Brennan B3 (2TB Black) HiFi - Hard Disk CD Ripper & Recorder, Storage and Player with Bluetooth, Internet Radio, Stereo Power Amplifier, NAS, Wav, Lossless (FLAC) and MP3.

I've been looking for a solution for integrating my old CD collection into my Sonos system. I'd got my vinyl turning again, with a line-in connection, but really wanted to be able to play the 300 or so CD's I have on shelves, which were just gaining dust. After some research, this looked like the best solution. I'd ripped the majority of my collection already onto a NAS, but that means being by a computer, with little to no ability to effect handheld control elsewhere through the house.The attractive things about this box werea) its provision of an app - which although I see others being critical of, works just fine for me. It's basic , but clear and quick.b) the ability to set up and switch between Sonos speakers easily - so no extra wires (my wife loves that) required to play CD's anywhere in the house (including the mobile speakers)c) the *truly* rapid ripping and logging of discs using the MusicBrainz DB. It's literally stick the disk in, press a button twice, and 60-90 seconds later you are done.The instructions are basic - but contrary to what others have reported, when I switched it on, it found my network quickly, got set up, and that was it.Setup is either through the rotary knob and front buttons, with a small (but clear) OLED screen - or using the mobile app - or a browser set to the IP no. allotted to the B3 (it advertises that on the front screen. Again, it's pretty intuitive, and I have not had the need to look up the support forums as yet.You can connect speakers directly to the box if want a single playing system - but I was predominantly looking for something I could integrate into my house system, and this does so easily.The added bonuses area) internet radio. I had that facility via the amp/tuner on my home theater, but it was limited to that room. Now I can play from thousands of radio channels, again anywhere throughout the house.b) bluetooth - so if I do have something I want to play on my phone, I can do so over directly connected speakers At the end of the day, it's not cheap - but it's HIGHLY functional, and has given me back a lot of music that I just wasn't listening to, anymore. It's the same experience as finding my vinyl again, and I am having a lot of fun with it...

When a friend of mine told me about the Brennan B3, it sounded like the perfect solution for ripping, storing and listing my 2000 CD collection. And it would have been if the device worked consistently.Setting up the unit is fairly straightforward as is ripping and storing the CDs although the device often mistitles CDs making them difficult to find. They can be manually relabelled when mistakes are discovered but this is complicated and time consuming.The biggest problem is maintaining connection between the two apps--phone and Web UI, which control browsing and play function on the device. The apps connect to the device via WiFi and if the IP addresses on the apps and device do not match, the connection is lost. This disconnection happens regularly for reasons unknown. I've learned to reconnect the device to the app fairly quickly but it's an annoying and time consuming process when all I want to do is listen to music.The bigger problem, which is happening more frequently, is that the connection will be interrupted and the device will not respond to either app even though the IP addresses on apps and device match. After a period of time, the connection is re-established--also for reasons unknown.Tech support for the Brennan is through a forum and answers to problems are usually swift but the company tech support tends to be defensive and quick to blame the problem on factors not related to the device : poor Wifi or a malfunctioning phone or something else that deflects the problem away from their product. When they offer advice, its often tech speak beyond my comprehension. The only real success I've had with getting usable advice on the forum is when a Brennan owner who has had a similar problem contributes their solution.I would not buy this unit again and cannot recommend it. My plan is to download all the music on the device to a hard drive and try to use it on another device that will deliver consistently because this quite expensive unit does not. Yes, it looks good on paper but...buyer beware.

I mean a solid four stars for this product at this point. I think five star ratings should be reserved for only those products which truly are remarkably outstanding and stellar. If not quite at that level, I find the B3 to be very good. Perhaps future software enhancements will make it even better. The Brennan company does seem to be innovative and responsive. I do find myself wishing now that a B4 existed which amounted to more of a robust and complete receiver/amplifier, one that featured more inputs and outputs, amplifier power and Bass/Treble/EQ/balance controls (which the B3 currently does not). The B3 does drive my modest Sony bookshelf speakers nicely enough, but at present there are no such balance/tone controls, only volume. More sound controls would be nice. To my mind adding any necessary size and weight to the product in order to achieve that would be worth the added functionality and completeness. In any case I'd advise potential buyers to review their website and the B3 forum to more fully understand the product as it is. I myself am fairly happy with it right now. It fulfills my main purpose for it which is/was to finally rip my entire CD collection (some 1400 CDs at this point) for use with my existing Sonos system. Ripping so many CDs is a lengthy process, but I'm finding the B3 makes it fairly easy and efficient at a reasonable price. It is thankfully quite fast at loading each CD, looking up the database, and then executing the rip. Each CD takes a couple of key presses to commence this, but then it generally completes the rip to WAV files in a couple of minutes. The database is pretty good, though it has failed to recognize a few of my discs out of around 500 CDs ripped thus far. The software lets you edit artist, album, track names, and cover art to correct such instances. Later you can have the B3 compress the WAV files to FLAC or MP3. That process takes a while as well (compresses about 1500 WAV files to FLAC per day is the rate I'm seeing). It's also not too difficult to backup/export what's on the B3 hard drive to a PC, but it could certainly be made easier. I've found the best way is to activate the NAS function of the B3 and then copy the files to my PC via the network. I've also found that process to be somewhat slow however using the included wi-fi dongle. I'm going to try the next iteration of my backup using a wired USB to Ethernet dongle to see if that speeds things up. I tried copying to an external 1TB hard-drive via USB but the gotcha is that the drive must be formatted in FAT32 for the B3 to recognize it, and Windows11 makes it very difficult to successfully achieve that formatting for such a large drive. I wasn't able to get it to work. The B3 really should be able to recognize and work with NTFS-formatted external drives. At present it will not. Anyway, all that said, the B3 is a useful product which is doing what I need it to do. The quality of rips seems to be fine. The sound driving modest bookshelf speakers is quite decent. The unit itself is handsome and feels well made. The software, while basic and functional, has been reasonably solid. There have been a couple of updates to it in the month I've had the B3. Powering down and then re-starting the unit has cleared the few glitches I've experienced after processing many discs in a sitting. It's a new product though, and is already pretty good, if somewhat hardware limited. I'm hoping further software enhancements take it to the point of being even more polished.

I really wanted to preserve my cd collection, about 500 or so. So I ordered this. Once you figure out how ro set it up nd start ripping, it’s not bad. The set up documentation is just awful. The app is not much better. I could.not connect to my router, which is just in thenwxt room, not far away. After reading the forum on Brendan’s website, it appears the device has to be right next to the router. Who knew?? Once I did that, it connected and has stayed connected. The ripping is easy and doesn’t take that long, maybe max 4 minutes. I would advise creating playlists as you add CDs. The list can get long pretty quickly and it will make it easier to play back like-minded subjects . I connected it to my Sonos with no problem. I have not tried exporting to my PC but I plan to. Apparently you can’t export to an external drive. So think about how you will get it on a PC and then move to an external; drive. I will be making suggestions on how the Brennan could be improved a LOT. Like being able to sort the list of albums in various ways. And there is no songwriter credits. That would be nice. I give this is 3 1/2 stars. It does what it says it will do, but it could be easier and it could do much more.

This is a great CD storage and playback audio system. It stores a couple thousand (depending upon format) CDs. There is a built-in amplifier so it can drive speakers directly. If you want to use it with headphones or to drive an amplifier, you need an external DAC that will connect to a USB port. These are available anywhere and are not expensive, some are less than $ 20. They say it can also find and use Sonos speakers, although I can not confirm that.I have been very happy with the unit so far. It connects to my Home Network using WiFi or Ethernet (with an external adapter). There is a nice Web interface and an app I have on my Android phone. This unit is not inexpensive but the only similar one I have ever seen was twice the cost and did NOT have good reviews.The Brennan B3 is very well made and the support is good online. It is obvious that they care about improving the product with feedback directly from users. There is great support on the Brennan forums. highly recommend this CD Jukebox.