------------------------------------------------------------------------ A poll associated with this post was created, to vote and see the results, please visit http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=88916 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Question: Why do you continue to use Squeezebox ? - I'm satisfied with the Squeezebox system, why change something that works good ? - I have already invested too much in Squeezebox devices, would cost too much to switch - I have just purchased a new Squeezebox and won't switch to something else anytime soon - I love the 3rd party plugin/app model and would only switch to something else that supports this - I would consider switching if someone offered something with similar functionality - I have already started to look for something else but haven't found anything interesting yet - I have already started or completed the transition to something else ------------------------------------------------------------------------
I'm usually the first one to bitch about anything, but I agree with every positive comment in this thread and have not experienced any of the downsides some have. I think the *only* issue I've ever had over the years was the obnoxious network trouble in 7.5.3, and even that was pretty minor. Someone else used the phrase "life changing" and I have to agree. I'm 52 and have been obsessed with recorded music and its playback technology literally for as long as I can remember. When people first started talking about music servers, my knee-jerk reaction was "Why bother?" I still think that the CD is an *excellent* music delivery system and thought that people complaining about the alleged "inconvenience" of discs were crazy. But at some point in the high-speed Internet era I started downloading lossless live concerts and, as an eMusic member, MP3s. I also discovered online radio, specifically Radio Paradise. Integrating all that stuff into a "normal" stereo was a pain. I started out with a Roku Soundbridge just because I liked having something like that for Internet radio. But I was never happy with its playback of my own files (anything that isn't gapless is, as far as I'm concerned, crap) and on a whim bought a Squeezebox. Oh, boy. At first it was just to let me mix and match Internet radio with what I'd downloaded. It was nice to be able to audition the downloads before committing them to disc and *then* finding out there was some fatal problem. But it didn't take long before I started thinking about putting my main collection of pressed CDs online and once I started, I was unable to stop until I was finished. It took me fully a year and half to get it all done but now, as others have said, I listen to my music more than I did for years beforehand. I've probably got 2,500 or more CDs. They're reasonably well organized, but the physical reality of the layout of the house combined with general clutter makes some of them difficult to get to. Then there's that whole thing where "I know I have a copy of that song, but what compilation CD is it on..?" None of that is an issue any more. And my "normal" collection integrates perfectly with my bootleg collection and with Internet radio and with podcasts. EVERYTHING is in one place. The ability to queue up any songs I want, re-arrange playlists on the fly, add another track because something in what I'm listening to now reminds me of it, etc. just makes it all even sweeter. There are even obscure cases where playing something via the Squeezebox works better than playing the disc. I've collected a lot of DTS conversions of old quadraphonic albums over the years, and my luck getting CD-Rs to work reliably on disc spinners has been up and down. I no longer care: If I can get a clean read into the computer, I'm set. Then there's the whole thing about being able to get to my entire library from any wi-fi equipped motel anywhere in the world... The list just goes on and on and on. Other than, I suppose, the amount of time it took to set everything up, I can't think of a single negative about this system at all. No, I take that back: The one single lone thing it can't do that I wish it could is output multichannel FLAC, allowing me to get my DVD-As online. Of course, that's probably a fraction of a percent of my collection and I'm not losing any sleep over it. Another completely unexpected benefit is that it's gotten me a bit more comfortable using Linux. I started out with an XP server, but it was just too overloaded and didn't work out so well. I wound up buying a very cheap box to run Linux and haven't looked back. -- atrocity ------------------------------------------------------------------------ atrocity's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=16009 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=88916 _______________________________________________ discuss mailing list discuss@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/mailman/listinfo/discuss
