Apple’s AirPlay is the envy of every audio lover. It’s slick, simple, and just works. There are many, however, who don’t own Apple products or want to be part of Apple’s ecosystem.
If you’re in that camp and you want to stream digital files to your hifi system, what options do you have if you can’t use AirPlay? Fortunately, for PC users there are alternatives such as UPnP (for universal plug n play) and DLNA (for digital living network alliance). As an aside, I don’t know what it is with PC-oriented terms, but they are simply terrible. Someone needs to follow Apple’s lead and get some cool terms, not acronyms.
UPnP/DLNA promise to give you some of the same benefits as Apple’s AirPlay, though it’s a bit more work and not as elegant a solution–but it works. The Computer Audiophile has put together a nice “how to” to assist users in putting together a UPnP/DLNA solution here. So if you’re ready to make the plunge into digital streaming of your media but don’t know where to start, this just might help you out.
