Is there a cheaper alternative to Airport Express?

[Rob00GT]

I want to stream music to a stereo in my living room. I use iTunes and the Apple Airport Express seems like a perfect solution (plugs into the network and the stereo, gets IP from DHCP, pretty much plug-and-play) except for the outrageous price and "optional" stereo connection package.

Is there a cheaper alternative? I do not need the wireless features, I have a good wired network in my home already.

[boggen]

rubs chin...

i bought a couple 25foot, rca style cables and a couple female to female rca connectors. to run video and L plus Right from pc in basement to tv upstairs. i had slight quailty degradation in video. but audio was fine.

50foot pressed the limits of the cheapo rca cables. for video.

needless to say winter came. and being in a farm house. a mouse decided to come in and snake on cable

(have creavite audigy platium, that has the remote) just setup a standard remote extender and it worked for what was wanted.)

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find a cheap used / referbished computer. that has motherboard, cpu, some ram, sound card, network card and set it up as media server (old pc perhaps laying around?)

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get a tivo, and do a little hacking to turn them into home network media server.

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do a google search for "HTPC" aka "home theater pc" might bring up some results

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www.x10.com has extenders stero, video, camera etenders.

www.radioshack.com has some speaker extenders. that may work for need.

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[Rob00GT]

get a tivo, and do a little hacking to turn them into home network media server.

Actually that is my current project! I have two DirecTV/Series 2 Tivos that I've hacked using the Zipper and then installed JavaHMO on a Windows pc. This will allow full access to mp3 and picture files. The downside is that you must navigate the music library using the tv. When I want to listen to music I usually don't want to turn on the tv, but having a computer on is fine.

I do have a couple of old computers lying around. One will probably be used to test something or other when I find another alternative. And the extra-long RCA cables is my current solution, but not very practical.