New n-Stream app is here

Allen, I owe you a beer, truth is I couldn't remember who had suggested it, you know I listen to your every word!!

Thanks for for the tip off!!

Some of us have repeatedly asked for nStream to be made available as a download for users who prefer to stick with it. I doubt it will happen but I haven't totally given up hope. The new app isn't any faster, slicker or less buggy on my iPad controlling NDS. It just looks different, does a couple of new things, omits at least one legacy facility which was immensely useful and is buggy. I'm still getting crashes. I expect a patch or two will be along sharpish. But I would revert to the last version of nStream in a blink if I could.

.. Or my two Qutes, two iPad minis and cheap as chips NAS (WB MyBookLive running a very old version of Twonky) Multiroom is easier to grasp. Black olive is the new green olive.

Hi Grahamh,

i have also only one source and have done exactly as you,multiroom disabled.

scott

Works well for me too, reliable and fast, looks loads better and has a few useful enhancements.  What's not to like?

The new app has more useful functions than the old one, that makes it an upgrade in my view.

Also, if Naim leaves the old N-Stream app online for ever more, that's two apps they have to support.

Just one question from me....

When will the Mu-so be available? It was promised in September. There are only 3 business days left in the month. With the Mu-so in place, the new app can be more thoroughly assessed.....

My Sonos ZP80 does this. It was released in 2006.

Sub-optimal on the control app as it would then rely upon multiple devices, perhaps using different operating systems, syncing with one another. What happens when the battery runs out too? It needs to be on the streamer/player.

Allen, you and I have discussed this many times in the past. There was indeed an opportunity to do things better but a ground-up redesign was required and I suspect this may require more than a firmware update of existing streamers.

Perhaps things will change from Muso onwards?

I had only two weeks experience of using the 'old' Nstream, so I can't really compare it to the new one. However, the new one is working well for me, albeit it takes a bit of finding your way around without a map, but that's par for the course nowadays.

Can someone tell me whether there is a 'Track Search' facility, as exists in Nserve? 

Are you reading this off the Sonos features list?

I really don't get the comparison with sonos. If you like sonos then use that, it won't sound anywhere near as good but you'll be happy with the control app and you'll get what the sonos brand delivers. My santa fe has more gizmo's and can carry more luggage than a Ferrari but it's not one of the world's best cars and it won't do 0 - 60 in 3 seconds. its a bit strange to expect Ferrari to care about the built in compass in my hyundai. Sonos and Naim are different products in different markets, you can't expect to get the best of both but if it makes you happy sell your streamer and replace it with a sonos

I have a few questions related to PLAYLIST

After I picked a number of songs on the play queue, I tried to save it as a playlist. In both my iPhone and iPad, it would show up on the main screen twice.

Not only that, when I click the playlist in the main screen, it would take me to the playlist with the Warning "Some tracks are unavailable as they cannot be located on the server or the server is offline", and then the whole playlist would be unusable for playback.

So I wonder where the playlist is actually stored and what is required to make it work? My server is a Synology box running the built in UPNP Media Server and of course was never offline.

Please let me know if this is expected behaviour or what?

Thanks a lot

You were moaning about the comparison with Sonos I believe. Your analogy of plugging your iPhone into your PC but them not being the same thing also misses the point entirely.

Consider this. Does music streamed from your PC sound better than music streamed from your iPhone connected to your PC? Please don't answer this btw. The point is that both options can reproduce music. Naturally if you have a lot invested in your PC you will want to believe it is superior than your iPhone. However, the PC is still in use with your phone plugged in so perhaps you might find it in your heart to be happy with either solution.

You could of course plug a USB device into a DAC and play music off that. However, you believe the streamer imparts some magical benefit. Setting this belief system aside, you are still unable to stream from a lossless service such as Qobuz using N-Stream. In other words, your superior solution in a different market employs not only a more limited user interface but also lower quality source material. Time to smell the coffee?

Don't bite, dayjay. For some people...

This is pretty fair.  It would be interesting to hear from the developers what the strategy is for the new app.  Is there something new and potentially / ultimately much better underneath the different looks?  What's the goal here?  Letting us customers in on what the strategy is seems relatively reasonable to me.  If it's nothing more than 'we wanted a more modern look, and something that we could use to run the mu-so,' then just say so.  If there is more afoot -- let us know.

Very true, if they were giving out free fivers there would be demands for tenners. Its all a bit predictable and I'd rather listen to some music

Hi Lhau, the playlist with Naim are stored in the storage memory of each tablet/phone etc. These playlists are not shared across devices. To back up the playlist with iOS you need to connect the phone/tablet to iTunes and manually save the playlist files associated with the Naim NStream app.

The Naim playlist contains a series of references to your tracks. These references contain the address of your Upnp server app and the index of the media within the UPNP server database.

If the UPnP server address changes or the server database indexes change (such as from a full rescan, but dependent on design of UPNP server) then NStream will show a red cross against the playlist item, as that link no longer works and is marked unavailable.

When you select the playlist and play it, NStream loads the list of playlist items into the streamer memory. The streamer then fetches these tracks in turn from the UPNP server.

Simon

One tip

If you have more than one device you use as a controller you can copy them across, albeit rather crudely.

Start a playlist playing using the iPad that has the saved playlist.  Then go to the next device and launch nStream.  You will then see what is playing and you can use the Save Playlist facility to save the playlist to the second device.

Richard

Thanks Simon.

My Synology box is on Fixed IP and the playlist became unusable as soon as created..... Maybe time to look at other solution?

I think that just about sums up the quality of your contribution,  well done, how proud you must be

Allen has posted on here for some time and knows what he is talking about. He hasn't just joined to go around saying everything is brilliant / jump on every bandwagon. You haven't responsed to my post about smelling the coffee I notice. Lets brush over the facts of the matter