It would be interesting to hear your thoughts, and if you have an Id, how do you use it? Is it mainly a renderer? Do you use it as a standalone media computer? Any video?
My Id (I bought your last one) sits on top of my Class D Preamp. I use it to play FLAC quality music files at high quality. I have the 1 TB HDD version and use it to keep a copy of all music files. It plays from the main library on the PC where I rip.
What do you like? What do you hope for?
Now that the system is setup and I am understanding how libraries work and am taking advantage of other integral pieces like M0 4MEDIA, I am having a blast and feel like a part of the new millennium finally. I even got music to play over my Android though there is something probably with Firewall settings that causes it stop once I leave the house.
After going through the learning curve, already I am not caring about the masses of people who could enjoy this product but will not because while MC and Id's are great for the technical oriented consumer, most people I know are not willing to go through figuring it out. More and more of my family and friends are turning into Spotify list people. They want super-easy. Even my techy ME son who used to curate his own music playlists like I am doing has gone Spotify because "he doesn't have time". I have been curating music since the 60's starting with a Radio Shack integrated FM radio/tape deck recording things off the radio and making mixtapes back before they were called that. I then progressed through all kinds of iterations of 8-track, cassettes, CD's, radio, copying, ripping, etc to make custom mixtapes on the media du jour. Now, the Id, MC (ratings, playlists) and easy access to digital music has given me capabilities beyond anything I previously imagined.
I met a guy in his 30's down in LA who does custom multi-media installations for the rich and famous. These people don't care what it costs - just make it look nice, sound great, and easy to use. I asked him what he thought about JRiver and he never heard of it. He is mostly using Sonos based systems for wireless installs in big homes. I share this because while it seems Id and MC would be great for these applications here is a guy at the top of this game doing $50-100K+ installs and he hasn't heard of it.
Since I am a JRiver fan, seeing this company succeed on a larger scale would be fun. I have always enjoyed being a discriminating music consumer and love making my own playlists. Where I am going with this screed? I don't really know. My vision would be that if JRiver is going to produce an Id in the $1k range, think about going all in and fleshing out a complete turn-key system that potentially comes integrated with the other components. Maybe that is not the vision for JRiver and you are happy with being a sub-assembly in the media universe, but once you get in the $1k range, I don't see a market there - personally, at that point I would have seen a NAS system as fitting more of the bill for me. Or, I would have just bought a multimedia focused PC system not really caring about the fact I am spending more on electricity vs the small Raspberry power draw.
When you think about the main advantage of a Raspberry it is small form factor and low power usage. Who cares about that, besides the few truly concerned about ecological issues, is those in an off-grid situation like an RV, van, Tiny Home, an off-grid house, etc. I can imagine a little Id hooked up to the small TV screen and music system in my friend's all-wheel drive, fully outfitted, Winnebago Sprinter Van. That would be cool.
