Logitech Squeezebox Touch review
Logitech's touch-sensitive addition to the Squeezebox family, aptly named the Touch, has taken a long and hard road to retail. First uncovered by the FCC almost a year ago, announced by Logitech back in September of 2009, and then delayed again and again, we've finally managed lay our hands on one and, more importantly, start putting some fingerprints on its 4.3-inch capacitive touchscreen. Does it deserve a hallowed place in the Squeezebox canon and, more importantly, is it worth the $299 -- $100 more than the Squeezebox Radio we reviewed last year? Those answers and more after the break.
If you're not familiar with the Squeezebox line, it's a series of radios and receivers that pull tunes from a media server over the network. Squeezebox devices don't rely on DLNA or UPnP or other standards like that, instead sucking down bits courtesy of custom software from Logitech called, appropriately, Squeezebox Server that must be installed and running on a desktop or laptop computer (or ReadyNAS) to serve up both locally-stored music and internet stations. Thankfully it's available for every major OS, like Windows (including Home Server), Mac OS X, and Linux. You can even download the source code if you know your Perl. The Touch then connects over a local network over either 802.11 or Ethernet to pull in music, though it can also connect to external storage via USB or the SD slot on the side.
The last addition to the Squeezebox lineage, the Radio, exists as something of a simple, semi-portable desktop or bedside solution for playing tunes wirelessly and even getting you up for work in the morning. The Touch feels just as solid and well built as the Radio but is rather different in intent -- a little more serious. Unlike the Radio it doesn't have a proper speaker built in, relying instead on external speakers provided by you. Nestled on the back are outputs for stereo RCA, optical and coaxial digital, and a simple 3.5mm port. This gives the Touch the flexibility to connect to anything from a high-end home theater setup to a simple set of powered speakers or even headphones if you're so inclined.
But, for the cost, $299, we're expecting most people investing in the Touch will be looking to utilize those higher-quality outputs to connect it to a receiver or the like. And, in that mode -- sitting atop a home theater stack -- it works well, pumping out its beats interference-free. Unfortunately that setup isn't always compatible with the best way to interact with the Touch: touching it.
Naturally that big, reasonably bright 4.3-inch capacitive touchscreen on the front is the primary way to find your tunes here. Tap the screen and a simple, finger-friendly interface comes up that allows you to browse through artists, albums, playlists, and also to search using an on-screen keyboard. That's nice and intuitive but, honestly, how often are you standing next to your home theater setup when you want to pick some tunes?
The Touch also can be used via remote control, and it does include one (though surely Logitech would love you to replace it with a Harmony). As soon as you touch a button on the remote the text grows larger, the menu options swell, and in general everything gets legible from across the room, though the default light-blue wallpaper doesn't help to highlight the white text. Thankfully that's easily changed to something higher contrast. It's workable from afar, but interacting with the Touch is naturally much less satisfying with a remote -- certainly nothing like the Duet. Thankfully, defining playlists is quick and easy, so you can queue up a series of tunes while standing next to the stereo and then go away and do whatever you like.
The Touch offers the ability to download and run apps, but we're not seeing a wealth of new apps available here since the Radio shipped in October. We're guessing that means we also shouldn't expect many new options going forward, either, but the current options are still nice, including Facebook for checking up on your friends and Flickr for cruising photos.
The Touch is another great addition in the Squeezebox series and, for many, the missing link in home entertainment system that needs only network connectivity. Build quality is predictably top-notch, audio quality is great, and compatibility with nearly any OS is killer. But, it's best suited for a situation where your entertainment system isn't too far out of reach, because interacting with the Touch is, unsurprisingly, best when you can touch it. If that's you, we think it's a great option, but we're thinking the Duet is still a slightly more couch-friendly option if your entertainment center is out of reach -- and if you don't mind having another remote kicking around, of course.
The design

The last addition to the Squeezebox lineage, the Radio, exists as something of a simple, semi-portable desktop or bedside solution for playing tunes wirelessly and even getting you up for work in the morning. The Touch feels just as solid and well built as the Radio but is rather different in intent -- a little more serious. Unlike the Radio it doesn't have a proper speaker built in, relying instead on external speakers provided by you. Nestled on the back are outputs for stereo RCA, optical and coaxial digital, and a simple 3.5mm port. This gives the Touch the flexibility to connect to anything from a high-end home theater setup to a simple set of powered speakers or even headphones if you're so inclined.
But, for the cost, $299, we're expecting most people investing in the Touch will be looking to utilize those higher-quality outputs to connect it to a receiver or the like. And, in that mode -- sitting atop a home theater stack -- it works well, pumping out its beats interference-free. Unfortunately that setup isn't always compatible with the best way to interact with the Touch: touching it.
The interface
Naturally that big, reasonably bright 4.3-inch capacitive touchscreen on the front is the primary way to find your tunes here. Tap the screen and a simple, finger-friendly interface comes up that allows you to browse through artists, albums, playlists, and also to search using an on-screen keyboard. That's nice and intuitive but, honestly, how often are you standing next to your home theater setup when you want to pick some tunes?
The Touch also can be used via remote control, and it does include one (though surely Logitech would love you to replace it with a Harmony). As soon as you touch a button on the remote the text grows larger, the menu options swell, and in general everything gets legible from across the room, though the default light-blue wallpaper doesn't help to highlight the white text. Thankfully that's easily changed to something higher contrast. It's workable from afar, but interacting with the Touch is naturally much less satisfying with a remote -- certainly nothing like the Duet. Thankfully, defining playlists is quick and easy, so you can queue up a series of tunes while standing next to the stereo and then go away and do whatever you like.
The Touch offers the ability to download and run apps, but we're not seeing a wealth of new apps available here since the Radio shipped in October. We're guessing that means we also shouldn't expect many new options going forward, either, but the current options are still nice, including Facebook for checking up on your friends and Flickr for cruising photos.
Wrap-up






























Hi-fi headphone listening seems to be a good application, a beside HD800 or Stax rig ;) Though someone will soon start on jitter :p
Ooooh, you can squeeze by box.
@Miakandogadget don't use my post to make irrelevant lame jokes.
@YpoCaramel
Comment is free.
@Miakandogadget Yes, it is. I cannot stop you. But I can request that you keep on topic and discuss the issues I raised.
@YpoCaramel
I find his joke better than your comment.
@kiyu727 That's alright.
@YpoCaramel
Sure, if you care to clarify what you're actually talking about in your post, I'd be glad to respond.
@Miakandogadget My reason for my annoyed reply is that you could have posted in the main area, rather than reply to my post, which happened to have been the first.
As for my opinion of your joke's humor, that is another issue entirely.
@Miakandogadget Okay, sure. What I was saying is that the Squeezebox Touch is a good solution for people seeking to stream music to their high-end, stationary headphone systems. These are headphones which approach the quality of a good stereo hi-fi speakers, and have their own amplifiers which cannot be easily moved around or run out of an iPod. The Squeezebox Touch is suitable for someone who want to use these headphones in a room when their computer is in another area, e.g. a bedroom or a den. A HD800 is one model of high-end headphone; the Stax system is another. If you are not convinced of the merits of headphone listening or hi-fis, please do your own research.
As for jitter, it relates to the timing problems from an digital audio output (optical or coaxial) that is said to reduce audio quality. However, it is a contentious issue.
@YpoCaramel
I wouldn't want to be accused of adding fuel to the fire but I sense that on some level you feel bereft of the commenting limelight for this post. I'd give you some candy as a symbol of my contrition but I can't, so I won't.
What I can do however, as I mentioned previously, is respond to your post which you have now clarified (and for which I am truly thankful, truly):
Personally, I prefer Denon AH-D7000's.
@YpoCaramel Looks like your just looking to argue with people.
Seriously, come on, he just made a joke... Forget about it.
@YpoCaramel That is the longest string of downranked comments I have ever seen...
I can't imagine having this in my living room, walking to the unit to change a channel every time. They need to move this touch interface to a remote.
@victor There is a touch optimized Web UI you can access via any suitable browser (mobile or otherwise) I'm surprised that there isn't yet an official, dedicated iPhone/Android/WinMo app yet. I'm tempted to write one if I can discover some API documentation somewhere - anyone know where to start?
@Malcolm
you can use the "command line interface" to manipulate the squeeze server outside of the web interface (basically simple verbs over a tcp socket connection). it's documented in the web interface.
http://wiki.slimdevices.com/index.php/CLI
@Malcolm I use ipeng (iphone) and squeeze commander (android/ on my nexus one). Those are fairly robust apps. Although, in the end; logitech needs to get their act together on this.
@victor, @jaybeeunix
I wasn't aware of squeeze commander - I'll give that a go. Might have a play with the CLI when I have an idle moment. Cheers.
@Malcolm There is pretty dam good iPhone app! I cannot believe engadget did not mention it.
@victor This is actually a real boon for me and my family. My wife gets lost in the menus using the remote with an SB3 and I have a 6yo who loves to listen to audiobooks. This would be a great interface for them and it will work just fine with the ergonomics of my setup provided I can keep the 2yo from reaching it.
@victor
I will heartily second the 'iPeng' recommendation for iPhone. After having to get close to my Slim Device Squeezebox to use the remote and to see realtime what I was trying to find to play, the fact that I can now use my iPhone as a touchscreen remote *anywhere* in the house to browse, select, play and pause my music is priceless.
Best app I paid for to date...
@victor I honestly have to agree that I can't find a use for it. I would much rather just use a Windows Media Center setup (or the Zune Software) (or Front Row, for the Mac users). I could actually control my music (and much more) from farther away (with DLNA support and no proprietary software) with an HTPC. After all, I could build a decently spec'd one for slightly more money than this.
@Malcolm There are already apps for that, try iPeng
@aschettler
Although Squeezebox Server isn't based on the DLNA or UPnP standards, it isn't "proprietary" in the usual sense, since it's licensed under the GPL. And the Lua-based player software running on the Touch was recently made available under the BSD license.
From what I've read about DLNA, it seems that it only standardizes some parts of a Squeezebox-like system. In particular, it specifies a "Media Renderer", a "Media Server" and a "Control Point" but nothing about how the control point works or how to remotely control it, so there is no standard way to e.g. reorder the playlist from other devices. And what it does specifiy about the other components seems to make things like gapless playback impossible, so I think it's ill-suited for systems like this. At least that's the impression I got when deciding which system to buy; please correct me if I'm wrong.
In the Squeezebox system the Server is the equivalent of a DLNA Media Server combined with a Control Point, with a published command interface for controlling the control point from other devices (e.g. with iPeng on an iPhone, as others have mentioned) and from the players themselves.
one of the big new features of the touch is that you can connect a drive directly to it so it can function as the squeeze server for your network of squeezeboxen.
@jaybeeunix
also a hires dac. That would be the only motivation in replacing my duet. Pair it with ipeng and you have a nice touch remote.
I can't see much of a market for products like this. You can spend the same amount of money for an xbox 360 or PS3 and get waaaaay more functionality.
@norman It's a bigger niche than you think. To audio enthusiasts (if not audiophiles), $299 isn't a lot of money. They might already have all kinds of receivers, DACs, amps, whatever... they're just trying to get music into their den or bedroom where they don't have a TV, and even if they did, this is more convenient.
It's just the Duet is more versatile.
@norman Dude, you don't get this. You can get multiple units and listen to the music across whole house. You can even listen to different music in different rooms. Plus this thong works. It's not like some app you need to start.... There is awesome iPhone app as well
@Jimbojones I actually own an old squeezebox, so I understand that streaming music is great, but mine sat with my home theater kit (just like the reviewer mentioned) where I now have two other devices that can stream music, plus an ipod dock. The multiple rooms bit is nice, for those with speakers around the house who don't want to use a dock.
@norman
duh! We don't want our TV to be on to listen to music. That's daft.
@norman
Yep, because a 360 and a TV on the bed stand would be elegant.
I will be getting one of these and hooking it to an hi-end DAC/AMP to power my Denon D-5000's. The last thing I would want is the fan noise of the 360. I have a 360 and the fan makes it useless for hi-fi, as you hear the fan noise during quiet passages, much less what sleeping spouses might think of one in the bedroom.
At that price ill just get an xbox/ps3 and use tversity. Watch movies and play games as well.
@Joeyjoejoe Shabadoo should have refreshed the page and reread the comments before posting >.>
i would like to see this using dlna
So can't I just put my i-pod touch in a good base station / charger that has audio outs - and do the same thing as this? Plus I can take the i-pod touch with me - on the road - and send e-mails - and have access to a bazillion apps. Yes?
@burgermiester
These things really come into their own when you have multiple squeezeboxes in different rooms. I currently have a Squeezebox classic in the living room hooked up to my hi-fi and a Squeezbox radio in the kitchen. Both have access to my large music library (as well as services such as last.fm and the BBC iPlayer) and can be synced when we want multi-room audio.
I'm currently looking at moving the Squeezebox classic to the bedroom and getting a Touch for the living room. Which will probably do until I move to a larger house :)
So you can do some of the same things with an iPod dock, but not all.
@burgermiester but then you only have access to what's on your ipod, and only when you're not using the ipod. I have the original version of this and have continuous access to over 200 GBs of music on my NAS, as well as pandora and streams.
@burgermiester Also depends on the sound quality someone wants. Base stations don't have digital output (Wadia iTransport and Onkyo ND-S1 are the exceptions; there's also an Audio Technica box), so the quality of the sound system you can hook up to is quite limited.
The need to have a specialized client running locally on the source machine is a dealbreaker for me.
@LANjackal Why? It's a pretty lightweight process and co-exists quite happily alongside DLNA or Windows Media servers sharing the same media.
It's a damn sight more reliable than either of those protocols too, and the remote control features are exemplary (ie you can control all player features from anywhere on the network)
@Malcolm I just don't want to have to run yet another client on my machine to get yet another network device to work. I'm already running the default Windows Media networking service on my Windows 7 machine for my 360 and a DLNA server for my PS3. At least the 2 services I currently run are standards based, which means other devices can come along and use them.
@LANjackal About a year ago I built the cheapest computer I possibly could from Newegg parts. My ONLY requirement was Gigabit Ethernet. Came to about $150 minus drives. Didn't take much. Proc, Mobo, ram, case/PSU combo, and nothing more. Threw some bigazz (albeit slow) drives in, and it does ALL the stuff I don't want my main rig doing. DLNA, uPNP, Orb server, you name it. (Also does backup, naturally.) Just sits in my office closet. Definitely one of my best ideas. If you're competent enough to set up a VNC server, you owe it to yourself to at least consider it.
Mine arrived just a few days ago, I love it
Momma's got a squeezebox and daddy never sleeps at night!
Neat, but I see no reason to get this over a duet for just a little bit more money.
@rhietpas
Think bedstand.
AGain before this turns into a sh1t storm -
i have used xbmc, xbox360, ps3 to play music and it's a long and arduous mess.
I got this device last week and love it.
The sound quality is awesome - far better than the other devices i listed. As the writer suggested it's the missing piece to my home theater.
works well with iPeng and my harmony 890
IF your not that into music then this isn't worth your time but don't knock the Squeezebox Touch if you haven't used it nor are a big music fan.
Here is a much easier setup. Mac Mini running squeezecenter and squeezeslave. Use your iphone/ipod touch to control your entire music collection or internet radio. Best remote ever using iPeng.
I've got the radio near my desk and I can control that with my phone as well if I want to.
@nsfw It's even easier to stream your music directly from your ipod touch/iphone/archos 5it/what_so_ever_mp3-player_with_bluetooth_and_wlan to your amp through a Belkin Bluetooth Music Receiver (http://tinyurl.com/y6ek5e3)