Hardware Review: Rio Central

My ongoing quest to find the perfect MP3 playing stereo component continues this week with the Rio Central. This is a $1500 box with a 40 gig hard drive that aims to do everything audio, from feeding reciever units, burning CDs, and populating portables, and of course, providing an interface to manage your tunes and play them on your stereo. And it's built on Linux- a USB keyboard is all you need to get to a command line!

I'll be frank- I was excited to see this box. A 40 gig drive makes this thing on the right side of the space curve since it means I can store a large enough portion of my CDs to make it useful. Of course as anyone who has designed or even used a large scale MP3 player knows, with great gobs of disk space comes the burden of attempting to create a UI to do manage great gobs of music.

What's the first thing you do with a 40 gig MP3 player? You plug it in and start ripping CDs. The unit is physically nice looking- it seems a bit big, but most of that is the large screen (which is unfortunately kind of dim). It has USB ports on the front and back. Optical audio connection is available but I tested it with standard RCAs plugged into the stereo in my office since I was familiar with the audio quality of this system having been listening to both CDs and MP3s for a long time here.

The box has a copy of a big chunk of CDDB on it, so it doesn't really need net access to rip a lot of CDs. However it does have a modem port, and an HPNA network connection for people using phone lines in their house as a sort of poor mans ethernet. I'm seeing a lot of consumer electronics with HPNA connections and it looks like a good compromise. Unfortunately the unit doesn't have a built in ethernet adapter, and it only supports a handful of USB ethernet adapters, so I had to order one in order to get this thing on my office network (to review the Rio Reciever which is a seperate device: review forthcoming).

Allright with all of that out of the way, it was time to rip a CD. The drive tray is white which is a minor nitpick, but it really is a sore thumb on the smooth looking black case. But hey, thats just my anal retentive side. Ripping CDs is trivially easy: stick it in and confirm the title. I ripped several discs without trouble (Gorillaz, Daft Punk, Ben Folds), but one had a problem (Blink 182's Dude Ranch). It just hung and there wasn't much I could do about it except eject.

Playback and navigation is a mixed bag. Doing common operations is pretty easy but constructing elaborate playlists is obviously going to be more work. Several nifty random options exist, like playing your most played tracks, or your least played tracks instead of going purely random. Very cool. I will say that this has the best UI of any stereo component MP3 player I've seen, but you need to get up close to do complicated stuff just to read the screen.

The audiotron allows a web interface. The ZapStation lets you use the TV to control playlists. Both devices have shortcomings, but at least there are ways to control your playlist without pulling your ass out of the recliner. The Rio's Remote and screen just don't cut it from more than 6-8 feet away.

The gee whiz stuff that is worth mentioning- having a hard drive in your stereo adds that plesant whirring sound. I'm sure that bugs people besides me. You probably won't notice it at a reasonable distance, but its there. The audio fidelity on the whole is as good as can be expected. We all know what MP3 encoding does to your tunes if you have a reasonable speakers. There are also silly little visualization things on the screen if you are into that. Its fun, but obviously its not the reason someone would buy this thing ;) But I know people who buy an EQ just to have the fancy lights in their stereo, so obviously some people dig it.

For those of you who are interested in getting under the hood, throwing in larger hard drives should be relatively easy. And with 100 gig drives at $200, you could really make this thing sing. If you plug a USB keyboard in, you can ease navigation in the UI... or hit ctrl-alt-delete, and suddenly the Rio Central's screen gives you an honest to god Linux Shell Prompt. There are a few games too, but thats just a nifty bonus, you won't be spending any quality time on them.

Getting audio onto the box through methods other than ripping CDs (or letting it read MP3s off a CDR) is tougher. The box has FTP, so getting MP3s onto the hard drive is easy... a little command line program to import a directory of MP3s would be swell. There's also an open source java application under development called jempeg which should eventually support the Central since it is based on the Empeg car player. That will Greatly ease the annoying process of getting your gigs of existing tracks onto the box.

There are a few other features that I didnt' really test. You can burn CDs or feed a few different MP3 portables. The UI to do this is pretty simple but I didn't have any CDRs or a portable MP3 player to test it out with.

Summary: Ethernet should be built in. Buying a $40 adapter for a $1500 unit is just silly considering the target audience for this thing. At $500-$750 the Rio Central would be a much easier recommendation. Maybe $500, and you add your own hard drive. But I know full well that such a thing currently isn't economically possible for a vendor. I still feel like the home MP3 player is over priced and can't imagine it catching on until it gets a bit closer to the price of big CD changer. But in terms of usability, this is the best one I've tested yet, and the standard 40G hard drive is probably enough for most people.

Coming Soon: the review of the Rio Reciever- this little baby connects over your network to the Rio Central and brings audio to any room you have an ethernet connection. This is what makes the Rio Central stand out. But you'll have to wait a few days to read about it here ;)

Comments

Lot of dosh

[moongha]

$1500? Sounds like crazy money to me...

Re:Lot of dosh

[phyxeld]

Yeah, one could probably build a net-booting (no hd, silent) PC for a lot less money, and have some change left over for a sleek black case. My ideal mp3s-on-the-stereo setup most definitely has the files stored on a server in the other room, and doesn't have a noisy hard disk in the living room.

I like how the website is quick to establish that it's a "home theatre compenent", because everybody knows that $1500 for a PC that doesn't even have ethernet is a ripoff.

Nice concept, nice to see linux used, but sorry guys $1500 is more than anybody in their right mind is gonna pay for something like this.

Re:Lot of dosh

[bomberger]

I fully agree. I wish I wouldn't have waisted time reading the article let alone writing this post. What a waiste! Give me 1500 smack-a-roos, and I can build you an mp3 player that does all that and more, and has a nice big screen monitor with a gui front end. Err.. a computer?

Re:Lot of dosh

[dan the person]

Yeah, one could probably build a net-booting (no hd, silent) PC for a lot less money, and have some change left over for a sleek black case. My ideal mp3s-on-the-stereo setup most definitely has the files stored on a server in the other room, and doesn't have a noisy hard disk in the living room.

The device you want is called the Rio Receiver, it has no internal storage, but connects to a file server instead. Much cheaper too.

The Rio Central is a new product for people who want a standalone player.

Re:Lot of dosh

[Anonymous Coward]

Here is a review MP3 Newswire did on the Rio Receiver last August.

All well and fine but ...

[Anonymous Coward]

what's wrong with building your own box with much the same features/hardware to play MP3s for cheaper?

Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[InfinityWpi]

C'mon, it's a review of a $1500 piece of hardware that does what an $800 computer can do if you give it a good sound card and a burner. Give me reasons why it should be bought!

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[Anonymous Coward]

to be fair, he did say at the end of the article that it was overpriced by 2-3x.

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[Loligo]

>Give me reasons why it should be bought!

Because some people don't want a big ugly beige box sitting next to their stereo rack?

Because some people have $1500 but not the skills to assemble, configure, and install their own components, OS, and software?

Because some people want a single person to call when the box up and dies, instead of having to diagnose whether to call Asus, Creative Labs, Micron, PC Power & Cooling, or Nvidia?

I dunno. Why should a lawyer buy one of these to put into his office when he can simply take a slew of billable hours out of his time to save $700 building a Frankenclone box that doesn't match his decor?

I just can't come up with anything.

-l

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[TheGreenLantern]

Because some people have $1500 but not the skills to assemble, configure, and install their own components, OS, and software?

Good thing it was reviewed on Slashdot then.

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[Loligo]

>Good thing it was reviewed on Slashdot then.

I'd suggest reading at -1 for a while and then coming back here to tell me that you honestly think more than 75% of Slashdot's readerbase has the skills to tie their own shoes or feed themselves, much less build a computer.

-l

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[batkiwi]

I think this IS way overprices.

I bought the sonic blue reciever for 99$, and felt it was a great deal.

This is not aimed at someone who would dream of having a computer with their REAL audio equipment. This is for an audio junkie who wants a nice looking, nice sounding, high quality mp3 storage/playback/burning station to go with their other components.

But for a concrete list of reasons:

-it's already set up. No cobbling together hardware/software with a remote listner to try to get it to do stuff. This already does it OOTB

-it will feed rio recievers. Sure you could hack apache to do it (i have it running at home) but it REALLY is a chore if you're not computer inclined. audio junkies can rip there, and listen anywhere in their house that they have a rio reciever.

-it looks nice. Your computer would not fit in with audio equipment, This does. It has a nice lcd screen, a nice remote, and a nice looking (non computer looking) case. You can get those tiny shuttle cases, or other plastic cases, or make your own, but they still look like a computer.

-it has high quality audio parts. Your soundblaster live/etc can not compare to solid state parts. It's the same reason that professional musicians buy a 1000$ audio input card that "does the same thing" your 90$ sb-audigy does.

It's like the tivo debate... sure you can hack something together that does it all, but a tivo looks nice, works nice, and is already set up for you.

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[beckett]

the thing is, i've tried everything, and i'm looking at stuff like this now. why? i've done the computer by the reciever. i've done the 2.4ghz video tranmitters. i've tried the long ass cords. these are the things that upset me with "brew your own"

1) i've got a 2000 stereo system, and i'm still relying on headphone jacks to get my sound out.

2) i'm the only person in the house that knows how to play a DVD through my system

3) the fan is loud. the box is clunky.

so in a nutshell, the computer will do you fine. so will using a set of slip-joint pliers instead of a sledge hammer to pound in a nail. when you buy a stereo system, you want everything easy to use as a remote control, easier if possible.

I'm looking for a sleek box that does all the functions i want from your computer as a media center. I'd pay more for ease of use and usability, and that's why i'd be interested in buying something like this.

however, IMHO i'll keep looking, becauuse this overpriced RIO box is just dang ugly. clunky too.

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[Anonymous Coward]

Easy to setup.
Easy to use.
Only 1 box, not several (PC, monitor, keyboard)
No noisy fans.
Runs linux.
Looks more like a stereo component than a PC.

I'm not saying you can't make a PC that can be all of those things, but it isn't very easy, takes time, and the average-person-with-excess-money that this is targetted at won't know how or want to do that.
IMHO the price is a bit steep, but competition should bring it down to sane levels soon enough.

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[phyxeld]

sure you can hack something together that does it all, but a tivo looks nice, works nice, and is already set up for you.

The kind of people that want a stereo-compenent-ish player are probably the same people who don't the the noise of a hard disk in their living room. That alone sinks all these devices imho. Course, the Tivo sold somewhat well (?), so what do I know...

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[Anonymous Coward]

It's like the tivo debate... sure you can hack something together that does it all, but a tivo looks nice, works nice, and is already set up for you.

Speaking of Tivos... I always thought it was odd how whenever there's a Tivo article the comments are always "Tivos are a gift from god", while an article about stereo mp3 players gets 200 "I can do better with $300 and a slackware CD, why would ANYONE buy this?" comments. Apparently simplicity and ease of use only apply to TVs or something.

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[Anonymous Coward]

ieeeeiiie i gotta preview more

that should be "people who don't want the the noise of a hard disk in their living room"

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[ncc74656]

>Give me reasons why it should be bought!

Because some people don't want a big ugly beige box sitting next to their stereo rack?

A can of Krylon will fix that.

Because some people have $1500 but not the skills to assemble, configure, and install their own components, OS, and software?

I'd think that the number of /.ers who fall into that category is fairly small. As for the blinking-12:00 crowd, I don't think they've even heard of MP3s.

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[ncc74656]

It's like the tivo debate... sure you can hack something together that does it all, but a tivo looks nice, works nice, and is already set up for you.

Your analogy is slightly flawed...a TiVo does considerably more than you would likely bother to hack together. Anybody can throw an All-In-Wonder into a computer and tell it to record a certain channel at a certain time of the week. It takes a bit more ingenuity to get it to track down every episode of Star Trek wherever/whenever it might be showing and record all of them. It takes more still for it to figure out what stuff you might like, record it without any intervention on your part, and make it available.

I've heard of PVR software that works with your TV-tuner card to provide basic recording functionality, but they usually do little more than turn your computer into a VCR. I haven't heard of PVR software that can do what a TiVo does.

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[Luke Marsden]

I'd think that the number of /.ers who fall into that category is fairly small. As for the blinking-12:00 crowd, I don't think they've even heard of MP3s.

Maybe so, but the parent post was referring to the people in the middle. Those few hundred million people who've used Napster and have a decent stereo system in a different room from their computer/server.

Those people might want to put an networked MP3 box in their living room, but don't know (or want to learn) how to flash an EEPROM and netboot linux over ethernet.

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[Anonymous Coward]

Because some people don't want a big ugly beige box sitting next to their stereo rack?

For $250 you can get a mighty nice 1U black case for your $500 computer.


Because some people want a single person to call when the box up and dies, instead of having to diagnose whether to call Asus, Creative Labs, Micron, PC Power & Cooling, or Nvidia?

This isn't Dell. Do you see a moronic surfer selling overpriced PC clones here? No, this is Slashdot, News For Nerds, Stuff That Matters. How does some overpriced turnkey PC make the frontpage when you can just go out and buy a $300 Turtle Beach Audiotron to do practically the same thing while still looking "pretty" in your stereo cabinet?

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[NorthDude]

Well, You are absolutly right about this, but there is one point to consider. People like to buy things when they are more expensive. Even if it isn't true, it gives most people confidence on what they buy. I remember hearing a story about Goldstar(correct me if I'm wrong), wich was selling their stuff very cheaply in chain store ala Wallmarth. Well, sells were not that bright and somebody there went with a new business model: selling the same stereo in "specialized" stores at 2 or 3 times the price. Well, they began to sell pretty well... I for sure would never buy an mp3 player at 1500$ but Average Joe probably would buy it to complement his home stereo/65"TV/etc etc because it's expensive, it looks cool, it does the job without any hassle and he feels confident that at 1500$, it got to worth it. I know that this really applies to my brother in law tough...
just my 2 cents

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[TampaTim]

Not a bad review, IMO, but you're right, if I was going to spend $1500, for something like that, I'd go with a small footprint PC, then your options are limitless.

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[Chorizo911]

My nutsack itches and my hemmroids bleed...

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[boopus]

Well, your criticism of his anology is slightly flawed. If you replace every mention of TiVo with "rio reciver" your comment is still valid. The rio reciver lets you have a CD jukebox that holds more CDs that would probably fit in the space, all available at the touch of a few buttons.

The software the empeg guys("sonicblue guys" doesn't work for me) have created is far more advanced than what you would come up with by yourself. I've never actualy used a rio reciver, but I've got two empegs/RioCars and the hardware is great but the software makes it usuable while driving. You can't pick up a mouse and scroll through your mp3 collection while driving on the freeway, but with the empeg is takes 5 secconds to add the song that you just thought of to the current playlist. Are you listening on random and want to hear another song by that artist that just played? One button on the remote. Are you listening on random and don't want to hear more from the artist/album/year that's playing? That's just one button press away. This software is essentialy the same on the reciver, except that you can rip CDs.

Criticising the software without having used it is sort of off base...

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[amuro98]

It's overpriced - but not because you or I could build our own for less.

The purpose to buy this (or similar devices) is that all the work is done for, and it provides you with a complete, integrated product.

However, its price of $1500 doesn't justify its features or capabilities.

For $1500, I'd want:

* At least 100GB of space - definitely should be expandable

* Built in ethernet, USB2.0, firewire, homePNA, and maybe a modem (hey, not everyone is going to have a network at home.)

* Full interface that uses your TV, with maybe some optional software for visualization plugins (ala WinAmp) Composite video would be fine for this purpose.

* Able to use either a keyboard or the remote to name folders, tracks, etc.

* Able to read/write from attached device so long as it can be mounted (this would include external HDs, USBMemory Stick readers, your desktop(!) etc.)

* Able to be mounted by Linux/Windows/MacOS box over the network. Sorry, but while FTP is nice, the masses aren't going to think it's "easy." Network Neighborhood, on the other hand, is "easy." This could also be an alternative interface for importing and organizing your MP3s.

* Web interface would also be nice.

* STREAMING SUPPORT - both as a client and a server.

None of the things I've listed above should be very hard to do - especially since similar products already do one or two them. Someone just has to *squish* all the features together onto a single box.

When someone does that, then we can talk about spending $1000+ on this thing.

Until then, I agree with the other posters who say $500 is a fair price for this thing. At $1500, only the serious MP3 folks are going to be interested - and guess what? They've probably already built a PC.

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[billcopc]

Some people are smarter and don't call Asus, Creative or NVidia. They call their local asian importer and buy new gear before the sun sets.

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut

[bradleyjg]

The rio receiver software can do none of the things you mentioned. The screen is tiny, the UI and remote are obtuse.

$1500?

[Steve B]

I don't see anything that can't be done for half that on a dedicated PC.

Re:$1500?

[theCURE]

Maybe that's why taco's review of the box said the exact same thing. He also doesn't like the color of the white drive, the fact that it didn't rip his crappy blink 182 cd, etc etc etc. but of course you read the article so no need to reiterate.

Rio hardware is nice stuff...

[tgd]

I don't particularly like Sonic Blue as a company -- they seem to have gobbled up and ruined a lot of good product lines, but I've used the Empeg before (which they bought), and own two Rio Receivers. (Which seem to be based on the Empeg technology, from the looks of the software running on them).

I love the Rio Receivers. I have two of them -- one in the living room, and one in my bedroom, streaming music from a Linux server running JReceiver. I can access all my MP3's, as well as listen to streaming music sources over the net on my stereo with a minimum of hassle.

Although a lot of the college students on here (or unemployed ex dot com people) have time to build one off solutions, for $1500, these are a good buy for those of us who unfortunately don't have time available to custom build solutions. For $99, the Rio Receivers were a no-brainer, I just wish I had bought a couple more.

Re:Rio hardware is nice stuff...

[Anonymous Coward]

Where did you pick up the RIO Receiver's for $99?

Re:Rio hardware is nice stuff...

[elbowboy]

There were a ton of rio's on ebay from 40 up. I picked two up for less then sonicblue sells one. (They still have them for around 169) With those and a $30 dollar ibm i picked up I've got a great setup working. My ibm sits in my darkroom and my rio recivers are anywhere in the home i can reach with a network cable. No problem running the 2 rio players off the one pentium, and with the extra 1350 I figure I can buy me one of them new fangeled russin brides.

Gimme a break...

[phallen]

I'll buy one of these when I get my Web Tablet, 3G video phone, Bluetooth wearable pc, and oh yeah: VR headset.

These companies have got to realize that cramming 1/10 of a computer in to a component and selling it for the price of a full-feature PC will never fly. These must be the same people trying to get me to buy a $3000 HDTV that get's 3 hi-def channels.

Re:Gimme a break...

[Anonymous Coward]

Since when are there only three HD stations? The major networks, including things like HBO, and some DirecTV PPV stations all have some HD programming. Additionally, DVDs and PS2 both look fucking sweet on HDTV.

Re:Gimme a break...

[phallen]

Ok, you got me! I'll retract.

5 channels + video games.

Audiotron?

[dimer0]

I still don't understand why people would buy these things. You already (well, should!) have plenty of space on a PC in your home. You can already rip mp3s. The only thing is you can't cue them up on a stereo component.

Get an Audiotron for $199 or so, and you're done. Use your existing collection. Why waste money..

Re:Audiotron?

[Anonymous Coward]

www.audiotron.net

"Price: $299.95"

Re:Audiotron?

[GlobalEcho]

I have to concur. The Atron is really *more* functional than this monstrosity because it plays so nicely with a network share (from OSX in my case).

I don't understand why all these manufacturers are putting HD's (at premium prices) in MP3 hardware. It's chaos! I'm annoyed enough just syncing my iPod. Owning 2 or 3 of these things and keeping them in sync would be a $3000+ headache I *don't* need...

...especially since I have 2 Audiotrons. They rock. And yes, they have digital out so I can use a real DAC.

/me sells 100 shares of SonicBlue short

Re:Audiotron?

[Lumpy]

Actually overall the audiotron is better.
It looks and acts like a piece of audio equipment. it's audio out is far superior.
and finally I'm not stuck with a dead unit after dropping it or moving as the harddrive decided to eat it'sself.

Sorry, audiotron - 10 : everything else - 0

Re:Audiotron?

[antijava]

Wow, the AudioTron is almost a match for what I've been looking for. Now, if they just supported 802.11b networking, I'd seriously consider buying one. I went wireless expressly because I DIDN'T want to have to deal with running ethernet all throughout my house (it's a bitch in a two-story house).

Re:Audiotron?

[Lumpy]

you can.

802.11 accesspoint.
audiotron.

connect the two with a crossover 10baseT cable.

voila wireless audiotron.

cool box

[laserjet]

Here are the features of the box:

* Digitally records and stores your entire music collection in a single location.
* Powerful 40 GB hard drive can store more than 650 CDs or 6,500 individual songs.
* Write standard audio CDs or MP3 data CDs using the integrated CD-RW drive.
* Move your MP3 music collection off of the PC and into the living room (use either a network connection or USB to transfer MP3's from your PC to your Rio Central).
* Create an unlimited number of customized playlists based on personal style, taste, or mood. Or, let the Rio Audio Center determine what you want to hear based on your listening habits.
* Large display, intuitive interface and advanced search features make it easy to find the music you want instantly.
* Frees your home of bulky CD collections and saves you from the hassle of searching through stacks of CDs to find a favorite song or album.
* Shares music with Rio portables via convenient USB ports in front and back of unit.
* Encodes at a bitrate of up to 320 kbps for high-performance digital sound quality. Provides an optional, lower bitrate encoding option for downloading to portables.
* Quickly record digital audio files from your personal CD collection. Just load a disc and Rio does the rest.
* CDs are automatically cataloged as they are recorded. Artist, album, song title, and other relevant information is instantly assigned to each file to make future searches quick & easy. Built-in 56 kbps modem will dial out to retrieve information from the Internet if necessary.
* Built in 10 mbps home PNA connection for streaming music to one or more Rio Receivers.
* Supports common audio formats like MP3 and WMA, and can be upgraded to emerging digital standards so your home audio system is always up-to-date.
* Engineered to the highest quality standards with stereo RCA and optical outputs.

now, here is what the comments will be:

1) I can do the same thing for $xxx with xxx hardware and linux

2) this is cool, but no one will buy it

3) how long will it be till it runs linux...

4) etc. use your imagination.

I for one, think it is a very nice looking box. People buying this probably are not too concerned with money, and it would be a VERY nice looking addition to my home stereo. I myself can not afford it, but it looks like they put a lot of effort into making it look nice and fit in with the rest of your stereo equipment.

true, you can do the same thing with a computer, but sometimes that just doesn't matter.

Re:cool box

[Loligo]

>1) I can do the same thing for $xxx with xxx
>hardware and linux

Except it won't look as cool and won't integrate nicely with your stereo system (think cosmetics).

>2) this is cool, but no one will buy it

I don't think they'll sell a lot of 'em, but they'll sell some.

>3) how long will it be till it runs linux...

It already does. Read the article.

-l

Re:cool box

[Anonymous Coward]

It does run Linux, try reading the bloody review

Re:cool box

[laserjet]

Apparently you didn't understand me. I DID read the article. I am saying what the COMMENTS will be. You have forgotten that most people don't even read the entire summary, thus it will be a common comment because people failed to read it.

I know it runs linux. But I also know many /. readers read nothing before posting.

Re:cool box

[Anonymous Coward]

It's amazing how stupid some of /. is, even the ones with low user id's. I know you were being (insightful +1) trying to predict (and very well, I might add) what the /. croud would bitch at, and moan about in this cool device.

It pains me greatly that people had to respond to your post in any way other than positive. That said, good job man, have an imaginary beer.

Re:cool box

[Anonymous Coward]

You missed comment 5) 50% of posts will begin with Did you even READ he article?

I appreciate your earnest cynicism, however. Keep up the good work.

For the masses sure, but for geeks

[baptiste]

This geek just wants a front end to my own MP3 server. The audiotron is sweet because it gives you teh slick interface and DAC on top of an Ethernet port. That way I can maintain my stuff on my server that will house other stuff as well. I'd rather have all my home files (MP3s, movies, etc included) one one central server instead of having to maintain a bunch of smaller servers throughout. Maybe thats just me, but that is why teh Audiotron or units like it win me over everytime.

Re:For the masses sure, but for geeks

[mcspock]

In some strange twist, it's actually not just you; it's also the company you mention in your sig. Centralized storage and intelligence will be the future of home computing, and instead of trying to make expensive, do-everything boxes, people will make simple cheap devices that hook into the PC.

an AI 'taste' module, too?

[jackDuhRipper]

> but one had a problem (Blink 182's Dude Ranch).

there you go -

Fine fine...

[ranger8x]

but does it run SETI??

Re:Fine fine...

[Anonymous Coward]

Probably not, unless the Rio uses a x86 processor (doubt it) or if there's a version of SETI that will run on the Rio's CPU. SETI (or anything else) on a Rio would be a cool hack though.

Linux for Playstation 2 instead

[Anonymous Coward]

If you already have a PS2 it's only an extra $200 and you'll pretty much have the exact same features as this over priced $1500 gadget.

the cost of iBook, iMac w/ iTunes

[stego]

That is exactly what hit me as I got through this article - does the same stuff, with a better interface and ethernet built-in. You could probably play games on 'em, too.

Re:the cost of iBook, iMac w/ iTunes

[Anonymous Coward]

HTPC's, which is what you're talking about basically, are very cool... the one limiting factor (and it's a big one) is tv-out on video cards... it sucks... (not to HDTV's or projectors, I'm talking about the regular old 36" toshiba I just bought). Why can't we make tv-out better?

Coffee PC at Thinkgeek...

[Penguinoflight]

There's a PC at thinkgeek for $999 it uses a 1ghz processor, has 256mb ram, has cdrw, 20gig hd. It has all ports. It's small too, 6" square.

I wouldn't doubt that you could replace the 20gig hd with a 80gig, which cost right at $100 on pricewatch.com

Re:Coffee PC at Thinkgeek...

[Splat]

Then you have to deal with putting together a good UI for it - which is no trivial task.

It's like TiVO - sure you can hack together some perl scripts in linux to turn on your capture card every tuesday at 8:00 on channel 9 but it's just not as aethstically pleasing.

I for one would rather pay for a nice interface and design then spend nearly the same amount for a hacked-together solution.

Re:Coffee PC at Thinkgeek...

[cybergibbons]

Problems are:

This thing has an absoluletely appaling sound card which is fine on PC speakers, but connected to a separates system?

It uses laptop HDs (IIRC). These are very expensive and whine a lot, as well as not being available in 100GB.

It's got a powerful fan and restrictive intakes, resulting in a lot of noise.

Better solution is something like a Shuttle SV24 (flexATX with everything built in, one PCI, any IDE hd, one external 5.25 bay, one external 3.5 bay. And if you want, a via C3 chip, and no need for a fan. Mmm... and a nice aluminium case. Makes a good DVD player as well.

Or any of the small form factor boards...

Re:Coffee PC at Thinkgeek...

[mcspock]

I actually looked at the same thing a while ago. The SV24 is a nice looking case, yes everything is built in, but i've heard a few things about it: specifically, the on board audio is not that good, the power supply fan is very loud, the case internally gets rather warm if you use a p3-800 or faster, and it has no hardware dvd decoding.

but yes, for a person like me, i'd rather spend the $700-$800 to build up a sv24 like solution and just write the software myself. :)

Re:Coffee PC at Thinkgeek...

[cybergibbons]

The C3 chips stop it getting so warm, and cope with DVD decoding fine (as well as being cheaper than p3s).

And you can replace the fan with a better, more expensive one, though granted, the small size and airflow cause it to be quite loud whatever. I have seen it removed and one large fan used externally to the case, though it didn't look as nice.

And the audio is up to SB128 noise levels, not that this says much....

Re:Coffee PC at Thinkgeek...

[BoneFlower]

"There's a PC at thinkgeek for $999 it uses a 1ghz processor, has 256mb ram, has cdrw, 20gig hd. It has all ports. It's small too, 6" square. "

Your joking right? Except for the size... My PC utterly annihilates that things capabilities, I paid 840. PIV 1.6, 256MB, 80gig, CDRW, DVD, all ports... 17 inch monitor... Granted mine is as big as a normal PC(that is waht it is of course) but I'm sorry... why pay that much for something so small?

Re:Coffee PC at Thinkgeek...

[saintlupus]

why pay that much for something so small?

Aesthetics are worth paying for to some people. I'm planning on moving the lion's share of my computer gear either into the attic or the basement when I buy a house, and just keeping one of those new iMacs around (or maybe a laptop) to tap into it via a wireless network.

The main advantage? I don't have to look at piles of beige metal in the spare bedroom, which is the situation I'm in now.

--saint

Re:Coffee PC at Thinkgeek...

[amuro98]

Yes, a good UI is an essential feature.

Unfortunatly, I don't call a 4" LCD panel "a good UI" for something like this.

This is intended to be a serious piece of AV equipment. It should be able to use your TV, period. A web interface would also be nice, but would be secondary to the TV interface.

Can you imagine trying to use a Tivo if all its interface was crammed onto a 4" LCD? It'd be a lot less attractive of a product - maybe even unusable.

Re:Coffee PC at Thinkgeek...

[Penguinoflight]

Because, it's cheaper, AND smaller than the rio central, that's why. Using a custom built machine is obviously the best choice, but many people would be deterred by the size. I wouldn't buy one, but I wouldn't consider a rio central either.

Couple of things

[beninkster]

OK,
A Couple of things:

1. What kind of security is this thing running on its FTP server? (You'd hate to see some punk storing warez on your stereo)
2. What bitrate does it rip at? How do you modify it?

It has been mentioned that this system could be built for ~$800. Does anyone know what software is running on this box, and are there any ways that the configuration could be improved in a home brew version of this.

Also, If one were to make a home brew version, how would you deal with creating a fancy case like this and a teenie weenie little screen.

I'm Curious.

Re:Couple of things

[pdh11]

What kind of security is this thing running on its FTP server?

It doesn't, in fact, have an FTP server. There is a Windows program supplied for storing existing MP3s onto it; this access can be password-protected.

What bitrate does it rip at?

You get to choose, off a menu. By default it rips twice, once at high bit-rate for playback, once at low bit-rate for downloading to portables.

Peter

Re:Couple of things

[beninkster]

There is a Windows program supplied....

Do you have any idea what underlying protocol this software uses?

Ben

Re:Couple of things

[pdh11]

Do you have any idea what underlying protocol this software uses?

It's more-or-less the same as the empeg-car synchronise protocol, for which GPL source is available (search for "emptool"). There is already a rather nifty Java re-implementation (www.jempeg.org), which I believe can (or soon will) synchronise to Rio Centrals just as well as to empeg-cars.

Peter

Re:Couple of things

[Anonymous Coward]

The newer prerelease versions can synchronize to (and download from shhh) the Rio Central.

Re:Couple of things

[maddugan]

Most stereos are right next to a TV. Just use TV out instead of a mini monitor that that may be unreadable.

and still no Ogg Vorbis support

[edgarde]

Supports common audio formats like MP3 and WMA, and can be upgraded to emerging digital standards so your home audio system is always up-to-date.

heckety heck

First I wanna ask if you can get to a command line, can you modify it to encode Vorbis -- but then really why is this thing not cheaper than a computer you could build or purchase to do the same work? Not worth having or hacking.

This isn't for us. It's for stereo gadget-philes that aren't too computer-savvy.

Re:and still no Ogg Vorbis support

[Anonymous Coward]

Ha ha! Nice ego, jackass. The reason it doesn't support Vorbis is simple:

No one, outside of this group of asexual whiners, uses Vorbis. No one.

Enjoy your self-imposed exile from the real world.

Re:and still no Ogg Vorbis support

[mcspock]

Dont expect vorbis encoding or even decoding anytime soon on this thing.

Internally, i'm 95% sure the rio central uses a strongarm 206mhz cpu (i think the empeg team has only used the strongarm and a cirrus 7212). To encode vorbis, someone would have to implement an integerized vorbis encoder, since there's no way it would run fast enough with floating point emulation. I'm guessing the only person with enough knowledge about vorbis to do this is monty, and monty doesn't like doing consequential work without making money off it (understandably so).

Unfortunately, SonicBlue is unlikely to ever spend money on vorbis, because nobody uses it. So unless the "open source community" decides to take on this project of building an integerized vorbis encoder, i doubt it will ever happen.

Re:and still no Ogg Vorbis support

[pslam]

First I wanna ask if you can get to a command line, can you modify it to encode Vorbis -- but then really why is this thing not cheaper than a computer you could build or purchase to do the same work? Not worth having or hacking.

Vorbis is currently implemented in floating point. The Rio Central has a StrongARM cpu inside, which hasn't got floating point support in hardware. Most other embedded devices have a similar story - floating point just isn't useful enough for the cost/power, and you can do everything without it just as efficiently and accurately.

So until somebody writes a free integer-only implementation of Vorbis, it's not going to appear in the vast majority of embedded devices.

Integrated LCD - why?

[mblase]

Surely it would be more economical and practical to connect a video output to one's television, like the Kenwood Entré does. You could program/navigate it using the remote control instead of having to stand right in front of it, and the box would be half the height to boot.

Re:Integrated LCD - why?

[Drizzten]

That Kenwood component costs $1,800 and the user manual doesn't mention that the 20 gig HD can be upgraded. Everything else looks pretty nifty, though.

Just Imagine a Beowulf cluster of these!

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, Just had to be said.....

Use the Shuttle, Luke!

[mkarpinski]

Step 1) By this ---- Shuttle SV24 BareBones System ($199 at Outpost.com)
Step 2) By this ---- VIA:CYRIX III 700 ($37.95 on Pricewatch.com)
Step 3) By this ---- A pretty good sound card with optical output: Hercules Gamesurround Fortissimo II ($50.00)
Step 4) RAM/Hardrive --- $200
Step 5) Assemble and install OS of choice :) Step 6) Lather Rinse Repeat for friends and family.
Viola!!! --- Dedicated mp3 jukebox for ~$500.00

Re:Use the Shuttle, Luke!

[Anonymous Coward]

Step 1) By this ----

Step 2) By this ----

Step 3) By this ----


i'll assume you meant to say buy as in purchase, not by as in "written by a dumbass"

Re:Use the Shuttle, Luke!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll assume you meant to say buy, as in purchase, not by as in, "written by a dumbass."

Please note punctuation, commas, and a capital letter.

Thanks!

Re:Use the Shuttle, Luke!

[dan the person]

Step 6) Spend several months full time developing a comparable UI.

Or
6b) If you are not a programmer, contract a software firm to develop a comparable UI.

$21 a Gig

[Anonymous Coward]

adds a nice $800 or so to the price. If that proposition becomes law.

No source code !!!

[Anonymous Coward]

There is a link on the site to the source
code for the linux distribution that drives
the Rio Central, but the link
is false it just returns you to the support
page. A GPL violitation ?

http://www.sonicblue.com/support/rio/default.asp ?m enu=support&submenu=Rio&item=source&product=Rio_Ce ntral:_the_advanced_digital_audio_center

Re:No source code !!!

[pdh11]

The source is available but the link is wrong. Try ftp://ftp.diamondmm.com/pub/rio/radac/

Peter

Re:No source code !!!

[phrenzy]

*DOH* I've asked the web guys to fix this ASAP.

The source also ships with the product on CD, and our stuff is passed back into the ARM Linux chain from time to time so most of it is in the standard distribution by now.

Re:No source code !!!

[TheAwfulTruth]

So, just grab the source and we can build our own for $500! Then market ot for $800. Sounds like a plan.

Re:No source code !!!

[pdh11]

So, just grab the source and we can build our own for $500! Then market it for $800. Sounds like a plan.

You only get the source for the GPL/LGPL bits (kernel, bash, glibc, etc). You don't get the source for the main player application.

Peter

Home PNA?

[mblase]

The device offers, according to the linked page, "Built in 10 mbps homePNA connection for streaming music to one or more Rio Receivers."

Nice, but practically speaking a waste. Better to replace the Ethernet card with a low-power FM transmitter, like most car CD jukeboxes do, so that you can pick it up from any radio in your house. The only use for homePNA would be to sell the Rio Receivers, but this $1500 device would be infinitely more valuable if I didn't have to spend more money to get remote listening.

Re:Home PNA?

[jargoone]

Yeah. The low power ones in your car transmit maybe 10 feet. You want it from any radio? Through walls? I'm sure the FCC would have absolutely no problem with that.

Re:Home PNA?

[boopus]

Actualy when I was back in high school there was talk of an unliscened radio station on campus. The people who did the reasearch found that whatever the maximum legal power would have covered most of the school. Now, the transmitter would cost money for something no one really wants, seeing as FM would kill the sound quality in a $1600 stereo component.

Re:Home PNA?

[adavidw]

Slightly missing the point. The connection for Rio Receivers is not just to get the sound from one place to another, but to be able to browse your library and play your own selection of music in that remote location, different from whatever anyone's listening to on the main box.

-Aaron

So this is where the subscription money is going

[Anonymous Coward]

To buying $1500 dollar 40gig hard drives.

spell check...

[jeffehobbs]

...for the love of God, spell check.

~jeff

Hey now!

[wiredog]

I can feed my own shoes and tie myself!

Re:Hey now!

[Steve B]

I can feed my own shoes and tie myself!

Whatever floats your boat when it comes to the bondage thing, but the part about food in your shoes is definitely TMI.

Deal running now

[Mr.Intel]

If you click the link and look at the ad in the lower left corner it says, "Free RioReciever plus $100 off when you buy the RioCentral". Since the reciever rocks more than the Central (it has ethernet) then this deal might actually make it worth getting. I get the whole enchilada for $1400. Need to cash in 401k... ;)

Subscriptions Alreday Working

[dthable]

See. The /. subscriptions do work. Taco has enough money to get married and still purchase a $1500 toy.

Re:Subscriptions Alreday Working

[Anonymous Coward]

Rob's Amazing Poem Generator

Once again, as an escape from productive labor, I have resorted to programming. This one generates poetry. This poem was generated from http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/03/13/161322 5.

http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/03/13/1613 22 5

Slashdot Login Create
a reasonable
speakers. There
are a directory of things: What
kind of course, as
a nifty bonus, you can maintain
my office since it gets a lot
of the extra audio
fidelity on until it win
me You want Personally, I can get to
emerging digital standards with 100 It
here ; are ways to This | is what MP3
server. on the Poster.
The highest Scores First Ignore Threads The ZapStation
lets you can
do complicated stuff page
Built in your
network card and
can easily viewed on the Central
would
be 1 reply beneath your
current threshold.
84 comments | will dial
out and built on your current threshold.

Re:Subscriptions Alreday Working

[Anonymous Coward]

Just wait until *after* he gets married.

Taco's post-marriage hardware review - refurbished Rio player with 16meg flash memory for $24.99.

Operating system.

[saintlupus]

And it's built on Linux- a USB keyboard is all you need to get to a command line!

Well, hey, I had reservations about dropping twice the current price of my iMac on something with less expandability, less functionality, less drive space, and no real network connection - but if it runs Linux, well, that changes everything.

*cough*

Yes, I'm being sarcastic. If it's not something designed as a general purpose computer, I don't even _want_ to know what OS is on it.

--saint

"Supports common audio formats"

[lightspawn]

Does it play .mid files? You know how many months of .mid files fit inside 40GB?

Kids today, it's MP3 this, MP3 that. Back in my day, we downloaded .mid, .mod, .xm, and .s3m files, 2400 BPS upstream both ways...

And we liked it!

And you try and tell the young people today that... and they won't believe ya'.

Re:"Supports common audio formats"

[nolife]

I still listen to my collection of over 5000 midi and mods, granted I did get most of them years ago in the 2x uphill manner you stated above. I havent made any tracker files since wavetable MIDI came about though. Even with a low price combination of a SB Live and a second Yamaha chipset soundcard, with some instrument changes and effects you can get very good quality midi files which can then be recorded as standard .wav files and burned to CD. I have about 200 midi files that I've converted this way over the years and have since compressed them to MP3 and added them to my local file/MP3 server.

Re:"Supports common audio formats"

[Anonymous Coward]

No, urine makes baby Britney cry!

http://www.aftonbladet.se/vss/noje/story/0,2789,13 9610,00.html

(people couldn't get any sleep while they were filming a comercial for hours on end..... so they dumped buckets of piss on her. :)

Re:"Supports common audio formats"

[cornflux]

As an aside... it's interesting how many people suddenly like MODs (et al.) when they're in MP3 format.

Many of my friends in college would feign death when I played, or talked, about MODs and demos. But, lo and behold, once those MODs were converted into MP3 format, they were suddenly the best thing since sliced bread.

Re:"Supports common audio formats"

[Anonymous Coward]

Pah, you kids and your MOD files.
Back in my day, we downloaded SID files over our
300bps modems. Some of us even saved them on cassette tape. We were high-tech then, with our 3-channel sound. Eat that, apple weenies!

*cough*

Re:"Supports common audio formats"

[Anonymous Coward]

Hahahahah! It's not a troll!

There's two pictures of Britney Spears soaked in urine!

Re:"Supports common audio formats"

[mtempsch]

There's a mod player hack for the empeg. Could probably be adapted to the Central without too much trouble.

Linux Kit for PS2

[gosquad]

This is exactly why I've preordered the linux kit for the Playstation 2. It seems to do everything this box does and more (for $1300 less, assuming you already have a ps2):

black case: check (with matching black cd faceplate. wow!)
40 gig hard drive: check
cd/dvd drive: check
optical out: check

the "and more":
ethernet card: check
tv/out: check

Add a cdparanoia/lame frontend, and maybe a fancy auto-mount script or two, and you're all set.

Re:Linux Kit for PS2

[Loligo]

>This is exactly why I've preordered the linux
>kit for the Playstation 2. It seems to do
>everything this box does and more (for $1300
>less, assuming you already have a ps2):

Your PS2 came with a CD-RW drive?

Nifty. Where do I get one?

-l

Re:Linux Kit for PS2

[Anonymous Coward]

Thought the PS2 linux kit won't give you access to the cd/dvd drive. I am not even sure about the hard drive, but someone can correct me here.

Sony PS2 - RIAA/MPAA inside

Home Theatre Component

[TheFlyingGoat]

Why don't they come up with something like this and add in a Tivo-type recording system? I know it can easily be done on a computer with a TV capture/out card, but it'd be nice to have it in one stereo component with nice audio outputs, optical output, Ethernet (allowing remote admin via web interface, access to the internal hard drive (so I can still access my mp3's from my computer), and the ability to mount a remote filesystem for playback (so the mp3s/video files on my computer could be easily viewed on the system without having to copy them over). Hmm... the ability to easily add future components (internal and external) would be nice as well (read: home automation). Please someone, make someone like this and sell it at a price I can afford! :)

40 gig * 21$...

[albat0r]

and that device will cost 1500$US + 840$CAN in Canada, if that proposal already posted on Slashdot is accepted! Already more than the cost of a PC...

who will buy it in Canada at 3000$CAN ???

Re:40 gig * 21$...

[Anonymous Coward]

They could sell the box as a computer minus software and then a freely downloadable software package to run it as a multimedia box. All they need to do is to have a few other possible apps to get around the loophole.

I think $840 Canadian is a lot of incentive for Creative (TM) (pun intented) solution.

Build a stylish compter for much less.

[guamman]

Here is a case Here that looks like a stereo component. Tack on an LCD display here and you have a killer computer that matches with your stereo, does more than the $1500 device and costs much much less. Additionally, you can put whatever size HD you want. Personally, I love having 160GB of Mp3s at my disposal.

Re:Build a stylish compter for much less.

[mcspock]

Close, but i believe stereo components are 17" wide, so the case you mentioned would be a bit narrow.

My setup

[InterruptDescriptorT]

Here's what I've got going at home:

Beside the TV/entertainment centre/etc. is a PII-300, running Win2K, picked up from a surplus shop locally for under $100. It is headless--there's no monitor or keyboard. There's an SB Live 128 in there with the line-level output signal going to the stereo system and the line-level ins coming from the TV's extra line-level audio outs. Of course, it has a network card in it and I administer it with VNC.

I can play MP3s from any machine on the home network. Furthermore, I run the ShoutCast server on the box so I can listen to TV from other rooms in the house (handy when I have to be on the dev machine in the bedroom but a game is on). With the addition of a bit more technology (a AllInWonder card or somesuch), I could have some snazzy video caps too.

Now all of this, including the cards, cost just under $200. Please tell me, a geek, why I could go buy the item costing over seven times what I put together my box for? I'm not dissing it; I'm just saying that on my own, I can get a much more flexible system that I control and configure. Sorry, Rio, nice idea, but a little too expensive for this humble driver writer.

We don't need no stinkin' CDRs

[room101]

So you are willing to order a $40 network adapter, but you don't want to go out and buy a few CDRs to test the burning function?

hmph.

what's so impressive ?

[Migx]

And it's built on Linux- a USB keyboard is all you need to get to a command line! So no advantage facing a PC with Linux (for half the price) ?

Price

[dimer0]

Look for them on clearance.. I bought mine from Best Buy for $149 about 6 months ago.

Re:Price

[mcspock]

heh, when a product goes down to half price, it's a good sign that the manufacturer is junking inventory and probably discontinuing it.

i.e. you may not want to be an owner of such a device.

Re:Price

[cs668]

Or just a sign that the people who normally shop at best buy are not ready for an ethernet mp3 player in their home.

The support for the AudioTron is better than on any product I have ever had. Over the last year they have added Web-acces, Streaming Net stations, and an API that can be used to control it.

The nice part is that when they released the doc for the API the userbase of the AudioTron was geeky enough that we now have bindings to the API in about 4 languages.

I did a java one if anyone is interested.

OT: ADS

[Unxmaal]

It saddens me greatly to see these huge ads on Slashdot comments pages now. I've been here for a long time, and this is something I've never expected. I am extremely disappointed in Rob and Jeff's handling of the content-vs-revenue problem, and I can only assume that they are mishandling it because they truly wish for Slashdot to fail.

Re:OT: ADS

[clustersnarf]

Well, if you are constantly banging refresh to see them. You shouldnt be trying to get First Post so hard.

Stay away from SonicBlue

[slutdot]

Their technical support blows. There's a problem with the battery and charger on the Rio 800 MP3 player. On the website, there is a link to order a replacement charger. I filled out the order form on 12/31/01. I then filled it out again on 1/31/02. I still haven't received the charger nor an e-mail. I sent countless e-mails to SonicBlue but got no response. I tried calling but they want $19.95 a call so I said forget it.

Don't believe me? Check this out.

Add $800+ in Canada

[Anonymous Coward]

Because of the new proposed tariffs (taxes) on MP3 players @ $21/GB... this will cost over $800 more in Canada. Argggghhh!

In Canada this will be taxed out the wazzoo soon

[BurpingWeezer]

In Canada, with the new levy $21 per Gig goes to the recording industry. $21 * 40 gigs = $840. Ouch. Time for CD based MP3 players I guess.

$1500 ain't so bad...

[dasmegabyte]

For a new component? Hell no. Think about it: you're paying as much for the service and the software as you are for the box itself. And though you can say very easily that you could find quality ripping, encoding and navigation software and add that to your $800 box, the fact is it still won't have the correct footprint, decent enough optical out, clean enough analogue out, a nice resolution mini monitor or a decent controller.

What a lot of people don't understand is that any idiot can toss together a cheap computer. Making a cheap computer into a great machine takes good software and an eye for detail -- what will cause a problem where, what will be unreliable and unsupportable in three months, what will cause dependencies that aren't intuitive. Shit, when I went Athlon I found out after installing the mobo and chip that both my NIC and my sound card were incompatible...meaning three hours of downtime while I shlepped to the local hardware emporium. That's why people buy boxes from Apple, SGI, Sun Cobalt, Snap, F5 and RADware...you don't have to hack anything to get them to work.

I figure the software that went into this machine took at least as much care as my Sun Cobalt webserver ($1900 for similar power), plus it's got that sweet little display. $1500 may be a lot for a computer -- but for this device, it's worth it and when the price drops in two or three months it'll be even more worth it.

Re:$1500 ain't so bad...

[Matthew Weigel]

For a new component? Hell no. Think about it: you're paying as much for the service and the software as you are for the box itself.

The software that, apparently, prevents you from doing most operations more than 6-8 feet away. You want me to spend $1500 on that?

And though you can say very easily that you could find quality ripping, encoding and navigation software and add that to your $800 box, the fact is it still won't have the correct footprint, decent enough optical out, clean enough analogue out, a nice resolution mini monitor or a decent controller.

Why add it to an $800 box? For $500 you can buy a cheap computer that does nothing but serve files (hell, you can probably find an IPX for $50, throw some more at it for disk space), and an Audiotron.

No optical out, though - is an optical out worth $1000 and a worse interface to you?

No great mini-monitor either - you'll have to make do with a web interface that provides more functionality at a greater distance (sorry).

Clean enough audio out? Heh. Clean enough so that you can hear the difference between 128k and 192k mp3s, I wager.

I figure the software that went into this machine took at least as much care as my Sun Cobalt webserver ($1900 for similar power), plus it's got that sweet little display. $1500 may be a lot for a computer -- but for this device, it's worth it and when the price drops in two or three months it'll be even more worth it.

That's wishful thinking. If care went into it, it would have ethernet, not HPNA. It would have a web interface, not a tiny little LCD. This is exactly what I would expect from SonicBlue, who seems to specialize in failing to add value for the money. That's why I have an iPod instead of a Rio... just because it's expensive doesn't mean it's worth it.

Re:$1500 ain't so bad...

[dasmegabyte]

I sit about six feet from my speakers...any further away, and you start to lose what little soundstage you have left after MP3. A web interface for a stereo component is totally worthless -- my stereo does not have anything to do with the web, and for most users of home audio the web is another kludgey interface.

My Adcom has about eight functions: Play, Pause, Stop, Eject, Skip Track (up and down) and Scan FF/Rwnd. For many home audio enthusiasts, simple is better. For components like this to sell, they have to be all inclusive, have a simple interface, and yet not be critically crippled. It is possible to perform all three of these with good design, and I feel SonicBlue has done this.

I'm not buying it or anything, but I respect the unit. This is exactly what I'd be looking for if I hadn't sworn off MP3s for good when I sold my Rio Volt.

Re:$1500 ain't so bad...

[Anonymous Coward]

Just because you're in a different market than others doesn't mean there isn't a market for this device.

Jesus, you and every other slashdotting freak here make me sick sometimes. Almost makes me wonder why I read your stupid, fuckstick comments.

Re:$1500 ain't so bad...

[dasmegabyte]

I wonder why you respond to them...

Re:$1500 ain't so bad...

[Mr.Intel]

For many home audio enthusiasts, simple is better.

That's the problem with a large jukebox MP3 player. You can't efficiently manage 6500 tracks with 8 functions. You have to have some kind of menu system that lets you build and edit playlists. Otherwise, it's impossible to listen to what you want, unless you don't mind having 100 tracks on it at a time.

Re:$1500 ain't so bad...

[Matthew Weigel]

You are misinformed. The presence of a web interface for complex functions does not preclude the existance of a simple RC interface for simple functions.

Further, of course, it is unreasonable to expect that all listening of music - and hence manipulation of what is playing - occur within a radius of six feet, even if your misinformed claim about the soundstage of mp3s were correct.

But, as you point out, anyon who would think that it was a good unit for mp3s probably isn't being consistent with their misinformed beliefs unless they swear off mp3s entirely.

This unit is a piece of crap catering to people who think that expensive is good, and haven't seen a good interface to a large library of music.

Re:$1500 ain't so bad...

[dasmegabyte]

your misinformed about your grammatical misinformation. furthermore, misinforming my misinformation misinforms the misinformed.

Roget makes this killer book called "Thesaurus." It's about a gregarious brigand and the cacophonous gentry of his prefecture. I highly suggest you pick it up.

Viola?

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought you were building a computer jukebox. You mean if I want music I have to pick up a bow and play it myself?

How 'bout serious fidelity testing???

[morgue-ann]

The audio fidelity on the whole is as good as can be expected. We all know what MP3 encoding does to your tunes if you have a reasonable speakers

All mp3 decoders are not created equal and I sure wish reviewers would dig a little deeper. If they go beyond navigation and I/O features and cover audio quality, it's typically only to mention background hum or hiss or a wimpy headphone amplifier.

mp3 at high bitrates created with a competent encoder (LAME is one) can sound pretty good. Decoding with cheap 16 bit DSPs such as the TMS320C54x used in the Rio One is hard to do-- you have to watch out for error accumulation (e.g. please round to zero instead of simply truncating).

If you don't believe me that decoders differ, consider these tests of PC decoders. Unfortunately, no one seems to do such detailed testing on embedded decoders.

I'm giving my Rio One to my nephew who will be so thrilled to have it that if he hears the high-frequency errors on playback of middlin' bitrates (192kbps), he probably won't mind.

I don't know what I'm going to replace it with, though. I know I shouldn't expect much out of a $80 player powered from on AA cell, but there's no guarantee that a $400 Rio Riot or iPod will be glitch-free: they might have spent the whole power and cost budget on LCDs, hard drives and amortizing development.

A StrongARM-based PocketPC might be the answer- plenty of horsepower to run less compromised 16 bit decoder or even a 24 bit or floating point one. It should also be able to decode ogg vorbis....

By the way, instead of reasonable speakers, I'm using a good pair of headphones. Much more bang for the buck when it comes to revealing audio defects, though the Sonys tend to be a bit shrill (well the older V6s that I have) for long-term listening. These are the same model we used when I was at E-mu for all normal testing. The only thing more revealing was the elements from a good pair of Sennheisers in a set of noise protection muffs to cut background noise by 23dB. Also, some of the ATC guys have Grado electrostatics.

Re:How 'bout serious fidelity testing???

[mcspock]

The reason people don't do decoder tests on embedded devices is that everybody knows decoders on embedded devices suck. There's no floating point, so everything is integerized, and there is limited processing power, so shortcuts have to be taken in order to decode in real time. For the most part, this doesn't matter, because the expected audience is using headphones or cheap speakers instead of a nice stereo system.

The Rio Riot is just a Rio 800 with a hard drive. Same processor, same DAC, same decoders. The iPod is a different animal, i dont know about the dac, but i do know that they have two arm7 cores instead of just one. I'm guessing they use the same decoders as the riot though.

Dont get your hopes up with strongarm. It's faster than what they use in the riot (cirrus logic @ 73mhz vs strongarm @ 206mhz), but there still isn't an FPU. Also, dont get your hopes up with vorbis on that, unless someone writes an integerized version of the libraries (or updates the open source ones to rcX; search for 'integerized vorbis' on sourceforge.net). The soft FP stuff isn't fast enough to decode vorbis real time on the SA.

Really, honestly, you're not going to get 24 bit audio out of an embedded device. At least not now. And you're definitely not going to get a good listening experience plugging sennheisers or grados into a portable device. It's just too expensive to put high quality audio components into a portable device.

Re:How 'bout serious fidelity testing???

[Anonymous Coward]

Grados, while they are superb headphones, are not electrostatic. They are dynamic.

Re:How 'bout serious fidelity testing???

[morgue-ann]

You're right of course. If they were electrostatic, they'd probably need an external power supply like the Stax cans.

The people with the Grados had bought them themselves & were from places like CNMAT & IRCAM (they weren't rich), so yeah, electrostatics are improbable (Stax start at just under US$1k).

-M

Re:How 'bout serious fidelity testing???

[morgue-ann]

I am not as pessimistic as you that a good quality portable decoder cannot be built. I agree that it probably won't be, but headphones should encourage better fidelity, not worse.

I can hear the Rio One decoding errors even with the cheap earbuds because they're mid-high-frequency errors which the earbuds reproduce especially well. If they were over 16kHz or under 200Hz it would be a different story. The warbling of too low a bitrate or a poor encoder is also easy to hear.

The earbuds don't provide as much isolation as over-the-ear headphones, so listening in an airplane or subway might hide the errors, but I listen on a couch or in bed in a quiet room after my son has gone to sleep. I can't use speakers at the volume I like & don't have whole house audio from my changer (though I'm thinking of changing that). I'd rather rip the discs to an archive on my PC & grab a few to an mp3 player that I can jack into my car, carry around the house & take to work.

----

When we say 24 bit audio, let's clarify what we're discussing. Junk like the Rio One use 16-bit *fixed point* DSPs. I'd assume that most PC decoders use single-precision (32 bit?) floating point. I don't know what the "24 bit" decoder plug-in for WinAmp is all about, but it is supposed to sound better than the built-in one.

The StrongArm can retire 12 bits of [multiplier] result per cycle and the adder can retire 32 bits. This yields a total latency of two to four cycles for a 32-bit result and three to five cycles for a 64-bit result. Maybe softfloat can handle quality mp3 or ogg vorbis decoding, but it seems that if inner loops are coded in assembly it might be possible.

A better approach might be to use a heftier DSP. I know the Motorola 56k series & this would seem to be a good candidate: 24 bit datapath with a 56 bit accumulator for 24x24=48 results accumulated without rounding until the end (so a 256-tap FIR is possible).

Sure it's more power hungry than a C54, but hell, skip the hard drive (use flash) but keep the lithium-ion battery and you're all set.

It'll be a lot of work to write the code, I'll grant you that, but fixed-point mp3 decoders have been written (by xaudio for example). Ogg Vorbis will be a chore too.

Actually, there already is a portable player that uses the 56k series, the PJB 100

If you're willing to deal with even worse power requirements, a CPU with FPU is possible. We can trade off things like a nice big backlight for a nice big color LCD and use a Pentium or PowerPC. I'm not going jogging with the thing, so if it weighs a pound or 2, I'm OK with that.

My old 120Mhz Pentium laptop can run WinAmp. An embedded Pentium 166MHz draws 2.35A at 1.8V or 4.23 Watts. Modern NiMH AA cells give 1800mAH each, so four might give you 3/4 to 1 hour of use. That's not enough, but it's within an order of (10) magnitude.

The "portable supercomputer" PPC 440GP also draws around 4Watts, but it runs up to 400MHz.

The TMS320C32 32-bit floating point DSPs draw nominally .675 and max 1.4 Watts @ 60MHz.

-M

$800?

[Anonymous Coward]

Come on. You could build an MP3 machine for a lot less than that.

Cmdr Taco Needs Help!

[filbo]

This "MP3 stereo component" obsession has gotten out of hand. I know someone who specializes in OCD. Please, for the sake of the /. community, I think Cmdr Taco needs to seek help dealing with this issue.

In Canada...

[Dorf_of_Eleven]

What's the first thing you do with a 40 gig MP3 player?

In Canada, you pay $840 extra. :)

Why.. for the love of god why?

[-=Izzy=-]

Why spend $1500 for this, when a computer would more than suffice?

Granted having a tower crammed into your average entertainment system would be ugly as hell.. not to mention unwieldly.

Personally, i got a Book-PC. it fits perfectly in with the rest of my system, plus with its svideo output, it gives the added value of allowing me to play my MAME games through the rest of the system. simply throw in a wireless keyboard and mouse. and your all set. and i paid less than $700 for the system.

i suppose i could use the extra $800 to buy beer or something.

just my 2 cents

Re:Jon Please Read

[Anonymous Coward]

Junis,
I'm glad you like the iPod. I stole it from the corpse of a slain exchange student at the local university. I'm sorry to say that Rio availability is no better in Kanzlekistan than in Kabul. Maybe someday we will be colonized.

Your pal,
Jon

Use the AudioTron

[kfhickel]

http://www.turtlebeach.com/audiotron

No expensive storage to upgrade, keeps everything on your PC. The latest software version has an API.

The company has been extremely responsive to suggestions on their support mailing list.

$350.

Re:Use the AudioTron

[lanalyst]

$271US at buy.com.

I set mine up over the weekend. Really an impressive box for the money. Ethernet and TOSLink... plays MP3s from Windows shares (or a samba share) and internet radio via stations setup on turtleradio's site...has a okay web interface and the next firmware release offers an API for custom interfaces (PDAs, etc).

We have several PCs with radically different tastes in music. Access to all of it is really handy.. it handles play lists and favorites.

We already have lots of storage on our PCs and CD/RW drives. I can't see spending the additional $$$ for a dedicated appliance drive and burner. I can buy another BIG harddrive for the PC and a TiVo (with a harddrive mod for it) for the price difference

Okay, the audiotron is WinCE based. when I get the Linux based TiVo, I'll get some karma back....

Re:In Canada this will be taxed out the wazzoo soo

[WildBeast]

what? where did you hear that? Any links?
This will make me mad.

Nice try, but no dice

[Patman]

Turtle Beach is not only still producing the Audiotron, but still supporting it via addition of new features.
The last month has seen the addition of a full API to go with the web interface and Shoutcast streaming ability. AT users also can join a mailing list that enables them to help Turtle Beach develop new features. In short, it's probably the BEST supported piece of hardware I've got.

Re:Nice try, but no dice

[mcspock]

Please excuse my mistake. It wasn't the manufacturer junking inventory, it was evidentally the retailer; from what i can tell best buy no longer carries the audiotron.

The whole basis for my comment was the $150 price one person mentioned; the device itself probably costs $100-$120 to manufacture, there's no way they can sell it for $150 on the street and make money.

Just laid off?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey lolligoat, why the sudden burst of posts?

Re:Just laid off?

[Loligo]

>why the sudden burst of posts?

Just bored. Check my posting history, I tend to go weeks at a time without posting, then several in one or two days.

Nothing unusual here. Move along.

Get an iMac that does all this for $1299.

[Anonymous Coward]

The $1299 iMac has a CD burner, comes with iTunes to rip your CD's, make playlists, and interface with portable players and burn CD's. It also has a built-in 15" flat panel display to make the interface easy and that can display visualizers for you, and you can broadcast streaming MP3 over it's Wi-Fi antennaes.

As a bonus, it surfs the Web, makes movies, and runs thousands of Mac, Mac OS X, Java2, and UNIX apps.

Also, the iMac is iPod-compatible. I have an iPod and, well, it fucking rocks.

How about in Canada?

[huh_]

So $1500 in CDN dollars is about $2500. Add on Canada's new $21/GB x 40 GB copy protection "levy" is $840. Wow, $3340.

Re:How about in Canada?

[Anonymous Coward]

Add in 15% or so GST + sales tax...

The whole package comes to $3841 Canadian

Out of which:
$840 goes to R(ipoff) I(nnocent) A(rtist) A(ssholes)
$501 goes to the government

This is illegal under AHRA

[gmp]

A good question which has not been raised is whether this thing violates the Audio Home Recording Act of 1984. 17 USC 1001 et seq.

No person shall import, manufacture, or distribute any digital audio recording device that does not conform to the Serial Copy Management System.

A digital audio recording device is

Any device of a type commonly distributed to individuals for use by individuals, whether or not included with or part of some other machine or device, the digital recording function of which is designed or marketed for the primary purpose of, and that is capable of, making a digital audio copied recording for private use.

The Ninth Circuit has said that storage of digital audio on a computer hard drive was not meant to be covered by this act. They held that the original Diamond Rio mp3 player was not covered by the act. RIAA v. Diamond Multimedia, 180 F.3d 1072. Because the original Rio "cannot make copies from transmissions, but instead, can only make copies from a computer hard drive, it is not a digital audio recording device." id. at 1081.

The Rio central can not only rip CD's directly without the intervention of a personal computer (not covered by the act), but it can then write those MP3s back to its CD-RW. This device does not fall under the exception to the AHRA that has sheltered mp3 players so far.

$800 !!!!???

[jhines0042]

Where are you shopping?

My home MP3 playing dedicated computer cost me $400 with the monitor. Where did I get it? A used computer store. Playing MP3s doesn't require a lot of processor (mine is a PII 450 and that is more than enough) and I do the ripping on my big box (PIII Ghz) and then transfer them over the network.

Re:$800 !!!!???

[Anonymous Coward]

my old 133MHz 486 can play MP3 with winamp and have a little bit of CPU cycles left...
Don't expect it to do any bar graphs though.

My old PII 233MHz box can barely play DivX (not with the postprocessing)

SonicBlue - My Hero!

[eples]

It's like they build this equipment just so they can get it on the streets before Congress passes legislation to ban it.

Hmm...

[madenosine]

It's really overpriced....but it runs Linux!!! I'll take it!!!

My choice

[BoneFlower]

An Emerson CD/MP3 player. A little portable unit that is only slightly larger than a standard portable CD player, has line out to connect to external speakers/stereo systems, reads Mp3s from a CD and handles subdirectories quite well, programmable playback sequence, all the standard functions of portable CD players. It may not have all the cool features of the mentioned box, but at 85 bucks you get a good solid hand held CD/Mp3 player that can be plugged into the wall with the included AC adapter, and plugged into your stereo system with the line out jack. Far better price/performance ratio than just about any Mp3 player, and more than enough for the average persons needs. It even comes with decent(though not outstanging) headphones, a first in all the portable cd player purchases I've made. For general use, I wouldn't recommend a different model Mp3 or portable CD player. Especially if you have a CD burner... its wonderful. Only failing is it chews through batteries pretty quickly, especially when playing Mp3s. Even so, the versatility it offers over a normal flash memory Mp3 player, or a portable CD player, and plug in the wall stay put units, makes it WELL worth the 85 dollars US I paid for it at my local Kmart(MILFORD IS STAYING OPEN!!!! YAYYY!!!!)

Re:In Canada this will be taxed out the wazzoo soo

[Mr.Intel]

Here is the proposal. And here is the /. post about it.

Software to do this with commodity PCs?

[esvoboda]

I think many of us have extra PC hardware laying around or that can be obtained cheaply that we can put together to make a decent enough MP3 player. My question is, does anyone have any suggestions for *software* to do something like this? Yes, I could open up an ssh session and play songs from a CLI or run Winamp or whatever is the *nix equivalent. But I'd rather get away from a keyboard/mouse interface to play music. I've searched around on Google but the solutions I've found seem to be more on the level of a hack rather than something nearly as elegant as one of these out-of-the-box players. What are you folks using? I've considered rolling my own but there always seems to be something more important around here that needs to get done, ha.

Re:Software to do this with commodity PCs?

[ryanwright]

My question is, does anyone have any suggestions for *software* to do something like this?

Sure. Download uICE. It supports various infrared controllers such as the IRMan. You can use any infrared remote to control it (your VCR's remote, whatever). Just teach the IR codes to the software and tell it what you want it to do. I use it with an AMX touchscreen linked to an AMX master controller. The master controller sends 6 character strings out one of it's 6 serial ports into one of my server's 10 serial ports. uICE receives those strings and passes control on to Winamp. End result? I can control all functions of Winamp from my living room. The AMX equipment also powers up my audio equipment and switches to the right input when I fire up Winamp from the touchscreen...

Replay TV

[Joe U]

My question is, why didn't they merge this with their ReplayTV line?

How much more could it have cost to combine the TV and music?

Re:Here is a better idea, asswipe:

[Anonymous Coward]

I would suggest that you suck my big fat cock, my dear.

I wonder how this compares to the $1299 ZapStation

[RealTime]

It looks like the ZapStation from ZapMedia does many more things than this unit. I guess the focus of the two products is a bit different, though. This product seems focused on music (with the ability to burn CDs and download to portable MP3 players), while the ZapStation is basically an "everything" player, but doesn't seem to be able to record.

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut; LAPTOP

[Anderlan]

Because some people have $1500 but not the skills to assemble, configure, and install their own components, OS, and software?

Ok, you completely ignored the fact that a prebuilt desktop or better yet a laptop works just as well for the previous poster's argument. I would bet you can find a laptop that does 99% of what taco says this thing does. And a laptop would on top of all that do scads more stuff, with a little less work than the mp3 box being discussed might require. Taco has too much money. ;p

Because some people want a single person to call when the box up and dies, instead of having to diagnose whether to call Asus, Creative Labs, Micron, PC Power & Cooling, or Nvidia?

See above. Laptops are typically sold by one company, just like this MP3 thing.

I dunno. Why should a lawyer buy one of these to put into his office when he can simply take a slew of billable hours out of his time to save $700 building a Frankenclone box that doesn't match his decor?

Well, a lawyer wouldn't, a lawyer would try to play some tunes from his laptop, if he was into mp3s at all.

I'm not saying there is no market for this device. I'm saying the market is defined as people who want an incredibly functional mp3 player with *slightly* less complexity than a PC, and who have no PC or laptop to begin with, and has an easy $1500.

Come to think of it, There are companies that are marketing and designing laptops specifically to make this type of thing easy (not complex). I kind of touched that above when I said many laptops easily do 99% of what this thing does.

So maybe there really is no reason for this device to exist. O wait, I'm forgetting the surprisingly huge market of whimsical [harsher ribbing reserved for karma's sake, even though it would have been in good fun] people with way too much money.

Re:Bad reviewer, no doughnut; LAPTOP

[Anderlan]

I have to reply to my own reply.

This things existence is not silly. It *is* a PC, it even runs Linux. But it's slightly more. Taco is paying a fantastically huge margin for someone to write and set up a little software for him. That's fine for taco, but I think I speak for 99.99999% of the readership when I say I would never go for that. We would write a suite and opensource it. Maybe taco will reimplement everything he likes about this box on one of his PCs, I dunno.

I keep wavering on whether this is ridiculous or not. Could taco explain what is innovative about this box? And if the innovation is software, how could it not be applied as a piece of software written for any PC (that includes portables) with the appropriate hardware? Maybe it's all packaging & marketing, which again, 99.9999% of the /. readership considers inconsequential.

For $200 less..

[jcr]

You can get an iMac with 40 gigs and a CD-RW drive.

For $1500, you can get an iMac with 40 gigs and a CD-RW/DVD drive.

The Macs include 10Mhz/100Mhz ethernet, USB, Firewire, iTunes, iMovie, and iPhoto software.

Sorry, this device just doesn't flip my switch.

-jcr

slashdot world history

[Anonymous Coward]

2.5 million B.C.: OOG the Open Source Caveman develops the axe and releases it under the GPL. The axe quickly gains popularity as a means of crushing moderators heads.
100,000 B.C.: Man domesticates the AIBO.
10,000 B.C.: Civilization begins when early farmers first learn to cultivate hot grits.
3000 B.C.: Sumerians develop a primitive cuneiform Perl script.
2920 B.C.: A legendary flood sweeps Slashdot, filling up a Borland/Inprise story with hundreds of offtopic posts.
1750 B.C.: Hammurabi, a Mesopotamian king, codifies the first EULA.
490 B.C.: Greek city-states unite to defeat the Persians. ESR triumphantly proclaims that the Greeks get it.
399 B.C.: Socrates is convicted of impiety. Despite the efforts of freesocrates.com, he is forced to kill himself by drinking hemlock.
336 B.C.: Fat-Time Charlie becomes King of Macedonia and conquers Persia.
4 B.C.: Following the Star (as in hot young actress) of Bethelem, wise men travel from far away to troll for baby Jesus.
A.D. 476: The Roman Empire BSODs.
A.D. 610: The Glorious MEEPT!! founds Islam after receiving a revelation from God. Following his disappearance from Slashdot in 632, a succession dispute results in the emergence of two troll factions: the Pythonni and the Perliites.
A.D. 800: Charlemagne conquers nearly all of Germany, only to be acquired by Andover.net.
A.D. 874: Linus the Red discovers Iceland.
A.D. 1000: The epic of the Beowulf Cluster is written down. It is the first English epic poem.
A.D. 1095: Pope Bruce II calls for a crusade against the Turks when it is revealed they are violating the GPL. Later investigation reveals that Pope Bruce II had not yet contacted the Turks before calling for the crusade.
A.D. 1215: Bowing to pressure to open-source the British government, King John signs the Magna Carta, limiting the British monarchys power. ESR triumphantly proclaims that the British monarchy gets it.
A.D. 1348: The ILOVEYOU virus kills over half the population of Europe. (The other half was not using Outlook.)
A.D. 1420: Johann Gutenberg invents the printing press. He is immediately sued by monks claiming that the technology will promote the copying of hand-transcribed books, thus violating the churchs intellectual property.
A.D. 1429: Natalie Portman of Arc gathers an army of Slashdot trolls to do battle with the moderators. She is eventually tried as a heretic and stoned (as in petrified).
A.D. 1478: The Catholic Church partners with doubleclick.net to launch the Spanish Inquisition.
A.D. 1492: Christopher Columbus arrives in what he believes to be India, but which RMS informs him is actually GNU/India.
A.D. 150812 Michaelengelo attempts to paint the Sistine Chapel ceiling with ASCII art, only to have his plan thwarted by the Lameness Filter.
A.D. 1517: Martin Luther nails his 95 Theses to the church door and is promptly moderated down to (-1, Flamebait).
A.D. 1553: Bloody Mary ascends the throne of England and begins an infamous crusade against Protestants. ESR eats his words.
A.D. 1588: The IF I EVER MEET YOU, I WILL KICK YOUR ASS guy meets the Spanish Armada.
A.D. 1603: Tokugawa Ieyasu unites the feuding pancake-eating ninjas of Japan.
A.D. 1611: Mattel adds Galileo Galilei to its CyberPatrol block list for proposing that the Earth revolves around the sun.
A.D. 1688: In the so-called Glorious Revolution, King James II is bloodlessly forced out of power and flees to France. ESR again triumphantly proclaims that the British monarchy gets it.
A.D. 1692: Anti-GIF hysteria in the New World comes to a head in the infamous Salem GIF Trials, in which twenty alleged GIFs are burned at the stake. Later investigation reveals that many of the supposed GIFs were actually PNGs.
A.D. 1769: James Watt patents the one-click steam engine.
A.D. 1776: Trolls, angered by CmdrTacos passage of the Moderation Act, rebel. After a several-year flame war, the trolls succeed in seceding from Slashdot and forming the United Coalition of Trolls.
A.D. 1789: The French Revolution begins with a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack on the Bastille.
A.D. 1799: Attempts at discovering Egyptian hieroglyphs receive a major boost when Napoleons troops discover the Rosetta stone. Sadly, the stone is quickly outlawed under the DMCA as an illegal means of circumventing encryption.
A.D. 1844: Samuel Morse invents Morse code. Cryptography export restrictions prevent the telegraphs use outside the U.S. and Canada.
A.D. 1853: United States Commodore Matthew C. Perry arrives in Japan and forces the xenophobic nation to open its doors to foreign trade. ESR triumphantly proclaims that Japan finally gets it.
A.D. 1865: President Lincoln is bitchslapped. The nation mourns.
A.D. 1901: Italian inventor Guglielmo Marcoli first demonstrates the radio. Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich immediately delivers to Marcoli a list of 335,435 suspected radio users.
A.D. 1911: Facing a break-up by the United States Supreme Court, Standard Oil Co. defends its freedom to innovate and proposes numerous rejected settlements. Slashbots mock the company as Standa~1 and depict John D. Rockefeller as a member of the Borg.
A.D. 1929: V.A. Linuxs stock drops over 200 dollars on Black Tuesday, October 29th.
A.D. 1945: In the secret Manhattan Project, scientists working in Los Alamos, New Mexico, construct a nuclear bomb from Star Wars Legos.
A.D. 1948: Slashdot runs the infamous headline DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN. Shamefaced, the site quickly retracts the story when numerous readers point out that it is not news for nerds, stuff that matters.
A.D. 1965: Jon Katz delivers his famous I Have A Post-Hellmouth Dream speech, which stated: I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the geeks of former slaves and the geeks of former slave geeks will be able to sit down together at the table of geeks... I have a dream that my geek little geeks will one geek live in a nation where they will not be geeked by the geek of their geek but by the geek of their geek.
A.D. 1969: Neil Armstrong becomes the first man to set foot on the moon. His immortal words: First moonwalk!!!
A.D. 1970: Ohio National Guardsmen shoot four students at Kent State University for Internet theft.
A.D. 1989: The United States invades Panama to capture renowned hacker Manual Noriega, who is suspected of writing the DeCSS utility.
A.D. 1990: West Germany and East Germany reunite after 45 years of separation. ESR triumphantly proclaims that Germany gets it.
A.D. 1994: As years of apartheid rule finally end, Nelson Mandela is elected president of South Africa. ESR is sick, and sadly misses his chance to triumphantly proclaim that South Africa gets it.
A.D. 1997: Slashdot reports that Scottish scientists have succeeded in cloning a female sheep named Dolly. Numerous readers complain that if they had wanted information on the latest sheep releases, they would have just gone to freshsheep.net.
A.D. 1999: Miramax announces Don Knotts to play hacker Emmanuel Goldstein in upcoming movie Takedown.

(you're not the only one who is into cut and paste)

SlimDevices MP3 Player = Better and Cheaper

[Anonymous Coward]

After thinking about what was important in a MP3 player, I came up with this list:
Above average audio quality.
Flexable and expandable.
Easy control of and integration into my stereo.
Reasonable price.

I did some searching and found The MP3 Player from http://www.slimdevices.com.
It is a small quiet player with a bright ELD display, Ethernet, RCA Stereo Line outputs, Infrared remote. It also comes with server software that runs on many OS's (MS Wintel, linux, Max OSX, etc) The player is controlled by the IR Remote or a server generated WEB page.

Here are some of the features it has and why they were important to me:
1) It sports exceptional audio quality, it has no fans or drives to degrade the sound, and it is well made and looks good.

2) It is infinately flexable. Create a 5 day playlist or play just one song. It is controllable from the IR remote, the web page or custom html, etc..

3) It's expandable. The server software supports multiple simultaneous MP3 players playing different streams.!!! One for the stereo cabinet. One for the bedroom with a low cost set of amplified speakers., One for work :) etc... The functioality of this player just keeps getting better, as they add more features to the server software. (Free Download)

4) it supports MP3 tags, Play by artist, album, Genre, Directory structure, sequential or random, etc.

5) It's also not limited by the size of a fixed internal drive, the files sit on my fanless Mac Cube w/ OSX ($830 @ half.com) or even a Cheaper Wintel PC. (The server does not have to be dedicated, and it sits away from my stereo). And there are no painful file downloads like the Audiotron. And a power outage. = Double OUCH! with turtle beach.
I rip a CD and it's ready to play now, with the Slim Devices player

6) Low Priced. It sells for only $250, even if you add the price of a computer it's a steal.

This is the neatest gadget I've bought in a long time. And with the latest and greatest included server software, it's off the scale on wow factor, and I'm not easily impressed.

Parr

P.S. The volume control also goes to 11.

But you have the best WEED!

[Anonymous Coward]

Canada has the best weed, I wouldn't mind an mp3 tax at all If I could smoke blunts all day. Blunt bros!

I want a touchscreen!

[Anonymous Coward]

I want a touchscreen flat panel kiosk. Damn and where's the ogg and flac support!

Anal Retentive Side?

[Anonymous Coward]

"The drive tray is white which is a minor nitpick, but it really is a sore thumb on the smooth looking black case. But hey, thats just my anal retentive side."

Tell me... did this side ever suggest ANYTHING involving the "colour" fuscia?

:D

The perfect mp3 playing stereo component? furbox

[whookey]

The title's already taken. Meet furbox . When compared to other products on the market, the questions are many: how's the UI, storage space, flexibility, power consumption... Many questions in which I lose; but, is the competition furred?

Strap on a set you pussies -- Build your own!

[donho]

For $1500 bucks?? Dude.. you could have the same system on a PC for half the price--and more disk space!

Step1. Buy decent PC speakers like Creative DT's
Step2. Get a remote control for your PC
Step3. Use decent software like MusicMatch
DONE

Who do these scam arist marketers think they're fooling by slapping a PC inside a pretty box??

My pet monkey built his own while you spanked it

[donho]

Agreed... You buy a dedicated box, and it's just going to be outdated in a year or two. Use your PC, and at least you can upgrate it later.

There's a sweet new infrared remote for your PC to do just that for 40 bux. Works fine for me. Plus I can do OTHER stuff besides mp3's... DVD/VCD, etc.

Re:$1500? How about the same thing for $30

[jmcgee]

Yep.. I just got the holy grail of the DIY solution.. "The Remote" (and there was much rejoicing).

Now I can surf my MP3 machine like one of these $1500 jobs... Sit on the couch and flip through my collection with my IR remote--no probs.

Why spend $1500 when you can spend $30 for one of these?

All I really want..

[dan.fitzgerald]

Is something like the Audiotron/RioReciever/SliMP3 widgets that will decode whatever audio/video data I choose to give it. Taking it as given that you have a computer and a network in your home (which even my grandfather does at this point) Your existing computer of whatever persuasion does an ace job of storing files! It's like it was meant for it or something! So all I want is an Ethernet interface, an IP stack, a codec, and the neccesary output connections on the other end of the LAN. For me even the interface is optional, that could be web-based and I'd be fine with it (think wireless iPaq/Palm for a cool remote..) This thing should be like a JetDirect box for Multimedia, connect it to the TV and stereo and LAN and throw it on the floor in the corner with the surge protector. For just a little more than a Rio Reciever it would add the video playback side. Then you can use your computer with an All-in-Wonder to record and rip and burn. My $.02