Tips?: hardware... media playback device

[Callan Jefferson Davies]

> I don't know much about hardware. I'd be grateful for some advice on
> what device to buy with which I can play back digital music files
> through a conventional hifi amplifier, a device that either has a hard
> drive or can be connected to an external hard drive. I hope to find a
> solution that'll play FLAC files as well as MP3 or WMA. I've think I
> once saw some device advertised on the Internet by Netgear maybe,
> costing a few hundred dollars.



Hi All,

A couple of comments here.

1, If you're looking to run it through your TV (which you've indicated 
is NOT your preference), then something like the Astone AP360T media 
player would be good. This streams most common media types, 
unfortunately "common" does not mean "flac" - it's just the usual 
MP3/WMA type stuff. It also streams videos. It accesses the files on 
your PC via Samba shared folders, or you can connect a USB storage 
device to the ports on the front of the unit. It also has a hard drive 
inside.

2. If you want a device that can play music, you could look at the Pure 
Sensia, which streams mp3/wma from home network via UPNP, has a touch 
screen interface and is generally very cool. Check out www.pure.com. It 
ships with UPNP server software that you have to install on your PC, but 
it only ships with the Windows/Mac version. This software is actually a 
re-badged Twonky Media server - which if you just buy it straight from 
www.twonkymedia.com you can get a version that installs onto Ubuntu no 
problems. This also does Digital Radio and Internet Radio, but note 
there is no provision for external USB storage - it only plays streaming 
from your PC.

3. Another device that I considered was the Logitech Squeezebox Boom - 
similar to (2) above, but without the touch screen (also one third of 
the price). It does streaming music, Internet Radio, but has no FM/DAB+ 
radio itself - it's a streaming device only. The only reason I didn't 
get one, is because of the lack of free-to-air radio. A couple of cool 
things - if you do your research online with the squeeze server (or 
maybe it's called squeeze center) software, you can download the 
software for free (yes, for Linux), and you can download a software 
player which looks and works like the real device, just on-screen, so 
you can sort of try before you buy. The other REALLY cool thing ... the 
device streams in a custom format from the server software. The server 
software takes files from your PC and transcodes them on the fly. The 
server software will read almost anything - OGG, FLAC, MP3, whatever you 
throw at it. Well worth the effort to check out.


Cheers :)
Callan