Using the Pandora as my Primary Music Player

[klapse]

Since the Pandora has such highly rated audio capabilities, I decided to try using the Pandora as the music player for my hi-fi home stereo.

I connected the headphone out directly to the 1/4" inputs of my Yamaha P2500S Pro-Amp, using RCA-1/4" adapters. The Yamaha expects higher input levels than typical line-input, so most of my audio sources sound too quiet. The Pandora outputs are LOUD! I can get REALLY loud when it is turned up to full.

The Yamaha also has high-energy efficiency current source, so in Idle it uses less than 20 Watts... I can leave it on all day without worrying about energy waste. The amp also always stays cool to the touch.. fans never come on.

The sound quality is... Godly.

I enabled USB host from the System menu, hooked up a 3TB ext3 hard drive with external power supply. No problems, all files visible.

For uninterrupted no-hassle enjoyment, I run Deadbeef and select "Add Folder", adding just the top folder of the music collection. Deadbeef takes a while to scan through and index all the files. Then I select Shuffle play and ... happiness.

Since a few months I havent been interested in video games, but the Pandora as a hi-fi audio player is worth its weight in gold!  (almost)

Cheers!

 

[LTStone]

Yeah , another cool thing we can brag and love about our Pandora, great sound!

 

[kingoddball]

I'm going to give that a shot!

I have a Muteki (Sony) should be similar with hookup and quality!

 

[elwing]

The Yamaha also has high-energy efficiency current source, so in Idle it uses less than 20 Watts... I can leave it on all day without worrying about energy waste.

do you realise 20 Watts is a lot for idle consumption. it's like having 3 economic light bulb on all the day... it won't cost you an arm and a leg but still... what a waste...

 

[Askarus]

I have some speakers at home from an old stereo system.

The speakers have no external power input.

I hardly hear them  if I use them with my laptop but Pandora is pretty loud.

It's not possible to go cheaper.

Pandora as player and loudspeakers that don't consume any power.

 

[KillRoXx]

I have some speakers at home from an old stereo system.

The speakers have no external power input.

I hardly hear them  if I use them with my laptop but Pandora is pretty loud.

It's not possible to go cheaper.

Pandora as player and loudspeakers that don't consume any power.

my pandora has a fault with earphones that have volume control on them. my suggestion, dont use iphone earphones or you may end up with alot of frequencies lost. use default plain earphones ones with no volume control

 

[klapse]

Just threw on some J.S. Bach with my pandora. It is SO good sounding! If you havent tried pandora with a hifi system, do it now!

 

[ExquisiteCorpse]

I want to tack a Q onto this.

IS it possible to get a script going that can skip or previous with the shoulder buttons? So it can still be used in clamshell?

 

[N3Cr0]

Just threw on some J.S. Bach with my pandora. It is SO good sounding! If you havent tried pandora with a hifi system, do it now!

I'm absolutely not into classic music, but I think an old PS1(scph 100x, or at least 500x) should also be good for that. So If you've got one, would you please compare the sound both devices (with your Bach CD) ? I'm just curious.

I use my PS1 only for Nu-Metal because it doesn't sound good on most other genres.

 

[FBnil]

ExquisiteCorpse: Rockbox has that http://repo.openpandora.org/?page=detail&app=rockbox.thomasjfox.003

Also, I think you should be able to remap your keys... Search the forums for xkbcomp xmodmap and xev.

http://madduck.net/docs/extending-xkb/


xkbcomp $DISPLAY xkb.dump
mousepad xkb.dump
xkbcomp xkb.dump $DISPLAY
So, once you get it working... You want your PND program to set your modified setting and then restore it so you can game with it, and not become n(ext) and p(revious) keys.... here is the magic:

http://repo.openpandora.org/?page=detail&app=pndconfig.dimag0g

Also do not forget to rate the software

 

[N3Cr0]

Spoiler

I want to tack a Q onto this. IS it possible to get a script going that can skip or previous with the shoulder buttons? So it can still be used in clamshell?

Just tried it and I'm lucky.A little hack in the pnd, quick and dirty. Basically, I bound the right shift (left shoulder button) to "Z", which is bound to the previous track in DeaDBeeF. The same with right control as "B".

I extracted the pnd and modified the startscript /scripts/deadbeef.sh . I changed





else
exec ./bin/deadbeef $*
fi
into

else
	xmodmap -e "keycode  62 = z Z z Z"
	xmodmap -e "keycode  105 = b B b B"
	exec ./bin/deadbeef $*
	xmodmap -e "keycode  62 = Shift_R NoSymbol Shift_R"
	xmodmap -e "keycode  105 = Control_R NoSymbol Control_R"
fi

and repacked the pnd.
I'm hope it's ok when I upload my mod here.

PS: There seems to be a failure in it: the b and z keybinds don't get deleted after shutting down the program.

EDIT:

Nevermind, Rockbox is definitely better.

 

[klapse]

Just threw on some J.S. Bach with my pandora. It is SO good sounding! If you havent tried pandora with a hifi system, do it now!

I'm absolutely not into classic music, but I think an old PS1(scph 100x, or at least 500x) should also be good for that. So If you've got one, would you please compare the sound both devices (with your Bach CD) ? I'm just curious.

I use my PS1 only for Nu-Metal because it doesn't sound good on most other genres.

Huh? I dont have a PS1 or a CD player hooked up to the pandora. FLAC, Mp3 and Oggs are what I play, along with some .MOD and .S3M etc.

What Im still looking for is a good way to control playback from a remote device (my Laptop). One possibility would be to ssh-in to a screen session running a curses music player. Another would be to use to use MPD (Music Player Demon) along with a command-line client. Anybody doing something like this?

 

[N3Cr0]

That's what I'm doing with my Raspberry Pi (should work similar on Pandora).

I have installed mpd on the pi and also several clients:

- mpdroid (including desktop widget) on my smartphone

- a GTK based client on my old system on the laptop (I don't use it anymore)

- last, but not leas, my favorite: ncmpcpp on the raspberry Pi.

It's a comfortable text based client which has the advantage that I can use it from any other device with ssh.

 

[sebt3]

I want to tack a Q onto this. IS it possible to get a script going that can skip or previous with the shoulder buttons? So it can still be used in clamshell?

http://boards.openpandora.org/topic/11848-audacious-324/