Post
by Mosley » Wed Apr 30, 2008 1:14 pm
I'm just having 3 little 'radios' here from a local store. Think I'll bring 2 of them back.
Here's the list:
dnt IPdio mini (EUR 100)
Technisat Internetradio1 (EUR 90)
Freecom MusicPal (EUR 120)
The dnt looks sleek, but doesn't listen to Twonky ("no media on server")
The Technisat was introduced 2 years ago, at a price (then) of >200 EUR.
It has two detachable stereo speakers and sounds certainly better than the other two
-- not really a replacement, though, for a stereo. The sound is flat, "mid boosting",
and there are no sound controls. Technisat boasts an optical out (!). The software is OK.
It lets you decide whether to "open" or "play" a folder, so, playing albums, folders
or playlists is no problem. Playing stops while you navigate the menus.
The downside of it all is that, the hardware is rather cheap. So, there are no
knobs, just a standard remote control. The remote control has a ridiculuously
short range, no more that 20cm. The loadspeakers are "active" (the power cord
is a Y-cable, plugging in both the player and one of the speakers). That means,
no amplifier on board -- to connect better speakers, you'll need a complete
HiFi stack. Another big problem with the firmware is that connects and requests
to Twonky time out after exactly 10 seconds. My Twonky tends to respond
sluggishly (need to fix that, maybe my folders are to big?). After a few hours
of uptime, the server will never answer within the 10 seconds window allowed
by the Technisat. So, no music at all.
The MusicPal certainly looks nice. What I like about it is that it seems to attract
a crowd of 3rd party firmware hackers now (and these players are just as good
as their firmware, so if that evolves, it's a big advantage). The software is
well thought-out, with some funny bonuses (rss display while on stand-by). It
_will_ go on playing while you browse the music list or change the settings.
But in many ways, it looks pretty "beta". So, sometimes it won't notice if I
plug in headphones, the built-in speaker will go on bleeping.
One thing I really hate is that you can' play albums or folders, only playlists. Funny
actually, as that's pretty inconsistent. See, you have two dials and two knobs
(no remote control). The knobs are for "EXIT MENU" and "FAVORITES", the left
dial is volume. The control you'll need most of the time is the right dial.
Rotating it means to navigate a list of things, pressing it means OK/select.
If you do an "OK" on a playlist item, it will start with the the selected item,
then go on to play the rest of the list. If you do the same thing with a
file within a folder or album, it will just play this song, then stop and wait.
No, the Musicpal does play albums just the way it does playlists. I was misled by a
corrupted song in an album which made mpal replay the last song all the time.
The speaker appears to have an oval membrane, 4 by 6 cms in size. It
is really just for listening to radio news. The MusicPal has line-out and
phones out for all higher creature comforts.
Last edited by
Mosley on Wed Apr 30, 2008 10:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.
