Abandon Squeezebox or not?

A couple weeks ago, right after I took delivery of my new Beresford MKII, one of my two Squeezebox Classics gave up the ghost. I think it got jealous of the new piece of equipment.

Anyway, I'm left with 1 Squeezebox Classic and a WDTV Play (that I picked up cheap to fill in the empty spot). I'm testing out JRiver and like it but Logitech Media Server still works fine. At this point I could go either way, get a new/used Squeezebox (or linux box that I could setup to run LMS like the Cubox-i2, or ditch/sell my remaining Classic and get a newer streamer.

The Squeezebox ecosystem has it's advantages like gapless playback at a reasonable price and a vibrant community so I want to make sure I make the right decision. My budget isn't huge and that seems like a hindrance to going the non-Squeezebox route, especially if I want true gapless playback.

At this point I think I'm leaning towards keeping the squeezebox-based setup running but any feedback or suggestions/alternatives would be most appreciated. I'd like to make sure I haven't missed anything as far as available options.

Depends if you want hi-res playback or not. If not, I'd recommend Sonos.

If it happend to me, in this moment, I would get a Raspberry Pi and run piCorePlayer on it.

The combination would be seen as a Squeezebox in the ecosystem and you can get sound from mini Jack, HDMI or feed a USB-DAC.

I would then add a Hifiberry Digi board and you have the option of optical and electrical S/PDIF; this way it would "just" act as a transport to your Bushmaster.

This will actually give you a better Squeezebox than the Classic in terms of feature support (high res, codecs, ...); but no display and not so "nice" looking.

There are some Guys that have added a simple text display, but are they using the same connector? I don't think so but I have not checked.. and then you would really have to DYI a box.
http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...ePlayer-£2-LCD

I know that Steen is working on getting the Wolfson Card(S/PDIF out) working in piCorePlayer as well, but it might last a while as it is not as easy as the other boards.
http://liliputing.com/2014/03/raspbe...s-much-pc.html


http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...th-Squeezelite

https://sites.google.com/site/picoreplayer/home

Quote:

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Originally Posted by mr sneff

Depends if you want hi-res playback or not. If not, I'd recommend Sonos.

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Does not apply with the Squeezebox Classic.
It plays up to 24/48 files only.
LMS has to resample anything down that's above 24/48, otherwise the Squeezebox Classic.

If I'm not mistaken the Sonos stuff work using their own app which addresses DLNA servers on the network.
They still haven't addressed the question of gapless playback, but this does affect ripped formats differently.
They support files up to 16/44.1, no further, and they don't recommend WAV playback - doubtless down to the lack of widely recognised tags with WAV files.

I have been using Squeezebox myself for quite some time, and I think the LMS server interfacing is superb.
That's what I would miss most moving away from the Squeezebox ecosystem.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by slate

If it happend to me, in this moment, I would get a Raspberry Pi and run piCorePlayer on it.

The combination would be seen as a Squeezebox in the ecosystem and you can get sound from mini Jack, HDMI or feed a USB-DAC.

I would then add a Hifiberry Digi board and you have the option of optical and electrical S/PDIF; this way it would "just" act as a transport to your Bushmaster.

This will actually give you a better Squeezebox than the Classic in terms of feature support (high res, codecs, ...); but no display and not so "nice" looking.

There are some Guys that have added a simple text display, but are they using the same connector? I don't think so but I have not checked.. and then you would really have to DYI a box.
http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...ePlayer-£2-LCD

I know that Steen is working on getting the Wolfson Card(S/PDIF out) working in piCorePlayer as well, but it might last a while as it is not as easy as the other boards.
http://liliputing.com/2014/03/raspbe...s-much-pc.html


http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...th-Squeezelite

https://sites.google.com/site/picoreplayer/home

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This is really heartening - I haven't been keeping tabs on the community developments, and things look to be healthy.
I still think Logitech shot themselves in the foot by closing down Squeezebox product lines.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by slate

If it happend to me, in this moment, I would get a Raspberry Pi and run piCorePlayer on it.

The combination would be seen as a Squeezebox in the ecosystem and you can get sound from mini Jack, HDMI or feed a USB-DAC.

I would then add a Hifiberry Digi board and you have the option of optical and electrical S/PDIF; this way it would "just" act as a transport to your Bushmaster.

This will actually give you a better Squeezebox than the Classic in terms of feature support (high res, codecs, ...); but no display and not so "nice" looking.

There are some Guys that have added a simple text display, but are they using the same connector? I don't think so but I have not checked.. and then you would really have to DYI a box.
http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...ePlayer-£2-LCD

I know that Steen is working on getting the Wolfson Card(S/PDIF out) working in piCorePlayer as well, but it might last a while as it is not as easy as the other boards.
http://liliputing.com/2014/03/raspbe...s-much-pc.html


http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...th-Squeezelite

https://sites.google.com/site/picoreplayer/home

---

Interesting...thanks for this info!

I really do like the Squeezebox ecosystem and the RaspberryPi looks to be a workable solution, as long as it's easy to build, which it looks like it is. The cost with the wifi, power adapter and HiFiberry seems to be just under $100 w/shipping, etc.

Is there anything I'm missing here (except for a case)?

If it were me, I wouldn't bother with alternatives, I'd just stick with LMS, which can be run on PC/laptop or ARM based devices, including NAS. I recently did this: http://theartofsound.net/forum/showt...Laptop-New-use

As has been pointed out, you would need to add one of the new audio cards to a RPi, if you went that route, in order to connect to our new Bushmaster. Controlling LMS via smart phone or tablet is a popular choice, a display on RPI, or other box is not necessary.

Have a look at http://theartofsound.net/forum/showt...rry-digi-board and a couple of threads over at hifi wigwam

http://www.hifiwigwam.com/showthread...son-Audio-Card

http://www.hifiwigwam.com/showthread...r-Raspberry-Pi

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Stratmangler

This is really heartening - I haven't been keeping tabs on the community developments, and things look to be healthy.
I still think Logitech shot themselves in the foot by closing down Squeezebox product lines.

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I am sure that you are aware of some of the stuff as as I have noticed you posting on the slimdevice forum... a small summary of the last year as I see it:

It was like the community just waited for Logitech to come out and officially declare that it was over; immediately the forum errupted in discussions and since things have been moving.

A lot of it is based around Triodes work with Squeezeelite which gives us the "squeezebox" experience on different hardware/OS http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...ux-Windows-OSX

So the community discussions ended up choosing Wandboard as the new platform and that spun of some Projects:
- software package http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...-F19-Release-1

- DAC addon (I2S based); seems that they are ready for a limited beta hardware run... and with "they" I mean John Swensson, Clive and Adrian that have carried this project - page 133 and forward for latest progress (production runs, cabinet, front/back plates...) http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...-be-interested


And a month ago the communitys first server release: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...-now-available!

Much of the work here is financed by Logitech letting Michael Herger use some of his work time on this... besides the corrections he makes for Logitech in the 7.7.x branch

Michael also found some spare time for some new plugins
http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...art-Mix-plugin
http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...rmation-plugin

Other plugins:
- HTML 5 based controller for Windows, MAC http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...p-for-Mac-OS-X

- Windows 8 app http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...-Windows-8-App

- alternative web gui http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...terface-(beta)

and off cause Steens piCorePlayer project, which can be compared to the community Projects, especially now that 4-5 different I2S based DACs have appeared from different sources... cheaper and less powerfull yes, but if you just use it as a transport to feed a DAC then sound quality should not be an issue... not dissing any of the add on boards as I have not heard them.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by slate

If it happend to me, in this moment, I would get a Raspberry Pi and run piCorePlayer on it.

The combination would be seen as a Squeezebox in the ecosystem and you can get sound from mini Jack, HDMI or feed a USB-DAC.

I would then add a Hifiberry Digi board and you have the option of optical and electrical S/PDIF; this way it would "just" act as a transport to your Bushmaster.

This will actually give you a better Squeezebox than the Classic in terms of feature support (high res, codecs, ...); but no display and not so "nice" looking.

There are some Guys that have added a simple text display, but are they using the same connector? I don't think so but I have not checked.. and then you would really have to DYI a box.
http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...ePlayer-£2-LCD

I know that Steen is working on getting the Wolfson Card(S/PDIF out) working in piCorePlayer as well, but it might last a while as it is not as easy as the other boards.
http://liliputing.com/2014/03/raspbe...s-much-pc.html


http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...th-Squeezelite

https://sites.google.com/site/picoreplayer/home

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I'm not sure how good the Raspberry Pi solution would be, but have you seen this - http://www.raspberrypi.org/the-wolfr...y-pi-for-free/

Effectively you get $$$s worth of software for not a lot, even if it does run slowly. Presumably this only applies to fairly recent versions.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ruleof72

Interesting...thanks for this info!

I really do like the Squeezebox ecosystem and the RaspberryPi looks to be a workable solution, as long as it's easy to build, which it looks like it is. The cost with the wifi, power adapter and HiFiberry seems to be just under $100 w/shipping, etc.

Is there anything I'm missing here (except for a case)?

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A week ago there was a post with a shopping list from another US Citizen and his experience
http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...l=1#post776822

I do want to add some comments to that:
- if you want to use wifi and you do not have an adapter at hand to try out; buy one that Works for others as it sometimes is a bit of hit & miss with linux

- powersupply; originally Raspberry Pi was constructed to be able to reuse old phone adapters (microUSB, 5V/0,7A), but experience has shown that it has to be a good one. As ApesBrain states the recommendation is now microUSB, 5V/1A

- if you go for the HifiBerry board I have no recommendations in regards to a case as height might be an issue for existing Pi cases... I just had a look at http://www.hifiberry.com/guides/gall...ers-creations/

I can see that one have used one of the simple open Pi cases where you can prolong the "legs" if needed example this http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00ENQJ43...I3FV87P3FW3KB1

Anyway just avoid a metal box if you are using wifi :)