The kind folks at Eos Wireless sent me one of their wireless multiroom audio systems to test out a couple weeks ago, and after setting it up tonight, all I can say is that it made me long for the power and solidity of the Sonos system that I got to try out last December.
Insufficient cord length fail.
CNET's Jeff Bakalar already hit all the high and low points in last month's review, and my experience was much the same. I started by plugging my iPhone into the base station. Some of the promotional material for the system says the Eos system loves the outdoors, and I suppose the sound that came out of the base station might have been fine if I were drinking beer at a barbecue--flabby bass, tinny treble, and what sounded like occasional lapses in one or the other stereo channel. I think they added some reverb to make it sound "bigger"--perhaps this is part of the "SRS WOW!" technology mentioned in the FAQ--but the overall sound was so weird and different from the sound that usually comes out of the iPhone that I couldn't really tell. It didn't make me want to sit and listen.
It was easy to plug the other three speakers into outlets around the house and outside, and the base station started beaming music to them almost immediately. The standalone speakers actually sounded better than the base station--still thin, but not as odd--but when I turned them up past about two-thirds, they got severely distorted. There was lag between the base station and the speakers, which created disorienting delays when I was walking between rooms. Like Jeff the CNET reviewer, I got a lot of drop outs at first, but unlike his case, they disappeared when I switched the "Range Ex" button on the back of the base station. (Which begs the question: why not just have whatever that switch does enabled by default?)
The power supplies on the extra speakers are big and clunky, and the cable's only 32 inches long. This created logistical problems--when I set a speaker up outdoors, I had trouble getting it around the plug guard, and then the cable wasn't long enough to set the speaker atop the three-foot fence running around my deck. Who wants to listen to speakers on the floor?
To make sure the audio problem wasn't in the source, I swapped my iPhone out for my fourth-gen iPod, and then connected my Zune via the auxiliary input using the included one-eighth-inch stereo cable. None of the sources sounded any better. To give you an idea of my reference points, I usually plug my Zune into the auxiliary input on a Bose Wave, my iPod into an iHome iH55SR (which may be best $99 audio gadget I've ever bought), and my iPhone into an auxiliary input that goes into the FM radio (not CD player) in the totally stock sound system in my 2006 Subaru. Those set-ups all sound better than the Eos Wireless. So did the Sonos system.
To its credit, Eos was exceptionally easy to use--there's no computer required (and no way to tap into a music library on a home computer), and I didn't need to read the instruction manual. In fact, it's so simple, you don't even need to turn the base station on. Which is why there's no on/off switch (which is weird). It's also a lot cheaper than competing multiroom audio systems, starting at $250 for the base station and one speaker--that's about one-fourth the starting price of the Sonos system. It might be acceptable for casual background music or a raging party. But if you're serious about music, I'd save up for something better.
Last week, I expressed some doubt that Cisco Systems would be able to come up with a multiroom audio system that's usable by mere mortals. After all, home networking is still a pain to set up and debug, and Linksys isn't exactly a beloved consumer name.
(Credit:
Cisco)
Reading John Falcone's preview of the Linksys Wireless Home Audio System calmed my fears a little bit. Not only has Cisco hired some industrial and user interface designers, it has gotten a few things right that Sonos missed.
First, the Linksys system is completely wireless, while Sonos requires you to have at least one device in the Sonos network plugged into your router--either a full audio base station (redundant if you've got a computer with speakers in the same room as your router) or a wireless bridge (a seemingly unnecessary $99 expense).
Second, the Cisco system wisely includes an iPod dock, so you can beam all the music from your iPod--including DRM-protected files--around your house. Sonos accomplishes this task by connecting to the iTunes library on your main PC, but it can't play DRM-encumbered files (a problem that is going away soon). More importantly, Cisco's approach lets visitors plug their iPods into your home audio system--a great way to let your guests play DJ or share their recent discoveries.
Third, the remote has a touch-screen interface--something Sonos achieves only if you have an iPhone and download the free controller application.
Fourth, the individual base stations have small infrared remotes--one problem with the Sonos system is that you need to control volume from the universal controller, or walk over to the base station and manually adjust it.
Finally, it looks as if Cisco took my advice for Sonos and is releasing several bundles, including an entry-level one-room bundle with just an amplifier, speakers, and an infrared remote. Now, if it can just undercut Sonos on price by a few bucks--say, for example, if all the bundles are less than $1,000--it could have a winner.
Understand that I haven't had a chance to test the Linksys audio system out, and neither has CNET, so there could still be some show-stopping bugs or poor UI decisions that sink the whole product. But at least these initial announcements show that Cisco has considered the competition very carefully and isn't wading in blind.
Networking is a dark art, and putting the word "home" in front of it makes it no simpler. Debugging a home network is not for the faint of heart--the intelligence of the on-screen wizards peters out after the first few obvious fixes, and soon you're checking help forums, running ipconfig commands, and tweaking DHCP settings.
Their industrial design has gotten a lot better. But would you trust Linksys to build an easy wireless home audio system?
(Credit: Linksys)So today's news from The New York Times--that networking giant Cisco Systems is getting into the consumer electronics business--filled me with dread.
The idea of piping audio files from your computer to your home stereo or other audio devices is valid: I'm a big fan of the Sonos Multiroom Audio system, and Logitech and Apple have also made a go at it. But all three of these companies specialize in consumer products. They understand--nay, live and breathe--the process of hiding complexity under a clear user interface.
Playing music from multiple sources in a single playlist on a Sonos system is simple. Connecting a Mac or iPhone to an existing home network is almost invisibly simple.
Cisco's purchase of Linksys got the company into the consumer home-networking space. While setting up my Linksys wireless router for the first time was relatively painless, thanks to a downloadable applet, I had to use their free phone support line several times over the next few years to debug mysterious problems that cropped up.
The support itself was great--a real person always picked up immediately, and they were always able to resolve my problem eventually--but the complexity of the underyling technology just couldn't be hidden. Any support call that asks you to log into your router to check your DHCP settings is not simple, even if you are walked through the steps.
Cisco's a solid engineering company. If it manages to hire some great UI designers and brands these products appropriately--coming up with names that are more interesting than these would be a start--it has a fighting chance. If it thinks that enabling multiroom audio is just a few simple tweaks to its existing home networking products, forget about it.
Apart from the song "Sleigh Ride," which I've been known to whistle on cloudy days in June, I hate traditional holiday music. Part of it comes from when I worked on the floor in a bookstore for a year, and was subjected to three months of traditional holiday tunes on endless loop, eight hours a day, five days a week.
The Sonos Desktop Controller (shown here), used in conjunction with Rhapsody, can help you build a playlist of Christmas songs that won't drive you nuts.
But tomorrow, we're hosting a holiday party, and you can't have a party without holiday music. The only Christmas song in my collection is John Lennon and Yoko Ono's antiwar "Happy Xmas (War is Over)."
Fortunately, I've still got my review unit of the Sonos Multi-Room Music System, which comes with a 30-day trial subscription to Rhapsody. This is the perfect use for a subscription service--finding tons of songs you need for a specific one-time use but would probably never buy.
Using the PC-based Sonos controller, I navigated to Rhapsody, fired up the search engine, and started with the songs I remember from rock radio in the '80s: "Father Christmas" by the Kinks, "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" by Bruce Springsteen, Bob and Doug Mackenzie's take on the 12 days of Christmas. Then I ran a couple of Google searches on "rock" and "Christmas" and found all sorts of gems, which I then grabbed from Rhapsody.
Here's what I finally came up with--perhaps it'll give you some ideas for your own holiday:
"Sleigh Ride," Doc Severinsen (the definitive instrumental version)
"Santa Claus is Coming to Town," David Grisman
"Father Christmas," The Kinks
"Santa Claus is Comin' to Town," Bruce Springsteen
"Sleigh Ride," The Ronettes (the definitive vocal version)
"Blue Christmas," Elvis Presley
"Thank God It's Christmas," Queen (drama!)
"Happy Xmas (War is Over)," John Lennon and Yoko Ono
"2000 Miles," The Pretenders
"Christmas Wrapping," The Waitresses (the pop song with the refrain "Christmas by myself this year" that I've heard on the radio a thousand times, but I never knew what it was called)
"Things Fall Apart," Cristina (getting weird)
"Santa's Beard," They Might Be Giants
"All I Want for Christmas Is You," Foghat
"Rock and Roll Christmas," George Thorogood
"Merry Christmas (I Don't Wanna Fight Tonight)," The Ramones
"This Time of Year," The Mighty, Mighty Bosstones
"Christmas Duel," Cyndi Lauper (it also features The Hives)
"Season's Greetings," Robbers on High Street
"Fairytale of New York," The Pogues (a classic, haven't heard it in years)
"Christmas is the Only Time," Wes Lachot
"Bouree," Jethro Tull
"Little Saint Nick," The Beach Boys
"Sleigh Ride," "Frosty the Snowman," and "Santa Claus is Coming to Town," all from the Ventures' Christmas album. Surf music! This must be what Christmas is like in Australia.
"Twelve Days of Christmas," Bob and Doug Mackenzie
"Christmas, Christmas," Mojo Nixon
"Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer," Elmo and Patsy (I never knew who did that song before this)
"Christmas at Ground Zero," Weird Al Yankovic (might not be a joke given the weather report)
"The Chanukah Song," Adam Sandler (in the name of balance)
I've been a fan of the Sonos Multi-Room Music System ever since I saw it in action at a neighbor's house a couple summers ago. There's no other solution that gives you such easy access to so much music in so many places in your house, whether that music is stored on your computer or delivered via partnerships with Internet music providers like Last.fm (owned by CBS, which also owns CNET), Pandora, or Rhapsody.
You should be able to save $399 off the price of a Sonos home system by downloading this free remote control app to your iPhone or iPod Touch. But Sonos hasn't made the necessary bundle available.
Recently, Sonos sent me a system to test out with their new free iPhone controller (more about that later), and I came away even more impressed. The setup process was a model of clarity and efficiency--every consumer software developer in the world should study it. (Microsoft, Apple, are you paying attention?) Without going into exhaustive detail--you can read CNET's full review if you're interested--the one-page quick setup guide worked flawlessly, the installation of the PC desktop controller software was fast and easy, and once installed it took less than 5 minutes to index my entire 25GB music collection. Connecting new devices to the system was as easy as walking up to them, pressing a couple buttons, and waiting for the lights to stop flashing. Done. On a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being attaching speakers to a PC and 10 being getting a MacBook to connect to a PC-based home wireless network and print to a PC-attached printer using SMB, this was about a 3.
To be honest, the only reason I haven't bought one--a reason which you'll see in almost every review and head-to-head comparison--is the system's price. The standard two-room Bundle 150, which gives you two base stations (one with amp, one without) and a controller, starts at $999. You can plug one of the stations, the ZP90, into any audio system with an auxiliary line-in, but the amplified ZP120 needs standalone speakers--Sonos will sell a pair to you for $179.99. Expanding into extra rooms requires you to buy additional ZP90s ($349) or ZP120s ($499). It adds up.
Another oddity with the system is that one Sonos device in your system needs to be plugged into a router with an Ethernet cable. The justification is reasonable: Sonos uses its own wireless mesh to avoid interference with regular Wi-Fi networks. But in practical terms, this will probably raise the price even higher.
Case in point: my wireless router's in the room with my PC. I don't need a Sonos system in there--I'll just plug headphones or small speakers into my PC. So if I'd bought one of these bundles, I would now have to go out and pay $100 for a wireless bridge to connect the Sonos system to my wireless router without wasting a base station. Yow.
There's an easy fix to both problems. In October, Sonos released a free app that lets you use your iPhone or iPod Touch as a remote control for the system. It eliminates the need for the CR 100 controller.
So why not create a new two-room bundle for iPhone users with home wireless networks? (Two groups that I imagine overlap significantly--call it the SuperGeek bundle.) Take out the CR 100 controller, which lists for $399. Replace it with the ZoneStation 100--the wireless bridge--which lists for $99. That would theoretically knock $300 off the price of the Bundle 150, bringing it down to $699; with speakers, the price could be $849. That's still not cheap, but it would be well below that psychological $1,000 barrier, making it easier to justify. (You could buy these parts a la carte today, but they'd cost almost the same as the bundles with remote--$948 without speakers, $1,127 with.)
Sonos could even package an entry-level one-room iPhone/Wi-Fi bundle--just a single ZP90 and ZoneBridge wireless bridge--for something like $399 (a $49 discount off the a la carte price), and I bet they'd fly off the shelves. And the product is so cool, and works so well, once people are in, they'll keep adding extra base stations as they can afford them.
One of my former neighbors, the Captain, recently informed his sons that he intends to spend their inheritance. His eldest son, who's about my age, helped him with this task by installing a state of the art multiroom digital music system in the Captain's house.
This weekend, I went to the Captain's annual block party, and while I've seen the Sonos system demonstrated at the last couple Consumer Electronics Shows, this was the first time I've seen it in action. My friend kept the set-up fairly simple, with only two zones: Upstairs encompasses the living room, kitchen, and a set of weatherproof wireless speakers in the back yard, while Downstairs is attached to their vintage 1960s stereo system in the basement rec room. Upstairs, the system was playing a selection of Patsy Cline hits, ripped from the Captain's CD collection, for the post-60 generation. Downstairs, we 30-somethings were blasting "Echoes," Pink Floyd's 23-minute opus, featuring several minutes of whale sounds in the middle. The Captain's not a Floyd fan, but his son had preprogrammed Pink Floyd Radio from Pandora, an online service that lets users create and operate personalized online radio stations.
After playing with it in a real world environment, I'm a big Sonos fan. The LCD remote was easy enough that I figured it out in about thirty seconds, and I love the way it plugs into existing sound systems: the vintage stereo still cranks out enough volume to draw the Mrs downstairs with her hands on her hips to give us the "turn it down" glare that we remember from when we were kids. If you're into music, have a house, and like to entertain, it seems like a worthwhile way to spend a grand or so.
As for the real kids? It was Dance Dance Revolution on the PlayStation 2, all day long. It was a little alarming to see the younger kids dancing to the old J Geils hit "Centerfold," but they weren't listening to the lyrics anyway.
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