Using a PSP or Wii to play music from PC

Syph

Syph

Syph

Soldato
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I'm on the lookout for a replacement to using my laptop connected to the stereo for music at parties etc. I've got about 700 albums on my PC, steadily growing (I get a few albums a month).

The laptop is fine for me, but I think it's not particularly 'idiot' friendly, nor do I really want people to use it when a little tipsy - it is my work laptop after all!

So, this has lead me to other devices I have, that I could use. I have a the main components to knock together a HTPC, bar a nice glossy black case and PSU. But then there's the noise and power issue (it's a lot of power to just play music).

I've got a couple of MP3 players... but neither are large enough to store all of the albums, nor do they have an explorer-esque view like the laptop does.

So that leaves me with the Wii. The Orb was rubbish at streaming my music, and Wiisic, it seems, couldn't handle loading the music. It would be great if the Wii had a simple file browser and player as a channel, but alas it fails. Does anyone have any suggestions for playing music off the Wii that doesn't involve a website (like Orb)... but like Wiisic (which uses my IP, connecting straight to the PC.)?

Failing that, I could invest in a new second hand PSP - if that would do the job. It at least has several other purposes, has a nice screen and hopefully a 3.5mm jack to connect to my phono in ports.

All I need to do is browse directories comfortably, would be nice with album art (a la thumbnails in Explorer) and play songs at the same quality. Basically, how the laptop does, but without the hassle of the rest of the laptop.

Any suggestions outside of consoles?

:D

Ta!
 
To be honest your best bet would be a second hand xbox with XBMC installed. I have two in my house and they can playback nearly any audio or video format and the interface is pretty good. Noise shouldn't be an issue as you can use XBMC to turn the fan to quiet.

They can access any Windows PC with a shared folder (via SAMBA), a NAS, FTP and iTunes share, internet radio and many other internet based sites. You could also install a large hard drive (120GB+) and dump all your media on that so you don't even need a PC running. XBMC also includes a FTP server to allow you to copy your files across and a HTTP server to allow you to control the media center from a webpage, or even from a mobile device such as a PSP (there was a custom app for the PSP that had a music interface too).

XBMC has so many great features I can't list them all here. All you need is an Xbox (< £50 second hand), a media remote, optional but better than a controller (< £5 second hand) and then you need to get XBMC on it (there are plenty of guides on the internet).
 
I don't use my xbox for games anymore, just XBMC, I use it every day, best thing I ever did with it, there are new features added all the time. I FTP'd the NASA TV asx file to XBMC and it was able to stream the video straight from the net. It also runs Python and people write scripts for it all the time for things such as YouTube and AOL music.
 
Tversity should work how you want.

Basically it's a bit like orb, but just goes over your home network rather than the internet.

Does vidoes reasonably well too.
 
I use my psp to play music through my Kenwood amp, works great.

just use a 3.5mm headphone to 2 phono cable and away you go.

4gb cards are pretty cheap now also.

any questions, feel free to ask :)
 
http://www.redkawa.com/

Does Wii (and PSP apparently) network file sharing. :)

However, I'd echo the use of XBMC. It's many times ace. I do actually need to sort out my new hard drive so I can put the old one in the 'Box and get it up and running again.
 
I'm tempted by XBMC, and missed out on a mint Xbox on Ebay for £16 last night lol.

I've heard of Tversity and RedKawa, so I'll try both with the Wii. I don't actually have a PSP but I could perhaps justify buying one as a sleek little device for playing my music. Perhaps not over an Xbox though.
 
fergie666 said:
I use my psp to play music through my Kenwood amp, works great.

just use a 3.5mm headphone to 2 phono cable and away you go.

4gb cards are pretty cheap now also.

any questions, feel free to ask :)
Click to expand...

Does the PSP work over LAN though? I'd rather keep all the music on the hard drive in the PC than stick it on a memory card.
 
I don't think it does "officially" mate.

i have used a homebrew program call Pimp Streamer to do it and it worked good enough for my needs, although it did have probs with some video files.
 
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