Shoutcast your playlist to buddies.

Old news, but I decided one day to try it and it was surprisingly neat.

You can spam your favorite music to buddies via a url or listen to whatever they're listening to (with just 1.5 mins of lag or so). You just download a small program and a plugin for winamp.

Here's a step by step, because the readmes are not easy enough to find/do. I don't know why this isn't more simplified and streamlined.

Some caveats: Windows and linux only plz. No firewalls, or you should know how
to work around your firewall. Decent connection would help, though one person with a 56 K can broadcast decently to another person (maybe 2?). Winamp2.x only, which is fine because winamp 3 is bloated garbage.


1. Download and install this winamp plugin: http://www.shoutcast.com/downloads/shoutcast-dsp-1-8-2b-windows.exe
Accept all the defaults unless your winamp's in a weird folder.

2. Download the server file by accepting the license agreement at this link:
http://www.shoutcast.com/download/license.phtml
Again, defaults. I wouldn't bother with the console, just the GUI.

3. Run the server (start, programs, shoutcast dnas, shoutcast dnas (GUI)

4. Click edit configuration. A warning + notepad will pop up. Scroll to the second item under "Required stuff" and change your password to something you can remember. Save your notepad file, exit it, click OK to the warning dialogue.

5. Click kill server and close that puppy down. Then restart it from the start menu. You can now click the hide option to shove it down to your systray.

6. Open winamp, load up a playlist of tunes, then press ALT+P for preferences. Click the plugins --> DSP/effect. Once you click close, a popup will appear and your music won't be playing out loud anymore.

7. Do the following configurations on that popup:
--click output tab, connection should say localhost, port should be 8000 (default).
--fill in the password you made for the server's .ini file.
--encoder dropdown should say 1.
--click yellowpages and fill in some optional (but I recommend it) info on your stream. Under description I'd say fill in something unique (like if I searched for it, the only possible result would be whatever you typed). Enable title updates is checked and is good.
--Click "connect".. if it works, you can click "main" and see the happy little bars jumping around.

8: You're now shoutcasting. If you give someone a link they can listen in to your playlist. The link should be like this:

http://yourIPaddress:8000

They should plug that into winamp by clicking add --> URL (top button under add).

To listen to your own stuff as you shoutcast it (with the same quality and 90 second lag your listeners have), you'll need two copies of winamp open. One will be shoutcasting, but not playing through your soundcard (esp. since some of us have crappy soundcards and can't play 2 sources of sound simultaneously). The second copy will be to tune in. To be able to do that, do alt+P to get to preferences --> options tab on left --> check box that says "allow multiple instances". Then you want to go to preferences --> output --> nullsoft NULL output (so you don't hear anything from your first copy of winamp). Run winamp again, and in the second copy do open url. Plug in your shoutcast address.

I am broadcasting currently at http://vfdc.dyndns.org:8000 (having a dyndns account owns). I'll prolly stop broadcasting as soon as I need bandwidth. If any of you start broadcasting and have a ton of bandwidth to toss around, post the links here.

 

Yeah, old, but deserves a post. I didn't know about Shoutcast until about 8-9 months ago. It rocks. I listen to it at work all the time. Very, very good idea.

 

Can you do this with jus windows media player?
I really don't like winamp anymore.

 

you might be able to do something similar, I dunno.

The good news is that while winamp 3 is bloated garbage, this shoutcasting only works with version 2. I think 3 and WMP both can tune in to someone else's stuff.

 

heh.

shoutcasting the G-e-G mix. Will be adding my entire CD collection as a big MP3 archive project so soon the small collection on my computer will jump to about 5,000 songs. in the meantime...

http://godeater.dyndns.org:8000

GE

 

After playing with this for a few days I have to admit I think it is great (I may be addicted). Jumping from different shoutcasts has introduced me to music I may not have ever heard before. I gotten a few friends in on this and we take turns listening to each other's playlists during work. Its like a mix tape you can share quickly with everyone.

GE

 

Yeah, the tops is when you find a song you once said "I need to get that" and then utterly forgot about it. Or hear a completely new track and get the broadcaster to send it.

Some misc stuff to help others shoutcast:
If people try to listen and get "mpeg encoding error" or something like that, the broadcaster needs to give them a link that ends in .PLS ... i.e. I'm

http://vfdc.dyndns.org:8000

but a better link is

http://vfdc.dyndns.org:8000/listen.pls

listen.pls is the default method of having people listen to your playlist, but you can also share a specific folder full of mp3's, and then people can listen to a particular tune any time they want by doing:

http://vfdc.dyndns.org:8000/Some_Song_Filename.pls

Finally, if all else fails make sure you fill in your yellow pages with an easily searched description, then you can search shoutcast.com for that description. When you find your broadcast, you can right click and copy the link shoutcast.com provides.

edit: the dyndns.org accounts are free, so if you ever want to give people an easy to remember shoutcast address (game server address, ftp address, etc etc...) you can do so by signing up for a freebie account and (if necessary) using one of the little helper applications that will update your IP address with the dns service every time it changes.