Hunting Unicorns


Why is it so difficult/impractical/impossible to design a music server requiring no external control device such as a laptop or tablet? The Aurender A100H seems nearest to what I want -- onboard storage, USB output, no DAC, no volume control. But as I understand it, even this requires "iPad control via the Conductor app" and offers no access to web-based streaming radio stations. So, like many others posting here, I'm "wasting" a Macbook Pro as my digital music source, feeding USB to a streamer/DAC/digital preamp combo device. 

To rephrase: why can't I have just one box receiving everything from everywhere, and sending anything via USB to my favorite outboard DAC? Of course this unicorn WOULD have its own dedicated remote that is not itself a computer.

Advance apologies for what is very likely a dumb question generated by an ancient, analog-wired brain.
hickamore
I've had a Squeezebox Touch for about 10 years now and almost never use the touch screen, especially for wading through libraries to select music. It's a painfully slow process compared to using a tablet to find the music I want to play. My favorite aspect of the display screen is that it displays a nice clock when the SBT is not playing music. ;-)
jond I think you have supplied the answer. One can go smaller than a laptop, but not to the size of a slender remote. Shame on technological advance for failing to anticipate my needs! 
As have erik_squires and mlsstl now. Thanks to all. I wondered why, and now I know. Next question would be an affordably functional tablet control device occupying little space.

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