We've put some effort into improving our web streams recently, and now that the work is pretty much done, I thought I'd do a quick writeup.
First off, it's worth pointing out that for the past little while, we've actually had four streams for you to choose from. They're all linked from the Internet Streams page, which you can also reach from the "Other" link in the upper-right-corner of every page.
In addition to the 128k MP3 stream that is at the main Listen Now link (and playable via the mini-player on the homepage), we have three other varieties for you to choose from:
Behind the scenes, we've made some changes that I'm pretty excited about. The biggest one is the Aphex Compellor that processes both our over-the-air signal and our stream. Without getting too scientific, it helps ride the audio levels on those occasions when our DJs are too busy dancing around the control room. It sounds SO MUCH BETTER than what we were using before.
Once the signal hits the Compellor, it's now 100% digital until it gets to your computer. We're a Linux shop for the most part, and for the longest time it was difficult to find sound cards with digital inputs that sounded decent and had full Linux support. That has all changed lately with the widespread adoption of the Class 2 USB Audio spec. We get audio from the Compellor into the computer via a HiFimeDIY UX1, which is a solid little box that will also double as a portable Digital-to-Audio convertor & headphone amp in a pinch.
Once the stream is in the computer, we use the following open-source software to get it out to you:
If you're still reading at this point, you're probably some kind of computer audio nerd. If so, and you have questions or want to compare notes on your own streaming setup, feel free to drop me a line!