Review: SliMP3

Frequent readers of Slashdot know that I'm an MP3 junkie. Hell, even casual readers probably know that at this point. This week I review another MP3 player, Slim Device's small wonder, SliMP3. And this $269 is really worth a good look.

So what is it? Its a small MP3 player with no internal storage of its own. It has an ethernet port, RCA audio outputs (you'll need an external amp!), and a power plug. It has a really bright little screen for displaying song information and a remote. It's about the size of a car stereo faceplate, but a little thicker.

It doesn't have a fancy plastic box. The backside is simply an exposed circuit board. But thats sorta the idea: this is a toy that can work for users, but is also hugely designed to be a hacker toy.

Configuring the device is easy. The latest version has DHCP, but I tested it on a network that lacked the protocol. I put the IP in of my 'Server' and gave the unit its own IP and I was off and running. The server is a perl program you download from the Slim Devices web site. It supposedly will run on on Linux, Windows, MacOS, FreeBSD, BeOS, and MacOSX. It worked great on my linux box. Trivially easy. This unit was the easiest to set up of any MP3 player I have ever used. Of course, I was already running Linux and had Perl ;)

You can control the SliMP3 with a remote control, but the server optionally can just serve up HTML on a high port number and set your playlists up via an acceptable web interface. And since its perl, its all ready for you to hack yourself. The code itself is fairly legible... there's a mailing list, and it is actively being developed.

The closest competitor to the SliMP3 is the Audiotron. The audiotron is almost the same price, has an optical output, a more developed HTML interface, and is physically a nice stereo component. It is a far more mature product. But the audiotron uses SMB file sharing and controls everything within itself. The SliMP3 uses an open source server program to stream the audio to the player. So the smarts are mostly on the PC. Which of course lends itself to easy hacking.

The interface currently is pretty sparse. Some places display filenames where ID3 tags would be preferred. I was unable to get it to load a 20,000 track playlist. But the server software is under active development, and these things should both be resolved in a not-so-distant release.

There are a variety of cool projects that could conceivably be hacked into this thing. A GTK-Perl interface would be super smooth. Cross-fade functions. Intelligent playlist creation. Tivo style thumbs up-thumbs down track rating for music playback. And this is the first MP3 player I've seen that things like this are possible because the code is right there and ready to rip apart. It's even legible!

If you need a pretty box, or demand optical connections to your reciever, go with the audiotron. If you want something tiny, or just want to hack at your MP3 player stereo component, this is a great way to go.

Comments

A few comments...

[NOT-2-QUICK]

First off, I am glad to see that Taco is posting stories again and even more that he is "generous" enough to provide us with such an in depth review (of equipment that he likely got for free provided he plug it on his high-traffic web site...) Unfortunately, however, I believe that the good Commander neglected to cover some of the less desirable aspects of this piece of hardware... Just for giggles, I figured I would enumerate a few of the more unimpressive features of the SliMP3:

"It doesn't have a fancy plastic box" says CT. How is this a benefit, I like pretty boxes!!! Even more, I, for one, am not adverse to removing a couple of screw and taking off the "pretty box" and checking out what is underneath. Come on now, would a car enthusiast buy a automobile without a hood just for easier access to the motor??? I didn't think so...

Next, and this is a bit more trivial, but the internal NIC on this thing is only 10MB. Now I know what you are thinking - that is plenty fast enough for streaming audio. Well, in that aspect you are absolutely correct; however, what if you no longer have a hub/switch that even support 10MB anymore. I have a home network that this could work with quite nicely...that is, other than the fact that I am going to dust off one of my 10/100 auto-sensing hubs just for this purpose and loose my bragging rights of having a completely switched, 100MB home network!!!

I have one word for you..."ogg"!!! Besides being a rather strange noise to make, it is also the file type of the majority of my music. Having not supported this file type may be the death of an otherwise appealing gadget for hardcore hackers!!!

And finally, to conclude my little critique, I will point to the usefulness of such a gadget. While speaker wire does have distance limitations that CAT5 far surpasses, how many of us would encounter such a limitation in our own home. At work it would be quite feasible for attenuation to have negating affects, but at home this is really a mute point. As such, what is the benefit in having hardware vs. software decoding of MP3's when the same or similar can be accomplished through a free download of Winamp...

Well, I suppose I will get back down off of my soapbox... I do enjoy seeing the Taco back to doing some stories, I just hope that he exercises a it more objectivity in the future!!!

-n2q