Winamp Remote Rocks!

I can't stop telling my friends about Winamp Remote, which enables you to stream your personal audio and video to any Web browser. Winamp Remote, though still just in Beta test, works flawlessly. Since I've been using Winamp almost exclusively to manage and play my MP3 and Video files saved to disk, I had a ready-made 1300-song catalog to run my tests. There is some setup required, but this mostly just involves setting up remote login and password credentials.

The first thing I did after configuring Winamp Remote was to log into the Winamp server from my smartphone. When I logged on to Winamp Remote with the credentials I established during setup, I was stunned to see a perfect mirror of the Music and Video directories on my desktop hard drive. Since this week I've been listening to the John Mayer Trio, I opened the John Mayer folder, clicked on the trio's screaming version of Jimi Hendrix's Wait Until Tomorrow, and proceeded to bask in sonic bliss.

Note: If you're going to stream audio and video over your mobile device, you must have an unlimited data plan or you'll get a nasty surprise on your next cell phone bill.

Later that day, I visited my good friend Tim, President of Broadcast Supply Warehouse. BSW is a fantastic source of gear for the home audio enthusiast--digital recording hardware/software, mics, mixers, monitors, and the like.

We were sitting at BSW's state-of-the-art ProTools console, a Mac-driven system. I asked Tim to launch Safari, and then proceeded to play my music remotely through a pair of $6000 studio monitors. This was just too much fun for a couple of music geeks.

Now before you think this is just another Napster, that concept is completely wrong. You can only share your music selectively with friends whom you've selected. Also, this is audio and video streaming only; you can't save the files down to your computer. So it's really just a cool way to host a listening session with friends.

Check it out on www.winamp.com. When you arrive at the Winamp Home Page, type Winamp Remote In the Search box. Have fun!