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    The Computer Audiophile

    By The Computer Audiophile •

    Joe Sixpack's Sooloos - Dell SX2210T Multi-touch Monitor & J River MC 15

    sx2210t-thumbnail.pngMany of us computer audiophiles, and audiophiles looking to get into the music server game, have long wanted a music server that rivals the Sooloos touchscreen interface without paying the Sooloos price premium. What many people don't realize is how advanced the Sooloos product is as a complete package. Notably how it handles metadata and library navigation using this extended metadata. I continually research music servers and every related product under the sun but I've yet to find anything that duplicates or equals the quality of Sooloos metadata support and library navigation. For example browsing an album's credits to find the producer then searching for other albums in the library that were produced by this person. It's all a couple touches away and without manually entering the information at any time. As the saying goes, there's no free lunch. This is certainly true with what I call Joe Sixpack's Sooloos.

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    This article is not meant to be a comparison between an inexpensive solution and the Sooloos package. It's more of a look at a viable option for budget conscious audiophiles.

     

    <img src="http://images.computeraudiophile.com/graphics/2010/0813/sx2210t-thumb.png" style="padding: 5pt 10pt 5pt 5pt;" align="left">The Dell SX2210T multi-touch monitor has a full HD (1920 x 1080) 16:9 21.5" screen with a nice glass feel. Somewhat similar to the feel of an iPhone. The SX2210T also offers pretty good color rendition although it's not even close to the Apple backlit LED 24" display. Compared to the Sooloos standard touchscreens (17") the Dell has larger size, better resolution, better feel, multi-touch navigation, and better color. The best thing about the Dell SX2210T is its price. Depending on the day of the week this monitor's price fluctuates from $299 to $399. Dell offers many different discounts that disappear as quickly as they appear and for no apparent reason. Frequently the Dell Refurbished site offers the SX2210T for $299 as well.

     

    Comparing this Dell monitor directly to the Sooloos Control 10 (~$5,000) or Control 15 (~$7,500) "monitors" is really like comparing apples to oranges. The Sooloos "monitors" do quite a bit more than just display the screen contents of a computer. The Sooloos units are computers with digital outputs, disc drives, and now storage. Thus, the comparisons to Sooloos "monitors" should, and will, stop here. Remember, It's the overall concept of an inexpensive Dell and JRMC 15 that's considered Joe Sixpack's Sooloos. This isn't a head to head competition or comparison.

     

    As I said earlier the Sooloos database and handling of metadata is outstanding. Since there is no such thing as a Sooloos software only package, us Joe Sixpacks of the computer audio world have to use what we can afford to run on our computers. Not only is J river Media Center my go-to playback application on the PC, it's a great application for touchscreen control. Out of the box JRMC 15 comes with the Obsidian Touchscreen Skin that runs in JRMC's Theater View. (Note: JRMC is used behind the scenes on some touchscreen music servers available today). What makes this combination of the Obsidian Touchscreen Skin and Theater View so powerful is JRMC's customizability. The default layout is great and will work for 99.99% of users. Since I like to customize everything I can I spent countless hours working on the touchscreen layout. I simplified the main screen by excluding links to Images, Videos, and the like. After trying many different layouts I settled for a simple Artist, Album, Genre, and Sample Rate navigation menu. Creating the Sample Rate Selection menu was a little more difficult than most JRMC customizations. The great thing about this menu is that it will create special sections for all the sample rates and bit depths in my library on the fly. No user intervention is required. when I add a new album that contains a sample rate not currently in the library a new section labeled with the bit depth and sample rate is automatically created and "touchable" via the Obsidian / Theater View interface.

     

    One issue I have with the J River touchscreen interface is its poor search feature. This could be my own lack of understanding of how to configure this feature, but it shouldn't require a Ph.D. in JRMC. As the video below shows when searching for an artist every song by the artist appears in the search results. It would be great if just the artist appeared then all the albums by that artists etc… I hope this is my error and the search feature works much better than what I experienced.

     

     

     

    Some additional info on the Dell SX2210T Multi-touch monitor:

     

    Video interfaces include Analog (VGA), DVI-D (HDCP), and HDMI.

    A USB connection from the monitor to the PC is required for the touchscreen feature to function.

    Currently the touchscreen features are only available for Windows. Mac users have been seeking third party drivers for a long time but so far come up empty.

    The software and drivers required for Windows & touchscreen features is very minimal and noninvasive.

    There is no VESA mounting option for this monitor.

     

     

     

    Here are two videos I put together of the Dell SX2210T Multi-touch Monitor & J River MC 15 operating in Theater View with the Obsidian Touchscreen skin. The first video shows the basic navigation of JRMC using the touchscreen. The second video simply shows the Dell SX2210T next to my Apple 24" backlit LED display on my desk.

     

     

    <b>NOTE: YouTube has just notified me this video is blocked for readers in Germany due to Sony Music's Copyright policies. I did unsuccessfully dispute this blockage. Here is the statement from YouTube <a href="http://images.computeraudiophile.com/graphics/2010/0821/youtube-block.png">[Link]</a></b>

     

    Here is a CA hosted version of the video for readers in Germany <a href="http://streaming.computeraudiophile.com.s3.amazonaws.com/2010/0813/01.mov">[Link]</a>

    <center>

    <iframe class="youtube-player" type="text/html" width="640" height="385" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/2lMgg0xsKtc?hl=en_US" frameborder="0"></iframe>

    </center>

     

     

     

    <center>

    <iframe class="youtube-player" type="text/html" width="640" height="385" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/4zHFJlPVFGs?hl=en_US" frameborder="0"></iframe>

    </center>

     

     

     

    Links:

    <ul>

    <li>Photos, features, 360 degree view, and more <a href="http://www.dell.com/content/products/superview.aspx?c=us&cs=19&l=en&pageoverride=gallery_view1&s=dhs&xdb=Z2xvYmFsOnByb2R1Y3RzOm1vbml0b3JzOnN1cGVydmlldzptb25pdG9yLWRlbGwtc3gyMjEwdCNyZWdpb24=">[Link]</a></li>

    <li>Product Page <a href="http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/products/Displays/productdetail.aspx?c=us&l=en&cs=19&sku=320-1172">[Link]</a></li>

    <li>Setup Diagram <a href="http://files.computeraudiophile.com/2010/0813/setup-diagram.pdf">[Link]</a> PDF 1.9 MB</li>

    <li>User Guide <a href="http://files.computeraudiophile.com/2010/0813/users-guide/index.htm">[Link]</a> HTML</li>

    </ul>

     

     

     

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    yoyoc

    I just installed JRMC 15 in a new ZOTAC Zbox HD-ID34 ( ion 1.8 GHtz dual core with integrated blu-ray player)<br />

    <br />

    I installed win 7 ultmt. OS.<br />

    <br />

    When installed JRMC 15 I too had a problem with clicks, drops in sound, could not rip and use theater mode and would even freeze when using theater mode.<br />

    <br />

    Well the fix is quite easy, I had the same thing before in another computer I use to record live music. What is needed is more ram.<br />

    <br />

    zbox came with one 2 Gig ram and had one free slot for another. Now it has total 4Gigs ram. I do not fault JRMC 15 for the need of more ram. In my experience running Win 7 with 2 gigs is just the bare minimum needed, with 4 the system improves dramatically and JRMC works wonderfully.<br />

    <br />

    Just my grain of info.<br />

    <br />

    My combo is the Zbox with a Planar 22" multi touch screen and gyration music remote. KILLER combo IMHO.<br />

    <br />

    Ripping Kenny Dorham, Quiet Kenny.

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    Journeyman_2012

    I'm new to the ComputerAudiophile website and I would like to ask for some advice about putting together my music archive. I have been a journeyman rock & roll musician during the late 60s (thanks to which I was able to seen much of the world), a songwriter, a music producer, a music journalist and now I write film scripts (which invariably) are annotated with great music. I was first truly "introduced" to music (starting with the blues)at the ripe old age of 14 and due to my contacts from then (both top musicians and label employees) I have been, for over forty years, the happy recipient of promos, reviews copies and pre-release freebies of the majority of the music that I have in my collection. 'Thing is', my collection now numbers over 37,000 cds, lps and reel-to-reel tapes and increases at a rate of ca 500 to 750 new recordings per month. I would like to digitize most of the titles (slowly running out of space)so I that can eventually free up much of the space it occupies. At this time, I'm not in a situation where I can 'spring' for a Sooloos set-up, but I read with interest this "Joe Sixpack" idea. I'm thinking of the following and would welcome all comments (and tips) that anyone may have: The 'Joe system' as written - the Dell SX2210T Multi-touch Monitor & J River MC 15 and for such mass storage needs as I have, possibly something such as the Synology DS1010+ NAS server, beginning with 5x 2TB Samsung ECO disks. Later using the Synology DX510 server add-on I could expand the set-up to a total of 20TBs. One key question I have is this - can software such as the J River MC 15 handle such an amount of data - thumbnails, metadata, etc. - that will be generated by such a large archive ?? (I can, of course, contact J River and ask them directly, but these days you often get pointed directly to their forum. So I thought first I'd ask here first if anyone has dealt with data at this level.) The other clear question is, does anyone see potential 'bottlenecks' anywhere else in the 'concept'. In advance, thank you very much for any input, ideas, tips, etc.<br />

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    The Computer Audiophile

    Hi Journeyman - Thanks for the bit of background information. Interesting story. <br />

    <br />

    J River should be able to handle your massive collection. I don't think there is a better app available other than a complete Sooloos system. <br />

    <br />

    Make sure you have a computer with good power to handle this large amount of data. <br />

    <br />

    Your NAS idea is very good, and one that I'm considering as well.

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    Journeyman_2012

    Hello Chris....First thing let me say that I love the site. Anything audiophile always grabs my attention without delay. And keeps it.<br />

    <br />

    Having checked out the J River information on their website & seeing the video that's a part of this article, I think it is the best choice for my needs. <br />

    <br />

    As to the need for a good powerful computer for the task - well, that's another thing for my 'shopping list'. Most of my work these days is done on a four year old Dell with 4GB Ram. So, I will definitely get something with much more horsepower for the job. Though, I think I already see a usage for this older PC. Especially in having been a musician myself, I am interested in most everything to do with the recordings and so a part of the archiving includes all the liner notes. Quite a task to scan, but luckily I already have a couple of volunteers. Possibly my current machine can eventually be used for this purpose.<br />

    <br />

    Again, thanks so much for your advice. I will certainly be one of your websites dedicated readers in the future.<br />

    <br />

    Rob <br />

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    speed65

    Hello Chris,<br />

    How did you create the sample rate menu in J River MC15 for the Joe Sixpack's Sooloos?<br />

    <br />

    Thanks,<br />

    Johnny

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