A brief review of JRiver's Id-Pi software

After purr1n posted his review and how to for the Pi2AES, I decided to give the Raspberry Pi another shot at becoming my primary digital transport. I tried using a Pi back in 2016 but the audio hats were not what they are today. I eventually stuck with my media pc with pro-grade audio card with AES out. This time the Pi2AES whipped the shit out of my media pc so I went about trying out different OS'es for the PI. Since Id-Pi is not free like most others I thought I'd try to save some folks some money. (Is this foreshadowing?).

What is it?
Id-Pi is a stripped down version of the JRiver media software meant to run on the Raspberry Pi as its primary OS.

How Much does it cost and where can I get it?
Contact Jriver and paypal them $39. You will get a 16gb microSD card with Id-Pi already installed in a few days under normal non-quarantine conditions. It is not available for download.

Streaming? Spotify? Tidal? Does it do it?
Id-Pi does not offer streaming integration but you should be able to use it as an endpoint from say a smartphone with a streaming app provided the app can see it on the network. You will probably need an extra app like BubbleUpnp to accomplish this (similar to what you have to do with the free version of volumio). Jriver does not seem to have any plans for streaming integration even for the pc, mac or linux versions - a point here for Volumio which at least offers a pay version with streaming integration.

Is Id-Pi any good?
Sound quality wise its great - equal to Volumio and MoOde. Interface-wise it is superior to both. Jriver's web based control known called 'Panel' is just plain better and feels way more solid than the interfaces for Volumio and MoOde. The android/apple app remote JRemote is amazingly good. On first time start up, Id Pi indexes your music library much faster and is more reliable than other Raspberry Pi software I have used. Overall it feels more solid during use.

Issues: Often when I use JRemote, album art is sometimes missing on the playback screen. This isn't a tagging issue, its a speed issue and is never a problem in the full version of Jriver. To be fair, and in my experience, Volumio and MoOde also have missing album art problems but those OSes are free to download.

Recommendation
If you don't already own* JRiver on a PC and you like the interface and remotes then buy it. Just understand that the interface is what you are paying for. You can try out a live version of the web-based remote (Panel) at this link.
login/password: first/second http://idtest.jriver.com:52199. Download a trial version of Jriver(PC) and Jremote to try before you buy as well.


*If you already own Jriver on a pc, you could just install volumio or moode on your Pi and configure Jriver to play to them. I still have my trusty media pc and when I have it and the Pi hardwired to my network there is no difference in SQ between using the old pc as a server with the Pi as a renderer and native playback on the Pi no matter what Pi OS I use.

 

Have any screenshots of the web-based controls?

 

See the link to the web based remote I posted above.