Sharing my experience with Micromax Funbook as a wireless media player

[dreamzsiva]

Hi everyone

I am a budget/newbie/wannabe audiophile . I always wanted to have a media player which would enable me to access my music collection stored on the network. My HTPC is in the living room and I wanted a stereo system in the bedroom. I tried being happy with playing music from Ipod, my android phone , even streamed music to bedroom stereo setup using Creative Xmod Wireless.

However, nothing actually satisfied my need. I wanted a touchscreen player, with a good interface, which will allow me to access huge library of music over the network. Couple of months back when Micromax Funbook was released, I read the reviews online and soon was on my way to the shop to get one myself, and boy I am so happy I did it.

It cost me 6.5k (costs less than that now), got ICS version of Android and a very decent processor for the money. Soon I was connected to home wifi, trying out different players for accessing music on LAN. But then, most of the players that are there on the Google Play , perform decently while playing music stored locally on the tablet, however fail badly with network storage.

I have always been a fan of XBMC and use it on my desktop extensively, and always wanted a similar software on Android. And almost as if my prayers were heard, XBMC has released an Android version of the software. It is not official yet, but the APK is available for download.

Pre-Built XBMC Apk Is Available, Here's What It Looks Like Running On A Nexus Q

Since the day I have got this on my tablet, there is no looking back. I spend hours at my stereo setup with this new toy. The audio quality is way better than Ipod. Very impressed with the performance of this cheap tablet.

 

[gaurav_s]

Hi dreamzsiva,

Thanks for a nice write up of your experience.
So if i take it your home network has a network shared drive (probably NFS) and you are reading from that from the Funbook?
Also the XBMC, does it run as an app. on Funbook or its a image with XBMC installed.

Thanks
Gaurav

 

[anujmishra]

Even, I am using this for past 3 - 4 months accessing all my contents stored in HDD and through Netwok (Saavn and other apps). I am using BubbleUPnp App to access all my contents and result has been excellent.

I have DLNA Setup at my home with TvMobili server and Micromax Funbook connects seamlessly to my wireless network and stream music.

I am also adding one more router (repeater) at my home so that I have access to contents to all parts of my house. :clapping:

 

[spirovious]

Congrats & welcome to.Which is the funbook model?Is is android 4.0V?

 

[dreamzsiva]

Hi dreamzsiva,

Thanks for a nice write up of your experience.
So if i take it your home network has a network shared drive (probably NFS) and you are reading from that from the Funbook?
Also the XBMC, does it run as an app. on Funbook or its a image with XBMC installed.

Thanks
Gaurav

Ya, I am using my HTPC as a NFS as well with couple of external hard drives.
XBMC is an app on Android, however , they are yet to release it on Google play as the software is not fully developed. I am using a beta version of it, compiled by some 3rd vendor(link in my original post). However, I guess one can run Ubuntu with XBMC on a tablet.

 

[dreamzsiva]

Congrats & welcome to.Which is the funbook model?Is is android 4.0V?

Ya , it is Android 4.0, also called Icecream Sandwich

 

[gaurav_s]

Even, I am using this for past 3 - 4 months accessing all my contents stored in HDD and through Netwok (Saavn and other apps). I am using BubbleUPnp App to access all my contents and result has been excellent.

I have DLNA Setup at my home with TvMobili server and Micromax Funbook connects seamlessly to my wireless network and stream music.

I am also adding one more router (repeater) at my home so that I have access to contents to all parts of my house. :clapping:

I've been playing with DLNA/UpnP for a whlie and its not entirely satisfactory.
At least in my setup, with Samsung Bluray player as DLNA client and PC running TVMobili DLNA server.

For one its not reliable, sometimes drops the stream/connection in the middle of play.
It cant read playlists?
The visual experience is not very appealing, no album art etc.

On the plus side, it can stream FLAC files. Can access content from your android mobile etc. as well.

But i can see it being quite handy in future as the DLNA protocol matures.

Gaurav

 

[anujmishra]

I agree with your certain points that it cannot read playlist. If you are using G router then there would be dropping issue. It can be solved by replacing your router with N type.

For playlist etc., I rely on media-player than DLNA server. I can create playlist in BubbleUPnp and save it.

I have used various DLNA servers past 2 years (through my Samsung LED) and performance of TvMobili is better than others.

I've been playing with DLNA/UpnP for a whlie and its not entirely satisfactory.
At least in my setup, with Samsung Bluray player as DLNA client and PC running TVMobili DLNA server.

For one its not reliable, sometimes drops the stream/connection in the middle of play.
It cant read playlists?
The visual experience is not very appealing, no album art etc.

On the plus side, it can stream FLAC files. Can access content from your android mobile etc. as well.

But i can see it being quite handy in future as the DLNA protocol matures.

Gaurav

 

[Flash]

OK a dumb question ... I am pretty lost when it comes to tech.


I use a laptop connected to a DAC + Emotiva Preamp

I use Foobar to play music.

Now can I use the Micromax tab to control foobar on my PC - basically song selection etc ?

 

[s_sachin]

Now can I use the Micromax tab to control foobar on my PC - basically song selection etc ?

Yes if you have the PC on a wireless network. The remote apps works on wireless as a transport , so both your PC and the andriod device need to be on same network

 

[baijuxavior]

OK a dumb question ... I am pretty lost when it comes to tech.


I use a laptop connected to a DAC + Emotiva Preamp

I use Foobar to play music.

Now can I use the Micromax tab to control foobar on my PC - basically song selection etc ?

You can use android tablet or phone to control foobar, xbmc etc. And you don't even need a wireless router for that. Most android devices have an option to create a virtual wifi hotspot and you can connect your pc to this hotspot easily. You can create virtual hotspot in your windows 7 laptop also, if the android device has no hotspot option.

 

[spirovious]

Ya , it is Android 4.0, also called Icecream Sandwich

Thanks,reviews say that screen is not very sensitive,touchscreen response is slow,is it so?

 

[manniraj]

Thanks,reviews say that screen is not very sensitive,touchscreen response is slow,is it so?

For the price you pay for this you cannot expect more. I have it brought sometime back for around 5.6k on ebay with a coupon. I find it VFM in all aspects.

Thanks

 

[anujmishra]

For the price you pay for this you cannot expect to more. I have it brought sometime back for around 5.6k on ebay with a coupon. I find it VFM in all aspects.

Thanks

Correct. We cannot compare it with Apple IPad 3 and/or Samsung Galaxy Tab. As per price, I see it provide lots of features.

The best part is its processor (Arm Cortex A8 1.2 Ghz) and 2 GPUs and can plug-in 3G dongle to browse internet anywhere.

 

[dreamzsiva]

The problem with UpNp clients is that one needs to run a server on the PC from which you want to stream music to android device. However, if you use XBMC client on android, you can point it to play from network share on the PC , you do not have to run a separate server on the PC. XBMC can create a media library out of the files on the share, can pull in album art, artist information, artist fanart and a lot more info. Its visually extremely appealing, thanks to the huge userbase of XBMC who keep contributing skins and plugins.

Some one was asking if he could control playback on PC from android. Again, being a XBMC fanboy, I will point to the XBMC client that can be run on android to operate a XBMC server on PC - that is if u want to play media on PC , not android. The remote app is on Google play. A short tutorial gives u an idea what it can do :Official XBMC Remote for Android - YouTube

 

[yahoo0212]

Is it possible to stream HD videos through the funbook. Which other devices one would require to stream HD video from funbook. I got AVR nd WDLive

 

[anujmishra]

Is it possible to stream HD videos through the funbook. Which other devices one would require to stream HD video from funbook. I got AVR nd WDLive

Yes of course it is possible to stream HD Video through Funbook. There is HDMI output from Funbook which connects to AVR. I regularly use for this.

Best part is available applications in Google Play can decode any kind of movie through it.

My connection is like this

Server side:
HDD -> Laptop -> Wifi

Funbook Side:

Wifi -> Funbook -> HDMI -> AVR -> LED.

 

[kneo]

Does Funbook also have regular stereo output connections? Maybe the headphone port?

I am planning to setup a chain of source -> Topping -> bookshelves. Can I directly use the headphone port of Funbook as the source whcih is connected to Topping? Also if I manage to connect my Funbook to a USB disk I dont need Wifi to begin with right? I can at least start with this.

 

[manniraj]

Does Funbook also have regular stereo output connections? Maybe the headphone port?

I am planning to setup a chain of source -> Topping -> bookshelves. Can I directly use the headphone port of Funbook as the source whcih is connected to Topping? Also if I manage to connect my Funbook to a USB disk I dont need Wifi to begin with right? I can at least start with this.

Yes it has the headphone port which I connect sometimes to my receiver. The sound is not so great using this option but far better than its own built-in speakers. You do not need to get a usb disk, it has a SD card slot with max capacity of 32GB. Put in all your music/movies in that and play them. I have put in a 32gb card and it works fine.

Thanks

 

[anujmishra]

Does Funbook also have regular stereo output connections? Maybe the headphone port?

Yes, it has regular 3.5mm stereo port.