How user-friendly is your streaming software?

[matt49]

In terms of userfriendliness, I think Sonos is brilliant. It has all the functions I want; the functions require a minimum of clicking and general fiddliness; it looks great, whether on a PC, smartphone or tablet; it's reliable; it's fast; its folder system presents my metadata exactly as I want to see it; Spotify and Qobuz run natively.

However, in my system even a modded Sonos Connect just doesn't sound as good as running my NAS directly into the DAC via USB.*

So I'd like to find out what people think about other computer-based music playback options, whether these are dedicated hifi streamers, or third-party software you can install on a PC or Mac, or programs that run on NAS drives.

What are the strengths and weaknesses of their software? Do they come anywhere near Sonos for user-friendliness?

:cheers:

Matt

* I don't want to get into a tedious argument about whether I could tell the difference in a blind test, thanks!

 

[CnoEvil]

I'm happy with Linn Kinsky, which was very clunky and temperamental when it was introduced....but through constant upgrades, it has evolved into a pretty user-friendly solution. It also works on all the usual devices.

Since I'm not familiar with the software from other brands, I've nothing to compare it to.

 

[soulsonic34]

I have simple set-up for streaming audio; a sony blu ray player using DLNA technology to wirelessly connect to my Mac using Serviio software. It works okay though the user interface is dire but has a big advantage of supporting and playing a wide variety of audio files other than apple lossless and AAC audio files.

however for ultimate convenience I use my iPad having a 30-pin dock hub connector which streams audio to my yamaha amp using yamha's proprietary wireless technology. By having my iPad wirelessly connected to my mac using the home sharing feature of iTunes I can play audio anywhere. Sounds great.

I've tried streaming using a Bluetooth adapter to my yamaha amp from my iPad , which works okay other than noticing a decrease in volume , so this method is rarely used especially as Bluetooth consume more battery power on the iPad.

Lastly I use my xbox 360 to stream audio from my MAC. Works really well, though does have the disadvantage of not showing album art but has the advantage of playing any audio supported in iTunes.

each method has its pro's and con's but if we're to choose one method it would be the iPad and yamaha combo using iTunes as the music server.

 

[ANOther]

Sonos is OK but i do wish it would show the artist name when you are listing tracks by album from Spotify - there is plenty of space between the track names but it just leaves blank space

 

[the record spot]

Software? Good for the most part. Apple just works so I can forget that. Onkyo's system is very intuitive so I can forget that too. Twonky for Android, or Streambels for that matter, open that platform up and I can steam to my Apple TV.

I don't use half of it. Any streaming is usually Netflix.

 

[Paul.]

I used to use airfoil a lot, but Mountain Lion killed that since you can airplay at the system level rather than just from apps. When I am feeling lazy I just use my iPhone and the Marantz app.

 

[matt49]

Thanks for the replies.

I realize I gave this thread a misleading title: what I was really interested in (and some of you have interpreted it this way) is music server client software. Often all computer-based music playback is called 'streaming', though a pedant would say that the word 'streaming' should be reserved for an external media stream coming from the web (e.g. Spotify, Netflix etc). I wasn't interested in streaming in this narrow sense. I was interested in the software, both server and but especially client, that organizes your music files and presents them graphically to you for playback from a PC, NAS or hi-fi 'streamer'.

The sense I'm getting so far is that people are broadly happy with the 'user experience' of their software. On the other hand, it seems to me that music server clients are not all created equal.

What I'd really like is some detail: what are the specific good and bad points? What good things can and can't your software do? What, if any, nasty habits does it have?

So a couple of examples:

iTunes doesn't create an ad hoc playing queue; there's no intuitive way to do 'add to queue' or 'replace queue'. This has to be done via playlists, which makes good sense for an iPod but not for a music server client.

Synology Audio Station does create a queue, but it's not part of the main screen; there's no 'replace queue' command; clearing the playing queue involves four 'clicks' (open queue, edit queue, select all, delete).

Sonos is exemplary in this regard, especially since the playing queue is in the centre of the main window, and a wide range of commands are accessible with one click.

Things like this may seem trivial, but IMO they make a big difference to the user experience.

Matt

 

[jamesrfisher]

Which version of iTunes are you using? There is now an 'Up Next' feature and you can add either the whole album or individual tracks to either play next or add to end of the queue by right clicking. The list of tracks can be viewed by clicking the 3 dots and lines in the now playing window.

 

[g777o]

Like yourself, I use a sonos connect into my DAC. It's quick and easy, and you can start playing music in about 20 seconds.

If however, I am sitting down, and relaxing to music, I prefer to use Jriver Media center through the computer.

I'll connect a USB to my DAC for asynchronous data transfer, and an HDMI to the TV.

I use a MCE remote control (£13 on ebay) to control the software in theatre mode, all from the comfort of the sofa.

If you miss the flicking through all your CD collection, but don't want to hassle of changing discs constantly, this is a great way to listen to your music 🙂

I'd highly recommend it, you can completely customize it to you own needs.

 

[wilro15]

I have a Mac connected via USB into my amp. I use the Apple Remote app on iPhone or iPad to control iTunes. Works very well, particularly on the larger tablet screen. I can control my music collection plus internet radio, plus will have iTunes Radio when it comes out in UK. No Spotify or any other non-Apple service without faffing though.

Don't understand why you can't change what's coming next, use the Up Next thing,

Genius playlists are quite good for playing tracks you've forgotten about.

 

[matt49]

Which version of iTunes are you using? There is now an 'Up Next' feature and you can add either the whole album or individual tracks to either play next or add to end of the queue by right clicking. The list of tracks can be viewed by clicking the 3 dots and lines in the now playing window.

Don't understand why you can't change what's coming next, use the Up Next thing,

Thanks for pointing out this function, which I hadn't spotted. It does seem to have less functionality than the 'Now Playing' queue in Sonos. You don't seem to be able to save the 'Up Next' queue as a playlist, and once a song has played, it disappears from 'Up Next', so you can't go back and play it again. But maybe I've just missed these functions too!

Matt

 

[mikeparker59]

I'm afraid to say Cambridge Audio's Stream Magic software is pants. It's so unstable I just don't use. I really wanted to be able to operate my NP30 from my tablet or phone. Sometimes it works OK but most of the time it just hangs or crashes, so I use the NP30 from the built in display and remote.

 

[Neuphonix]

Hi Matt,

this is something I have been experimenting with this year with varying degrees of sucess. I use a Mac with external drives as well as a NAS.

For most listening I use Minimserver on my NAS controlled via Kinsky on my iPad. Minimserv is free & it's great, the browsing structure just seems to suit my needs. Also now has the Minimstream add on for on the fly conversion if you desire.

Have also tried J-River / J-Remote on the Mac (no Linux version for NAS yet although it is coming). I would have to say that this is the solution that I would like to use, lots of configuration options. The MAC version I find is still very buggy though. I suspect that a program like this might struggle on a NAS, really needs the extra processing power of a fully fledged computer.

Kinsky can be a bit clunky at times, but on the whole I find it to be pretty good, fairly stable. Probably the best of the control points that I have used so far. Another control point I have tried with-out much success is Lumin, seems to be held in high regard by many, but I just couldn't get it to connect to my DS reliably. The user interface is pretty good though.

 

[Longjohn]

Dear All,

I'm a classical music freak too, and have loads of stuff recorded from the BBC Radio 3 website and other internet radio stations using iPlayer Converter and Replay Media Capture (used to be called Replay AV). The latter piece of software is superb and you can easily set a timer for recording from radio programmes. It's far better than Total Recorder.

For storage and playback I use an excellent Asrock Vision 3D media PC running Windows 7 Ultimate and use Foobar for setting up playlists. I'm very happy with its playback performance, too. For this, I run the signal via asynchromous USB into my Arcam rDAC. If I want remote control, I use the FoobarCon app for Android.

I also use Foobar as an internet radio tuner, and I'm very impressed by the performance I get from the 320 kbps/s BBC Radio 3 AAC or WMA streams.

I have a Synology DS213 (with 2 x 3TB Western Digital Red Drives) waiting in the wings, but I haven't started to use it yet. I would very much like some advice on the best audio playback software for this NAS.

One problem i have with my tagging is that I've put all my titles in the file name, but most audio playback software looks for this info in the title / track tag.

Is there some software that will convert file names into tags in batch mode? By 'batch mode', I mean converting about 1000 or so files all at once.

Kind regards,

Long John

 

[ANOther]

One problem i have with my tagging is that I've put all my titles in the file name, but most audio playback software looks for this info in the title / track tag.

Is there some software that will convert file names into tags in batch mode? By 'batch mode', I mean converting about 1000 or so files all at once.

Mp3tag will do this

 

[steve_1979]

I use a PC as a media server (mostly listening to music from the hard disk and streaming fromSpotify) and I have all of the major media player software installed on it. But for general day to day listening I find that good old WMP suits my needs best because I like the user interface. It's missing a few functions that the more complicated media players have but if you just want to listen then it's dead simple and easy to use. Selecting music from the standard Windows 7 filing system is straight forward as is creating or editing playlists. Most mornings it just right click on the WMP icon and select 'play all' which plays my entire music collection in a random order.

I might start using iPlayer in the future though because it can remember the pre-set the graphic equaliser settings for each track individually which is handy because there are some songs which need a bit of EQ but others that don't. That's a handy feature if you like listening to music on random (as I often do) but don't want to keep changing the EQ whenever a badly mastered track plays. I'm not a fan of the iTunes PC user interface though but the phone app is good.

 

[James7]

However, in my system even a modded Sonos Connect just doesn't sound as good as running my NAS directly into the DAC via USB.

Interesting that in your experience, in your specific set-up, sound quality improves if a NAS is connected directly into the USB input rather than via ethernet to something like a Sonos then presumably via co-axial to the DAC. This may just be the extra connections / hardware between NAS and DAC, or maybe something to do with the asynchronous nature of the USB input. I don't use streamers much but have found pligging flash drives into my Squeezebox USB port to sound better than sending music via ethernet or wirelessly. Bryston took this approach with their digital players - not streamers in any real sense of the word as they are designed to take music from a number of USB devices. I see the new Sony players have built in hard drives so music is transferred via ethernet but then played from an internal drive.

Some good software is obviously what you are looking for at the moment and I cannot really help there, I am afraid, but I wonder in the long run if you really want to get the best out of that Devialet of yours whether something like the Bryston BDP-1 may be a solution.

 

[NHL]

Using Wimp, with CD quality. Works brilliant!

 

[busb]

Most SW doesn't handle tagging of classical music that well at all! I currently use both iTunes & Spotify on a Mac Mini. As has been discussed, iTunes' interface isn't that great but Apple's Remote app makes navigation fairly easy. iTunes isn't very good at finding cover art as well! Spotify works well enough on a Mac but has no remote control ap despite my iPhone having Spotify installed.

 

[matt49]

Thanks for all the contributions. Lots of different stuff going on here.

For most listening I use Minimserver on my NAS controlled via Kinsky on my iPad. Minimserv is free & it's great, the browsing structure just seems to suit my needs. Also now has the Minimstream add on for on the fly conversion if you desire.

Have also tried J-River / J-Remote on the Mac (no Linux version for NAS yet although it is coming). I would have to say that this is the solution that I would like to use, lots of configuration options. The MAC version I find is still very buggy though. I suspect that a program like this might struggle on a NAS, really needs the extra processing power of a fully fledged computer.

Cheers Neuphonix,

These both sound like options I should look into. Ideally I would want to run the server software on a NAS. I think Synology do NAS drives with heavyweight processing power, so I don't think that would be a problem. The difficulty I have at the moment is that my NAS, the Synology DS213J, has a rather niche ARM processor, and the common server software packages won't install on it.

For storage and playback I use an excellent Asrock Vision 3D media PC running Windows 7 Ultimate and use Foobar for setting up playlists. I'm very happy with its playback performance, too. For this, I run the signal via asynchromous USB into my Arcam rDAC. If I want remote control, I use the FoobarCon app for Android.

I also use Foobar as an internet radio tuner, and I'm very impressed by the performance I get from the 320 kbps/s BBC Radio 3 AAC or WMA streams.

Interesting. Does it run Spotify natively?

I have a Synology DS213 (with 2 x 3TB Western Digital Red Drives) waiting in the wings, but I haven't started to use it yet. I would very much like some advice on the best audio playback software for this NAS.

See above. Not good news if yours is the DS213J, I'm afraid.

for general day to day listening I find that good old WMP suits my needs best because I like the user interface. It's missing a few functions that the more complicated media players have but if you just want to listen then it's dead simple and easy to use. Selecting music from the standard Windows 7 filing system is straight forward as is creating or editing playlists. Most mornings it just right click on the WMP icon and select 'play all' which plays my entire music collection in a random order.

It's a long time since I looked at WMP. I recall it being horrid, but maybe I need to take another look. No native Spotify though, I guess.

Interesting that in your experience, in your specific set-up, sound quality improves if a NAS is connected directly into the USB input rather than via ethernet to something like a Sonos then presumably via co-axial to the DAC. This may just be the extra connections / hardware between NAS and DAC, or maybe something to do with the asynchronous nature of the USB input. I don't use streamers much but have found pligging flash drives into my Squeezebox USB port to sound better than sending music via ethernet or wirelessly. Bryston took this approach with their digital players - not streamers in any real sense of the word as they are designed to take music from a number of USB devices. I see the new Sony players have built in hard drives so music is transferred via ethernet but then played from an internal drive.

Some good software is obviously what you are looking for at the moment and I cannot really help there, I am afraid, but I wonder in the long run if you really want to get the best out of that Devialet of yours whether something like the Bryston BDP-1 may be a solution.

Yes, my suspicion is that async USB is the way to go.

The Bryston is pretty pricy and doesn't support ALAC. I don't fancy transcoding all my files! One plus point is AES/EBU, but the Moon MiND 180D also has this and costs less than half the price. And then there's the question of the user interface, which I really want to get right.

Most SW doesn't handle tagging of classical music that well at all! I currently use both iTunes & Spotify on a Mac Mini. As has been discussed, iTunes' interface isn't that great but Apple's Remote app makes navigation fairly easy. iTunes isn't very good at finding cover art as well! Spotify works well enough on a Mac but has no remote control ap despite my iPhone having Spotify installed.

Don't talk to me about tagging! I've just finished re-ripping 300 classical CDs. Torture!

I did try using Apple Remote to control iTunes on an iPad. It's a rather circuitous solyution for me, as the music is on a NAS. It works, but ...

:cheers:

Matt

 

[Neuphonix]

Thanks for all the contributions. Lots of different stuff going on here.

For most listening I use Minimserver on my NAS controlled via Kinsky on my iPad. Minimserv is free & it's great, the browsing structure just seems to suit my needs. Also now has the Minimstream add on for on the fly conversion if you desire.

Have also tried J-River / J-Remote on the Mac (no Linux version for NAS yet although it is coming). I would have to say that this is the solution that I would like to use, lots of configuration options. The MAC version I find is still very buggy though. I suspect that a program like this might struggle on a NAS, really needs the extra processing power of a fully fledged computer.

Cheers Neuphonix,

These both sound like options I should look into. Ideally I would want to run the server software on a NAS. I think Synology do NAS drives with heavyweight processing power, so I don't think that would be a problem. The difficulty I have at the moment is that my NAS, the Synology DS213J, has a rather niche ARM processor, and the common server software packages won't install on it.

My QNAP Nas also has an ARM processor. Minimserver definitely has versions suitable for install on a Synology with ARM processor.

 

[Longjohn]

Dear all,

Comments on above:

1) I know mp3tag is free, but it's certainly not user-friendly. Surely there is something better...

2) I have the Synology DS213, not the DS213J. Does this help me in setting up audio playback?

Best regards,

LJ

 

[ANOther]

1) I know mp3tag is free, but it's certainly not user-friendly. Surely there is something better...

mp3tag isn't too bad to use - the trickiest bit is gojng to be defining how your filenames correspond to tag names - you really can't avoid that if you want to use your names rather than one of the online databases.

Start up mp3tag and point at your music directory (choose File / Change Diectory and select the root directory for your music - if you have a structure of sub-directories then make sure that the "Subdirectories" checkbox is ticked.) mp3tag will read the existing metadata from your files.

Now highlight the files you want to change and select Convert / Filename to Tag).

A box comes up which asks you to define your naming structure - it can't guess how you have set things up.

As an example if you have set up a directory structure with separate directories for artists and albums within arists and then tracks within album you enter the following string: "%artist%%album%%title%" - click on preview and it will show you what it has found - when you are satisfied press OK.

As with anything you should back everything up first and run a sample to make sure you are getting what you want although mp3tag does have an undo function if you mess up.

 

[matt49]

My QNAP Nas also has an ARM processor. Minimserver definitely has versions suitable for install on a Synology with ARM processor.

Yes, it seems it will install on the DS213J. Good news!

Matt

 

[Jota180]

Synology DS213+ with Minimserver and Minimstreamer set to transcode FLAC:WAV24. Using N-Stream app on iPad to control Naim Unitiqute2.

Sounds great and very easy to use.