DIY network music streamer

[lemanfan]

Many of us here like music, and many likes a little DIY.  I just wanna give you a tip on something that made me happy recently: Volumio.

Volumio is an open sourced (free and gratis) software pack for small computers that turns e.g. a Raspberry Pi into a Network Music Streamer - with really good functionatlity.  By installing this software and connecting it to your home stereo, you can play all mp3:s on all your hard drives, and listen to internet radio and even Spotify - all controlled from everything with a web browser.  I love it.   

Read more here: http://volumio.org/

The hardware I used was a Raspberry Pi B+ starter kit from a local vendor, and a $19 USB DAC from http://hifi.me/ and the sound quality is EXCELLENT! 

If you have some other smaller computer hardware lying around, you can achieve a similar setup by installing the VLC media player on it, and then downloading a VLC remote control app to your phone or tablet.   Again, free software!

[stlbrah]

I run subsonic from an old pc at home (free) and have an app on my phone for it.

I run it with linux/apache/tomcat but I think there is a windows version now.

[alsoknownasDean]

For a slightly-different idea, if you have an unused old Android phone nearby (might work for iPhones too), you can plug it into a stereo using a 3.5mm cable and run an Airplay/etc receiver app and turn it into a little Airplay unit. Should work for DLNA/Bluetooth and the like as well. Bonus is that you're reusing old hardware :)