An introduction to computer audio
Music servers
This are stationary iPods.
They are called music servers as most of them support multi room so can act as a server but in pratice they are all clients to as you can play the music using the box itself.
The idea is nice, you have 1 box who does it all.
Comfort is the name of this game.
It has de look and feel of conventional audio equipment. Connect it to your amplifier just like a CD player and there you are. Some brands even stresses that it is NOT a computer. It is a CD player able to play other audio formats as well.
What do you get?
Well, a computer running Linux or Windows with some proprietary software to manage your music collection and in general a very small display and a moderate sound card.
This makes me wonder, what do these dedicated boxes have to offer compared
with a good quality PC?
Windows Media Player has an interface beating most of this DIY developments.
Vista audio is very good.
A box running Vista/WMP11 combined with a high quality sound card or a outboard DAC will probably:
- outperform most of these dedicated boxes in speed and sound quality
- offers a far better interface
- for a lower price.
Some examples:
Network: ethernet
400Gb HD
4 zones via RCA (analogue)
WAV/ MP3
Not a server (streaming audio not supported)
Cambridge Audio - Azur 640H Music Server
Network: ethernet
160Gb HD
Formats:
- Uncompressed PCM
- Windows Media Audio
- MP3
- AAC (MP4)
- .wav .snd .mpa .mp2 .mp3 and many other common music files also supported
Not a server (streaming audio not supported)
IP-based digital distributed audio system.
Colorado old model Vibe was a hard disk player. The new model is a true server solution.
The Color Touch screen includes a Class D amplifier.
Network: ethernet
6 independently- controlled streams
500/750 Gb HD
Escient Digital Media Managers
Network: ethernet
160 - 750 Gb HD
Supported Audio Formats:
ENCODE: MP3, FLAC
DECODE: PCM, MP3, FLAC, WMA, AAC
Streams: 4 (probably proprietary format)
Internet database: Gracenote
Hifidelio Wireless Music Center
Yes, you can connect it with a cat 5 cable to.
Network: ethernet/ Wifi
80 / 160 Gb HD
OS: Linux
Player software: Hermstedt
Streaming: UPnP AV(Twonky Vision)
Recording
- MP3 and MP3 VBR
- RAW data formats: AIFF, PCM, WAV
- FLAC (Free Lossless Audio Codec)
Playback and Multi-room streaming
- MP3 and MP3 VBR
- RAW data formats: AIFF, PCM, WAV
- OGG/Vorbis
- FLAC (Free Lossless Audio Codec)
- AAC (MPEG4)
Supported sampling rate for recording: 44.100 Hz
Supported sampling rate for playback: 44.100 Hz
A nice optical illusion. If you stare hard at this picture for 5 minutes you see a fat control at the right
€ 12.000
