[FRANKe]

Hey all - I have a friend who has asked for my advice on setting up a situation where he can play music in his office and his living room simultaneously (in his small condo). I, of course, recommended the Squeezebox, but now he also says he doesn't want to have to have the CD ripped. (He has a big collection and he's lazy and also when a friend comes over with a CD he doesn't want to waste the time ripping)

As I understood, the Squeezebox will not play CDs, but I just want to double check. I know the Transporter has S/PDIF input, so you can play from a CD player, but will that play simultaneously in two rooms?

Is there anything else I can recommend to him to play CDs simultaneously in two rooms (wirelessly)? (And be able to control it from his office chair?)

Thanks!

[Carlman]

To answer your first question, no a Squeezebox will not play cd's... no input to do so.  I don't know about the Transporter but that's a really expensive solution for this situation.

Your friend's best bet for a low-tech solution is to get a wireless transmitter on a cd player... then connect the receivers to amps/speakers where he wants to play music.  Amphony used to make a digital unit that would convert sound to digital, then transmit that in RF.  You could get one base unit and multiple receivers. 

I kept looking for a technology similar to this... except I wanted it to take the digital output of a cd player, digitize THAT, and then have a DAC on the receiving end only.  In the above example, the path was Digital->ADC->RF->DAC instead of just Digital->RF->DAC.

Best of luck on finding that.  Seems simple enough to make.. the market doesn't realize the need.

-C

[FRANKe]

Thanks Carlman.

Any Transporter users out there - can you confirm (or deny) that the synchronize feature works while using the input from a CD player?

Thanks.

[Greg Erskine]

hi FRANKe,

The synchronization of Squeezeboxes/Transporters is done from Slimserver. Connecting a CD player to a Transporter is just like using the Transporter as a DAC.

Be careful, don't waste YOUR time on lazy friends, you'll do all the work and they'll still be unhappy and blame you. 

regards

[Thump553]

Explain to him that spending a relatively little bit of time ripping does not violate the principles of laziness.  No longer will he have to hunt down CDs, worry about scratched CDs or have the CD he wants to listen to in the car/with his spouse/SO, etc.

Ripping my CDs (to FLAC) and storing them on USB connected external hard drives is easy, cheap and highly practical (make a backup of the collection on DVDs just in case).  Using EasyCD Extractor is simplicity in itself and gives great ripping results. 

Once he does this, the hardest part of listening will be finding the remote.

<--- lazy and proud of it (I call it efficiency).

[FRANKe]

Be careful, don't waste YOUR time on lazy friends, you'll do all the work and they'll still be unhappy and blame you. 

But at least he's willing to pay me to set it up. 

Thump553 - I totally agree, but it's going to be a tough sell. He'll probably just ask me to rip them for him. Urgh! I would do it if he paid me, but I'd hate to wear out my CD drive. (I have a discontinued Plextor drive - excellent ripper)

[Thump553]

Send him to one of the ripping services-I know there is at least one that posts here that people have been happy with (can't recall the name(s) but check through the threads in this circle).