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Music Play(To) Apps?

Rvacha

Member
I don't know if there are any big time network music junkies on the forum, but I am one for sure. For some background I run a Windows Home Server 2011 (WHS2011) and it stores all music, videos, and photos (and a huge amount of other stuff). I used to use the WHS2011 built-in media server but recently switched to Asset UPnP (music only) and have been very impressed. My audio devices consist of many things, but my favorite are four old legacy Roku SoundBridge M1000 DMR/DMCs connected to DACs with Toslink so I avoid the internal DACs. It has been a great setup up but is getting furry now. M1000s are UPnP but not DLNA compliant so I changed the registry to allow them to show up as "Play" devices in Win8.1. They are buggy, but somewhat functional. Additionally there are no DLNA DMC apps for Windows Phone 8 that can talk to them. Time for a change.

I am having trouble locating a decent Win8 music app. Several will Play(To) a single song, but virtually none allow you to send an entire album to the DMR. Some *appear* to allow playto of multiple tracks (or album) at once but the M1000s will only play the first track and stop. My TVs behave the same, as does my Blu-ray players (but NONE are Win8.1 certified). I don't know if this is a limitation forced upon apps or just my devices being so non-compliant they don't work correctly. One that appears to hold the most promise believe it or not is File Brick, a file explorer replacement. Other apps cannot both interface with a DLNA server and send to DLNA DMR/DMCs simultaneously.

Has anyone found a DMC app they like?

A little OT, but anyone have a hardware DMR/DMC device that is working well with Win8.1? I just ordered a Pioneer Elite N-30 to try out. It isn't a certified device but I am hopeful it'll perform fine
 
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Rvacha

Member
A follow up to my own question. In the end I decided to try out a Pioneer N-30 DMR/DMC. It isn't Win8 certified, but it is DLNA 1.5 certified. At this stage the best app I've found is Xbox Music (aka Music). Never thought I'd say that :) Two bugs, both of which I think are app issues and not DMR issues:
1. If you split with the desktop after some period of time the app will just vanish. Its still running, just not visibly where it was. The desktop acts as if it is still there and does not revert back to full screen automatically
2. The now playing list does not properly update in this mode, so it looks like you've been playing the same song for the last hour

IMHO both bugs are agitating but it otherwise works to my satisfaction and beyond. The N-30 sounds great and even works well with my WP8 DLNA app
 
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