I moved my Linux Home Server from a Sereniti 2000 case (which is a hopeless piece of crap, cheap metal, had to hammer one screw through the aluminium because it was stuck and the screwdriver literally screwed it, and noisy as hell) with a smaller Morex 2688 which sports a lot less space inside but has no fans! Ahh – a quiet server – unless it’s accessing the harddisk… This will go in a closet soon and serve my music and my videos and backup my Windows PC’s here at Chaos Central.

Next on the toylist was a Neuston Virtuoso MC-500 – an audio and video streaming box. It can play MP3, OGG, MPG-2, MPG-4 and probably more. It sports DVI, SCART (RGB Component), Optical and Coax Digital outputs, 100 MBIt Ethernet and a PC Card slot for a WLAN PC-Card. Nice stuff. And it works! Truly plug and play. Downsides so far? Sure: Requires a Windows PC as a streaming server (even though the software seems to be written in Java). It doesn’t play all DivX profiles (and no QuickTime or RealMedia)

The upside? It cost me about US$200 – which I consider an attractive price.

Right now it sit’s next to the living room TV and plays Does Humour Belong in Music (Amazon.de) by Frank Zappa. He died exactly 10 years ago.

Frank we miss you! Politics is the entertainment branch of industry. [F.Z.] from the Zappa QOTD.

Oh – there’s also the Does Humor Belong in Music DVD (amazon.com)