The Mantuary

BUY MANTUARY GEAR!

As men there are only two things that can keep us from eating or sleeping: women and gadgets.  (And despite popular belief the former is rarely as impressed with the latter ever since the “clapper” made it creepy.)  Though the majority of my Mantuary could double for mission control at NASA, it is rare that I find a new gadget that is so cool that I almost considered taking a day off of work just to play with it.  Enter the Logitech Squeezebox Duet, the coolest music playing device since the ipod.  So cool women might even be impressed by it, but let’s not push it.

What is this badass device you ask?  The Squeezebox Duet is the predecessor of the old school Squeezebox which in my mind was a crappy attempt at letting you play your MP3 list from your computer to your home stereo via a wi-fi connection.  The Duet allows you to setup multiple rooms with different receivers entirely controlled from the super cool remote with a 2.8” color LCD display allowing super easy navigation of your personal MP3 collection, internet radio (like Pandora, which is half the reason this product is worth it), as well as iTunes music.

Why is this cooler than the 20 other devices that also do this?  First of all the Duet sets up in about 10 minutes and if it takes you longer seek professional help because you are a retard.  In my house I set up two zones for upstairs and downstairs and within a moments notice, I was playing two different things in both zones all controlled through the ultra attractive wireless “remote.”  Want to turn up the volume in one zone?  No problem, select the zone and click up the volume.  Want to play Pandora classical music for your guests and AC/DC in the Mantuary… no trouble at all.  Using just standard RCA cables to connect to my Bose Wave Radio (#2 on the list if you don’t have one), I almost passed out the sound quality was so good.  I used an optical connection for my Bose 3-2-1 sound system and almost cried the sound was so fantastic.

The remote to this is the best part.  It’s small and lightweight, but on top of looking cool: it has a very long battery life, it is motion sensitive (move it and it turns itself on), it’s easy to use (I can easy get through about 50gb of MP3s with ease, and it has great range for the wi-fi connection in my house.  However, the greatest complement to the system is an account at MP3TUNES.com which allows you to sync your music from all of your computers.  The Duet logs into your MP3TUNES.com account right from the remote and gives you streaming access to all of your music.  That means you don’t need a computer at all to get this working, which was my biggest gripe with the first generation devices.  By the time you got your computer talking to the remote, which had to talk to the receiver, you might as well have just connected your ipod.

The bad?  I haven’t really found anything functionally bad about the device, and I’ve been playing with it for almost 12 hours straight (and the battery still hasn’t died).  The entry price is a little steep at $400 for the remote and one zone.  The additional zones are $150 for the receiver.  Compared to competing devices that offer similar features, this is still the cheapest in its class and it’s the only one I know of that works with MP3TUNES.com.  An account with them costs $40/yr for their 50gb account, however use the coupon code “SALE50” and it’s only $10 for the whole year.  Duet or not you can’t beat this.  Bottom line… this is a gadget that you are going to need.

Be A Man
-The Founding Father

Filed under: Gadgets & Tech, Stuff You Should Own