Squeeze Box

I have the older slipm3 player and absolutely love it. It is the best way to remotely play your mp3s in your house. This new one is wireless and digital to boot. I needs ta get me one.

 

This is better

http://us.creative.com/products/cate...p?category=119

 

Unless you don't use a PC, then its rather worthless.

The some advantages of Slimp3:

1) Can play back uncompressed music. (wav and aiff)
2) Open source
3) Multi-platform (Win, Mac, Linux)
4) Web Interface
5) Doesn't require proprietary software to manage music lists.
6) It does other things (like text streaming of news, ect).

I will admit to remote envy though.

 

The creative model also does not support internet streaming audio.

 

wait... what is so wireless about it? just the remote? who the hell wants to scroll through 1000s of songs on a remote or some rinky-dink dot screen? seriously, what is the advantage of this? you can get a pc to run winamp off a remote...

 

i guess im just saying if this thing was the size of a pencil or wallet, it would be cool, but its not... guess it just has the right buzzwords

 

Because a PC is way more expensive, and is overkill. I'm not going to sit a whole PC in my bedroom, family room, kitchen, or anywhere else I want to listen to my MP3s.

I understand its not really for people who live in small 1 bedroom apts, but for people like me who have an office on one floor, and the family room is on another, this is perfect. I've had one for over a year now and still love it.

 

old laptop on ebay + wireless card = way more expensive?

 

lol, yes that's what I want. Someone's 5 year old beatup laptop sitting on top of my stereo. If you can find something decent for say 299, your still missing digital out, a remote, a warranty, zero boot time.

Hey Im not saying its not possible to DIY cheaper. Im just saying Im not that cheap, and this is a cool device I would get if I didn't have the last generation.

 

the laptop would just be to control the pc (which has to be on anyway, right?) the laptop would just basically replace the remote. the pc would replace the unit itself. besides, the two laptops i've bought for under $300 each (off ebay of all places)weren't beat up at all... they looked new.

how many mp3s do you have? under 1000? singling through one at a time, 10, or even 100 at a time is way too cumbersome for me.

 

requiring digital output using mp3's as a source is almost laughable btw... are all your mp3's in 320kbps?

 

Somehow I don't think that any of those is able to find any of the mp3s on my network, which are stored on 3 different computers and need passwords to access.

If any of those can, then I'm sold. I can just hook it to some speakers in the garage so I have stuff to listen to while working on my car

 

a) Convenience
b) It has aiff/wav support
c) no, but at least 80%. Ive been doing 320kps since before my first iPod (2+ years).

I will admit that I would never be able to tell the difference.

 

It basically is streaming music from your computer to the Squeezebox (the squeezebox really just listens to that stream). It's a perl script with a web interface. As long as your computer is on and itself can access those mount points, it will work. In fact you can download the software from their site now to test it without a Squeezebox.

They also have a development version of the software that works with itunes, so all your playlists and meta data get read into the Squeezebox. Whatever your 'main' computer is, as long as it has access to the other two computers, it should work fine.

 

I used to do it this way, and it was ok, but the slimp3 blew me away. No, I would want an actual remote on top of the laptop, to control it from the couch.

The slimp3 can sort by artist, album, genre, read playlists, or any other way you sort your music (like an iPod), it even has a nice web interface if I have laptop in hand. Yes it can suck *** when you want to listen to something specific but I've never had any problems just sticking to playlists or artists.