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19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Phillips NP2900 vs. Logitech Squeezebox Boom, May 11, 2009
This review is from: Philips NP2900/37 WiFi Internet Radio Network Music Player with Rhapsody (Black) (Electronics)
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I recently got the chance to test and compare both the Philips NP2900 and the Logitech SqueezeBox Boom Streaming Internet Streaming Radio units together side-by-side. If you were just to test each unit individually, you would be impressed by either unit but head-to-head, I noticed distinct pros and cons with each unit.
The first thing you'll notice different between the two units is the styling. The Philips NP2900 is a very stylish looking unit with its metal construction, brilliant color LCD color screen and nice round corners which just looks sexy. Compared to the Logitech SqueezeBox Boom, with its plastic construction, more utilitarian green LED screen, bulkier square design and bigger size, the Philips unit just plain looks and feels better. The remote control on the Philips also looks and feels more like a hi-fi remote whereas the Logitech's remote is a small, simple remote that you'll probably lose pretty quickly since it's so small. The only real complaint I had with the Philips remote was that there was no page up/page down function makes scrolling thru long playlists a pain. Considering the backgrounds of the two companies, it was obvious the Logitech was designed with a PC in mind while the Philips unit was designed with more of a standalone, CE mindset.
As for the setup, both units were easy to setup with each unit finding my Wi-Fi connection quickly and entering the WEP security key a breeze. I was up and running on both units within 5 minutes of unboxing them and was scanning for and listening to Internet radio stations with ease. Since I had them side-by-side, I tested the same Internet radio stations playing simultaneously on both. I had a few friends and family over so we all listened to each unit playing the same radio stations and compared the two. I then took a vote from the group of five to get their opinion for which sounded better. Everybody agreed including myself that the Logitech unit did sound better and on inspecting both units' speakers, you could see why. The Logitech unit had two bigger main woofer speaker cones and two tweeters while the Philips unit had two smaller woofer speaker cones and no tweeter. The Logitech unit was also quite a bit heavier and most audiophiles will tell you that the heavier the amplifiers/speakers, the better the sound. This is not to say that the Philips unit sounded bad as it still sounded great and if we did not have the Logitech unit side-by-side, I am sure everyone would have been more than satisfied with the Philips' sound. Anyway, if you don't like the speakers, you can always plug your own in the back thru stereo RCA jacks or headphone jacks. Overall, the sound on the Logitech just sounded fuller with more bass and dynamic range.
As for software, Philips comes with software from Twonky Media which turns your PC into a uPnP server so that the NP2900 can see and play music from your PC. The Logitech came with its own proprietary software that pretty much did the same thing. The one thing that the Logitech had that the Philips unit didn't was the ability to control the unit over the Web thru a standard browser. This was a pretty cool feature as you can adjust the volume and controls from the Internet on the Logitech unit whereas the Philips unit required using the remote only. For online services, the Philips let's you access Rhapsody but after the first month, you'll have to buy a subscription which is $12.99. Logitech can access Rhapsody for a fee, but can also access services such as Sirius and Pandora so it gives you more options in that regard. Since I really love the Pandora service, the Logitech gives me more options here.
The bottom line is that both units are great units that most people would be more than happy with. Depending on what you want though, each unit is designed for different tastes. If you want a stylish, sexy hi-fi unit that is going to make your interior designer happy, the Philips unit is definitely the one. If you are more utilitarian and want the unit that sounds better and has more ways to control it, the Logitech unit is the one for you. As far as price, the Logitech unit is also about $75 cheaper so if price is a factor, the Logitech unit does everything the Philips unit does. If price is not an issue, then the Philips unit just looks hotter, almost like a piece of art.
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18 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great Choice for easy-to-use Media Player, April 27, 2009
This review is from: Philips NP2900/37 WiFi Internet Radio Network Music Player with Rhapsody (Black) (Electronics)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
Length:: 5:35 Mins
I will warn you that my review compares the Philips Network Music Player to the Logitech 930-000054 Squeezebox Boom All-In-One Network Music Player with Integrated Speakers (Black) and while the Squeezebox Boom offers a few more features my personal preference is for the Philips.
Things that I like about the Philips Network Media Player
- Very easy to use - my wife prefers the ease-of-use compared to the Squeezebox Boom
- Nice functionality in the remote control
- Excellent Sound
- Relatively small footprint - not much bigger than your typical alarm clock
- External Antenna to help extend the range of your wifi network
Cons-
- Only one music network - Rhapsody
Final Verdict -
I am very happy with the Philips Network Music Player - in fact, it has taken the coveted spot in our kitchen (replacing the Squeezebox Boom) . While it would be preferable to have more music services than just Rhapsody, but in all honesty I mainly just listen to the internet radio stations anyway. Finally, the Squeezebox has more features and for the techno savvy it may be the better choice, but for us we enjoy the Philips.
4 1/2 Stars
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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Philips server failed, no radio, June 12, 2009
This review is from: Philips NP2900/37 WiFi Internet Radio Network Music Player with Rhapsody (Black) (Electronics)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
Philips Streamium NP2900
"First things first. Since getting this Internet radio I have spent about 6 weeks trying to trouble shoot what is essentially a failed device. Initially I was very happy to deal with the tech support people as they were in the USA and I was happy about that. I once did tech support for a software company and all our jobs went off shore. That said, I became very frustrated with the lack of support I was actually getting. "
Above, was the first paragraph of my initial review of the NP2900 which I held back posting. I could not believe Philips actually wanted me to review such a faulty device. It was very frustrating making call after call all to no avail. Eventually a replacement was sent to me which exhibited the same problem as the first. It refused to play any radio station labeled "USA Only". Being in Los Angeles, I knew that had to be a mistake. Well FINALLY after all the calls and a letter I wrote to corporate in Georgia , about a week or so ago a firmware update was sent to the radio. Now it plays USA Only stations with all the rest that it should. It doesn't play UK Only stations, and it shouldn't, for me. I don't know why it took so long and no one in support ever actually helped me directly but maybe in some small way my nagging got an engineer assigned to fix it.
All that said what we have here is now, a pretty nice Internet Radio/Music streaming device. I personally also have the Logitech SqueezeBox Boom. It is one of the most direct competitors for the 2900. Both are fine examples of what such a player should be. They both capture Internet radio broadcasts via a WiFi signal and can also stream music from your computer via a home network connected to the WiFi router. Each comes with accompanying software to facilitate this. The Philips includes Twonky Media Server which installs and finds and sends your music (and cover art!) to the 2900. I found the software works fairly well, but having a Squeezebox it can interfere with that software. You can also (on a PC) use "Orb", a free media streamer if you have issues with Twonky.
An issue that I continued to have with the 2900 was slow scrolling through menus. Well, TODAY there was another firmware update. Boy, those engineers are getting their "busy" on! This one fixes that issue and adds some WiFi security features and graphics.
Graphics, that's where the 2900 shines. Its screen is quite nice and in full color. The Boom uses blue/green characters only. Color is nice and it can use graphics to identify radio stations or as wallpaper or album art for your music collection. This is very cool and well executed.
The remote control is a "typical" lots of little buttons, remote. I wound up adding the radio to my Harmony 880 remote and prefer to use it to control the functions, especially at night as the original remote is not backlit. There are only four basic controls on the player itself. On the unit's top are Power, Mute, Volume Up & Down. That's it. I wish it had more but that's a design choice. The result is a very sleek minimalist radio face. It is a very "pretty" radio and will add a touch of style to your room. It also sounds VERY GOOD. The speakers are more than decent and can fill a good size room with nice rich sound.
A couple of minor annoyances are that it only has Rhapsody as a supported music service. They do include a free trial month but you have to subscribe thereafter. The Boom has a very large assortment of music services that it supports both free and pay. The other main annoyance is how to "surf" the radio section. The 2900 is radio "station" centric. Meaning you can find stations by searching for their location or by call letters. The Boom let's you find out who's on now. As in I want to listen to Talk/Progressive and it will list who is on now and you can then tune to whatever station that person is on right now, wherever they are. I find that system far more useful. You can still search for an actual station from your home town, but overall, to me, the Boom wins on usefulness. I think this is a software issue and hope Philips sees fit to address it in a future update.
When you play music stored on your computer, first it needs to be DRM free. That said it does a fine job doing that and brings any stored album art along for display. This is a way cool feature.
In summation, this is a very nice streaming player. When you get it all set up check for those updates, it's in the settings menu. I was going to give it a low rating because of the earlier issues but, that's all fixed and is deserving of 4 stars. If Philips fixes/adds the browse by topic feature I would wholeheartedly give it 5 stars. It's a very good choice.
UPDATE:
This radio is tied to Philips servers. About four days ago (end of Aug. 2009) their server died. My radio died. Epic Fail. One Star, revised.
At first I was the only post on the Philips 2900 Forum, then others posted. No response from Philips. My 2900 is now in the closet in its box. Too bad.
Keep away!!!
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