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DIY Ethernet Audio Receiver
geo writes "I created this site to describe my latest toy: a digital audio multicast receiver. LANPipe receives 16-bit, 44.1 kHz audio multicast from a PC based server. The server uses a Winamp plug-in, so LANPipe can play almost any source format (mp3, ogg, uncompressed). It even has a digital audio output. The receiver uses a custom CPU written in VHDL and implemented on a Xilinx FPGA. This was a fun project that is best appreciated by fellow hardware geeks."
"This was a fun project that is best appreciated by fellow hardware geeks."
Not appreciated nearly as much as Web servers than can handle a Slashdotting.
Vincent J. Murphy
Spandex Justice
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Looking at the device I see a place for you to plug in the device. It should be able to do PPOE and get its power from the ethernet cable, that would rock.
How can you say it's of no interest to potential employers? This guy has demonstrated his expertise with Xilinx design, and, last time I looked, that was a marketable skill.
Okl it's cool, but for $100.00 in parts? it makes just buying an audiotron from turtle beach look nicer.. i can have 30 audiotrons playing 30 different things all from my samba server or even that legacy OS called windows.
I understand the part of doing it for the learning fun and the "I DID IT" factor.. but overall it's pricey for what it is, and doesnt seem to be too open source so that I can duplicate it.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
I like this.. This would solve many of the problems I have with putting a computer near my stereo.. I don't have any space near it... SOmething small like this would be very very cool..
One feature I would like to see is the possiblilty of "multiple channels", so that I could stream several channels at once.. So my GF, who likes country, can listen in the livingroom, and I can listen to my stuff in the basement, without having a computer at each location...
--John
Slashdot is like Playboy: I read it for the articles
Network Audio System has been around for as long as I remember.. Some pretty good pages here and here. In the case of NAS the hardware decoder is in the workstation.
Slashdotters, before you slam this thing, please consider the following facts:
I hate to respond to such an obvious troll....but...
A project like this is very valuable. For one thing, it makes a great hobby. How much time does the average moron spend watching NFL? Take that time over a year and you can create some pretty cool (and valuable in many ways) technology. Even if nobody other than yourself ever uses it, it has value.
What is the value? Although you claim that employers don't care, it is projects like this that have made my career. I'm currently employed, making a decent living as an engineer, even though I have no degree (working on it still at age 29.95). I got a job offer from one of those top 100 employers who was looking for an engineer with a masters degree because they were so impressed with my portfolio of hardware/software projects I had 'hacked' together on my own. I actually didn't take the job because I was interested in pursuing a different job offer I got because of some software I had written and published online as a hobby. It got me attention, and the offers literally came pouring in.
If you are unemployed, by all means spend most of your time looking for a job....but there is a lot of value in showing that you are smart enough and motivated enough (even more rare) to complete a project like this on your own.
So you can go back to watching NFL while the rest of us do something useful.
Multiroom audio without having to install wiring. I've got multiroom at home, between the lounge and the kitchen. Great for parties and such like, but it meant having to install wires between the rooms, hiding these was a long task that involved removing sideboards and putting wiring under the floor where possible. It was worth it, it's great to go between rooms and heart the same song playing.
Wireless solves this. My only question is on syncronisation. With multiroom audio, you need perfect timing, otherwise you'll hear an echo from the other room. With wires this isn't a problem, but as this uses packet data transfer, I'd dare say there was some buffering going on.
I'm an apple picker, my job does grow on trees you insensitive bastard.
At the same time, this is a useful project - clearly, Ethernet is a common communications infrastructure component, and is probably one of the most flexible. This type of technology means that someone can plug a (commodity?) component into an unquestionably commodity network infrastructure, something not really available right now. There's no need to rewrite the home because the best place for the CD deck is in one room, and one place where the output might want to be listened to is another.
These two issues are important - a problem has been solved with open components, and it would be impossible to solve that problem without that open infrastructure. Yet various groups, lead by the MPAA (and to an extent cheered on by the RIAA, the representative of the recording industry which has concerns about unauthorized copying) have promoted laws that remove that ability to problem solve. In the end, the output of copyrighted material producers is being compromised by these actions, but this doesn't stop them as there's an assumption that open technologies are bad, and that technologies need to be centrally controlled and contain technologies to prevent not merely uses of copyright material that are clearly unfair to the content producers, but also of uses of that material that the producers have not heard of.
One company, Microsoft, has already proposed and demonstrated technologies that would make projects such as the above impossible. Content would not be copyable onto unprotected commodity components in Palladium, a digital restrictions mechanism that uses encryption and authorization at the hardware level to divide a world into "trusted" and "untrusted" realms. While Microsoft argues their technology is voluntarily, a content producer can restrict use of their content to only those who sign up for the technological restrictions.
This is a block on innovation. It's a block on personal freedom. In the end, it will cause damage not merely to consumers but also to those who produce content. We face a future of stagnant information growth, resembling more the state of Brewery development in the 60s, 70s, and 80s, than the technology industry during the same period.
Palladium is backed by entertainment industry promoted laws such as the DMCA, that make it illegal to bypass access control mechanisms, such as Palladium's Digital Restrictions Mechanisms.
This quagmire of a paranoid entertainment industry crippling the future both of content production and technology will not disappear by itself. Unless people are prepared to actually act, not just talk about it on Slashdot, nothing will ever get done. Apathy is not an option.
You can help by getting off your rear and writing to your congressman or senator. Write also to the Jack Valenti, the CEO and chair of the MPAA, whose address and telephone number can be found at the About the MPAA page. Write too to Bill Gates, Chief of Technologies and thus in overall charge of Palladium, at Microsoft. Tell them you understand the concerns content producers have about unauthorized copying, but that without an open technological infrastructure, the value of content will be lowered, and as the bar to entry into content production is raised more and more innovation will be sucked out of the industry. Tell them that technologies such as Palladium, DVD CSS, and other technological locks, will damage both the content and technology industries in ways that go well beyond anything reasonable. Tell them that you appreciate the work being done to create new ways of viewing and hearing content but that if those technologies are closed, you will be forced to use less and less secure and intelligently designed alternatives. Let them know that SMP may make or break whether you can efficiently deploy OpenBSD on your workstations and servers. Explain the concerns you have about freedom, openness, and choice, and how digital restrictions harms all three. Let your legislators know that this is an issue that effects YOU directly, that YOU vote, and that your vote will be influenced, indeed dependent, on their policies towards legally enforcing clearly damaging restrictions management systems.
You CAN make a difference. Don't treat voting as a right, treat it as a duty. Keep informed, keep your political representatives informed on how you feel. And, most importantly of all, vote.
KMSMA (WWBD?)
Sorry about the being slashdotted. We're working on getting that fixed.
I'm a server administrator at the webhosting company that hosts that page. Today (at 1AM) two of our five T-1's went down (Qwest appearantly had a cable cut - bah, force majure). Of all days for our network capacity to be decreased by 40%...
At any rate, we just turned up MaxClients, MinSpareServers, and MaxSpareServers in the apache config. We're going to start really hounding Qwest. We'll get it back up as soon as possible. It is accessable right now, but slow.
Again, apologies.
~Will
Server Administrator,
Netmar inc
sig?
About the same thing.
Remote controlled, streams over Ethernet, GPL'd software (Linux, Win, Mac)
250$ - a bit expensive, but I bet the price will come down...
Any sufficiently advanced libertarian utopia is indistinguishable from government.
The LANPipe doesn't run Windows. It doesn't even really run an operating system. It's actually, from the article...
Xilinx Spartan II FPGA (XC2S30) containing:
Custom 8-bit CPU (10 MIPS @ 20MHz) with 16-bit memory interface
64k x 16 hardware FIFO (using external SRAM)
I2S output (to DAC) and SPDIF output (digital audio out)
Hardware timer and RS-232 transmitter (for debug)
Firmware uses fewer than 200 assembly language instructions
Assembler and remote status monitor written in Java
It just accepts a digital audio stream from a pc running windows and winamp, or the prototype "driver" on the linux machine.
Carpe Cerevisi - Seize the Beer
There have been a number of discussions about /. /.ing sites that simply can't handle it. And whether /. should courtiously mirror the site.
/. admin that posted the story made a comment with a bit of text from the linked URL as the first comment that showed up for everyone. Then you would only need to go to the URL if you wanted to know even more.
After seeing this post at the top, what if the
"Not knowing when the dawn will come, I open every door." - Emily Dickinson
This is the 2nd time karmawarrior posts this
The last part about "getting off your rear" has been used numerous times in his comments.
Not a stupid opinion, just troll.
Any sufficiently advanced libertarian utopia is indistinguishable from government.
No slamming here. Even if you could get something commercially, it is always fun to hack your own solution. That *IS* what hacking is all about. Fun first, to satisfy a need a very close second.
not everyone has a spare PC or two lying around the house
True. But I bought a PII-233 Dell Optiplex for $85 at a computer show. I am sure you can get one much cheaper now, I got mine a few years ago. I wanted one of these because they are fairly slim and quiet.
I run Knoppix off of a CD (quiet), so the PC has no hard drive. It displays through the TV via a cheap video card with TV-OUT. Sound card plays through the stereo. It accesses my MP3 collection on my GNUMP3D server on my LAN. (Mozilla/XMMS) Quiet, relatively unobtrusive solution for me. Was pretty cheap too, probably $100 total.
some people DON'T have their PC sitting in the middle of their family room, right next to the stereo.
Yeah, this does kind of suck, and the keyboard/mouse control on mine could be more elegant. I could go wireless I guess. Mine sits on the floor under the stereo rack, so it doesn't stick out too badly.
people value elegance
This is where a lot of hacks fail, and this one seems pretty good. There is always the balancing game between elegance and price though.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Lan Pipe is cool, but what about a simple to use Music Server?
Someone please tweak Knoppix boot CD OS into a music server!
PC with, bootable CD drive, as well as Nic and sound cards. Hardisk with digital audio files, normally mounted read only, so hardpower off is no problem.
Samba and Netatalk for music via file sharing and play list creation, and LAN Pipe. Xmms with RF wireless remote and relevant plug in. Also use a webinterface to control the sound card on the server via Xmms command line tool and Web Control interface
LanPipe is nice, but FM Broadcast is MUCH cheaper. It uses existing home radios, and 1 piece serves all, and no pulling cables, with this $39.95 FM solution, or that $189 FM solution.
First person to say "Knoppix" on slashdot?
Mac Refugee, Paper MCSE, Linux wanna be
This is a very cool project in the tradition of what used to appear a lot on Slashdot. Hopefully it will inspire more people to something similar. One suggestion - howabout adding an IR interface to it so that it can be controlled with a remote? Just send the IR back to the server and let the SW on the server handle it.
Lan Pipe is very cool, particularly if the house is correcly wired with Cat5.
But what if you don't have wires already? FM is MUCH cheaper!
Uses your existing home FM radios recievers in every room, or your walkman. Simply add one of these to your music server, and no pulling cables.
$39.95 FM solution, or that
$189 FM solution.
First person to say "Knoppix" on slashdot?
Mac Refugee, Paper MCSE, Linux wanna be
You could bring the BOM of this project down by chucking the FPGA and using a microcontroller. The FPGA and its RAM and ROM are probably a large percentage of the total cost (the Xilinx Spartan II would cost around $15 with the ROM and SRAM chiping in a couple dollars). As a fun project that might allow you to learn something new, using the FPGA was interesting. However, you can find a microcontroller, potentially with integrated 10Mb Ethernet, that can do the job. You could also, potentially, do away with the external DAC by using a microcontroller with intergated DAC capability (e.g. Cypress Micro. This project was meant as a fun learning exercise. Analyzing the BOM in terms of a production-quantity retail product is unfair.
I just updated the web site minutes ago: MacWorld show special: $239 with free ground shipping!!
Everyone,
The source for this thing is not available. Thus, this is nothing more than some jpegs of a circuit board to you.
As you can tell from the poll, the guy is interested in selling the device and NOT releasing the code if enough people are interested...
LS
There is a fine line between being a cultivated citizen and being someone else's crop. - A. J. Patrick Liszkie