Community Newsletter: Q&A forum: 9/22/06 Solution for sending MP3s through wireless network to stereo

Any "solution" which includes the proprietary, DRM (Digital Rights Mafia) entangled iTunes is no solution at all. No thank you.

Personally, I built a cheap little Linux box, put it next to my DVD player, set up Apache on it, load it up with all of my MP3s, and installed Jinzora on it (Glirnath is another good audio-jukebox app). I connected the audio output straight into my surround sound system's aux inputs, and I can control the music from any computer on my home network.

Why can,t u just use a audio video transmiter?? I think using the audio would be fine. radio shack,s got em for 99.00

Just wanted to second the suggestion on the D-Link Media Lounge. I have the 320 version which is older but it works like a charm. One thing I would definitely recommend, however, is adding a high gain antenna to the device to make sure you are getting the wireless consistently. Mine is located in a family room off of our kitchen and before we got this, we would have pauses in the music/media every time the microwave went off since they use the same frequency

Sonos released an amp-less version about 6 months ago for $999.

The original creator of this thread asked "How do I play my computer's MP3s on my home stereo via a wireless network? My idea is to be able to quickly drop a few music folders into my Winamp playlist area, randomize the tracks, and hear whats playing on the stereo in my living room"

Many of the responses are for solutions that simply "play" whatever is happening in WinAmp out through the network into the stereo receiver. But, you then have no control over the music unless you go back to your PC and re-sequence the playlist in Itunes, or Win-amp...

So, if you want to be able to really "control" the music (or photos or video) from your living room, you need a WIRELESS MEDIA SERVER.

A good example is the D-Link DSM-320 (well under $200) or the one from buffalotech.com. Many years ago, I bought one from Prismiq, but they've gone out of business. Basically, these units let you use your TV set as the "user interface" to PULL the music from your PC library. In my case, I have a PC on the network int he basement that is turned on 24/7 and contains all my music, downloaded DVR video files, etc. i just turn on the stereo and the TV set in the family room and queue-up what I want to watch (e.g. photo slide show) and play some favorite CDs in the background, all of which is being pulled from PC.

So, if you just want to pre-select music and PUSH it to the stereo, that's one route. But you want to use a media server to "pull" music to your stereo without getting off the couch.....

ps: some music servers even don't need the TV turned on since they have their own built-in display fo what playlist you are pulling form the PC.

By FAR the GOLD STANDARD for distributing MP3 music in a home network to your stereo system - was the Audiotron, by Turtle Beach (http://www.turtlebeach.com/site/products/audiotron/producthome.asp)

This device is hands down better than anything on the market today, had a nice web interface you could use to control it, and had the best ease of use by far. Unfortunately, Turtle Beach and the market didn't see it the same way - and its no longer produced.

We own both the Audiotron AND the D-Link DSM-520. The D-Link plays more than music - but IT IS CLEARLY INFERIOR TO THE AUDIOTRON in ease of use, playlists, playing genre's, complete artists, grouping, and the like. You must control the DSM-520 via a clunky hand held slow reacting tiny buttoned remote control. Yes, the DSM-520 plays other file types, pictures, "some" MPG and MPEG files - NOT ALL - and can stream *.avi (MPEG4 only) files to your big screen. That is super stuff - however, the question on this thread was music access. The DSM-520 pales to the old Audiotron.

Sad to say - that the market didn't see things the way of the Audiotron fans. Great reliability, super stability, and a well written HTML Interface (Web Browser), streaming audio - for free - as well as a clean hand remote - made the Audiotron the best out there. The other guys aren't even close.

I own the "new" stuff - and its not even in the same league as Turtle Beach's Audiotron is/was. My bias comes from putting my money where my mouth is.

I have wireless stereo speakers from Acoustic Research. They have a jack that hooks to your computer output (to speakers) as well as jacks for your stereo headphones or whatever. The receiver is fairly attractive and recievs well up to 300' away.
I have hooked it to my computer to listen to tunes from it out in the back yard, as well as hooking it up to my Surround Around (Connected to TV) system for listening to the football game while I was out back.
Has carrying handle and works all around the house and out into the street. I recieved it as a gift, I think it is about $95.00

The solution posted by Joshua W. was in fact nothing more than a list of commercially available products.

I do however have to scratch my head by the statement Joshua made This page is about hacking a do-it-yourself wireless networked music player for less than half the cost of a retail model and potentially creating one with more features. I continued reading his response as I was interested in the potential ability of hacking my existing WiFi capabilities.

Where in the heck was the Hack part of the response???

Very helpful information, thank you. What similar equipment exists for sending music over a wired network?

I scanned the comments on Amazon.com about this product. Currently selling there for under $90!!! However, numerous complaints about it (along with some solid kudos). Seems like it is very difficult for some to set up (but easy for others). Complaints about audio drop-outs and ultra-heavy CPU utilization (which are what are probably causing the drop-outs). I'd surmise that one should get this product only if TCP/IP savvy and have a heavy and fast CPU and hard drive!

This sounds like the answer! Has anyone tested it with iTunes????

Joshua's remarks regarding the Sonos system are either incomplete or outdated. They do offer (and to my knowledge always have offered) a non-amplified version, it's called the ZP80 instead of the ZP100. It runs about $200 cheaper than the amplified version. You get a set of two and the remote for $1199 for the ZP100 (amplified) or $999 for the ZP80 (non amplified). The ZP80 also has both optical and coax digital audio outputs while the ZP100 has a line out for a powered sub as well. This is a true wireless mesh solution to help with large coverage areas. Out of the price range discussed, but the only think I'd be looking at as it sounds fantastic and you can set up as many as 32 locations. About the only formats it won't play (currently) are wma protected and aac protected, but I'd be suprised if they didn't have a firmware upgrade out in the near future for wma protected. Considering I have nearly 30,000 songs, none of which are protected, and having four existing stereo systems this would be what I'd be looking at for wireless.... especially when you add in it's all controlled by one killer remote.

On the otherhand, I currently have two Audiotrons running on my networks and they just rock. Initially they didn't support wma protected files either but they came out with a firmware upgrade to allow it. Never had a problem with either of them and they sound fantastic. They also will run analog or digital outputs.

If you use iTunes, then the Airport Express is the perfect way to wirelessly transmit your music to your stereo (or to another computer that is not wireless capable). In many cases, it's cheaper than the wire necessary to connect the PC to a stereo system, and it's about as easy to use too. All other solutions posted here seem finicky, expensive, or both.

I too thought and shopped long & hard for wireless solutions to get the music off my PC thru my amp & play them thru-out the house on my existing speakers. In the end, regardless on the cost (and for me cost was not a limitation), any wireless option offered lower quality & more reception problems than a hard wired answer.

Basically going wireless presented the same quality limitations as wireless speakers. And if you've repeatedly spent $1200 for Bose speakers in every major area of your house instead of settling for cheaper wireless speakers, why settle for sending less than perfect sound to your amp. Remember --> the quality of the output is only as good as the quality of the input.

Ultimately, I asked myself why get hung up on wireless. My house is already full of speaker wires with Bose speakers in every room. I just wanted to get the highest quality sound from my desktop to my main amp that controlled all these speakers.

Best solution: http://www.xitel.com. The Hi-Fi link is only $49 and that includes cabling that alone would cost you $30 at any Radio Shack. You can also opt for the more expension Hi-Fi Pro but unless you feeding dolby digital surround sound you don't need it. Strongly suggest you also get the Ground Loop Isolater ($39?) which will prevent a humming sound coming off your house electrical system (the website explains that).

In the end, for under $100, it was worth the effort of running one more cable from my PC to my amp to be able to play my full iTunes library over my full house system. And after having done so, I then dumped my CD juke boxes & CD players and my home stereo system consists of a single amp and speaker selector switchbox. That's it.

Connection is directly hardwired from a USB port, so no interference and tho it may not have a remote like Soundbridge, I prefer to select playlists off my large PC screen than the other brand's small LCD read-out. Biggest problem was believing that something costing only $49 could actually deliver the best quality sound!

Xitel gets you the purest signal to your amp and when you consider the cheap cost compared to other options, it's well worth figuring out how to run that one last cable to your amp.

From my experience, any wireless option can't compare in terms of ease & quality. Face it, until they come out with top quality wireless speakers, wires are a necessity for any home stereo system. So what's one more cable to your PC?

What I heard was that the user wants (and I think it makes perfect sense from a user perspective) to play any sound file on the PC and get it to any sound system over a wireless connection.

This means that the sound output needs to be captured and streamed over a wifi connection (or any TCP/IP) in real time.

On the other end, the wifi-enabled receiver gets the streamed media feed, turns it (back) into an analog (e.g. music) signal such as any sound system expects (e.g. line level or perhaps optionally digital) and connects to a sound system using a standard jack.

As many people have mentioned, it gets around the awkwardness of non-transferable music files as well as the awkwardness on not having a hard drive (or a built in PC) next to a sound system.

It would also be great for getting line-level sound from one side of an auditorium to another, or from a PC into a hotel or conference room sound system, etc.