Slim Devices' Squeezebox now in four delicious colors
By Joshua Fruhlinger 
posted Nov 18th 2004 9:28AM
posted Nov 18th 2004 9:28AM
The Squeezebox, Slim Devices' iTunes-compatible network player is now as colorful as an iPod Mini. See, it now comes in four delicious colors: Rhapsody in Blue, Tangerine Dream, Purple Haze, and Triple Platinum, dude. In a bid to create some hype around the Christmas season, the limited edition color players can only be purchased from their website for $209 ($289 for wireless). They ship next week.
[Thanks, Greg]
Too bad it can't play protected files downloaded from iTunes (like the Apple Airport Express can) and too bad it can't play protected WMA files downloaded from anywhere else (like the RokuLabs SoundBridge can). If they added the ability to play protected WMA files, I'd buy one.
I like the new case colors but they need to do something about that ugly greenish vacuum florescent display. They should use a white display and include colored film filters so that users can customize display color.
so why buy something that just plays music from itunes when you get get something like the eyehome http://www.elgato.com/index_fr.php?file=shop_onlineshop_eyehome
For less money and with more features (video, photographs, music...), and I think that it can play protected aac as well, but i am not totally sure, it says on its site fully itunes compatible.
I just setup a Pluto Home system (smarthome + media server). It’s really cool and works great with SqueezeBoxes. Just plug the squeeze box into an Ethernet jack. When it sees the squeezebox request an IP address it automatically installs the slimserver and sets everything up on its own. There’s no software to install at all. And if you have a Bluetooth mobile phone, that turns into the remote control—complete with cover art, access to playlists, etc. Plus, it knows how to control all the other stuff too—so when I start playing music on my squeeze box it automatically turns on the stereo and sets it to the right input.
There’s only 1 problem… They have these interactive maps so I can see what’s playing around the house and make the same thing play in multiple destinations. If all the destinations are squeezeboxes, it’s great. But if some are squeezeboxes and some are media PC’s, Pluto uses slimserver to go to the squeeze boxes, and videolan to stream to the PC’s—and the 2 ‘groups’ are not in sync. They say it’s because the only slimp3 player that emulates squeezebox2 and runs under Linux requires Java. Pluto sends a network boot image to all the media pc’s in the house—that’s how it turns your other PC’s into set top boxes. They don’t want to add the whole java runtime to the net boot image and bloat it just to get a slimp3 player. There are 2 open source C++ slimp3 players that are small and lean, but they are old and don’t support the new protocols.
So, is anybody out there working on a C++ squeezebox2 player? This is the only small piece that’s missing. With that piece this would be a total sonos killer. You would still have a cool GUI with cover art. But it’s even better than Sonos’ because it uses your existing mobile phone—one less thing to lose—and your music follows you automatically as you move throughout the house. Plus it does movies—not just music. And controls a/v equipment and home automation too. And costs 1/10 the price.