Streaming endeavours
Monday, March 27, 2006
Flushed with the success of the DVR box, our halting plans for a more digital life got another boost over the weekend when I set up streaming to the hi-fi from the two laptops in the house. Now Marci and I can use iTunes to play our music and podcasts through the living room stereo, while also letting us put away all our CDs, just as Finn gets mobile enough to start throwing them around.
Our wireless base station has been an Apple Airport Express
The cable modem comes into the office, and the printer is also there, meaning that the base station couldn’t easily connect to the living room hi-fi without the pile of cables we were trying to avoid in the first place. A second Airport Express would have worked of course, but at $120 a throw, I was encouraged to try another option.
I had an old Linksys BEFW11S4 wireless router lying around, and that was pressed into service as the main router in the office. It’s only 802.11b, but interestingly, since we do much more internet surfing than computer-to-computer file transfers, its speed is still faster than the cable modem’s so we don’t notice any real slow down from 802.11g.
Configuring was dead easy, and we left broadcasting SSID on, but password protected it (none of the neighbour’s networks are protected though, which is instructive).
Next came configuring the Airport Express. The setup utility was very straightforward, alllowing me to use it just as a Airtunes conduit with no alarms. I could have used it to extend the range of the Linksys, but I didn’t want to get too ambitious, and the house is small enough that range isn’t an issue.
So now I can listen to the BBC’s very cool Newspod when I please, and pick my favourite tunes effortlessly without letting young Finn chew the jewel cases.
In the end I think we’ll end up with a dedicated media server beside the TV and stereo (perhaps my Mac mini when I get a new MacBookPro next year), but for now there’s something very liberating about getting the computer talking to the stereo next door, with no strings attached.