Creative Labs Sound Blaster Wireless Music
Sound Blaster Wireless Music gives you the freedom to play all of the MP3 and WMA music on your PC in another room of your home over your existing 802.11b or 802.11g wireless network. The remote control features a large LCD screen that lets you view and choose songs and playlists without needing a TV like other systems. The wireless receiver connects to any audio system, so you can listen to your music in any room, on your Home Entertainment system or with any powered speakers. And Sound Blaster Wireless Music is designed to be easier to set up than other solutions, detecting your existing wireless network and either connecting automatically or with a simple USB setup.Sound Blaster Wireless Music makes it easy to listen to your PC music collection in the living room, bedroom, or any other room where you want to enjoy music.
Creative Labs Sound Blaster Wireless Music Accessories
Creative Labs Sound Blaster Wireless Music Reviews
gadget than a useful appliance. If you want to get the SB wireless music to work with an encrypted wireless network, you need to read ALL the KB articles on the Creative site, the directions in the box are insufficient. Regularly, the remote looses communication with the remote, so we need to unplug the base station, and when it wakes up, it finds the remote and starts working again. We have been using the SB wireless music for about a month. Unfortunately, it suffers from the usual flakiness of a creative product, so it is more of a P.I.T.A.
Good points:. If Creative could just spend more time &money to get the bugs out of their software they would have an incredible product. Required us to re-configure wireless network from "Shared" to "Open" Network Authentication. Would not connect to WEP encrypted network until we downloaded and updated the firmware.
Summary:. Bad Points:. System uses same (decent) desktop software as my wife's Zen Micro and my Nomad Zen, so we have one system for managing all our music. The first unit we received was not working, and Creative customer support replaced it after a short e-mail discussion, which is a big improvement in Creative's approach to customer support.
Occasionally, the base-station forgets how to communicate with the wireless network (happened 2x in one month) and the only solution is to carry the base-station back to the PC running the creative software and re-configure it with a USB cable. When working, it works well, and it is cool, because the audio stuff is hidden, only the remote is visible, and with a volume control on the remote, that is all you need.
This is truly a great product and I can now enjoy my collection of 2500 mp3's throughout my house with the amazing convenience of the remote. My house has speakers wired throughout, but the builder terminated all speaker wire in our mechanicals room next to our furnace.a ridiculous place for a stereo system. However, my situation is unique in that I'm forced to put the receiver in the basement because that's where the house speaker wires terminate. To solve this, I installed the sound blaster in the mechanicals room and have it pumping music into a stereo receiver sitting next to it. My laptop is transmitting my music to it over our wireless network and the remote allows me to view, play, queue up songs, trigger pre-made playlists with the touch of a buttom, and adjust volume.
The remote will work consistantly and relatively quickly (quick enough, at least) from all three levels, but not throughout the length of the house. This thing is doing EXACTLY what I wanted it to do. If I were to list a downside, I'd say it was the range on the remote. It has no problems going through floors, but they do add interference. In other words, there are dead spots where the remote cannot find the sound blaster receiver.
The music sounds great, everything was very intuitive, and this is a great product. If I had the receiver on the main level (1st floor), I wouldn't have an issue. I live in a two story house with a basement and have the transmitter in the basement.
I love that you can control the receiver from the computer as well as the remote even the current playlist. I received this item about an hour ago. I have used other products that are controlled with the TV or the PC. I am currently listening to it through my stereo. Overall easy setup and install. The only reason I didn't give this 5 stars is because of the lagtime with the remote.
The media server is the usual Creative software somewhat cumbersome at times, but powerful and not too bad to get used to. I assume it would be faster if your library is small. You will need an RCA-RCA or optical cable if you want to plug this into a typical stereo. After I permitted the receiver on my wireless network (I am a tech geek, you don't have to do this) it connected no problem. If you have ever used a Creative MP3 player the remote will look very familiar. I found it very easy to install the software and import my 80GB library.
Not a perfect product, but Creative is close. No need with this remote. The receiver ships with a mini plug. . That's silly.
The LCD screen is large enough to read unless you have pretty bad vision. There is a little lag time when communicating with my PC, but not more than a few seconds. The remote works well in almost every room of my house. It's not bad and still faster than thumbing through hundreds of CD's.
The device connects wirelessly to your PC or to your router. It sucks though because I get my music through Napster, which DRM-encodes all music. This SUCKS, but I've found a (tedious) way around it (basically recapturing the DRM-protected WMA filestream by using a Virtual Audio Cable loopback and an application called MuvAudio). It's a decent buy if you still haven't bitten the bullet on a full blown Windows Media Center Edition PC. It comes with a Wireless Music Server application which you run on your PC. Because the remote uses an RF connection to the device, you don't have to have line of sight to the device to kick off a new song.
2) The system won't play DRM-protected WMA files. 1) The remote is sluggish at times. This is a huge deal because I no longer have to run cables from my PC to my stereo across the floor or through the walls. Overall, I'm pleased with my purchase and it will suffice until I get around to building a Media Center Edition PC and buy a couple of Media Center Extenders. This is great for me because my office is in the back of my basement, but my living room and stereo system is in the front. I'm able to use my remote wirelessly to kick off music in my living room across the house. The Device itself is an external device about the size of a cable modem which you can plug into a receiver or powered speakers via RCA or Optical connections.
(This isn't too bad though, as I really like MediaSource). The downsides:. The remote controls the device and allows you to browse your music library by artist, playlist, album, etc and play the music. 3) It doesn't work with Windows Media Player - You have to "import" your playlists and file IDs into Creative's MediaSource application. It also comes with a RF (radio frequency) remote control with LCD display.
One nice thing is that after you select music, you can add more to the queue. I like the remote with the LCD. So, I was disappointed in having to use the "server" (software on the PC). I bought this unit for the bedroom, where I wanted something small to hide in a bedside table; it is very small and unassuming. Click the wrong button and it takes that action (vs.
I do not know if the volume control through the RCA diminishes the quality (some do, since the amp is defined for a fixed signal power), but it is very handy to control everything from the one remote. So, you do not have to be line of sight and do not have to read an LCD on the main unit. It goes blank quickly and so you have to click a button to see again. Overall, a very pleasing product. It works with the RCA jacks.
But, it was easy and it works perfectly. But, the remote takes a bit of getting used to. For example, if you follow from Artist to their album(s) to the 1st song and press play, you only add one song. I have an Audiotron, which I have had for years; it looks good with my stereo equipment. just waking up the screen).
The remote is a great invention, especially as it is RF. I have a small stereo with no fiber optic link, so I do not know if this work with that. It works very well and was easy to setup.
This then moves the cursor down one line which can be a little disconcerting. The "currently playing" menu item's format is rather ugly (not well laid out info), but works (and tells you how far through the queue you are). The volume on the remote is nice.
It came with the newer software and there is no delays or glitches that have been reported before. I would have preferred the automated network filesystem search of the Audiotron (no PC has any server, it can find music on standalone remote disks (like the LinkStation)). To queue, you just hold the play button down for a couple seconds - rather non-obvious: I would have preferred the opposite (click play to queue, hold down to stop the current song and start selected).
You have to stop at the album and press play to select all the songs within. The power-on on the remote starts the unit and makes sure it can find the server - this is fast after the 1st time.
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