Play me old king cole

Well that last post rambled for a bit. My writing style is very conversational so you expect SOME ramblings, but that might have been pushing it.

Let me tell you about my new toy. Its called the Squeezebox and its wonderful (http://www.slimdevices.com). Basically it plays all your digital music files that live on any computer on your network. It works wireless, or wired ethernet. If you have iTunes, it allows you to use your playlists. Even better it can be controlled by a remote, any my logitech universal remote even has it in it's system. To top it all off, I can access the music server through my laptop and arrange song orders and playlists on the fly. I can even change the Squeezebox settings over the network. Its a well polished piece of hardware.

No more putting CD's in the DVD player, or hooking up the iPod and getting up to change the song. Its even better since my iPod will soon not be able to hold my entire library as I finally get around to finally ripping the rest of my CDs.

It seems like a simple thing, but we're already finding it was well worth the $300. Its nice to have music going almost constantly. Gavin and I have been doing quite a bit of dancing. Gavin has added the 'spin' to his dance moves, which is incredibly cute. For some reason the song that has gotten him the most excited was Depeche Mode's "Pain That I'm Used Too". Maybe it's the base line.

Speaking of which, go out and buy Depeche Mode's "Playing The Angel" CD. Its some of their best work. Its got songs that are danceable, sing-a-longable, and even great creative pieces. Go ahead, I'll wait....

Good choice buying that CD, you'll really enjoy it. Continuing on.

It really adds some warmth to the house when we can have music on command. Next step is to be able to serve it up to the kitchen, dining room, and the outside patio. We can get the mustic to the kitchen and dining room simply by turning up the volume in the family room. The downside is that its way too loud for anyone sitting there. So I want to put a speaker in each of those additional areas (an outdoor speaker for the patio of course).

A couple of ways to do this, I could by 3 squeezeboxes, and 2 sets of computer speakers and 1 set of outdoor speakers and set them up in each room. And yes, the Squeezebox's can play in sync with each other. Surprisingly, this might be one of the cheaper solutions. It has some drawbacks though, if the tv is playing hockey, or football, that doesn't get served up to those areas. Also this means I have a visible Squeezebox in each area, and I have to have a remote in each area to turn the thing on and off. It DOES give me a great deal of flexibity in controlling volume and they Squeezeboxes don't HAVE to play in sync.

The other solution would be to take the monitor out of my reciever, and run it to the basement, then under the floor to an amplifier. From that I can run cables to speakers in each area. That's going to be a lot of cable and drilling, but it will allow whatever is playing in the family room to be heard everywhere. I don't know how I'll control the volume in each area though. Also, it means that if I'm watching hockey, Pam can't listen to music in the kitchen.

I could also do an official multi-source, multi-room audio system. I have NO idea what the final cost of that would be. Probably > $1000. I'm probably willing to spend around that, it will improve the value of the home, and more importaintly, it will improve our quality of life for the many years we'll be here. I WISH there was better sources of detailed information on this. It looks like I'll have to track down an audio installer and get a quote. I hate not having a good idea ahead of time though.

See! I can do a non-rambling post. Now please excuse me, its overtime hockey time between Edmonton & San Jose. God I love playoff hockey.