Squeezebox Radio - first impressions and questions

[Pascal Hibon]

I finally received my SB Radio today and I wanted to share my first impressions. At the same time I have some questions (actually feature requests) as well. Here goes:

1. The initial setup wizard is a pain. I understand what the intention behind the wizard is and it will be okay for first time users. For advanced users and for those who have SBS locally running the wizard is not the ideal thing. The most annoying of the wizard is that it insists on connecting to MySueezebox.com. I have my SBS running locally and I have absolutely no desire to setup a MySB account. In the end I found a way around it but it made me loose quite some time. The wizard should present the option to exit the wizard at first start. It should ask the user whether they like to continue setup through the wizard or use the Advanced Setup Mode. The advanced setup mode would give the user access to the normal setup menus. I guess this is a feature request.

2. I’m amazed about the sound quality, even for such a tiny box. Although it plays good sound I’d like to have bass and treble controls on it. I have the feeling I can make it play better by adjusting bass and treble. Does anyone know if this is on the roadmap?

3. I noticed that there isn’t much configurable on SBS for the Radio. There are only 4 menus available (Basic Settings, Alarm Clock, Audio and Synchronize). And even those menus contain very little things to configure. Will the number of configurable features through SBS be extended in future software releases?

4. One forum member talked about the capability of assigning an individual audio channel to a player. I’m currently running 7.5.0 but can’t find anything along those lines. This would be a fantastic feature for the bedroom. Imagine two SB Radios along each side of the bed. Left channel would be assigned to the Radio on the left side; the right channel would be assigned to the Radio on the right side of the bed. Both players would then be synchronised to become a stereo set. That would be awesome ! Is this feature on the roadmap as well ?

That’s it for now. Overall, first impressions are great.
I’ll have the Radio next to the Boom in the bedroom to see how it behaves as a bedroom player / alarm clock.

[Mnyb]

4. this settings is definitely in 7.6 all players can be set to both (stereo) left or right, if is in 7.5.2 don't know .

Btw 7.5.1 (or 7.5.2 safe bugfixed beta) is the current release why running 7.5.0 ?

3. Both Touch and Radio has most of settings on the device itself, it has more cpu than the old players and can do more on it's own. Also I think this made soo because of the fact that more users uses mysqueezebox.com exclusively no computer running. Thus settings on the player makes more sense. And with the current 6 people staff doing the software nobody has the time to duplicate the settings in a web-UI, I find that a bit sad I would have prefered to have more settings on the local SBS .
The current trend is subscription services like napster spotify and pandora etc.

It's only us dinosaurs that keeps a private collection of music files

How ironic that the radio works so much better connected to a local server....

[Pascal Hibon]

4. this settings is definitely in 7.6 all players can be set to both (stereo) left or right, if is in 7.5.2 don't know .

I just looked at the change logs for 7.5.2 and 7.6. That feature is indeed in 7.6 – not yet in 7.5.2. I wonder when 7.6 will be released. That is a killer feature !

Btw 7.5.1 (or 7.5.2 safe bugfixed beta) is the current release why running 7.5.0 ?

I know but I tend to upgrade only when I experience bugs in my current version or if a higher version contains new features I like. I do that ever since the first 7.4.x buggy releases which made me go through a lot of pain. At that time I even went back to 7.3.3. until 7.5.0 proved to be stable.

It's only us dinosaurs that keeps a private collection of music files

Yes that seems to be the case. It is actually sad for the whole music industry as well. For some reason the new Internet generation isn’t really interested in buying music anymore.

[aubuti]

Re (2), one of the developers once said on these forums that it is technically possible to add bass and treble controls to the Radio, like the Boom has, and that it was in the future plans. But that was a fairly long time ago, and frankly I don't imagine it will ever come to pass. Far more critical bugs are going unattended, and the dev who could probably have done it more easily than any other (Caleb) doesn't seem to be on the dev team any longer.

[Mnyb]

Re (2), one of the developers once said on these forums that it is technically possible to add bass and treble controls to the Radio, like the Boom has, and that it was in the future plans. But that was a fairly long time ago, and frankly I don't imagine it will ever come to pass. Far more critical bugs are going unattended, and the dev who could probably have done it more easily than any other (Caleb) doesn't seem to be on the dev team any longer.

Maybe but the Radio seems to lack the DSP that comes within a boom, might not be that easy to do then.

[Pascal Hibon]

Re (2), one of the developers once said on these forums that it is technically possible to add bass and treble controls to the Radio, like the Boom has, and that it was in the future plans. But that was a fairly long time ago, and frankly I don't imagine it will ever come to pass. Far more critical bugs are going unattended, and the dev who could probably have done it more easily than any other (Caleb) doesn't seem to be on the dev team any longer.

Indeed, according to many threads Logitech doesn’t seem to be dedicated to the Squeezebox line of products. I don’t know why that is but I find it sad to read about that. This system has so much potential. Sonos for one has a clear roadmap and shows dedication towards multi room music systems. Too bad Logitech doesn’t feel the same about Squeezebox.

Maybe but the Radio seems to lack the DSP that comes within a boom, might not be that easy to do then.

Indeed, some mentioned that in the bug report.
The tone controls bug report doesn’t seem to get much of attention either.

[bluegaspode]

Sonos for one has a clear roadmap

Where do I find it? Or is it just general impression that they are dedicated to multiroom?

[Pascal Hibon]

Where do I find it? Or is it just general impression that they are dedicated to multiroom?

There is no “click here to view the roadmap” button but it is clear they are dedicated. And they need to be because Sonos is only in the business of multi room systems. They have no mouse, keyboards, webcams and other computer accessories to divide their attention on.

Another important indicator is their website. It provides plenty of useful information on their systems and how it all works. They have tons of videos and documentation.
For Squeezebox that is a total different story.

I prefer Squeezebox products for many different reasons. It is just sad to see how Logitech threads this product line.

[toby10]

Where do I find it? Or is it just general impression that they are dedicated to multiroom?

I think it comes down to focus. Sonos' entire business is multi room digital audio.
SqueezeBox is (now) a minor product category in a corporate behemoth marketing many different products into numerous product categories.

A while ago one of the developers hinted that the SB Radio has become the best selling SB player ever.
This makes sense when you consider the Logitech distribution channels (which I'd bet was the main reason Logitech was interested in SlimDevices in the first place).
Wouldn't it be ironic if the best selling SB player eventually becomes the very downfall of the entire SB concept due to lack of focus on improving and fixing the product?