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SliMP3 Successor; Radio Station in a Box
XDG writes "Slim Devices just updated their website and announced The Squeezebox, the Wi-Fi successor to the SliMP3 player. The new hardware adds digital output, support for uncompressed WAVs, and, of course built-in 802.11. And, best of all, it's still a simple front end hardware device running on upgradeable, customizable, 100%-open-source server software. Anyone that owns or ever drooled over a SliMP3 has something new for their holiday wish lists!" We also have a submission about a "digital radio station in a box" from World Vibrations.
One thing I'm not too clear on; does it stream from shared folders, or does it have an internal HD? Or perhaps both?
Included FREE in every box, on RIAA subpenoa!
It's patent-encumbered and lossy, yet has somehow permeated popular culture. This is yet another device that has MP3, but not FLAC or ogg. I'd buy something that announced as a feature the absence of MP3 support! Sure it's only a few cents to the price, but it's great not to have that baggage around. Somewhat like a language that doesn't support decimal. Think of what the historians will say about "MP3"--just an example of something imperfect can effect popular culture, but then die down as a useless artifact of the past.
-Libertarian secular transhumanist
Geez, why did I know I would see this here? I just got my SLIMP3 two weeks ago. I can't speak for the Squeezebox, but if it's anything like the SliMP3, go for it. I love the thing.
:( Oh well.
I like most everything about the device. It's easy to setup and control, sounds and looks great, and is actively supported by its developers and fans. There is an extensive FAQ and a popular support mailing list.
There are, however, a few things I would like to have seen, that the Squeezebox fixes. First, the SliMP3 is wired only. You can hook it up to a wireless bridge to make it "virtually wireless" but that's not an out-of-the-box solution. With many competitors releasing wireless solutions, SlimDevices caught on and developed their own. The SlimP3 also does not have an optical audio output. An optical connection would make the sound quality even better, however, most users would not notice a difference.
The display is a little small, and hard to read from across the room. However, most competing products display via a TV, meaning you'd have to be near a TV to select the music you want. The SLIMP3 doesn't require a TV and looks at home in your home theater system.
I thought it was definitely worth the $239 price, but now I wished I'd waited two weeks and got the Squeezebox for $299
Squeezebox actually has a painted finish - the case is polycarbonate, but it has a "soft-touch" surface. It's actually sexier in person than the slimp3.
So could one end up in jail for 3 years for "broadcasting" copyrighted material on a "public network" if a means comes along to sniff the 802.11 data back into a copyrighted file?
Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose.
$299 for this OR...
$199 - Tivo
$50 - USB Wireless Adaptor
$50 - Home Media Option
$0 - JavaHMO (Streaming music)
Problem solved, same price and I get to skip commercials!
They are also donating 10% of net profits from squeezebox to the EFF.
Read that page - they even make a little jab at the DRM music stores. Pretty bold...
(as featured on bbspot's daily links) has some interesting info on internet radio and it's legality.
This post was brought to you by the number 584811 and the characters / and .
I know you've qualified your statement by saying that you own a Slimp3 but for the benefit of other readers its worth pointing out that the Linksys ain't that good by comparison (apart from on price).
The Linksys has no inbuilt display - you have to plug it into your TV to see whats going on. I.E. when you want to search through hundreds of albums to find something.
The Linksys is currently certified to work in conjunction with XP.
The Linksys works with shares folders. Thats it. Slim lets you browse using the remote or you can combine it with additional server software (look up moodlogic) to create dynamic playlists based on your current listening tastes!
Linksys is proprietory (and tied in to M$) whereas Slim have opened their source code.
G4 Hackintosh
And that's a good thing. They also display movies and photos/slideshows. Not having this ability puts the SB at a distinct disadvantage, and relegates it to the narrow niche of audio player. What's called a display is just a readout. I mean for C'sakes, even my phone can do movies and snapshots.
OK, but I don't want a TV connected to my stereo. All I want is music.
I think it's really lame to have to turn on a TV just to listen to music, and that's one of the things I really like about the Slimp3. A former roomate had one, and the interface was better than any other thing on the market (no keyboard, no mouse, no TV) - all you needed was the player and a remote.
The reason I went with the Turtle Beach Audiotron instead of this device is because it does not need any kind of back-end server running in order to access music files. This is an issue for me, as all my media is stored on a home NAS (Linksys Gigadrive).
The cool part about the Audiotron is that you simply point it at any SMB shares (thru its built-in web interface) and it'll scan for music on those shares. Works great - with no need for a separate PC working as a middle-man to point to the files.
What you want is irrelevant; what you've chosen is at hand! - Spock, ST VI
Looks like they're finally catching up to where cd3o has already been for the past year - a wireless media receiver that can play uncompressed streams. I like the fact the Squeezebox can apparently transcode to uncompressed PCM from other formats (like .ogg) on the fly - cd3o doesn't support that feature yet - but it also costs $100 more than the cd3o.
.WAV files or other uncompressed files. The cd3o supports MusicMatch's .WAV tagging abilities, allowing you to seamlessly integrate both compressed and uncompressed files into your library. And the cd3o also sports a better remote and their "voice guide", which eliminates the need for any kind of physical display. The Squeezebox has a nice little display, but the keyword here is little. There's no way you'd be able to read that from across a large room without a telescope, and managing playlists on it would be impossible.
Worse, it apparently doesn't support any kind of tagging for
As it stands, I'd still give the edge to cd3o, provided they get their act together concerning the ability to transcode other formats to uncompressed PCM for streaming to the receiver. But it is nice to see their design approach being validated by their competitors.
Get a grip and try and learn to discuss without being insulting.
Yes, I have heard of 'home theater'. However, I don't want a TV in my garage; all I want is music.
I work on bikes, cars, wood and metal in my garage. Electronics don't last long because of the dusty and sometimes dirty environment. If I have your 'home theater' in my garage, I need a PC a TV, a keyboard, a mouse, an amp and speakers. I need a low, flat place to put them (at least the keyboard and mouse). I need to replace them every few years also, as they have moving parts that don't like dust.
If I have a Slimp3/Squeezebox, I only need an amp and speakers. I can wrap the remote in saran wrap so it stays clean. There's no moving parts.
Perhaps a 'home theater' corks for you. If it does, more power to you. Being an insulting troll doesn't make you right; it just makes you an insulting troll.
Here's a tip: the solution that works for you is not always the solution that works for everybody else.
Actually, the SlimServer does support ID3 tags in WAV files and has for a while.
And the cd30 only supports windows because they use the crappy windows speech synthesis to create almost recognizable facimiles of the information in your ID3 tags.
>Why bother spending the money on this box when you
.mp3, you're going to need a lot of storage space to hold a decent-sized CD collection. Uncompressed, my collection currently consumes 200+ gigabytes. Yeah, I could have saved scads of space by storing them compressed, but:
.
>could take an old laptop, a WiFi network card, some
>audio and video cables and a cordless keyboard and
>mouse and get even more functionaltiy by hooking the
>laptop into your entertainment center?
I thought about taking this route myself a few months ago, before finally breaking down and purchasing a cd3o player. There are plenty of reasons why laptops and small PCs don't make a lot of sense as media players:
1) Interface. This is really a two-parter:
a) How are you going to get commands to the device, and
b) How is the device going to acknowledge the results of those commands
Getting commands to the device is fairly simple with a keyboard, but how are you going to see what the results of those keyboard commands are from across the room? You could plug the PC into a large display, but most of those make a nasty whining noise, and anyhow, who wants to have to leave the tee vee on just to listen to music? Laptops with displays large enough to be visible from across the room are still on the spendy side for the most part, and their look hardly blends into most living rooms. For that matter, most wireless keyboards would also stick out like a sore thumb.
There are dedicated wireless media remotes designed for PC's, but they tend to be somewhat expensive, and limited in what software they'll work with off the shelf. They're fine if you want to use Media Player as your jukebox software (gag), not so fine if you want to use other programs. Yeah, you can customize them in most cases, but that's a lot of effort to go thru for something so basic. And, there goes about $50.
2) Storage. Unless you have a laptop or small form factor PC with a gigantic hard drive inside of it, or can live with the idea of ripping your ENTIRE LIBRARY to lossy-compressed
a) Editing all the metadata that goes along with a huge library is a significant undertaking - one I never want to repeat, thank you very much and
b) I would have opted for the least compression possible, which is fine for home use, but would suck for portable use, meaning I'd have to recompress files for portable devices, and suffer additional quality loss as a result. Ick.
So I'm either going to need to hook a giant external hard drive up to the laptop (here's hoping that old laptop has USB2 or Firewire connections), or I'm going to need to network it into my main PC and use it as an audio server. So what exactly am I gaining by using the laptop over a cd3o, Audiotron or Slim Devices gadget, other than (possibly!) saving a couple of bucks? And will I really even save any money? Read on . .
3) Audio Quality. In a word, the D/A converters and amps in most laptops SUCK. They typically transmit more than a bit of electronic noise from inside the laptop as well. Not an option for quality audio. And I've had laptops that sent a nasty popping sound to the speakers when the power cycled. Don't want that frying my stereo. You could always add on a halfway decent external sound option from Creative, but there goes another USB connection and at least another $50.
4) Mechanical Noise. Laptops are quieter than most desktops, but they still aren't silent. When I'm listening to music, I do not want to hear hard drives clicking and whining or the whirr of a fan. These dedicated media receivers are all perfectly silent - a huge advantage.
5) OS License. This isn't such a problem if you happen to have a laptop sitting around, but if you're trying to assemble a small form factor PC from scratch and want to use Windows, kiss another $100 goodbye. Yeah, you can use Linux, but there's less support for formats like Windows