Audio/Video Player Search for XMC-1

[keithfree]

Hi,

I'm fairly new to the hifi world and after picking up the XPA-2 amp and XMC-1 pre/pro I'm trying to sort through all the options to figure out my ideal playback solution for my audio and video media. Below are the approaches I have been taking thus far for these two things. I am very interested in understanding where XMC-1 is going in terms of playing networked content and lossless audio.

Audio
The gap seems to be which hardware or software will act as the media player.

My music is stored on a Synology NAS and I play it from a laptop via various software. The laptop connects to the XMC-1 via a USB cable. For hi-rez files, this seems to be the cleanest path, although it's somewhat annoying since I don't want to keep a laptop near the stereo equipment. The final solution definitely needs a slick UI where I can search genres, artists, etc much like you can do in iTunes. To that end, I've been experimenting with Roon since it has Apple & Android apps which can be used like remotes. What other players are out there that have nice app support? I also have an old Apple Airport Express connected to XMC via an optical cable (toslink). I like the flexibility this offers, but don't like the 48/16 limit it imposes on the signal path. What other options are out there aside from building or buying a small PC that can sit next to the XMC-1 and connect via USB?

Video
Similar to music, my video collection is also stored on the Synology NAS and I playback using the Plex app on my XBox One (or Roku) in another room). This works great and I love the client/server model of Plex since I can connect remotely to watch new media. I only mention video in this post since it's part of the overall picture and perhaps if the final audio solution is the purchase of a hifi network player (Marantz, Emotiva, Auralic) it may support the necessary video codecs as well (and tv/movie metadata).

[KeithL]

I'm a little curious why you "don't want to keep a laptop near your stereo equipment". If you're concerned about noise emissions, or something like that, you need to realize that any media player is really just a computer, and so isn't necessarily going to be any better or worse than a laptop (if you want to limit heat and fan noise, then go for a laptop with a solid state drive). While there are plenty of apps for Apple and Android phones, the really high-end audio players are for full-fledged computers (jRiver Media Center, Foobar2000, Audirvana, Amarra, etc.)

Nov 29, 2015 19:11:41 GMT -5 keithfree said:

Hi,

I'm fairly new to the hifi world and after picking up the XPA-2 amp and XMC-1 pre/pro I'm trying to sort through all the options to figure out my ideal playback solution for my audio and video media. Below are the approaches I have been taking thus far for these two things. I am very interested in understanding where XMC-1 is going in terms of playing networked content and lossless audio.

Audio
The gap seems to be which hardware or software will act as the media player.

My music is stored on a Synology NAS and I play it from a laptop via various software. The laptop connects to the XMC-1 via a USB cable. For hi-rez files, this seems to be the cleanest path, although it's somewhat annoying since I don't want to keep a laptop near the stereo equipment. The final solution definitely needs a slick UI where I can search genres, artists, etc much like you can do in iTunes. To that end, I've been experimenting with Roon since it has Apple & Android apps which can be used like remotes. What other players are out there that have nice app support? I also have an old Apple Airport Express connected to XMC via an optical cable (toslink). I like the flexibility this offers, but don't like the 48/16 limit it imposes on the signal path. What other options are out there aside from building or buying a small PC that can sit next to the XMC-1 and connect via USB?

Video
Similar to music, my video collection is also stored on the Synology NAS and I playback using the Plex app on my XBox One (or Roku) in another room). This works great and I love the client/server model of Plex since I can connect remotely to watch new media. I only mention video in this post since it's part of the overall picture and perhaps if the final audio solution is the purchase of a hifi network player (Marantz, Emotiva, Auralic) it may support the necessary video codecs as well (and tv/movie metadata).

[wilburthegoose]

Use JRiver. There are remotes available on iOS.

I have a desktop PC about 15' from my XMC-1, and it works perfectly (connected via HDMI and USB - don't need both, but I like the redundancy)

[geebo]

Nov 30, 2015 14:16:58 GMT -5 wilburthegoose said:

Use JRiver. There are remotes available on iOS.

I have a desktop PC about 15' from my XMC-1, and it works perfectly (connected via HDMI and USB - don't need both, but I like the redundancy)

Another vote for jRiver. And jRemote works very well, too.

[novisnick]

Nov 30, 2015 14:33:37 GMT -5 geebo said:

Nov 30, 2015 14:16:58 GMT -5 wilburthegoose said:

Use JRiver. There are remotes available on iOS.

I have a desktop PC about 15' from my XMC-1, and it works perfectly (connected via HDMI and USB - don't need both, but I like the redundancy)

Another vote for jRiver. And jRemote works very well, too.

+1

[Gary Cook]

I have an Apple TV3 connected to a UMC-200 via HDMI, it uses the home wifi network based on a pair of Airport Extremes, in my home office the movies and music are stored on EHDD's connected to a MacMini. The family's iPhones, iPads etc give access the the content using iTunes. For sure it's not perfect in every area, but it's easily the most user friendly system that everyone can use, visitors included.

Cheers
Gary