[sclug] Jukebox

[James Wyper]

The easiest thing of all would be to get a hard drive MP3 player that
has OGG support.  I have an iAudio M3 which fits the bill - cost ?240 a
few months ago (though has since been superseeded) for a 40GB model; a
20GB one was also available.

It has support for .m3u playlists though you can only put these in a
single directory.  You can also create dynamic (on-the-fly) playlists
though there's no way of saving these.  Most other portable MP3 players
don't do OTF playlists.

There are regular firmware upgrades, and the sound quality is very
good.    it plugs into a linux box without any hassle as /dev/scdX; I
regularly synchronise it with the music on my PC with a simple cp -ur
command.  The only odd thing about it is that the screen is on the
remote control, effectively forcing you to use the remote.

At the time I was looking the iRiver range was another contender but in
general there were more people happy with their M3 than with their
iRivers on the forums.

I think there are other MP3 players (Archos Jukebox?) that have been
hacked to run Linux (the project's called Rockbox I think) in order to
boost their capabilities.

Other than that, one idea I looked at but never followed up was getting
a thin client PC with sound support that could run linux.  There's
usually a selection on ebay under computing -> mainframes/terminals,
and some come with touchscreens built in esp. if they used to be POS
systems (for the ones that don't, I think it's possible to get VGA ->
SCART convertors). They sometimes have PCMCIA slots too (so you could
use a wireless connection).  They don't generally have local storage so
you'd need to store your music on a server somewhere.  

Alternatively (and I have no idea about prices or feasibility here) -
are there linux-capable PDAs that (a) have sound, and (b) WiFi
capability?  You could stream your music to one of those..


James.
--- Tom Chance <tom at acrewoods.net> wrote:

> Ahoy,
> 
> I've been wanting some kind of stereo device for a while now, but
> I've 
> recently got some money to finally sort one out.
> 
> Basically I want to be able to store my OGG collection on a box that
> will:
> 
> - plug into my PC speakers, and eventually a decent set of speakers +
> amp
> - allow me to browse and manage playlists
> 
> At the moment I'm considering either building up a shuttle PC,
> plugging it 
> into my TV and running a stripped down GNU/Linux set-up on it. That
> way I get 
> all the power of software like amaroK in a small, quiet box. I also
> thought 
> about trying to find a really small laptop so it stays out of the way
> but 
> also has a screen with it.
> 
> The problem with these two solutions is that they're still quite
> pricey. A 
> basic Shuttle PC with TV-out goes for around ?350, whilst the laptop
> would 
> need to be second hand and I'm not too happy with the prospect of it
> packing 
> up a year later.
> 
> Has anyone else done anything similar, and if so what do they
> suggest?
> 
> Regards,
> Tom
> 
> -- 
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> please e-mail me at: telex4 at yahoo.com
> 
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