Having become addicted to playing audio from my laptop to my HiFi via a Bluetooth receiver, I am devastated that the system is no longer working following a few weeks of intermittent un-pairing. The device that I’ve been using is the Esinkin Bluetooth receiver which cost ~£25 and has been working flawlessly until recently.
Perusing the interweb for a more reliable device I am astonished to find examples costing up to £150. I guess you “get what you pay for” in this world, but at these prices I would seek advice from experienced users of such technology before buttering up my bank manager.
So; I would be very grateful if any of my esteemed readers can recommend a reliable Bluetooth receiver of good sound-quality, without paying over the odds.
Iirc squeezelite (which makes you linux box a squeezebox player) also makes the PC show up as a media renderer over wi-fi/network
. So pretty much any phone, tablet, laptop etc etc can cast the music straight to the linux box (no need for extra adapters etc.)
@Mark:
Sorry to omit the laptop info. I am running 64 bit Ubuntu 16.04 on a Lenovo Thinkpad T500. Not sure what “architecture” is but “lshw -c cpu” tells me, inter alia: product: Intel(R) Core™2 Duo CPU P8400 @ 2.26GHz
size: 2266MHz
It might be worth displaying permanently on the “Forum” page the info that one is advised to include with first posts. For people like me! (Or strictly: people like I, for Radio 4 listeners)
@Mr-Mac
I have not been able to discover/understand what a “media renderer” is so can’t really respond to your kind suggestion. Perhaps I haven’t provided enough info on my audio arrangement.
I have both a laptop with Bluetooth that provides a sound source (music files or internet radio) and a basic hi-fi amplifier. To get the music to play through the hi-fi without cables, I bought a Bluetooth receiver whose RCA outputs are connected to the amp.
Have you tried booting a previous kernel … it might be a kernel regression (that came in via a kernel update) that caused the problem and not hardware.
We used to have that info on the front page, but nobody ever read it … and we’ve repeated that it’s important to provide as much information as possible to ‘help people help you’ ‘ad infinitum’
I wasn’t ‘having a go’ Keith, just prompting for relevant information
My point is, there are hundreds of different Linux distros and versions (and a handful kernel architectures … i386, amd64, Itanium, ARM, MIPS, etc … but usually 32bit or 64bit will suffice) … any response is highly likely to depend on this information, so it should ALWAYS be included, even where you think it may not be relevant.
I mean you’d think a a piece of hardware that works in Ubuntu 16.04 64bit would work in Fedora 18 32bit right … not necessarily the case, often but not necessarily.
And it’s even more important when asking for ‘support’ where troubleshooting and fixing the issue is even more likely to be distro/version/architecture specific.
You are absolutely right to mention it, Mark, and I usually do remember to add info on my system. I shall try to do better next time! :-[
As for the Bluetooth thing: I have just done a software update and BT is working fine. So as usual I have wasted your time - sorry. But perhaps not completely, as it might be useful for me to know how to “boot a previous kernel”. Would you tell me, please, how one does that and also the circumstances under which one might wish to do it?
Media renderer basically shows your pc up on network as a Dlna endpoint for music in this case then all your devices can cast music to that renderer (your pc) over wifi.
When you set that up on the linux box it will then automatically show up to all devices on same network. So basically works very similar to BT but doesn’t need a BT adapter on PC and obv range is better
Hmmm! Well, thank you for offering an explanation, and I think I have the gist of it. Although it seems from your explanation that my amp will need to be one of these new-fangled jobs that has wi-fi.
Such a system would have, as you say, much better range than Bluetooth. Sadly my funds won’t stretch to fancy kit, so I shall have to stick with BT.
Thank you for taking the trouble to explain.
My apologies i thought you had a linux box connected to hi-fi and linux box had a bt adapter for audio…
I have a pc setup with vortexbox to act as a Dlna end point, auto cd ripper, playback music on hi-fi via USB dac and also makes music avail over network. Brill wee system
Your system sounds wonderful, even though I don’t know what all the words mean.
Worth looking into, so perhaps I could come back to you if it looks like something I might try. And after I’ve found what all the words mean!
I have just done a software update and BT is working fine.
Great news Keith
So as usual I have wasted your time - sorry.
Never a waste my mate, if i didn’t enjoy trying to assist I simply wouldn’t do it
it might be useful for me to know how to "boot a previous kernel". Would you tell me, please
Sure - When you turn on your PC and get to the GRUB menu, use the down arrow key to move down to “Advanced options…” and hit enter. Now choose an option that doesn’t end with “(upstart)” or “(recovery mode)” and hit enter to boot it.
circumstances under which one might wish to do it?
If a kernel update breaks something on your system … you can still boot the previous kernel.
Re GRUB menu: when I boot up the laptop, there is the POST then it goes straight to Ubuntu without anything resembling a GRUB menu. Perhaps there is a special way of booting that reveals it?
Turn on your PC, and when you see the POST screen, hit and hold the Shift key … this should unhide the GRUB menu.
Some PC’s don’t like you holding Shift at the POST screen and stall (usually beeping like nuts because it thinks there’s a keyboard problem) … if yours does this, instead try hitting Shift IMMEDIATELY after the POST screen.
