The PSX1 is very cool with the MX6000. If you are not fortunate enough to be able to afford the 6000, the PSX2 has component video out and is the best standalone dock on the planet. IR control front and rear. A very, very nice GUI that will wow you or your clients. Somewhere around 200 discrete commands!! Every conceivable shuffle, search, play by genre/artist/etc ... It's worth a look!

I completely agree.

I have integrated this with URC & RTI, and it is amazing. The GUI is fast & flows really nicely.

Every customer that has seen one in the showroom, now has one in their system.

I concur, just wish it had IP interface to be used with touchpanels and such like an escient.

how much is it? So far I haven't found a dock that can really compete against an ATV for overall functionality and WOW for the price.

The little CI features are cool, Apple could be so much better if they just tried.

msrp $399

The PSX-2 is the best dock currently available. The above statement surely hits home though. I own both, and I lean more toward the ATV. My main concern is the iPod is portable, so when it is away from home what is the music source? If you go with a dedicated iPod for home plus the price of a dock, it gets a little pricey. I really like my ATV.

Hey Joey,

How did that RTI layout end up working out?
Which way did you lean? do a keyboard ?

You could keep the ipod as portable and stream itunes from a pc or mac in the house to the PSX-2.

you could remember to take your iPod out of your pocket and put it back on the dock when you get home. and when you are out and about with your ipod why would you need it in the dock, you're not even home.

;)

It is still a work in progress, mainly becuase of how much control there is over the unit... I am still amazed at how this thing can be controlled.

It started at almost 10 pages of control, but I realized very quickly, I need to trim it down.

I sold my personal unit last week, and I need to get another one to keep on playing... I dont like to design blindly (without product).

ATV is great, and has a market of its own.

The ipod / dock solution is a different market, in my opinion. Somone who needs music to be centrally located, and always available surely would not consider the ipod/dock as the sole music source.

I, on the other hand, never need to have the music stored in my house while I am not there, since my wife enjoys completely different music than I do, and she has her own Ipod.

I enjoy the ability to sort, categorize & make playlists only once, and have that exact layout where ever my ipod will end up, wether in my truck, or in the garage, or on the boat, or at a friends houses. I really enjoy the portability aspect of ipod/docking/plugging, rather than the stationary aspect of the ATV.

Joey you make some good points about the ATV.

I have just barely started working with them. My thought is to have any laptop and computer in the house back up to a NAS so that EVERYONE's music is always fed to the ATV.

For my larger system's I think that you should always have some sort of Dock and Music server.

For my more modest systems $5 - $10 k I really haven't figured out the best solutions, we just did our first ATV system recently and so far it has proven to be great, but the family doesn't have a an ipod (yet) they just use iTunes as a way to manage their music.

I know what you mean ....
One client I did a genre search only type interface since this would have been her ideal way of using her old FP-1
Others I've done a keyboard search layout.
At my house I use the jukebox features and a keyboard hybrid but I haven't had as much time to play with it in the last 2-3 weeks. I've had to help celebrate 5 B-Days and any downtime I've spent indoors has been absorbed making grilled cheese sandwiches & wathing Hulu on my newly hacked AppleTV .... damn that thing gets way too hot, almost burnt my sandwich.

Well I guess I will have to try one then

The DLO PRO dock I use was $250. it did pretty much everything the PSX2 does, except that it would lock up for awhile when it gets to the end of an album or playlist. It would also sometimes lock up while loading album art. They have a new HD model now but I'm not really interested because of the bad experience and because I want the URC compatibility.

Not to be too self-promotional, but check out the 200+ discrete IR codes that the PSX-2 supports. Trust me, no other dock has ever approached this level of discrete control.