Posts by BurnStuff 6 publicly visible posts • joined 5 May 2010
Emby is another great alternative. A true client server model that means the server does the heavy lifting so the client can be lightweight. Native TV recording without using a plugin to another backend (using my HDHomeRun) is one of the reasons that I was finally able to ditch Windows Media Center. It is still a little rough around the edges, Live TV especially is still a little rough and ready but for all the bits that are still a little bit v1.0 there are a ton of features that WMC and Kodi never did.
Finally it's also pretty OS agnostic (front and backend). I've run the server on both Windows and Linux (I used CentOS) and the experience was very comparable.
It's worth mentioning that the vCSA is no longer distributed as a VM. It is now distributed as an ISO and uses a browser based installation routine that requires a Windows plugin. (I'm not sure if a Linux plugin exists). The install routine connects to your ESXi host and builds you the vCSA.
Having completed an install a couple of nights ago it's pretty easy once you get your head around installing a plugin so that you can use a browser based installer so that you can build a VM on a remote ESXi host!
I use the existing Android app and to be honest once you learn the slightly weird navigation it's actually pretty good. It's not the quickest to load so I also have a 3rd party widget that allows you to control the Sonos quickly through your home screen (though I'm pretty sure the app has had it's own widget for a while).
I haven't spent too much time playing with the new app but it has a pretty clean look and and the navigation does seem to be improved.
Since Amazon and 7digital streaming are both already supported I suspect that Google Music will be along within the next year.
While an updated Android app is all well and good it was much lower down on my wishlist than a Linux client and proper BBC iPlayer support. Live radio is great through TuneIn but the catchup library available for the BBC leaves a lot to be desired, more often than not I just plug my phone into a Sonos load the iPlayer app and re-direct the Line in to whichever rooms I want to listen in.
When my girlfriend needed a new phone I wanted to move her to Android and she wanted something small enough to find in a skinny jeans pocket. The answer was the Xperia Ray, smaller and cheaper than the competition while still having plenty of power. While it wouldn't necessarily be my first choice it fits her perfectly!
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
