In the interests of recomending an MP3 audio streaming device for my Dad, I’ve done some research to determine what sort of devices are available. I was looking for an audio-only device that would connect to a wired ethernet connection, and stream digital audio from a PC (not from an integral HD). My starting point was this overview article from cnet
- Simplest devices - no user inteface & driven directly from iTunes on a PC
- Apple Airport Express Base Station: Apple cnet Review, ZDNet review, EBuyer purchase
- Base level devices with wireless, wired, local display and remote control
- Netgear MP101: ZDNet review, Trustedreviews review, PC Mag review, DevHardware review, PocketLint review, Froogle UK.
- Netgear server software not great, but other available. Has 802.11b wireless and an Ethernet jack. Analog audio only.
- Creative Sound blaster wireless: CNet review
- Omnifi
- Logitech wireless music system: Amazon.co.uk
- Transgear APX-300: Pixmania
- Terratec Noxon No wired ethernet port
- Terratec Noxon 2
- Netgear MP101: ZDNet review, Trustedreviews review, PC Mag review, DevHardware review, PocketLint review, Froogle UK.
- More advanced devices with lots of functionality
- Full distributed audio system
- Sonus Digital Music System (although it needs a seperate networked music storage system such as a PC or NAS)
- Alternative media server software that works wih UPnP devices (of which the most notable absence is the Squeezebox - which only seems to work with their own free server software). This can be used to replace the Netgear software, which by all accounts isn’t great.
- TwonkyVision TwonkyMusic
- TwonkyMusic provides you with a much more flexible navigation structure than any other media server. TwonkyMusic provides you with extra navigation options including categories like Genre/Artist, Artist/Album, Year/Album, Year/Artist, and Alpha/Artist. Alpha group search is in particular very convenient when your client devcie only has a very small display.
- Allegro Media server
- The Allegro Media Server streams digital music from Macintosh or Windows iTunes libraries to wired or wireless networked digital music players using the same UPnP protocols as are used by Windows Media Connect. This means that networked UPnP-based Digital Music Players such as the Philips Streamium series, the Roku SoundBridge products and NETGEAR MP101 can access an iTunes Digital Music Library over the network and play individual songs or playlists.
- TwonkyVision TwonkyMusic
Sources: CNET
Tags: MP3 Digital_Audio_Receiver