open a beer and slob.
Now, if someone could think up a way for all these household electrics to play nicely with each other...
threadeds blog
If Kerbango plans on releasing the radio this Spring, how will they support USB? Will they have to run on a 2.3.x kernel?
"The best way to do mathematics is to be creatively lazy." -I. M. Isaacs
A lot of people seem to look at it as a useless device, that they have no need for it because of their Desktops/Latops. Look at it from the view of it being an extension of your PC. You can hook it up to your home network and access MP3s, and those with dedicated/high speed connections can use it for streaming HIGH quality audio... pretty cool. And it saves you from running cable from you pc to your bedroom or where ever...
I think such information is best posted in your usual haunt... alt.sex.stories.watersports.cock-jockies.
;)
--
If I had one euro for every witty sig that I wrote, I would have enough for a small bottle of French beer
The opinions contained in this document are in no way expressed.
There are really to many unknowns with this internet radio. Yeah for Linux and its coolness factor but sometimes ideas need more development. How does it play MP3s of of a network? FTP, SAMBA, NFS? ALso how do I really go through 4,000 streams and find what I want. FInally what is the cost. THis would be really sexxy for 100-200 dollars but over that my SB Live and surround sound can probably rock this thing to pieces and I actually know it will work and give me what I want.
Perhaps the just GUI part of it is messed. I agree that the graphical G2 is a resource hog. PPC Linux has been trying to get G2 for awhile now these guys come out of nowhere and Realnetworks custom builds it? I guess it is a matter of catching the right person at the right time.
ANOTHER attempt to waste our bandwidth for things that already have adequate distribution means. Between regular old AM/FM and all the channels available on DBS satellite and who knows what else, why waste our 2-way bandwidth for a one-way medium??? Use the Net for requesting songs or whatever, but leave the actual content distribution for OTHER mediums designed for one-way distribution!!!
What's next - DoS attacks with "The Carpenters' Christmas Album"????
--Now tell me what I'll have to do to let this thing access my MP3 archive!
Good
quick
cheap
soon.
choose three!
.. Blub falls right in the middle of the abstractness continuum. -- Paul Graham
It is only available for Intel, but it works fine. It has a few annoying bugs but it is less annoying than the gaudy Windows version!
On homepage they talk about a LCD screen of 320*240, this is only quarter-VGA, so were is the other half????????????
Secure messaging: http://quickmsg.vreeken.net/
Whats wrong with you'r hi-fi. Everybody seems obsessed with integrating everything into their computers and linking every piece of electrical equipement to the 'net (in the interests of progress??). Digital Audio Broadcasting is just starting to show its colours in the UK - this should provide enough broadcasting bandwith for everyone. Get a life - buy a radio.
Now whats the deal with this Kerbango Audio Operating System... Is this just a custom version of Linux or is it something running on top of Linux... Could be interesting to see if its possible to crack these things somewhat like EMPEGs... -d11
I am a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar.
Most of us are sedentary couch and mouse potatoes, and the Kerbango Internet radio sounds like a great way to do a little more digital grazing. No longer will I have to sit at my computer and feign productivity while I listen to decent radio stations in other cities. I can sit on my couch and completely dispel any illusions of productivity, and there's even a possibility I can listen from the comfort of my porcelain couch. I don't know about you.. But for that very reason I can't wait till they do it with an internet tv... Then we can reach the peak of nerdiness... Not only being a couch potato, but a computer geek. Actually, that could be an interesting idea though, make a tv that does something similar and uses a service kinda like iCraveTV. Jack Valenti would probably shit a golden brick over that one. -d11
I am a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar.