Plug Computers for whole-home audio (was: [GNHLUG] REMINDER: ManchLUG: Tuesday April 19th @ Wings Your Way - Manchester NH)

[Jarod Wilson]

On Apr 25, 2011, at 9:51 AM, David Miller wrote:
...
> The problem with many embedded audio systems, this especially includes laptops, is that their power source is typically too close to the audio chips and results in a lot of noise.  In a laptop you can hear this by doing some experiments of running on power vs on battery.  In something as small as a plug computer I would imagine that this would be a problem.  The way around this is to use a usb audio interface.

Or digital audio out.

Rather happy with the AppleTV 2 myself to do exactly what's being
discussed in this thread (including perfect sync between multiple
devices in different rooms, centralized control via a computer or
via an iDevice), but I don't think the AppleTV route would work
very well for those with a Linux-only setup. You *can* root them
and put other software on though (xbmc, anyway). Not sure if there
has been any success getting linux to run on the ATV2 like there
was with the first-gen one. The second-gen hardware is definitely
far superior though, on multiple levels...

-- 
Jarod Wilson
jarod at wilsonet.com