Internet radio seems to be taking a foothold in Japan judging by the latest wares from Yamaha
and Denon. Now England's
RECIVA have stepped up to carve out some turf with the Scitec IT-001W which is almost certainly based on the same RECIVA reference design as that
AE WiFi radio seen previously. However, the IT-001W brings the "g" in addition to that 802.11b WiFi, WEP 64/128 and WPA protection, and is capable of pumping out MP3/WMA/Real Audio/Ogg Vorbis/AAC/AU/AIF/WAV (PCM) audio formats streamed from any of the estimated 10,000 internet radio stations on the planet. Best of all, it's subscription free and RECIVA takes care of all the station updates daily so they show up on that 126 x 64 pixel display already sorted by country and genre. Oh, and did we mention it'll stream audio from your PC too? Well it does, presumably via
UPnP but they don't specify. Expected in Japan July 12th for about ¥30,000 or $259.
posted Jul 7th 2006 8:33AM
Too bad it's so butt-ugly. The Roku Soundbridge has been doing this sort of thing for a long time, looks much nicer, and costs a lot less.
I have the magicbox and it looks the same as this radio, it is a beautiful modern stainless steel radio - not ugly at all and it works without a hum or any problems and the sound is fantastic!
http://www.magicboxproducts.co.uk/
Looks like you can buy them in the uk from the url above - if this is the same model?
...here's the URL
http://www.lusonic.com/products.asp?cat=90
Yes, meets all my requirements, could do with a DAB tuner for the UK, but otherwise ugly as sin with auwful styling...
Like everyone has said before more, ugly as all sin, which it really too bad because it's not often that you see a device support that many different audio codec... in fact if a portable supported MP3/AAC/FLAC/APE/WAV I'd dig it, but I haven't seen any device so far besides a computer that handles FLAC and APE files (for those not in the know, they are lossless formats that normally have around a 3:1 compression ratio). I guess I need to get with the times and start encoding in lossless AAC.
Looks like I spoke too quickly (also incorrectly, apperently iPod's lossless format is called Apple Lossless Audio) - I wouldn't consider these really "portables" in the sense of they are no iPod mini, but a couple of devices (one even featured here on Engadget having the horribly sounding name of the Iwod) do have FLAC support. That is very nice to see. If you are into video as well Cowon seems to have a nice device out there - http://www.cowonamerica.com/products/cowon/a2/index.html
When I first saw the picture I thought it was Microsoft's Ipod killer.
Buffering.....
Well The Roku design might be "nicer looking" but it is MUCH more expensive at 399 dollars and DOES NOT support real media which is a HUGE plus for RECIVA like radios.
I have searched all over, there is nothing like this device above which is based on the reciva technology.
Thanks
@Sam: I had scanned the internet radio market for a while and ended up buying a KiSS DP-1500. Okay, you need a TV to select the stations, also this model is somewhat older and has no further support. But its cheap (120 EUR), it runs DVDs and all kind of stuff you throw in, it stands near the TV and the amplifier anyway, and it runs on Linux, so there's open source firmware (which lets you run WebRadio 3 and fixes the time-server URL). http://www.kiss-technology.com/?p=dvd2
Still I wouldn't mind to have a stand-alone radio with some decent looks, maybe like a Torian, but without batteries plus a speaker? http://www.torian.com.au/
I want to add to the other comments:
The Roku does not do real audio unless you set up your own server. 40% of all internet radio stations stream using real audio servers.