I got my second Raspberry Pi this week. I wanted another so I could play around with it, my first has become a media player in the lounge that the flatmates are rather fond of. Having a bit of a think about what I could do with the second, I’ve decided to make a headless radio jukebox. Some rough initial requirements:

1. Headless, no monitor  required to use the system
2. An LCD screen which displays either the time or the currently playing track
3. SMB support to play music from a file server
4. One button – Hold down to start / stop. Press once for the next track
5. Last.FM support, scrobble each played track to their servers
6. Audio out the 3.5mm headphone jack, will support any speaker system with AUX in
7. An alarm system (might be difficult with only one button – maybe have to set via SSH or web interface)

I have bought one of the adafruit cobbler kits which should enable me to play around with the LCD screen initially without any soldering. I also bought a breadboard and some solderless breadboard jumper cables.

I will post photos of this project as I build the hardware & write the software.