Digital jukeboxes are like TiVo for music

Over the last few weeks, I've been coming down pretty hard on manufacturers who in my opinion have clogged store shelves with ho-hum gadgetry and PC products sorely lacking in real eye-popping innovation. And while we did manage to find some hot spots of innovation, like the ever improving cellular phone, I was delighted this week to stumble upon another gem of a product category that may someday soon change the way we all listen to music.

They're called digital jukeboxes, and though the idea is not that new, or even that radical, the latest product in the category is nearing what I would call almost-ready-for-prime-time. Or in other words, a great, nearly-mature product that a techie will enjoy sinking his teeth into.

Digital jukeboxes do it all
The device I've been testing is called the AudioReQuest from ReQuest Multimedia. Strange caplitalizations in its name aside, ReQuest Multimedia has built an intriguing device that is essentially a custom PC for your music files. Sit it next to your stereo and you can archive your entire CD collection, as well as music from any audio source you may have. Connect it to your TV, and through the colorful interface you can search your music collection by artist, by album and even by how you rated each song. It can even turn your TV itself into an addictive laser show when music is playing.

Better still, attach the AudioReQuest to your PC and you can finally move your MP3 files off your hard drive and even connect to the Internet to download more files and artist and track information directly. I was able to back up my hard drive's collection of MP3 files, and archive over 10 CDs in just a few hours. In addition to copying and archiving songs, the jukebox software lets you create custom playlists from your music collection--perfect for parties. And since my stereo has a CD burner, I was able to copy a playlist straight to a blank disk and then enjoy my playlist in my car's CD player.

Geek alert
Of course, the software interface is something only a geek will truly understand. Odd inconsistencies are everywhere: On some screens you can't enter the song title, only the album and year. But from other screens you can type in the title but not the album name, etc. It takes a bit of fiddling to develop a navigational style that will get the job done, and no amount of explaining will make that easy for someone not born with DOS or Unix commands in their head.

The hardware connections are also strangely high-end and low-end. You can connect a USB keyboard or an old school AT keyboard, but the unit is missing the most common keyboard connector of them all--the venerable PS/2. Luckily I had an old cigarette lighter-sized AT connector and PS2 adaptor, because using a keyboard is a must if you plan to type in song titles for every track you archive. For the ultimate flashback, the unit even comes with a function key template so you can Shift-F12 your way to a faster library.

Networked and ready
The same high-low options abound when you connect to a PC. On the high end, the ReQuest gives you a nice Ethernet option, but then uses an old parallel port connection for PCs without a network card. It's as if the developers missed the PCs that fell between 1996 and 2000--again something any geek with a drawer-full of adapters and plugs can overcome, but not something mom and dad will enjoy wresting with. If you have a home network, the AudioReQuest is accessible from any point on your network--making this a great glimpse of the media options a home network may someday sport. And best of all, you can have it today.

Quirks aside, I have to say that ReQuest's digital jukebox did for music what my TiVo did for watching TV. It enriched the experience and took things to a completely new level. It instantly freed me from that awful pile of CDs growing in my living room, it gave me a way to listen to what I wanted to listen to and in what order with a simple click of a button, and it took away that annoying balancing act of trying to have a good time and playing DJ swapping discs all night.

The player holds about 5,000 songs or 525 hours of play and is a pricey but still reasonable $1,199. For smaller music collections, The AudioReQuest also comes in a 350-hour version for $799. For more info, try www.request.com.

Bottom line: this is a pricey way to get control of your music, but well worth the cost if you have a giant collection or love to customize how, when and where you listen to music. Overall, the category is still raw as evidenced by the odd hardware and software glitches, and there will be bigger names entering this market in the fall, but clearly the home is about to get some serious new audio capabilities and I eagerly applaud any newcomer willing to blaze the trail. Until we have giant media servers and seamless broadband networking in the home, the AudioReQuest is like a little gift from the future.

Alice Hill was the vice president of development and editorial director for CNET and is EVP of Cornerhardware.com. She covers technology every other week for ZDNet News, pondering everything from the wireless Web to why geeks love motor scooters and the twilight of the LCD display. She welcomes your comments and e-mails.