February 25, 2004
Netgear MP101 Wireless Media Hub
We have a junky PC hooked up to our stereo and TV at home so we can access our MP3 collection. Well, it's badly in need of replacing, so I started looking at my options.
One compelling idea is to scrap the whole PC, move the hard drive with all the MP3 content on it to our main PC upstairs, and go with a wireless media hub like the Netgear MP101 (shown). The MP101's job is to stream audio content from your networked PCs to your home stereo.
One main thing differentiates the MP101 from many of the new media hubs coming out: it doesn't do video. No photo showing or video playing. It doesn't require, or even allow, a connection to your TV -- it is audio only. To counter this limitation, the MP101 actually has its own 4-line LCD. This makes it convenient since you needn't turn on your TV just to listen to music. That's a big plus if your TV has a long warm-up period like ours does.
The MP101 isn't available yet, but I'm thinking this might be a good, inexpensive (<$150) replacement for the dying PC that is our media hub right now. Of course, we lose the ability to do PC stuff on our TV, but frankly, we haven't done that as often as I expected us to. Oh, well...I'm sure that will change eventually.
Posted by Craig | Permalink | TrackBackYou might also check out the Turtle Beach Audiotron. It's a similar product with the following differences:
-Wired net access only via ethernet or HPNA.
-Digital Optical out.
-No server software required - finds music on standard Windows/SMB shares.
-More 'stereo friendly' form factor.
-Managable via web interface as well as the front panel/remote.
The price is a bit more@$199, but I've got two of 'em and am totally happy with 'em.
http://www.turtlebeach.com/site/products/audiotron/producthome.asp
StickyC: yeah, I've seen the Audiotron (Mitch has one). The thing keeping me from considering it is the fact that it has no wireless access (I'm *not* running Cat-5 all the way downstairs when my 802.11g network is perfectly fine). The MP101 has a web interface as well, which is a bonus.
Posted by Craig at February 26, 2004 01:56 PMOk. So can a 4-line LCD display be used to manage and play a music collection as enormous as Craig's?
Posted by Bob at February 27, 2004 10:16 AMDunno...we'll see!
Posted by Craig at February 27, 2004 03:27 PMIs there a limit on the number of songs the unit can track? I know the Audiotron runs outta memory around 30k songs.
Posted by StickyC at March 11, 2004 12:53 PMGood question, StickyC, but I don't think so. I believe that the MP101's song database resides on a PC on the network, unlike the Audiotron's reliance on internal RAM for holding the track list.
Posted by Craig at March 11, 2004 01:48 PMHi,
sorry I fail to see why 11g is a requirement, 11b is perfectly adequte for streaming mp3. In addition it alienates a whole section of potential users if you make it 11g only.
I have this machine and it performs excellently.
FYI I have a 11g network so it is compatible with both.
In addition there is an update due to the server software that will link it to VTUNER for Internet Radio, now we have yet to see if this will be one-off or subscription based.
http://www.radio1234.com is the site.
I got into this similar site using a made up MAC address
hyyp://www.radiosetup.com
and digging around it suggested one-off payment (which is obviously preferred).
In the UK this unit is £100, a bargain when compared to alternatives.
Regards
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