DloHomedockMusicRemote
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Switched On: Musical screen plays
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about technology, multimedia, and digital entertainment: Even in this age of slim, lightweight televisions, few consumers short of bored bodybuilders would want to have to lift one whenever they needed to, say, change the channel. (Hence the remote control remains as popular today as it was 20 years ago.) But the iPod is a different story. For all the lawsuits targeted at Apple for iPod-related consumer complaints, none has alleged a strained back or pulled groins caused by Apple's miniature media machine. (Indeed, this has held true in spite of past rumors from credible sources that Apple has been working on a giant iPod.)Nevertheless, as close a companion as many iPods are, there are times when they aren't packed in our pockets. Since they can hold months' worth of music, hard drive-based units in particular can serve as the main music library in the home in any number of ways -- with one-piece or, more recently, a variety of separate speaker docking speakers, through add-on docks for receivers or home theater-in-a-box systems from popular home audio companies, or via standalone media docks such as the Kensington Entertainment Dock and DLO HomeDock and HomeDock Deluxe (which added a Media Center-like television user interface). Further taking advantage of this new role, USB remote pioneer Keyspan and iPod accessory veteran DLO have released new remote-controlled docks -- the $179 TuneView and the $129 HomeDock Music Remote. What separates these new arrivals from earlier efforts such as previous AV docks from DLO and Kensington is that they have screens that can be used for track display and navigation -- a simpler slice of Sonos.
