[Fwd: Re: Re: Squeezebox 3]

[Kevin Hawkins <lists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

rb_ziggy wrote

> Thanks for the replies... They do raise a couple more queries:
>
> - I infer from your replies that it's unlikely that anyone is using
> slimserver 6.2 with xAP. Is this correct?
>

No indeed not, sorry my post was perhaps a bit misleading  re that...
- I use SlimServer 6.2 with xAP...   although I'm currently not using
all the more involved features as I have changed my music organisation
quite a bit since using Sonos.   I do use the basic OSD display features
and transport control . It is the Squeezebox 3 I haven't any experience
with and there are new features in SlimServer 6.2 that are not supported
by the conduit.

> - Are people tending to use slim devices with xAP or is this now a
> bit of a backwater in terms of music streaming and information
> display?

It's a fine way to get transport control and information displayed on
the players (OSD)  ..  With Sonos for example this is currently not
possible at all.  The big change in V5 to V6 SlimServer has been the
integration of an SQL database for the music library.  To complement
this the CLI was revised to support more manageable interaction with the
DB, particularly for searches. also a better eventing model was
introduced to remove some needs for polling that the previous version
needed. This has allowed the likes of Crestron and AMX to better
integrate with SlimServer. The xAP conduit does not exploit these later
features but they are not required for 99% of purposes either.   The
conduit is very feature rich compared with any alternatives - unless you
choose to drive the CLI directly.  (The CLI is SlimServers command line
interface over IP,  a fairly low level but capable interface for
programmers. Actually you can mix this and xAP at the same time should
you so desire)

> If so, what are people tending to use now?  (My reason for
> asking is that I'm using xLobby with Pocket PCs for most of my audio
> but in the lounge I need something different to link into the normal
> hifi. The xAP to xLobby connector has proved to be the 'glue' that
> I'd been looking for in linking a number of components together and
> this was my reason for looking into the squeezebox.)
>

It will work well depending on how much music control you need , and
from where you are going to originate that control . For example are you
wanting to control what music is playing on a track by track basis via
xAP ? What about playlist creation/editing and management of 'now
playing'.  Library searches ?   The xAP conduit makes a fine controller
for transport but is limited in some other more complex areas ,
particularly with support of searches etc for which a whole new
mechansim was introduced in SlimServer 6.2- have a read of the features
the conduit offers and see if that suffices.  (It does for me)

Also it is not possible from XLobby for example to set up a Slim player
(or indeed any hardware mp3 player) as a music output device ...
Stephens development on XLobby appears stalled too.  Now playing
feedback and OSD is supported  so you can get display and transport
control of a SlimPlayer within  XLobby (via xAP) , just not music
selection/ playlist management integrated to the XLobby library.   The
problem is that XLobby doesn't output easily accessible
filepath/transport requests and even more awkwardly doesn't support a
way of providing player feedback .   At one stage I had XLobby driving
its preferred (WinAMP) client and was picking up the activity in WinAMP
via xAP and reflecting this onto a SlimPlayer, again via xAP . The idea
(kludge) was that XLobby would drive a virtual WinAMP client which would
be mirrored onto a SlimPlayer. In practice the synchronisation was a
very slight issue at trackchange time ( multiroom synch was not
workable) and also any interaction with the Slim device wasn't reflected
back to XLobby (as it still thought it was controlling WinAMP).  The
better way of approaching this would be to emulate a WinAMP client back
to XLobby but actually drive xAP out the other side.   One of those
things on the 'todo' list but as I changed my own music setup it dropped
way down the list.

> - Depening on the answers to the above, if I downloaded slimserver
> 6.2 could I 'experiment' with xAP connectivity without a device
> attached (or do I really need the display/player to make any sense
> of things)?
>

Indeed yes, just use SoftSqueeze, it acts just like a real player (even
plays audio). Some people even deploy SlimServer with  SoftSqueeze as
their only players :-) ..all free...   The obvious thing you lose is the
infra red remote of course but you get control back via an onscreen
keypad or via xAP.

K