Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler This stinking squeeze box is really pissing me off

I'm done with this stupid thing. I have the Duet, and it's been a love / hate relationship from day one. Sporadic connectivity issues (regardless if it's wired, wireless or hybrid) that always happen when guests are over, it doesn't play with Rhapsody well at all, the damn battery is good for about 15 minutes off the charging cradle.... It's outta here. I'm round filing the SOB.

I'm looking around for something to replace it with. It looks like the Sonos or "cough" Logitech Touch are my choices. Are there any other options for me to consider??? Anyone have the Touch for a while now that can vouch for it? Rick, you have one right??

I do not have an Ipad or Iphone, and I am not about to get either....

I have all my music on a HP Smartmedia Server. I want to keep it on this server. I just need something to talk to the server for my music collection that's all FLAC, and the Internet for Pandora / Rhapsody, then send that data to my pre-amp.

Mike send that Duet to me, I'll be more than happy to throw it in the pool for you ... I love doing that, my wife thinks I'm nuts but it sure is a tension reliver.

I have both a Classic and a Touch for about a year or so now and love them both, never had an issue with either. I'm using Vortexbox appliance for storage, the Logitechs and the VBA makes for a great combination. I was looking at the Duet a while back and if the old brain can remember correctly I believe I read some not so favorable reviews.

Do you stream Rhapsody Rick? That has been hit / miss, always. Pandora works all the time. I actually like the controller that comes with the Touch more than the Sonos, so I'd prefer to go that route, but not if it isn't any more stable that this stupid Duet. Glad to hear it's working for you, that's encouraging.

Mike I do not stream Rhapsody, only because I forgot to sign up and keep forgetting to sign up. I do have all of our collection ripped in FLAC also and let my Pandora subscription laspe because if I'm we're not listening to our own music we usually have one of thousands of Internet stations playing and just wasn't listening to Pandora much at all.

Both my wife and I have the Squeezebox remote apps for our iPads as well as our iPhones so as of right now I can't tell you what the Touch and Classic remotes even look like ... does the Touch even have a remote? We absolutely love the setup and the Vortexbox has worked flawlessly and effortlessly so far. I believe Tom uses either the Touch or Classic (maybe both?) and uses his iPad as a remote as well, I'm almost sure that what he uses. He'll chime in I'm sure.

You guys and your Ipads.... I may just have to cave and get one. Thanks for the feedback..

Mike, it won't hurt a bit.

I scarrrreedddd Ken... The dark side beckons..

mike, apple is the side of enlightenment brotha. you will see, when you buy your new ipad...

P.S., All joking aside. I have been using a Mac since 98, back then i had a powerbook laptop. It was 1/2 as fast as my Dual processor windows machine at the time. However, i enjoyed using the laptop more.. As far as their computers go, i enjoy not having to clean out the registry on a somewhat regular basis.. I will admit the last PC i owned was back in 2003, so maybe dealing with corrupt registries due to crap you pickup online are a thing of the past. I have Never had a problem with any of my Mac's, i turn them on and they work Every time.

Honestly, all of the viruses ect are one of the motivating forces for me to switch. The Mac OS does crash from time to time, however from time to time is more like 1 or 2 times a year..

Anyhow, i do not want to continue on as a "fan boy". I like their products for a specific reason, the damn things just work.

Some quick thoughts:

Sad to hear of a dislike for the Squeezebox since I love mine so much. Of course, I have an older model that starting to look archaic until iPod/IPad, remote control integration turned it into a high tech. toy again.

Sonos seems to be the popular choice for dedicated units these days and the multi-room ability is a bit more refined. The price is still hard to swallow though.

Maybe now that receivers are maturing through the streaming world, investigating some solutions for a new receiver might be worth a look as well.

I like the mental bump of being able to send FLAC as a pure digital source all the way through my house right to the receiver but if I had to start over, I'd be torn.

Also, with laptops becoming so cheap, you can pick up a dedicated music library/player for almost next to nothing these days. Get something with a touch screen for the flare factor or just add a Bluetooth remote to operate it from across the room.

Do you have one of the original wood-fired models?

No, of course not. That would be silly. It burns moonshine as a very clean and very cheap, naturally replenishing fuel.

Speaking of steampunk, Rush's new CD is a rare commodity these days in that it is a themed album. If you read the enclosed booklet, the songs follow the theme of a mini, steampunk adventure.

So if I were to just get an Ipad, I could just use that to stream music from the server to my receiver? Wouldn't I still need some sort of magic box between the Ipad and the receiver??

You need a magic box, yes, unless you have a 2011 Denon, Pioneer, or (I think?) Marantz with Airplay. The magic box is either an Airport Express or an Apple TV.

OTOH, you wouldn't NEED an iPad to do that--all you would need is a computer running the dreaded iTunes.

An airport express is also a wireless extender, so if you go that rute, your wireless internet signal will be stronger in the house. I have 2 of them, and they integrate well with i-tunes. You name them, and then in itunes you can choose "which room" you want to send the signal to.

I think you have to use itunes for this to work though.. I don't know if that is a big deal for you or not. If you do use itunes though, itunes control is integrated into pretty much all of apples products now.

You can always use Airfoil with just about any audio outputting program on OS X or Windows.

I have squeeze classic and it can be a real bitch controlling it from the computer interface. What i found works for me is giving my router a static ip range but let it handle the dhcp and give the squeeze box a static ip as well as my computer .I find this helps it from becomeing lost and hard to connect to. I have mine at work and now with the app for my android phone it is excellent ,i can listen to music off the computer or the internet. I dont have pandora so i have no idea how well that works or if at all. Hopefully you can find something that works better for you.

All my regular home network devices get a static IP. It just keeps things like that simple and eases troubleshooting if a device goes haywire. Only guests get DHCP assigned addresses. I guess for that reason, I never seem to have trouble with my SB. My only complaint is that for a while there (seemed to be after it gotten taken over by Logitech) I dreaded doing their software updates as something always got broken or moved where I had to go find it. Seems to be much more stable now again.

Same here, all my known devices get a fixed IP address. They think they are doing DHCP but the router always gives the same IP address to each device. Never had a network problem with the Squeezeboxes: wired on the Touch and wireless on the Radio.

I noticed the same thing, there were a lot of updates for a while now things seem to have stabilized.

I ordered a Touch.

How do you give something a static IP address??

I think you'll really like the Touch Mike, I set my static IP address on the Votexbox settings but I don't see how to do it with Squeezebox. I'm not too terribly bright regarding all things geeky so I don't know if and whenever you set up the static IP address on your HP server if it automatically carries the address over to the Squeezebox or not ... my guess, pulled completely outta my ass says yes it will? Looks like it did just that with my Vortexbox.

Speaking of which...

I do remember having a hell of a time trying to get things to mesh whenever I was first setting all of our stuff up and it seems whenever I set a static IP up all of the troubles went away.

Good luck with it amigo!

That's very tough to answer because it depends entirely on the uniqueness of your individual network and what gear is used.

In short and without intending the sarcasm that this will undoubtedly sound like..... If you have to ask, it's probably better if you stick with the automated method. However, I'd be happy to help out if you decide to dive in. I'll try to summarize the high level but it's impossible to give a step by step without knowing all your individual details.

Any networked device generally has two options somewhere in its setup.
1. It can be assigned a static IP that never changes or
2. You enable it's DHCP client that goes out looking for a DHCP server to give it a number every time you turn it on.

Where you change this depends on the device and/or it's operating system.

Generally, in a home network, it is the Internet router that is set up as a DHCP server to assign addresses to anything that asks for one. It will have lots of settings as well but again, they will differ from model to model. In more complex networks, another PC may be utilized as a DHCP server.

In the above common home environment, to assign a static IP to a particular device, you need to know how to do two things.

1. How to go into that device's network settings to turn off the DHCP client and assign it a usable IP number (and other associated information.) You also need to understand subnets (how ranges of IP numbers work) in order to assign it a valid one.

2. How to go into your DHCP server and "reserve" that number so it never assigns that particular number to another computer. If two devices end up with the same IP, that is bad and neither usually work.

Another scenario is that in the DHCP server, you reserve an IP for a particular device based on its MAC address. The MAC Address is the device's network 'serial number'. It is unique, assigned by the manufacturer and normally never changes. When the device boots up and goes searching for a DHCP server to assign it a number, the server checks it's MAC address and realizes that there is a 'reservation' listed for that address,. It then always assigns the chosen IP for that device.

More complexity.
DHCP also takes care of a bunch of other things for you that you need. Not only does it automate getting an IP address but it also dishes out other important pieces of information like the default gateway, subnet mask, DNS addresses and other important settings. If you manually set an IP, you have to enter in all these yourself. Again leading back to my first point, which I hope you now realize was not sarcasm.

I think you'll be happy, I purchased a Touch recently to stream Rhapsody and it works perfectly, with the exception of the occasional hiccup caused by the wireless router, which for some reason once in a while assigns the same IP address to two devices (Netgear WNDR4500 N900 Dual Band Gigabit Wireless Router). I went with the Touch after finally giving up on the Denon 3808ci when the Denon rep told me I would have to revert to factory default settings and see if that helped multiple internet connectivity issues that were essentially random; I was quite skeptical since the amp would only stream Rhapsody once in a blue moon, and then would freeze or shut down without cause mid session.

Mike, I got a touch. It seems fine. I still have to reboot it about once a week, though.

Murph, I thought you had a touch, also.

Murph, thanks for the informative response. I have a LAN throughout the house, and can utilize that if needed. I have a Liksys E3000 router and two Linksys ten port switches in the office hub where the Internet router is. That is also where all the LAN cables are routed to a 12 port LAN patch block. From the block, I have patch cables to the two switches and the router. I can then just plug a patch cable into the the patch block as needed in the different rooms throughout the house. I obviously use wireless as well, for some things like my laptop. This hub is also where all my cable and phone lines tie together. The phone is a 110 block, cable is a mess of different ported hubs. I did the installation and terminations myself, with the help of a comm tech friend of mine and a case of beer.....

At both rooms where I have audio gear, I have a four port switch that plugs into the LAN. The devices on the EQ racks then plug into the switches. I have them set up this way, as they all get firmware updates via Internet, or they have Internet functionality of some sort.

I have my HP Media Server plugged into the network as well.

I am running Widows 7 on all my computers, and I used the homegroup set up wizard for each, with a set up key.

I do have odd network issues. Sometimes I can not access a computer from a different computer, although I have set each up to allow unlimited access on the network. Between Nortons and all the other shit I don't understand, I'm sure this problem is my own doing. I should just pay someone to come over and fix this, but I hate not knowing how to do something myself, so I tend to fumble around and make things worse, then ask the Axiom forum to fix my mistakes...LOL>

Michael, this was my favoriate sentence of your post. Just though i would share .

Tom,
Nope. I hardly ever get a Touch. Sad really.
Also, I have the old LCD screened Squeezebox with the IR, buttoned remote. However, I use iPeng on my iPod Touch as a wireless, touch interface. It was like getting the latest, greatest Squeezebox for just $6.99 which is what the app cost.

Michael,
Ya, home networks can be finicky. Businesses spend a lot of time, dollars and energy to lock them down and work out the bugs but with home networks, we just want to be able to just turn stuff on and have it work. It usually does 95% of the time but the other 5% can be a bitch.

Doesn't sound like you have anything unusual there. Unfortunately, it's very hard to work the bugs out of someone else's set up without being there to view it and play around. You may be on the right track for odd ball connection problems on the "Norton's and all the other shit" angle. The Windows 7 networking tools seem to do a pretty good job but remember that you only need one firewall running on a PC. Two will not only slow it down but often cause issues as well.

Got the Touch hooked up yesterday. Took about five minutes. Everything synced, it's working perfectly so far. One thing I really like, is that it has usb. I can hook my server up to it via usb, verse the network. My network is a mess. I need to hire someone to fix it.

Glad the Touch is working out for you Mike, how does it compare to the Duet remote wise?

Hey, now.

Mike, I want to hear more about using the Touch as the server. Can you still access those files on your network? I thought of loading all my music onto an external hard drive and using the Touch as a server (i.e. not running Logitech Media Server on a computer), and I can't remember why I didn't do that. Might have had something to do with an inability to sync files with other network resources. Did you - literally - just run a USB cable from the SB to your HP Server?

Rick, I tried to build a Vortexbox out of an older computer yesterday, but couldn't get it to recognize that it is on the network. That's probably NOT my end game, but Mrs. Tuttle has been displeased with the performance of her machine, and I thought if I could stop running media server on it, that might help.

Ya, I just ran a USB cable from my server to the touch. Not sure if it matters or not, but the only Male A to Male A cable RS had was a high dollar transfer cable, so I bought it. Obviously my server and the touch have Male A ports....

I run the Squeezebox software on my server. The Touch is used to access the music files. It was amazingly simple. It recognized the server immediately, no fiddling with anything. It is working way-mo betta than the duet did accessing music files via the home network. I still have the server on my network, and use it for backing up my other computers.

Rick, the Touch comes with a little remote, but it's IR, so you have to point it at the Touch. Nothing fancy, just a plane ol remote. I do sorta miss the Duet controller, as you could carry it around the house and actually see album art and all that. But I sure don't miss its fussiness. This Touch is working without any issue - so far.

Ah! So you're still running Logitech Media Server software on the server computer. Got it.

I've had really good luck using my iPad as the controller. Love it. That would solve your Duet controller angst.

No kidding there Tom, I absolutely love using either the iPad or the iPhone as a remote controller for both the Touch and the Classic players. I use the Touch in the main listening area, the Classic is used primarily for the back patio system and the garage but I'm thinking about getting another Classic dedicated to the garage so that I won't have to physically disconnect it from the outside system. What's really cool about the iPad/iPhone controllers is that the players can all be synced to play the same music or each can be playing different music using one controller.

I absolutely love the setup, mostly because it's a no brainer setup and not complicated to use ... and the shit works.

Mike here are the apps I use..

SqueezePad for iPad .... http://www.squeezepad.com/

IPeng for iPhone .... http://penguinlovesmusic.de/ipeng-the-iphone-skin-for-squeezecenter/#comments

Squeezepad does not have an app for the iPhone so that is why I use the different controllers, I do have both SqueezePad and IPeng controllers on my iPad but prefer using the SqueezePad.