suggestion for an RPi music server+player

[KaLam1ty]

Another one here on the piCorePlayer + Material UI train.

I find it to be the most robust platform, with very little latency and usability issues with UI/UX. It's very quick to operate and feels very much like a native app, despite being web operated. I found both Moode and Volumio absolutely hated browsing of large libraries on slower phones/tablets. Their UIs are not nearly as customizable, either.

 

[Gee2]

Not sure how lean Moode and Volumio are but: "piCorePlayer is built on a very small linux distro which is only about 12 MB, known as piCore Linux. It boots very fast and it is running entirely in RAM, it doesn't write to the SD-card unless you want to save a new setting. Therefore, pCP is very robust and you can simply pull the power without any risk of corruption of your SD card."

 

[tsengf]

Running LMS (native, not through PiCorePlayer) on rpi4 with 64-bit raspbian OS. Also installed squeezelite as player on same rpi. USB of rpi is connected to audio equipment. You can control LMS with any browser (on desktop or phone). Material skin is much nicer than the default option.

 

[nsfgp]

Tried Volumio/Moode and settled on LMS/PiCorePlayer ... no going back ... Material Skin is just a perfect UI IMHO. Runs greats on a pi2B and never had any issue USB out to any DAC. I don't even have a great quality microSD card.
On Android device I recommend you install the Material Skin Wrapper App: https://github.com/CDrummond/lms-material-app
On PC there is Squeezelite-X: https://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?108550-Announce-Squeezelite-X

 

[Wino]

Tried Volumio/Moode and settled on LMS/PiCorePlayer ... no going back ... Material Skin is just a perfect UI IMHO. Runs greats on a pi2B and never had any issue USB out to any DAC. I don't even have a great quality microSD card.
On Android device I recommend you install the Material Skin Wrapper App: https://github.com/CDrummond/lms-material-app
On PC there is Squeezelite-X: https://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?108550-Announce-Squeezelite-X

I prefer Squeeze Ctrl app on android to Material Skin, but haven't used Material Skin in a while. Have compared them? What does the Material Skin Wrapper App give you?

 

[Ralph_Cramden]

I prefer Squeeze Ctrl app on android to Material Skin, but haven't used Material Skin in a while. Have compared them? What does the Material Skin Wrapper App give you?

Since the Material Skin only requires a browser, it's a far better UE than any Android app on my Chromebook, most of which only operate in portrait mode. It also works beautifully on my iPhone.

 

[nsfgp]

I prefer Squeeze Ctrl app on android to Material Skin, but haven't used Material Skin in a while. Have compared them? What does the Material Skin Wrapper App give you?

I will try out Squeeze Ctrl when I got some time. Thanks for suggesting it.
The Material Skin App wrapper is just like putting your web browser page into one of your home screen app. Just a little easier to manipulate/use in full screen. It is the exact same Material skin/core. Using browser is just fine as it is also easy to make your page into an app button/icon. In all my Android devices I use the App Wrapper. But subtle difference only.
EDIT: forgot to add with the wrapper app I can scan/switch between multiple LMS servers (I have 2) and I never have to know/remember the host/IP/etc. of my LMS. Pretty handy little extra over using browser.

 

[rgdawsonco]

Squeezelite-X also embeds the squeezelite player so you can use that to play from PC. You can let it run in the background and minimize to the tray area. Squeezelite-X will automatically discover your LMS servers(s). Also, you can define custom menu links which are handy (for example, I have a link that will find the currently playing track on youtube). If you have a network enabled Denon/Marantz receiver, Squeezelite-X provides controls for that. And if you have multiple sound cards you can run up to 8 instances of squeezelite for a multi-room setup from one PC. Squeezelite-X has a Wake-on-Lan feature to automatically wake the server if you want. Squeezelite-X lets you interactively select your output device/protocol. And you can interactively switch between the default and Material Skin. (Disclaimer: I'm the author of Squeezelite-X).

 

[Wino]

I will try out Squeeze Ctrl when I got some time. Thanks for suggesting it.
The Material Skin App wrapper is just like putting your web browser page into one of your home screen app. Just a little easier to manipulate/use in full screen. It is the exact same Material skin/core. Using browser is just fine as it is also easy to make your page into an app button/icon. In all my Android devices I use the App Wrapper. But subtle difference only.
EDIT: forgot to add with the wrapper app I can scan/switch between multiple LMS servers (I have 2) and I never have to know/remember the host/IP/etc. of my LMS. Pretty handy little extra over using browser.

I added Material Skin and will leave it as my browser interface. Still prefer Squeeze Ctrl as my overall interface.

Really wish someone would update the Tidal plug-in. It's all free, so can't really complain. But, that would be my only grip with the whole LMS, Picoreplayer system. I sometimes use LMS Connect so I can use the Tidal app, but it's not entirely there yet.

 

[Wino]

Squeezelite-X also embeds the squeezelite player so you can use that to play from PC. You can let it run in the background and minimize to the tray area. Squeezelite-X will automatically discover your LMS servers(s). Also, you can define custom menu links which are handy (for example, I have a link that will find the currently playing track on youtube). If you have a network enabled Denon/Marantz receiver, Squeezelite-X provides controls for that. And if you have multiple sound cards you can run up to 8 instances of squeezelite for a multi-room setup from one PC. Squeezelite-X has a Wake-on-Lan feature to automatically wake the server if you want. Squeezelite-X lets you interactively select your output device/protocol. And you can interactively switch between the default and Material Skin. (Disclaimer: I'm the author of Squeezelite-X).

Thanks for all your hard work!

 

[Jungstar]

Volumio ticks all the boxes for me.

Volumio has been very unstable - especially if you use Spotify sometimes.... while I do have a FLAC library,spotify is very spouse friendly.