The Macsense HomePod has Mac in its name and comes in iPod white. It doesn't come from Apple, however, but from an Apple peripherals vendor. The HomePod works with Windows, Mac, and Linux PCs, even if it doesn't play all the music you may have. Most people will find this wall-mount device the easiest to use in our roundup, but it has a few quirks.

The HomePod looks and feels like a baby monitor or burglar alarm, and you can screw it to the wall or set it on a table. It has an integrated LCD and 11 well-spaced controls, plus an 18-button remote. A pair of small speakers are built-in, but they're not very good.

The design looks great in advertising photos but less so in real life. When the HomePod's placed on a table or on the stereo, it's top-heavy. Wires stick out at right angles from both the left and right sides, like the tufts of hair sticking out of Grandpa's ears. If you mount it on the wall, invest in a cord-hiding plastic conduit like the Wiremold CordMate.

The HomePod plays music only: digital files from your PC, FM radio from the built-in tuner, and Internet radio. It connects via wired or wireless (802.11b) Ethernet, but analog, coaxial digital, optical digital, and headphone jacks are also included. It even has a USB 1.1 jack, allowing playback from a portable hard drive.

Setup is easy; you load a small server applet on every machine you want to take music from. To use the HomePod, just turn the center dial to choose a source, music directory, or genre, then push the center of the knob to start play. The HomePod plays MP3 and AAC files, and playlists. It does not, however, read WMA files (an upgrade is promised) or rights-managed AAC files. So beware: All those songs you bought from the iTunes store? Sorry. Apple has no plans to let devices other than iPods and Macs play protected AAC files.

There were no performance issues using wired or wireless Ethernet. Directory navigation was quick. To play audio files only, several products do the job more cheaply, though none are easier to use, and the HomePod is an especially good choice if you have music on a Mac or in AAC format—just not rights-managed AAC files. The wall-mount capability is unique; nearly unique is the inability to play WMA files. All in all, though, if you can mount it on the wall and hide the cords, the HomePod is a winner.