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The Real Scoop On Philips' Streamium
UVwarning writes with his review of the Philips Streamium MCi-200.
"The MCi-200 is an internet micro hi-fi system introduced in selected locations in
the latter half of last year. Here is a press
release. I've had my Streamium for about 3 months and I really love it, but it is not everything that I thought it would
be. For those of you who are thinking of getting one, you need to know the truth about it. The following paragraphs consist mostly of my complaints. If you want a more general and/or lovey-dovey review click here." UVWarning addresses below the unit's performance with various music sources, and has some words about Philips's tech support.
PC Streams The PC-Link feature allows you to stream MP3s from any PC on your LAN. Unfortunately PC-Link software is not only proprietary, but it only runs on Windows and it requires you to download the trial version of MusicMatch Jukebox. This is obviously very inconvenient for a non-Windows user and what I find to be even more annoying than that, is that in addition to their browser requirements on myPhilips.com, there is an OS requirement. You can only access myPhilips.com if you are running Windows or MacOS -- Try it, I'm not kidding! I want to strangle whoever the webmaster of that website is. I have to reboot into my Windows partition every time I want to change some setting on my account.
Other
FYI Here are some other internet audio appliances:
Internet Streams After logging into myPhilips.com with a web browser and adjusting your account settings, the Streamium will be able to connect to myPhilips.com and from there access any radio stations that you have configured. Unfortunately Philips seems to be keeping tight control on which internet radio stations customers can access. Not only are the number of stations relatively limited, but some of them you have to pay for. A couple of months ago, Philip's online FAQ stated, in response to whether or not users can select their own radio stations that are not listed on Philips website, that (and this is the exact quote) "Future software update release will cater for this feature." Now they have changed it to say that "In the future it will be possible to have different online music services accessed via myPhilips.com" So what are they saying? That they will simply have a larger selection available, but will not allow you to select your own? That's a bit annoying, but then I can't really see them being able to charge for premium services and allow users to access any station they want to.
PC Streams The PC-Link feature allows you to stream MP3s from any PC on your LAN. Unfortunately PC-Link software is not only proprietary, but it only runs on Windows and it requires you to download the trial version of MusicMatch Jukebox. This is obviously very inconvenient for a non-Windows user and what I find to be even more annoying than that, is that in addition to their browser requirements on myPhilips.com, there is an OS requirement. You can only access myPhilips.com if you are running Windows or MacOS -- Try it, I'm not kidding! I want to strangle whoever the webmaster of that website is. I have to reboot into my Windows partition every time I want to change some setting on my account.
CDs MP3 CDs / MP3-Pro CDs / CD-Rs / CD-RWs are all supported, however it doesn't seem to like any of the CD-Rs that I burn. They seem to work fine in other players, but when I stick any of them into my streamium, it gets confused and won't eject the CD unless I unplug the power cord and plug it back in (the power button doesn't work in this situation). CD-RWs surprisingly work just fine.
Tech Support When I couldn't get the PC-Link feature to work, I called tech support. Needless to say they were no help. This is a new product to them and I don't think they are used to dealing with software type issues. They kept telling me to unplug and plug all of the cables. Whatever... Later on I figured out on my own that it was because my AT&T Global Network Client that I was using for work had installed a permanent software firewall that I did not know about and so I disabled it and everything was peachy.
Other
FYI Here are some other internet audio appliances:
I think things like this are great. I'm glad geeks like stuff like this for the most pat. But I'm not happy about it. I knew it was going to happen. What I dont like is that EVERYTHING must be commercialized. :-( I remember back in the day I wanted to engineer my own custom car Mp3 player. I still can obviously, but the bad part is I can't do it as cheap as these in dash "Hook up the power and go" units. Its kinda depressing. The minute you build something nifty outta an old PII board and misc parts, some stupid company comes along and says "Oh, lets make this cheaper, smaller, and mass market it. This just sucks. Yeah its great for the "Not as geeky" people. Its just not as cool when I show off my geek thing and someone else was like "Oh, yeah I bought one of those last month". :-(
Can all fish swim?
No Ogg/Vorbis Support? *shakes head* to hell with it then! crap crap crap
Yeah, it's the same reason it's OK to refuse service to niggers, you are still catering to 88% of the universe.
Nope, not that way at all. There are no special accomodations that need to be made for black people.
It's more like refusing service to aliens who don't breath oxygen and require a hydrogen atmosphere.
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
What marketing whiz came up with that name? Sounds like a good name for an adult diaper.
Karma: Good (despite my invention of the Karma: sig)
>> I hit menu, down to 'search by song title', right, typed in 'mac' hit right, and chose 'Macerena' (a long forgotton MP3 in my collection) and hit play... it's too smooth.
The Maca-frikkin-rena. G-Zuz.
Kill yourself for humanity's sake.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
>> I bought something from Philips once, and I never will again. There are better, cheaper, properly supported alternatives for just about anything Philips makes
But you have to admit, it's getting better; it's getting better all the time.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
I think you really meant:
"[F]or albums like Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon there are segways between songs."
What? I thought segways just came out a couple years ago! Man, Pink Floyd really was ahead of their time...
Does anyone know of any devices that can record AM/FM radio into an MP3?
An AM/FM tuner with the line out feeding into the line in on your sound card? (Software radios mostly suck, why not use the real thing?) There's lots of software that can figure out what to do from there. If you want standalone, attach tuner to computer with duct tape.