There already are some.

Oh wait, they're blurred...

Any thoughts on the box from Lansonic? Any glaring shortcomings to this box? Since I have a desire to re-rip my CD collection, I must admit I have succombed to the "shiny objects" syndrome in Lansonic's ability to link to a Sony jukebox and rip an entire collection. (Yikes!! total price about $2k for 60gig & multi-ripper option).

A comparison matrix such as the one at http://www.mypocket.com/mobilematrix/index.php
would be helpful right about now to help digest all the features...
--Andrew

Well, get started. :) Don't wait for me to put together a new matrix for these other products.

That is, unless the respective companies want to send me units. Then I'll put together the best matrix yet. :)

Bruno

Can I install the OS on a preformatted (and loaded) HD?

If I preloaded a 100+Gb HD with a "starter" MP3 database could I somehow install the player OS and tools without disturbing an existing (say ext3) filesystem?

Oh no they're not, you're just not looking hard enough

No, but vice-versa should work. Install with the starter CD *then* put disk in a PC, mount reisferfs, copy tunes over, delete the database in /drive0/var and put it back in the HSX; it will rebuild.

However, this seems pointless - it's a lot easier to drag the tunes into emplode. You'd have to fill in all the tag info (duration in milliseconds, etc etc)

Hugo

Where? In the forground of the photo with a blurred one in the background? I'll have to reinspect each of Geek site photos!

In the forground of the photo with a blurred one in the background?

If it's the photo I think you're thinking of, then no, it's a CD-ROM drive sitting on top of a Rio Receiver in the foreground.

I don't know what picture Rob is talking about.

Right, the lower box has speaker outputs...

Vise-versa... hmmm.. OK... but your comment suggests that all the emplode generated data indexes will not be completely rebuilt when the HSX does a database rebuild?

Pointless? I can squeeze about 10Gb per day via USB -> empeg1. Thus I would need about 8-9 days for the initial load. I'm just trying to save this step and use a nice quiet HSX as an MP3 server instead of a noisy overloaded PC! :)

Thanks for your help.

Hmm, 10GB/day seems a little slow; you should be getting at least double that.

The database is build soley from the info in the *1 files. Actually, come to think of it you may just be able to get away with title= artist= genre= length= tags; emplode will then notice (on first connect) that there are missing tags and rebuild them.

The unit is very quiet; the drives are consumer-type (like in Tivos, etc), on isolation mounts. The fan simply doesn't run in normal use; they're there for "worst case" (eg, unit stacked in a cupboard above a hot amp). When it does run, we kick start it with 12v then drop down to about 7, which runs it slower (and silently) until the temperature falls sufficiently.

The HDD will spin down completely when the unit is off, as long as you're not streaming to any receivers or have any pending compression that needs doing.

Hugo

How does it cope with the plug being pulled at inconvient times like writing to the disk

ReiserFS is a journalling FS. We've not had any problems; however it's not designed to be powered down every time you stop listening; you just put it into standby (much like a lot of hi-fi equipment).

Hugo

Thanks for your help. I'll stop whinning about what the HSX doesn't have now... the unit is truely flexible...

Hats off to you guys... it's a hard system to beat.

It's after all the software that makes all this special. My girlfriend loves the waving Tux! It's just SSSOOO cute ... :)

waving tux is very popular with mine as well

I'm glad the waving Tux is so popular. Thanks.

Go and have a look at Toby Duckworth's (Prolux) photo. Given the length of time the web site was up there, I'm really surprised no one noticed what he has sat (quite prominently) on the shelf!

Well, goodness, there it is, in all its prototype-plexiglass-box glory. Never noticed it there before.

I think the Empeg team likes toying with us and subjecting us to "Where's Waldo?" games with the new products.

Ah, on geek site! I forgot about it. Of course, that's the same box blurred on riocar.org photo (sits on the same shelf, anyway).

Oops.

So have you worked out the spec of our forthcoming Rio Punt product? We're going to follow that one with Rio Model Bird.

Rob

Um... I don't get it...

We're going to follow that one with Rio Model Bird.

The one in Hugo's car on the install album? I've got grave concerns about the quality of the plastics on that unit.

Peter

Umm, no, the more natural looking bird at the fireworks party (and I don't mean Mel).

Rob

I think I'd better do some in-depth investigation, anyone know her phone number?

;)

Hugo