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| Home >> Handheld & PDA Reviews: Linksys Wireless-B Music System WMLS11B | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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User Submitted Linksys Wireless-B Music System WMLS11B Reviews (cont...)Date: 2006-04-11 LinkSys did a poor job on this one My wife gave me this "Wireless-B Music System" for my birthday (a year ago now) on the recommendation of a friend. Unfortunately she bought it in Texas and took it home to Florida where we live. As a result, returning it to the store became a problem. So I was forced to keep it and doggedly tried to set it up despite of al the awkwardies that this unit has. I eventually gave up anyway because it seemed impossible to associate it with my wireless network, even when I had "downgraded" network encryption from WPA back to WEP (the WMLS11B can not handle anything above WEP encryption). The WMLS11B has been gathering dust ever since. A few days ago I decided to try again because new firmware (1.09) is available now. And indeed, the network setup problems are over, it links fine now wirelessly, albeit with WEP encryption only; as before. But the link is stable now. I was able to set it up with several Internet radio stations that I found on the web, which it can play (from the favorites list) directly from the router without the PC having to act as a server or the like. Really nice. However, the WMLS11B can only play MP3 live audio streams from the web, and not Windows format, or Real Audio format. It would have been easy for LinkSys to create firmware for the WMLS11B that can play all the 3 streaming-audio standards so this is a serious weakness I think. The next step was to set up the WMLS11B as an MP3 player using the PC as an MP3 server. This apparently requires the Musicmatch Jukebox player to run on the PC. I agree with most of the reviews here that this player is horror. It aggressively tried to take over all file associations from Windows Media Player (my favorite player). It really would have been nice if LinkSys had given the option to choose between different media players, not just Musicmatch. A very poor move it seems, from LinkSys. I did manage to get it going though. But once it had been setup, I have all the problems that other reviewers pointed out: Really awkward menus on the WMLS11B, the "file format error" appears randomly for whatever reason (in fact a web search for that error brought me to these reviews which promted me to write one myself), and I can't get it to play multiple songs in a row, have no idea how to overcome that (if possible at all). To summarize: Works great as Internet radio albeit only with MP3 streams, but completely sucks as a remote MP3 player using the PC as a music server. I'm sure the hardware would be able to handle the task though, if only LinkSys would be writing better and updated firmware for this unit. But apparently they prefer to just leave it as it is, while selling a newer unit instead. You know, I hear so much complaining about Microsoft all the time, but where can you buy a product (WinXP in my case) and still be able to download updates from the manufacturer after more than 4 years? LinkSys should take an example from that Microsoft model!! Date: 2005-11-26 Have to admit.. a bit of a flake - for early adopters only All the reviews are good. If you are a techy, filter out the 'I found it difficult to connect'. If you know your WAP from your WEP and a hex doesn't freak you, then no worries. What they say abou the UI is true. It sucks, big time. The number of times I have stabbed a button on the remote and cursed because it went to somewhere that was not intuitive.. grr. Big thumbs down to linksys/cisco engineers there. As to the performance, again, not too impressed. It sticks, it goes bloop bloop, it fails to respond - just like a computer. If you reboot your PC (i.e. your music server) and unplug then plug in this product, everything should be ok. For a while. You'd better get your playlists in order. Browsing through your music is a joke. And even when you play your playlist, I found that going to the next song with the usual >>| did not work. Access and playing your tunes is rubbish with this interface. If you rack up your tracks in an order you like then fine. If you want to skip your racked up tunes, then hard luck. But other users have other experiences. Maybe I don't know how to use it properly yet. That'd be beacuse the manual sucks too. In summary: this unit for early adopters who know about wireless parlance (if you run wireless security). It blips out from time to time, it simply doesn't play sometimes. Sometimes it gets stuck in loop in a loop and I have to pull the power plug. But, in saying all that, the ability to play the tracks that reside on your PC or laptop rocks. For all its early weaknesses , I am glad I bought it. But it is not for the faint-hearted. Note to Linksys: come on guys, put a hurryup on producing a more robust unit with a much better UI. An alternative is the Squeezebox. It gets rave reviews: [...] Date: 2005-09-02 Finally- High Fidelity Access to My Music Collection! I recently purchased and installed my new Linksys Wireless-B Music System. Like many of you I suspect, over the past few years most of the music I now listen to the most resides on my hard-drive. Up 'til now, access to this music was through a set of anemic sound powered speakers on my computer or on CD's burned and played on my stereo. I enjoy and use music for entertainment of friends and family and would love to use the versatility of custom playlists to suit the mood and crowd. Unfortunately, my computer in the study is too far away from the family room and I rarely have time to burn playlist CD's for any given event. Enter the wireless music system! The WMLS11B by Linksys allows you to transfer your music wirelessly either to your stereo system or anywhere within the normal 11B radius to the unit as a standalone "boom box" with integral speakers. The system operates within a music server platform (MusicMatch Jukebox). I can now edit a custom playlist for the evening just before the guests arrive, and Voila! the system relays my high quality music files to my sound system and plays them at high fidelity in a fully automated program. I found the WMLS11B very easy to install and got it up and running in under 30 minutes using the included CD. The integrated receiver allows me to remotely access my music collection with a handheld controller and employ the selection of playlists, albums, artists, or even genres from a small on-screen menu. The system also allows you to store and access your favorite internet radio stations and play them through the unit! There are a few difficulties- the music server program sometimes mysteriously refuses to respond unless you turn it on and off a few times when you first start-up your computer, and the menu screen can be a bit cumbersome to page through if your selection is well down the alphabetical order. Admittedly some of these issues may just be because of my inexperience with the software. All-in-all, I have enjoyed my WMLS11B tremendously and at the price I paid to Amazon, I consider it a tremendous value. Date: 2005-08-06 Great product, can't beat price Based on some of the other reviews I was a bit nervous about buying this product. But once it went on sale on amazon, I figured it was worth a shot. Boy, was I right. I have know idea what other people are doing, but it took me about 20min to setup and no real issues. --Setup-- Wireless connectivity to my network and server was instant, no problem. The first time I tried to play an mp3 it connected, but no music. Tried the musicmatch demo mp3 that came with musicmatch and that worked. I don't have many mp3s on my pc, so chalked that up to a poor quality rip. Used musicmatch to rip a cd, connected, and it worked! I did find some other mp3s that I had and was able to play those. --Speakers-- The speakers aren't the greatest, but based on some of the reviews I thought that they were going to sound like music through a tin can, not at all. For small powered speakers for a bedroom or a kitchen they are perfect. --MusicMatch-- What's the big deal? People go nuts over this. Is it really any different than any other media player? Insert CD, rip, and it automatically adds to library. Or add mp3 to musicmatch library. It's simple and it works. Playlist seems to work fine, but I hear there is a 10 song limit. Haven't tried that yet. --UI-- This is probably the only downfall to this product. The UI, I found intuitive, but frustrating for the same reason everyone else did. You can go 4 levels (say Song title) into a menu and then when you try to backup one level (to say Album title), it should to you to level 3 (Album), but goes all the way to level1 (Browse, the main menu). That is annoying and can't believe they release it like that. --Overall-- Besides the slightly annoying UI, you can't beat the price for a small, wireless, bookshelf music system. Looking at other products you will have to buy powered speaker or hook up to existing system for much more. Like I said, this is great for a bedroom or kitchen. Also it has internet radio feature, what a cool bonus. Date: 2005-07-26 Good idea, really bad product. DON'T BUY I already had the network and I would say although I'm not brilliant, I am pretty computer savy. Forget this thing. It's so frustrating because it's such a great idea. I actually had it up and running for a weekend. I kept getting "download error" when I tried upgrading the firmware (on THREE computers!). But it worked OK without the upgrade. I told myself I could live without playlists.....But now more than 90% of the time I get "Rhapsody is being accessed by another program". Doesn't matter how many times I power cycle the computer and Rhapsody. Or I get my other Fave "file format error". It's really too bad - I had such high hopes for this.
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