Newman Zone

Browsing a UPnP share in Boxee

I finally got my two favorite apps working together: Boxee and Simplify Media. Last night, I installed Simplify 2.0 on my Mac Mini and iPhone 3G. In Simplify’s announcement of 2.0, they list “Broadcast to UPnP devices” among the new features. Since UPnP works with XBMC, I figured it might work with Boxee, although it’s really aimed at external hardware like Sonos and Roku.

After enabling UPnP sharing in the Simplify Media Preferences, I fired up Boxee and started poking around. Turns out, you can locate the Simplify share by choosing Settings > Media Sources > Network Sources > Add New Source. Boxee scans your network for available devices. If it doesn’t find anything, click Rescan Sources. For me, at least, Simplify showed up as a source called Music. Next, drill down, select a folder to monitor, and click Add Source. I selected All Playlists. Boxee prompts you to name the new source. I replaced the suggested name and clicked Add.

The only hitch is that, once you enable the Simplify source, it doesn’t appear with cover art like the Music > Artists section of Boxee. Instead, you’ll find it in Music > Browse. Still, if you absolutely have to have your iTunes playlists in Boxee, this is a pretty good workaround.

Tags: Boxee, Simplify Media