BIOS: Technology Means Business

TerraTec’s Noxon 2 Audio is a new breed of audio player for your home or office. And it’s nothing short of amazing value. Wherever you can access your broadband connection via a Wi-Fi or Ethernet network, you can listen to over 2500 Internet radio stations (streaming MP3, MMS) from countries all around the world - or simply access your entire MP3 or WMA archive from your computer’s HDD or external UPnP-compliant storage solution.

The Noxon 2 Audio (Best Current Price: £125) is essentially an IP radio receiver designed for 54Mbit/s wireless networks and can also be operated on 11Mbit/s networks. The external antenna ensures optimal signal quality (although some Internet radio stations are poor quality), while WEP and WPA encryption support provides secure data transfer from the sender to the receiver. Moreover, if your Noxon 2 Audio ever finds itself outside the range of an available wireless network (like in a basement), you can continue to use it simply by plugging it into your Ethernet cable-connected home network-no setup necessary.

Whatever your taste, just think of the unlimited variety of radio stations you can now access without needing to even boot your computer - American Indie, Indian Bollywood, Scandinavian Electronica, Australian shows from back home. The list is seemingly endless and you can easily brows by other country, genre and popularity. And if you find something you like, you can press the smiley face on the remote to save it to your favourites list, or the sad face to banish it. With the Noxon 2 Audio it really does seem as though the traditional radio has had its day.

Operating this portable, ergonomic silver-and-white jukebox using the integrated buttons is a snap, while the high contrast display gives you control over your music playback. Terratec even supplies an infrared remote control so the gizmo can be integrated into your living space just like a regular audio device. The device not only has a fixed MAC address, but it also supports WEP/WPA encryption (64/128-bit key support) and proxy servers to ensure a long and happy integration in your network.

An additional USB 2.0 port adds the finishing touch for complete music diversity - use it to connect your portable MP3 player, memory stick or a portable USB 2.0 drive containing your personal playlists. The Noxon 2 Audio can also play MP3 and WMA 9 audio formats at up to 320Kbit/s using an external UPnP device (TwonkyVision software supplied). Support for Digital Rights Management (DRM) also guarantees that you can play songs bought online that have Windows Media DRM10 copy protection. Playlists supported include M3U and PLS.

There are a few downsides to the Noxon 2 Audio. Firstly, there are no integrated speakers, although Terratec says it plans to release an add-on speaker system later in the year (there’s a proprietary speaker connector built into the underside of the player). As a result you’ll need to pipe your tunes through your existing hi-fi (optical digital and RCA outputs included) or listen via the headphone socket. The Line output is located on the rear panel of the device. The output is intended to be connected to the Line input of your Hi-Fi amplifier or a pair of active speakers (i.e. speakers with built-in amplifiers). The output is designed for a voltage level of 2-VRMS.

The digital audio output (S/PDIF), also at the rear of the player, is available to connect a digital amplifier using an optical cable (also known as an optical waveguide or TOS link). One of the advantages of digital transmission of the audio signal to the amplifier is that the interference cannot affect the signal and reduce the quality as can occur with analogue transmission. You can also connect the optical input of a minidisk recorder to this output to save the playlist on MD.

The second issue is that the product’s build quality is disappointing. In particular the plastic silver buttons on the device itself look cheap and are noisy when clicked, and the remote control is basic and isn’t backlit. The LCD is also fixed, making it difficult to view comfortably if the device is below eye level or placed at an angle.

Terratec’s Noxon 2 Audio is an excellent value product that allows you to listen to thousands of free Internet radio stations for free without even booting your computer. It’ll eat into your broadband package if you’re not on an unlimited (flat rate) deal, but it’s a great taste of what’s to come in terms of the future of radio. It’s relatively easy to use, but it doesn’t have the aesthetic design and build quality of a consumer audio device. If you’ve grown tired with the limited choice and occasionally poor sound quality of DAB radio products, the Noxon 2 Audio is definitely worth a closer look. [8]

[Best Wireless Media Player Pricing UK]
[Best Wireless Media Player Pricing US]