Squeezebox Touch -- Modifications

[vzs]

Buy an iPad+iPeng! It'll hurt once. You'll never look back
That'll look and feel like "Highest End". No, no SOOLOOS required
anymore -- at a fragment of cost. iPeng won't even cost you 10$.

Operating your collection via the tiny screen I consider
a NoGo. Operating the Touch via an internet browser got
the same status from my perspective.
With an iPad that streaming solution feels like serious stuff.

I'm actually hiding my Touch in a cabinet nowadays. My stereo
greatly integrates invisible into my living room.
I'm running the Touch feeding a full digital amp on my 2nd system btw.

And as I wrote on the block. Version 2.0. on the toolbox provides
a lot of flexibility. But don't expect to get most out of that box
if you strip my proposed solution down its bones.

Cheers

OK, will try to squeeze the juice out of it with my planned setup: USB HDD with Flacs + Touch + NOS DAC + amp + me

...but I don't really got the point:
If a PC is needed and an Ipod (at least) to browse the albums then why not simply hook up an M2Tech Hiface to a cheap(but adequate) PC and stream the music to the DAC?
I have only one answer to this: because Wifi/Ethernet gives us the possibility to run the noisy PC far away from the listening room

Don't you think that if the whole setup: possibly fan-less PC, SB Touch, DAC + amp are in the same room then this fully stripped Touch is futile to stream SPDIF to a DAC?

With all respect, I believe if the above setup is used (as in my case) by stripping down SBT to its bones we simply throw out the baby with the bath water.

Thanks, Zsolt

 

[soundcheck]

OK, will try to squeeze the juice out of it with my planned setup: USB HDD with Flacs + Touch + NOS DAC + amp + me

...but I don't really got the point:
If a PC is needed and an Ipod (at least) to browse the albums then why not simply hook up an M2Tech Hiface to a cheap(but adequate) PC and stream the music to the DAC?
I have only one answer to this: because Wifi/Ethernet gives us the possibility to run the noisy PC far away from the listening room

Don't you think that if the whole setup: possibly fan-less PC, SB Touch, DAC + amp are in the same room then this fully stripped Touch is futile to stream SPDIF to a DAC?

With all respect, I believe if the above setup is used (as in my case) by stripping down SBT to its bones we simply throw out the baby with the bath water.

Thanks, Zsolt

Of course you can put any PC into your audio room, with any great audio interface.
But first read the PC tuning threads at AudioAsylum and elsewhere.
And 2nd it's not only the M2Tech it's also the "noisy" PC you should
put on your balance sheet.
On the PC you'd need to purchase a J.River, on an OSX you need to purchase
Amarra or Pure Music.
If you run more than one source in the house you need to duplicate all that.

My level of comfort managing my sound system just skyrocketed.

In my case the iPad became a multi purpose animal. I consider it the best
invest into electronics I've done for quite some time. I don't put
100% of its cost on my streaming solution balance sheet, since I use it
for a lot of other things.

But that's my way of looking at it. We all know that you'll have a hundred million different ways to approach that very same audio subject.


Cheers

 

[mrdon]

Under the OSX instructions 1.2.7 - step 3., what does the Your-Source-Dir imply? Can someone who has done this on their Mac give me an example of what I should be entering here.

After ToolBox is downloaded, place it in your User folder. The path to this folder is as follows : Macintosh HD > Users > Your User. Place TouchToolBox 2.0 in that folder then attempt the process again using Terminal.

 

[Bjarnevip]

Linux

Hi Soundcheck

First of all - thanks for the mods to SBT

I am going to install linus on my server, but witch one shall I use? I am totally green

Shall it be:
Unbuntu 10.10
Mint Debian
Mint10

or ???

thanks in advance
Bjarne

 

[soundcheck]

Hi Soundcheck

First of all - thanks for the mods to SBT

I am going to install linus on my server, but witch one shall I use? I am totally green

Shall it be:
Unbuntu 10.10
Mint Debian
Mint10

or ???

thanks in advance
Bjarne

I'm running Mint10.

 

[knassiri]

Thank you Klaus, mrdon for your help. Using the Terminal app on my Mac I'm still having problems on the 4th step -- when entering 'tar xf touchtoolbox2.0.tar' I get the response 'No such file or directory'. I've gone back and made several attempts but I continue to get the same response. Any Ideas?

p.s. If I can get this figured out I'll be happy to write out the steps in a more Mac specific way using the free Terminal application that is already on Mac computers.

 

[soundcheck]

Are you in the right directory?

On the Touch run:

cd /
ls tar*

that should print the filename. If not. Something
went wrong with the scp command.

If the file is there run the tar command again. And proceed.

 

[grigis]

After ToolBox is downloaded, place it in your User folder. The path to this folder is as follows : Macintosh HD > Users > Your User. Place TouchToolBox 2.0 in that folder then attempt the process again using Terminal.

For me it doesn't work to copy the toolbox in to the touch
is this correct using terminal:

cd /Macintosh HD/Users/myuser

after enter that following is written:
-sh: cd: can't cd to /Macintosh

any help?
thx

 

[knassiri]

Grigis,

This may be a case of the blind leading the blind but what worked for me is just as mrdon described. Put the touchtoolbox2.0.tar file in your user folder. Once it's in your user folder this is what worked for me -- cd /users and then hit the return key.

 

[knassiri]

Are you in the right directory?

On the Touch run:

cd /
ls tar*

that should print the filename. If not. Something
went wrong with the scp command.

If the file is there run the tar command again. And proceed.

Klaus,
I see that you've updated the instructions on your blog. Adding ":/" behind the root@My-Touch-Address fixed my problem. But now I've hit another snag when attempting to unpack the archive. After entering 'tar xf touchtoolbox2.0.tar' I get the message 'tar : short read'. Any ideas? can you double check your instructions for any typing errors? Thanks.

 

[grigis]

Klaus,
I see that you've updated the instructions on your blog. Adding ":/" behind the root@My-Touch-Address fixed my problem. But now I've hit another snag when attempting to unpack the archive. After entering 'tar xf touchtoolbox2.0.tar' I get the message 'tar : short read'. Any ideas? can you double check your instructions for any typing errors? Thanks.

I got it finally!!
This worked for me:

tar xvf touchtoolbox2.0.tar

enjoy!

 

[knassiri]

Congrats grigis! Mine is still giving the 'tar : short read' message.

 

[mrdon]

OK, so this is very interesting.

Some OS X users had issues with <tar xvf touchtoolbox2.0.tar> and replaced it with <tar xf touchtoolbox2.0.tar> and that worked.

Other OS X users had issues with <tar xf touchtoolbox2.0.tar> and replaced it with <tar xvf touchtoolbox2.0.tar> and that worked.

Hmm...CLI experts any ideas here why one variation works for some and not for others and vice-versa?

 

[soundcheck]

I change it back to xvf. Thx for the hints.

Good to see that more and more OSX folks get it done slowly but surely.
Let me know if I should put some more comments in for the OSX process in particular

BTW: I made a little mistake last night ( too much Squeeze in my head lately):

I said type:

ls tar*

it should have been

ls *tar

ls lists all files ending with tar in that particular directory you're in . If it says "no file found" or similar
you're in the wrong directory or your file is not there. The next step tar command will fail.


Cheers

 

[soundcheck]

A question:

Anybody around who experienced a problem on internet radio streams?

Somebody reported "Chipmunks" like sounding radio stations, with the digital
output mod in place. Pandora would be working fine.

Cheers

 

[grigis]

As a OS X user, I'm a beginner, I could finally install the toolbox 2. It was not so easy for me and it took me some hours, but I'm so happy with the audio result of this mods. I want to say to soundcheck: VIELEN DANK!!! Thank you very much!!! Merci beaucoup!!!Grazie mille!!!ありがとうございます!!!

For me as OS X user there was some problems which I want to tell you.
I used the terminal, no 3rd part programm.
First I downloaded the toolbox to my user directory, but from this directory, I couldn't copy it to my touch!???!!????
So I made a new folder with

mkdir temp

after I put the downloaded toolbox file to this new folder.

from this new folder I could finally copy the toolbox file to my touch!

cd temp
scp touchtoolbox2.0.tar root@Your-Touch-IP-Address:/

(with "ls" you can check if you are in the right folder. It makes you a list from all the files in the actual folder which you are)

then I go to the touch to unpack the .tar file as

ssh root@Your-Touch-IP-Address
Password: 1234
cd /
tar xvf touchtoolbox2.0.tar

that was the way which I had to go for the nice audio result...hope it helps you as a OS X user....I'm new in OS X and Linux things...

And btw, I use the mod with the touch firmware 7.5.0...because my Synology NAS doesn't have an update package yet.......but it works

cheers

 

[knassiri]

Hi Klaus,
Any idea what tar : short read means? It doesn't matter if I use 'tar xf...' or 'tar xvf...' I keep getting the 'short read' message. I've tried 'ls *tar' and I am surely in the right directory. I've also tried starting over from scratch, moving the 'touchtoolbox2.0.tar' file to a new folder and starting the whole process over again. Still, no dice.

 

[knassiri]

Here is a copy and paste of what I'm seeing :

Last login: Fri Jan 14 07:50:50 on ttyp1
Welcome to Darwin!
macbookpro:~ kiannassiri$ ssh root@192.168.2.15
The authenticity of host '192.168.2.15 (192.168.2.15)' can't be established.
RSA key fingerprint is d0:bd81:05:be:a5:61:be:8c:1c:0f:8d:17:6e:4e.
Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)? yes
Warning: Permanently added '192.168.2.15' (RSA) to the list of known hosts.
root@192.168.2.15's password:

This network device is for authorized use only. Unauthorized or improper use
of this system may result in you hearing very bad music. If you do not consent
to these terms, LOG OFF IMMEDIATELY.

Ha, only joking. Now you have logged in feel free to change your root password
using the 'passwd' command. You can safely modify any of the files on this
system. A factory reset (press and hold add on power on) will remove all your
modifications and revert to the installed firmware.

Enjoy!
# exit
Connection to 192.168.2.15 closed.
macbookpro:~ kiannassiri$ cd /temp
macbookpro:/temp kiannassiri$ scp touchtoolbox2.0.tar root@192.168.2.15:/
root@192.168.2.15's password:
touchtoolbox2.0.tar 100% 0 0.0KB/s 00:00
macbookpro:/temp kiannassiri$ ssh root@192.168.2.15
root@192.168.2.15's password:

This network device is for authorized use only. Unauthorized or improper use
of this system may result in you hearing very bad music. If you do not consent
to these terms, LOG OFF IMMEDIATELY.

Ha, only joking. Now you have logged in feel free to change your root password
using the 'passwd' command. You can safely modify any of the files on this
system. A factory reset (press and hold add on power on) will remove all your
modifications and revert to the installed firmware.

Enjoy!
# cd /
# tar xvf touchtoolbox2.0.tar
tar: short read
# ls *tar
touchtoolbox2.0.tar
# tar xf touchtoolbox2.0.tar
tar: short read
#

 

[knassiri]

Problem solved and I'm a bit surprised as to what was the cause. The 'touchtoolbox2.0.tar' file itself was the culprit. When I right clicked on it and selected 'get info' I discovered the file was 0kb. There was nothing in it!

Moving forward now...

 

[knassiri]

This OSX user is all systems go. Klaus, Sounds terrific, thank you for all of your work and thank you for sharing it with all of us.