# Stream laptop output to musicbox

**URL:** <https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514>\
**Category:** Pi MusicBox (archive)\
**Created:** [January 6, 2015, 2:13pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514 "2015-01-06T14:13:49Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 20\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Michael\_Michaelsen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/53a042/32.png) [@Michael\_Michaelsen](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/Michael_Michaelsen)\
**Post date:** [January 6, 2015, 2:13pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/1 "2015-01-06T14:13:50Z")

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Hi there!  
I have been using musicbox on my new raspberry for a couple of days now and I love it so far.  
What I’m trying to accomplish at the moment is to stream all my laptop (ubunbtu 14.10) audio output to musicbox via DLNA/UPnP.

On my former setup with raspbian it was pretty easy to set up using pulseaudio and following this tutorial: [Link](http://rootprompt.apatsch.net/2013/02/20/raspberry-pi-network-audio-player-pulseaudio-dlna-and-bluetooth-a2dp-part-1-pulseaudio)

Since musicbox already has DLNA integration I thought it might be best to give this a try. After a little while on google I came up with this: [Link](http://oliversmith.io/technology/2012/01/10/streaming-audio-from-ubuntu-linux-to-a-dlna-player-blu-ray-or-ps3)  
So following this tutorial I think that my Laptop is now working as a DLNAServer streaming all soundoutput.

The Question is how do I make musicbox recognize and use this stream?At one point the tutorial suggests to:

> " Connect your player to the DLNA device which should have appeared  
> (probably as GstLaunch) and you should hear any audio played on your  
> computer through your DLNA device."

Could anyone point me in the right direction to get this working with musicbox since I can’t find an option to chose a device.

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**Author:** ![kingosticks](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/858c86/32.png) [@kingosticks](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/kingosticks)\
**Post date:** [January 6, 2015, 3:28pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/2 "2015-01-06T15:28:17Z")

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As far as I know, Musicbox only has a dlna/upnp renderer, it needs to be told what to do by a controller (such a bubbleupnp for android). With something like bubbleupnp you should be able to select the server (your laptop) and renderer (musicbox) you want to use. Having said all that, musicbox changed from using gmediarender to upmpdcli in v0.5.1 beta and I’ve not personally tried it since then.

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**Author:** ![Michael\_Michaelsen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/53a042/32.png) [@Michael\_Michaelsen](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/Michael_Michaelsen)\
**Post date:** [January 6, 2015, 11:14pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/3 "2015-01-06T23:14:50Z")

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thanks a lot!  
so now I installed GuPnP AV Controllpoint and actually was able to choose rygels Gst Launch Stream (as mentioned in the tutorial I posted above). After starting playback I actually got sound through musicbox for about 5 seconds. After that it was gone. Haven’t been able to get sound ever since…  
Well but that seems to be the right direction.

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**Author:** ![jochen](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/discourse.mopidy.com/jochen/32/473_2.png) [@jochen](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/jochen)\
**Post date:** [January 7, 2015, 11:59am UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/4 "2015-01-07T11:59:03Z")

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Hi,

another way would be to use SongCast. With that you can apparently also stream your sound output to a SongCast receiver. The receiver part needs to be added to the musicbox system, It is basically an extension to the upmpdcli component that is included in musicbox already.

I wanted to try it out but could not get it to work with the given documentation:

> [@How to get SongCast working](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/how-to-get-songcast-working/502/1):
>
> Hi, in version 0.9.0 of the upmpdcli (which is currently used by musicbox for upnp streaming) support for SongCast was added. With Songcast, the whole sound output from a PC can be streamed to a songcast receiver. I’ve tried to get it to work based on the description on the upmpdcli website, but I did not get it to work. I followed the description on [http://www.lesbonscomptes.com/upmpdcli/sc2mpd.html](http://www.lesbonscomptes.com/upmpdcli/sc2mpd.html) and was able to compile the binary, but in the SongCast program on my PC the musicbox was no…

Jochen

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**Author:** ![Michael\_Michaelsen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/53a042/32.png) [@Michael\_Michaelsen](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/Michael_Michaelsen)\
**Post date:** [January 7, 2015, 1:51pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/5 "2015-01-07T13:51:34Z")

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> [@jochen](#):
>
> another way would be to use SongCast.

Thanks! But google tells me that apparently Soundcast is Windows and Mac only or am I missing something?

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**Author:** ![kingosticks](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/858c86/32.png) [@kingosticks](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/kingosticks)\
**Post date:** [January 7, 2015, 3:29pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/6 "2015-01-07T15:29:17Z")

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Nope, you are correct and pulseaudio is probably the only option. Since you did get a few seconds of sound you can’t be too far off. Are you using a wired connection?

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**Author:** ![Michael\_Michaelsen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/53a042/32.png) [@Michael\_Michaelsen](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/Michael_Michaelsen)\
**Post date:** [January 7, 2015, 3:42pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/7 "2015-01-07T15:42:06Z")

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I’m using a wired connection for my laptop and wireless for the pi…  
Just tried to stream mp3 sound from my android phone to musicbox via BubbleUPnP. That at least worked fine despite both devices using wifi. So maybe I’m just dealing with an compression issue since my rygel configuration turns the stream into flac output…hmm.  
As soon as I get home I’ll do some troubleshooting.

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**Author:** ![kingosticks](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/858c86/32.png) [@kingosticks](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/kingosticks)\
**Post date:** [January 7, 2015, 5:10pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/8 "2015-01-07T17:10:34Z")

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Perhaps it’s that, it’s certainly a good idea to use whatever format gives the pi the least work possible to do.

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**Author:** ![Michael\_Michaelsen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/53a042/32.png) [@Michael\_Michaelsen](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/Michael_Michaelsen)\
**Post date:** [January 7, 2015, 6:37pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/9 "2015-01-07T18:37:40Z")

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Figured it out! So it was an compression issue… switching to wave encoding solved the problem. As soon as I find the time I’ll post the complete setup… thanks for all the help!

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**Author:** ![jochen](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/discourse.mopidy.com/jochen/32/473_2.png) [@jochen](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/jochen)\
**Post date:** [January 8, 2015, 10:54am UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/10 "2015-01-08T10:54:03Z")

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Hey,  
to quickly return to my previous post: yes, SongCast does not seem to be supporting your platform.  
Just came across a different solution though that might be interesting for others: Asset UPnP DLNA ([http://www.dbpoweramp.com/asset-upnp-dlna.htm](http://www.dbpoweramp.com/asset-upnp-dlna.htm))

Basically, it is a DLNA server that also allows you to stream your sound output via UPNP just like a web radio station.  
It’s available for WIndows, Mac, Debian, Raspberry and QNAP.  
Unfortunately, it is not free, though.

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**Author:** ![Michael\_Michaelsen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/53a042/32.png) [@Michael\_Michaelsen](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/Michael_Michaelsen)\
**Post date:** [January 8, 2015, 12:05pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/11 "2015-01-08T12:05:06Z")

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> [@jochen](#):
>
> Asset UPnP DLNA ([[Asset UPnP DLNA](http://www.dbpoweramp.com/asset-upnp-dlna.htm)][1])

Looks nice actually…wish the trial version had the stream pc audio card feature. It’s a little risky for me to spend 25 € for something that might not work for me…

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**Author:** ![vrs01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/71e660/32.png) [@vrs01](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/vrs01)\
**Post date:** [January 9, 2015, 9:48am UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/12 "2015-01-09T09:48:21Z")

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On Windows you can use:

[http://www.streamwhatyouhear.com/](http://www.streamwhatyouhear.com/)

to capture the audio output and send it via UPnP. It’s free and works fine except for a delay of a few seconds.

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**Author:** ![JackRichardson](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/discourse.mopidy.com/jackrichardson/32/1174_2.png) [@JackRichardson](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/JackRichardson)\
**Post date:** [January 9, 2015, 12:36pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/13 "2015-01-09T12:36:35Z")

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Seeing as musicbox has Shairport included, can’t you just install this on your computer? - [http://tuneblade.com/](http://tuneblade.com/)  
I use it all the time, and have no issues, no need to install anything extra on the Pi. Having said that, I am still running pimusicbox 0.5 until the Shairport issue is fixed with version 0.5.2.

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**Author:** ![kingosticks](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/858c86/32.png) [@kingosticks](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/kingosticks)\
**Post date:** [January 9, 2015, 1:43pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/14 "2015-01-09T13:43:58Z")

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The OP wanted to stream his Ubuntu (not Windows) laptop output. It’s great  
that there’s no need to install anything extra on musicbox with any of  
these methods. Pulseaudio on an Ubuntu laptop should be perfectly capable  
of sending audio for playback on musicbox’s airplay or upnp interfaces so  
you should be able to try both methods pretty easily; the guide at  
[http://westmarch.sjsoft.com/2014/04/streaming-audio-linux-to-raspbmc/](http://westmarch.sjsoft.com/2014/04/streaming-audio-linux-to-raspbmc/) might  
be helpful. But if using shairport means you need to stick to older  
versions of musicbox then it’s probably better to use upnp, for now.

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**Author:** ![surfacescan](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/discourse.mopidy.com/surfacescan/32/62_2.png) [@surfacescan](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/surfacescan)\
**Post date:** [January 9, 2015, 2:19pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/15 "2015-01-09T14:19:36Z")

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Hi @Michael_Michaelsen I would love to know the setup you finally arrived at. Please do post if you get the chance.

Thanks!

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**Author:** ![David\_R](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/discourse.mopidy.com/david_r/32/1335_2.png) [@David\_R](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/David_R)\
**Post date:** [January 10, 2015, 1:45pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/16 "2015-01-10T13:45:49Z")

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I’m using the shairport-sync musicbox feature with [pulseaudio/raop2](http://hfujita.github.io/pulseaudio-raop2/) on linux. The latest commit for pulseaudio/raop2 resolved my last issues with stutter. Sadly I had to update the shairport-sync package on the musicbox manually with the instructions on it’s [github page](https://github.com/mikebrady/shairport-sync). You have to install a gcc and make and resolve some conflicts but it’s straight-forward. And you can do it all as root.  
Or you can just use musicbox version 5 until shairport-sync is updated.  
Pulseaudio/raop2 is awesome. I hope it will be merged into mainline pulseaudio some day. It’s stable enough right now.

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**Author:** ![woutervanwijk](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/discourse.mopidy.com/woutervanwijk/32/15_2.png) [@woutervanwijk](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/woutervanwijk)\
**Post date:** [January 13, 2015, 10:49am UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/17 "2015-01-13T10:49:29Z")

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I will update shairport-sync in the next version

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**Author:** ![tot\_rispekt](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/discourse.mopidy.com/tot_rispekt/32/1277_2.png) [@tot\_rispekt](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/tot_rispekt)\
**Post date:** [March 21, 2015, 12:03pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/18 "2015-03-21T12:03:36Z")

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I want to add to this thread that there is also this:  
[https://github.com/masmu/pulseaudio-dlna/tree/master/debian](https://github.com/masmu/pulseaudio-dlna/tree/master/debian)  
Tested on Debian Jessie/gnome with pulse. In many ways even better than rygel.

if you use ubuntu:  
[https://launchpad.net/~qos/+archive/ubuntu/pulseaudio-dlna](https://launchpad.net/~qos/+archive/ubuntu/pulseaudio-dlna)

the latency on these is always quite large. if you need something that has low latency I suggest you check out Soundwire. Tweaking the buffers with it I was able to achiece almost non-existent latency. It has a RPi version. Obviously you need to install it on the PiMusicBox.

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**Author:** ![PieterScheffers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/48db29/32.png) [@PieterScheffers](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/PieterScheffers)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2015, 7:09pm UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/19 "2015-05-16T19:09:36Z")

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I want to stream music from a Windows PC.  
Streamwhatyouhear didn’t work for me, so I just use windows media player.  
Enable uPnP/DLNa on the pimusicbox.  
Then in windows media player select ‘play to’ and select ‘musicbox’ to stream the music.  
This way you can add a single song, or an entire playlist.

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**Author:** ![jodal](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/discourse.mopidy.com/jodal/32/2564_2.png) [@jodal](https://discourse.mopidy.com/u/jodal)\
**Post date:** [February 19, 2026, 11:47am UTC](https://discourse.mopidy.com/t/stream-laptop-output-to-musicbox/514/20 "2026-02-19T11:47:42Z")

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