Help to make a MP3 jukebox

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'99

Weaksauce
Joined
Oct 19, 2005
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99
I'm planning to build a MP3 jukebox, using a small kabinet, motherboard, and a high-end soundcard. To control the "thing", I planned to use a touchscreen.
I would like to hear if someone has build something like this, and which components they used. Also what software they used to control it.
Why I wanna build one? Besauce I don't like the idea that my TV has to be turned on just becasue I wanna to MP3's, and also to get a better interface that I would get buying a Sqeeze Box... and maybe a better sound quality.
 
How about an XBox using XBMC. The Soundstorm audio is very good in an Xbox and you can always pipe it digitally to your reciever to let your reciever do the processing anyways.

It would use your TV, but that's not such a bad thing. Lets you see lots of stuff at once and easily controlled with a remote.

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Can't forget MythTV + Music Library, though this isn't my favorite setup. The MythMusic isn't the best interface.
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Another option is slimserver. Then you can run a tiny little soekris box with a nice PCMCIA sound card in it and control it over the network. That'd be pretty trick.

Lots of options for you. If I think of more I'll let ya know.
 
Erm... xbox sound quality is pretty crappy. Soundstorm was great because it allowed for real time dolby digital output, but from a quality standpoint, that's an awful thing to have. Much better to use analog outputs, and better quality DACs.

Back to the OP - for a simple jukebox you could use any one of meedio, mediaportal or gameex just to name a few. For linux, myth is pretty much the only game in town. As long as the touchscreen sends a mouse click, any one of those programs will work out great.

I prefer meedio, but it's no longer supported and hard to find a download. It also has a bit of a learning curve. Mediaportal is the up and coming star - lots of development, but I found it difficult to switch from what I know. gameex started out as a mame addin for MCE, but has since spiraled a little bit out of control but should be good for a jukebox.
 
I've got Media Portal controlling Foobar on mine. Hardware-wise it doesn't much matter, for a sound card I'm using a Chaintech AV710 because they're MP3s (in my case AAC files) so having a highend sound card doesn't really matter much since the audio is already compressed. It just has to be a good/decent sound card.
 
CrimandEvil said:
I've got Media Portal controlling Foobar on mine. Hardware-wise it doesn't much matter, for a sound card I'm using a Chaintech AV710 because they're MP3s (in my case AAC files) so having a highend sound card doesn't really matter much since the audio is already compressed. It just has to be a good/decent sound card.
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Don't knock MP3's as a whole. It all depends on how you rip and how you encode them. Go to www.ubernet.org and look up their ripping tutorial. It is fabulous. Really goes over the righ way to rip and the right way to encode.
 
I've built a few of these over the past few years.
The first one I built was for my car and I couldn't find an affordable touchscreen so I used a Playstation controller as an input and a cheapie game console lcd. The software for that one was WindowsXP with winamp as shell, and joytokey.exe. (joytokey was to use the controller analogs as mouse and the dicretes as winamp shortcut keys) The motherboard was an Epiawhatever@800MHz.
My current juke system is a mini-itx pentium board (killed my epia in a video modding accident) and a TM-868 8" touchscreen LCD (some one jacked my shitty $75 5" LCD , yet tossed my little mini-itx system -once worth approximately $500- in the neighbors yard.) (what fools.) It runs on TinyXp "Beast Edition" and Winamp. I am still looking for something better than Winamp (that is free), or at least a more touchscreen-friendly Winamp skin. I'll soon be trying out Doscab on an additional project - not just a juke this time.
 
slightlyawesome said:
I've built a few of these over the past few years.
The first one I built was for my car and I couldn't find an affordable touchscreen so I used a Playstation controller as an input and a cheapie game console lcd. The software for that one was WindowsXP with winamp as shell, and joytokey.exe. (joytokey was to use the controller analogs as mouse and the dicretes as winamp shortcut keys) The motherboard was an Epiawhatever@800MHz.
My current juke system is a mini-itx pentium board (killed my epia in a video modding accident) and a TM-868 8" touchscreen LCD (some one jacked my shitty $75 5" LCD , yet tossed my little mini-itx system -once worth approximately $500- in the neighbors yard.) (what fools.) It runs on TinyXp "Beast Edition" and Winamp. I am still looking for something better than Winamp (that is free), or at least a more touchscreen-friendly Winamp skin. I'll soon be trying out Doscab on an additional project - not just a juke this time.
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Sounds nice... Are you using a X-Fi card? or are you rinning on the onboard soundcard?
 
check out mp3car.com for some decent software for touchscreens. I used roadrunner in my car for just what you are talkign about. only problem is they are dumbed down. just basic tag reading, playlist support, and playback controls.
 
Wow.. weird.. I'm thinking of doing the same thing... I'm stuck at finding a touchscreen, you guys have any suggestions? I don't want to get one only to find out that it's a POS..
 
bobbydole said:
Wow.. weird.. I'm thinking of doing the same thing... I'm stuck at finding a touchscreen, you guys have any suggestions? I don't want to get one only to find out that it's a POS..
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What were you planning on using.. mobo, sound card and so on? I've been looking at some MiniITX boards, but I dont know if they can carry a X-Fi card (Extreme Music) and if it would fit inside a MiniITX case.
 
I am telling you, if you are looking for specs on a small form factor, touch screen driven mp3 PC there is no better place I have found that mp3car.com for info. They also have a store with some quality components and nifty specialty pieces. A lot of it is automitve specific, but a lot of it is just based on making a small PC.
 
[QUOTE='99]What were you planning on using.. mobo, sound card and so on? I've been looking at some MiniITX boards, but I dont know if they can carry a X-Fi card (Extreme Music) and if it would fit inside a MiniITX case.[/QUOTE]

I'm just going to use some left-over parts. It should be good for what I want to to do, I'm not really aiming for super small here.
 
[QUOTE='99]Sounds nice... Are you using a X-Fi card? or are you rinning on the onboard soundcard?[/QUOTE]

just the onboard, but it has static noise sometimes, so I might put one of my pci sound cards in. Only one PCI slot, though, and I just broke my PIE aux-in connector this morning (shorted across tiny terminals with multimeter probes), so I might use the pci slot for my old tv/radio tuner card. Then it would just be the PC and an amp.
 
bobbydole said:
Wow.. weird.. I'm thinking of doing the same thing... I'm stuck at finding a touchscreen, you guys have any suggestions? I don't want to get one only to find out that it's a POS..
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Hi. First post here. Here's a link to one I just ordered. Haven't received it yet so I can't vouch for quality. The description is:

15" Planar PT1500MU Multifunction Touchscreen LCD Monitor w/Speakers - No Base (Black)

http://www.geeks.com/details.asp?invtid=PT150MU-BK-NOBASE-R&cat=MON
They don't come with a base (meant for wall mounting), it's a discontinued model, and they're refurbished! But it's only $155.00 and others I've seen are in the $400.00+ range, so I thought I'd take a risk. I plan to either hang mine on a wall or leave it lying on an end table next to the couch anyway, and I could always rig up some kind of stand if I had to.
 
i would use mediajukebox.com in theater mode for an excellent touchscreen jukebox interface. i plan on making jukebox's soon too, when i move and have a real heated garage... you can also enable 'party mode' so nobody can fuck with the jukebox's settings while its activated.
 
Wow, you're right, that is 3 years old; didn't even notice. Pretty good for this thread to have still been on the first Google search page though. Think that dude's still looking for a touch screen? LOL
 
hardocp does a really good job suckin googles di... well whatever they do to keep on top of google its working
 
i think that you have to check your computer first then there is may be a corrupt files in your computer you please check your computer first then install it.i think that you must have to re-install it fully.thanks
 
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