Since most of my favourite CDs/tracks are now digitsed on my PC and phone, my hifi has been sitting there feeling a little out of the loop. Last year I bought an Apple Airport Express, which allowed WinAmp to stream to my hifi over the wireless LAN. That’s been OK, but means the PC needed to be on, with WinAmp configured to send to remote speakers, to listen to any of it. Too much faff plus another A-D-A conversion in the path.
I went looking for other solutions, and really – they’re all too expensive for what they do – so I’ve put a simple ‘media server’ solution together for under £400.
Parts:
ASUS eeeBox (B202) / 160 Gig HD (a very quiet mini server) – £200
Lilliput 7in touchscreen monitor – £160
AlbumPlayer – touchscreen optimised player/library £30
Installed, this sits on my hifi rack for touchsceen use.
Album player is designed for touchscreen use – there’s even an on screen keyboard.
My master store of mp3s and FLACs are on the main PC – I simply copy the files / folders I want over the wifi to the Asus. Album player discovers them in a ‘Picasa’ sort of way and off you go. Can create playlists and custom libraries (very different ones for me and Zarina for instance!). Only glitch so far is that the album covers aren’t all being automatically sourced from the album folders.
No specific remote yet – waiting on an iPhone for that 8^).
Now I only have the problem of finding time to sit down and listen to music again…
what do you use for the DAC? Output through a sound card in the eeebox or is there one in line connected to the eee box via USB?
Comment by dr hogan — August 1, 2009 @ 5:28 pm
Hi
There is an optical digital out but because my old amp has run out of connectors, for now I’m using the 3.5 stereo line out jack on the back of the eee, via a Monster cable into an aux input. So DAC is whatever the built in soundcard is. For most of my stuff, its perfectly adequate (I’m not a purist these days!).
Mike
Comment by mikelowndes — August 2, 2009 @ 11:41 am
Hi
Really interested in your solution, it’d nice and compact and not too expensive.
My Hifi system is not bad quality wise, It is rated at 40 to 20000 hz. ( yes I know you can’t hear it)
I am trying to keep the quality without spending a fortune. I tried using an IPOD on the end of an analogue feed and it sounded terrible even when the highest sample rates for Itunes was selected.
Can you tell the difference on your system betwee the original CD and the playback from the server ?? I think that sums up my concern.
Comment by Les collier — October 30, 2009 @ 8:44 pm