Squeezebox Touch

[jinp6301]

Squeezebox Touch unboxed and in the wild

Looks interesting

[guzziguy]

It's dead Jim.

[Mark527]

Ah man, now I'm looking at my SB3 like it's a monochrome iPod.

Here's the thread on the Logitech/Slim Devices forum:

Got my Squeezebox Touch... - Squeezebox : Community : Forums

[xand1x]

Any word on if this thing does 24/96? (Not that my source can actually process that high but still curious)

Edited August 29, 2009 by xand1x

[jinp6301]

Logitech Squeezebox Touch Desktop Audio Player Looks Lickable Too - logitech squeezebox touch - Gizmodo

It does do 24/96

[morphsci]

Logitech Squeezebox Touch Desktop Audio Player Looks Lickable Too - logitech squeezebox touch - Gizmodo

It does do 24/96

Hmm, likely they will be updating the transporter then as this will cut into transporter sales methinks.

[atothex]

So, what's the consensus on the quality of the regular Squeezeboxes as transports? I could never figure where it ranks in the grand scheme of computer transports. I've just assumed async USB and word clock at the top, pro sound cards next, then SB stuff is the next best thing.

[Icarium]

I dunno wireless is supposed to be amongst the best, but I have no real idea. I'd guess that it's underneath async USB/word clock and any other transport clock slaving set up.. but...

Well maybe j4cbo or grahame or some other hardcore slim devices dude can comment.

[morphsci]

It depends a lot on how well your DAC handles jitter and or how it reclocks the data. If it handles it well then the slimdevices do very well and there is actually little (no) sonic difference between them. Using the built-in DAC's only the transporter is competitive with a good outboard DAC. IMO. I guess two SB3's, one transporter, two receivers, one controller and one Boom doesn't qualify as "Hard-Core".

Edited August 29, 2009 by morphsci

[Grahame]

So, what's the consensus on the quality of the regular Squeezeboxes as transports? I could never figure where it ranks in the grand scheme of computer transports. I've just assumed async USB and word clock at the top, pro sound cards next, then SB stuff is the next best thing.

How would you justify your assumptions?

If you can do that, then you have your answer.

It has been argued that extracting clock and data from the same signal (as in the case of S/PDIF - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia is inherently flawed). Variations in the recovered clock being jitter. Jitter being audible above some threshold would imply that lower jitter is better.

Word clock gets round this by supplying (a hopefully low jitter) clock, turning the issue into how do you populate a buffer that the word clock can clock data out of (hint: you'd want a bidirectional async protocol with error correction and retransmission as opposed to a synchronous forward only protocol )

This only solves the getting the right bits at the right time to the inputs of the DAC. Other people have argued that the quality and the design of the the analogue output stage connected to the output of the DAC (both onboard the DAC, and downstream) is a far bigger determinant of final audio quality.

Computer audio can be tricky, as there are many ways that the software pathways can muck up the bits before the DAC even gets to see them e.g. Digital volume controls, re-sampling etc

It constantly surprises me that we don't have a digital audio standard that is a "solved problem" rather than one that is based on a broken protocol.

But then, how would you sell upgrades?

[Icarium]

It depends a lot on how well your DAC handles jitter and or how it reclocks the data. If it handles it well then the slimdevices do very well and there is actually little (no) sonic difference between them. Using the built-in DAC's only the transporter is competitive with a good outboard DAC. IMO. I guess two SB3's, one transporter, two receivers, one controller and one Boom doesn't qualify as "Hard-Core".

The truly hardcore would have 2 Transporters: One Transporter for actually transporting the digital signal then feeding into another Transporter doing dac duties.

[morphsci]

The transporter is only doing transport duty into the 840c's DAC, which to my ears is better than the transporters. But I do get your point.

[CarlSeibert]

It does do 24/96

There's a good reason for its existence.

I'm certainly not going to get up and go across the room to touch the thing.

I hear that's still illegal in some states anyway.

[tkam]

Actually I think the Squeezebox is one of the better available transports, I don't think it'd be out of place in any system. If you believe stereophile's measurements it's jitter measurements are actually pretty low.

[falkon]

I don't think I'll be updating unless there is a large sonic difference. I have been looking forward to touchscreen since Sonos came out with it but am sorely disappointed that it is capacitive and on the unit itself. I would have snatched up a SB remote with touchscreen.

[Grahame]

I don't think I'll be updating unless there is a large sonic difference. I have been looking forward to touchscreen since Sonos came out with it but am sorely disappointed that it is capacitive and on the unit itself. I would have snatched up a SB remote with touchscreen.

You can use a nokia 770 (or 800, or 810 or the upcoming n900) with the 770 skin, or an iPhone, or iTouch using the iPeng skin or [url=http://penguinlovesmusic.de/ipeng-the-iphone-webapp-for-squeezecenter/]iPeng

[jinp6301]

And most of you have iphones/touches so you already have a remote!

EDIT: Grahame is a fast one

[atothex]

Actually I think the Squeezebox is one of the better available transports, I don't think it'd be out of place in any system. If you believe stereophile's measurements it's jitter measurements are actually pretty low.

I just checked it real quick, and it looks like their SB jitter measurements were about the same as those of some old RME cards, somewhere in the low 200ps range. Looks to be about a wash as far as Stereophile measurements go. Not really sure how good of a gauge those are, but JA also mentioned the Transit being pretty high and the 0404 being even higher, both in the single digit ns range I think. That seems to confirm what others tell me as far as transport quality. So there's definitely a correlation, if not necessarily a causation thing going on.

[CarlSeibert]

I don't think I'll be updating unless there is a large sonic difference. I have been looking forward to touchscreen since Sonos came out with it but am sorely disappointed that it is capacitive and on the unit itself. I would have snatched up a SB remote with touchscreen.

They already have a remote with a screen, but it's got buttons. Personally, I think buttons are great and I'm kicking myself for not scoring one on the cheap when Circuit City went out of business.

[blessingx]

So as this does 24/96 and reads "directly from USB drives and SD cards" am I wrong that you could take the computer completely out of the equation (possibly after initial setup and, of course, ripping music), and have a nice little high res delivery system with only a ST and 1TB USB drive (add DAC if desired)?

I know Squeezeboxes have had some NAS support and internet radio streaming sans computer before, but if the above holds true it certainly could pull me back to Slim Devices... err Logitech.

Also interesting that ALAC is a codec no longer listed as "through transcoding."

http://www.logitechsqueezebox.com/products/squeezebox-touch.html

[jinp6301]

Logitech's Two New Squeezeboxes Bring Streaming Audio to the Living Room - Squeezebox touch - Gizmodo

Also a Squeezebox Radio is coming as well. I guess people liked the Boom?

[ojnihs]

So as this does 24/96 and reads "directly from USB drives and SD cards" am I wrong that you could take the computer completely out of the equation (possibly after initial setup and, of course, ripping music), and have a nice little high res delivery system with only a ST and 1TB USB drive (add DAC if desired)?

If that's the case, I'd totally be up for one of these.

[n_maher]

I guess that you can't take the compy out since it's always been the case that you had to be running the slim server software in order to manage the library contents. I can't imagine that going away with the release of one specific product.

[Kabeer]

So as this does 24/96 and reads "directly from USB drives and SD cards" am I wrong that you could take the computer completely out of the equation (possibly after initial setup and, of course, ripping music), and have a nice little high res delivery system with only a ST and 1TB USB drive (add DAC if desired)

Does anyone know if any of the already existing Squeezboxes (or similar products) can do this (work as a standalone system without a pc needing to be on at the same time).

Thanks

[tkam]

Umm, technically there are some NAS boxes that can run the slimserver software so in that way you wouldn't really have a PC running all the time.