I just received my SLiMP3 from Slim Devices Inc.

It's a purpose built mp3 playback component which relies on streamed data from a server over ethernet. Go here to read about the product in the words of the vendor.

What follows is my own personal view :

• Price. The price is ok but not super-cheap, however since this model is hand-assembled, there's a certain neato factor to it that made me more than happy with it for the price (I have tried to solder components myself in the past, so I take my hat off to these guys).
• Setup. It's pretty easy to set up - basically all it needs to know are it's IP address, netmask, plus the IP address of the server and the local gateway. It stores these away too so that you never need to reenter the information merely because you pulled out the power cord.
• Sound quality. This aspect is great. It seems to output as good quality a signal as my sound blaster card being fed by a powerful cpu doing the decoding. Perhaps this is natural given the dedicated decoding chip, however it's especially impressive given the small size and power-draw of the machine. Also there are no clicks, buzzes, hums or delays - just how a hi-fi component should be.
• User Interface. Physically, the display is everything it is claimed to be. It is legible to me from across the room whilst sat on the couch. The remote is a little cheap and nasty, but then it is truly a off-the-shelf item (I could replace it from my local electronics shop). I find the browser a little spartan so far, but this is an area of extremely active development (due to the power of Open Source) so I have every faith that many more features will be available in due course - way to go guys!
• Looks. Well, my wife doesn't mind it, so that's a start! From the front it looks cool. From the side it looks a little more unfinished (chips and leds visible) but actually I like it that way.
• Suggestions. I would like the ability for it to play from m3u files so that it would play back albums in the correct order. It would also be nice if it could talk to multiple servers and merge all the files available. That way my wife can keep her mp3s on her Windows machine and I can keep mine on my linux server, and yet we can share the player without reprogramming the IP address. Both of these should be possible without any hardware changes due to the client-server architecture where the server is a remote open source perl program (=> easy to hack) and the client can be software upgraded using the bootloader - again, very smart design choices in such a modest piece of hardware.
• Verdict. 9/10. One point docked due to lack of Ogg support. I know the reasons, but I'm a little tiny bit uncomfortable with the behaviour of the MP3 patent holders.