Squeezebox Touch released today

[mlsstl]

Logitech announced today (4/7/10) that they have released the Squeezebox Touch music player. This is the latest in the line of Squeezebox players. It had originally been scheduled for release in December 2009 but was delayed as they tweaked the software to get out the remaining bugs.

Unlike the other Squeezebox players which must be connected to a server, the Touch has the capability to accept the direct input of a USB storage drive. The Touch also supports up to 24/96K material. Previously only the expensive Transporter model did this directly.

I had preordered one some time ago so hope to have it early next week if they ship on a timely basis. I'll give a report when it arrives.

[Ajani]

Thanks for the update on the Touch... I started a thread on it last year when news broke about it... but the launch has been delayed so long that I started to wonder if they'd ever release it....

[recoveryone]

I'm still enjoying the Classic one, They keep adding apps like Last.FM and its just gets better and better.

[3LB]

Can I hook this up to any type of storage device, like a computer harddrive or desktop harddrive?

[mlsstl]

Can I hook this up to any type of storage device, like a computer harddrive or desktop harddrive?

Yes, that was one of the big changes in the Touch. It has a USB input and can accept an external hard or flash drive directly without need of an external server.

[mlsstl]

My pre-ordered Touch arrived this afternoon. I was quite surprised because even though they were released two days ago they was a lot of confusion as to when they would actually start shipping.

Anyway, it took me about 10 minutes to set it up and it works perfectly. I just finished syncing and volume matching my existing SB3/Lavry combo with the analog outs of the Touch and plan to do some serious listening this weekend.

However, the initial impression out of the box is that the Touch is an amazing piece of kit for $300. So far the difference between it and the Lavry is very subtle.

[Ajani]

Have you tried plugging a USB drive into it yet? That's the feature that most interests me... As I'd like to remove my laptop from the music server chain... and use the Touch in my main system and to feed the Classic in my bedroom system...

[mlsstl]

Have you tried plugging a USB drive into it yet? That's the feature that most interests me... As I'd like to remove my laptop from the music server chain... and use the Touch in my main system and to feed the Classic in my bedroom system...

I'll give that a try tomorrow and report back. Getting the built-in software for this feature (acting as its own server for plug-in drives) was apparently the one item that delayed the release originally planned for December 2009.

[Ajani]

I'll give that a try tomorrow and report back. Getting the built-in software for this feature (acting as its own server for plug-in drives) was apparently the one item that delayed the release originally planned for December 2009.

Thanx!!! I'm looking forward to your report... I'm currently using an old laptop as a server for the Classic, but the laptop is starting to malfunction, so I'm going to need a replacement soon and the Touch looks like the perfect option...

[mlsstl]

Here's the quick report on using the Touch itself as server.

The first test was I used a 2 GB flash drive with about 1.5 GB of music. It took about 2 or 3 minutes for the Touch to mount the drive, start its server, and scan the music. It played flawlessly and the responsiveness was certainly acceptable.

I then removed the flash drive and mounted one of my USB hard drive backups (Linux EXT3 format with 47,000 plus songs). The only catch is that the initial scan of the music is very slow. (However, once a drive is scanned, it only needs to look for new or changed music if you unmount and then reattach the drive. This process is much faster.)

It played everything on the drive I asked it to (though folder browsing) even while it was scanning.

The only issue I encountered was it wouldn't play any iTunes (M4A) material. (Most of my music is FLAC so this didn't affect much.) The Touch is supposed to play AAC material natively so I'm not sure what the issue is. My guess is there is some pref setting that needs to be changed or codec installed.

I'm not in a rush to research the issue since I'll continue to use my existing server, but it does make for an interesting option to be able to bring a Touch and hard drive to a friend's house and be able to have thousands and thousand of songs available to play on their system with first-rate quality.

[Ajani]

Thanks for the update... I'll probably have to convert my music collection to FLAC (it's all in apple lossless at the moment), as I'd want the Touch to also be a server for the Classic...