Let's say you have a good pair of speakers that uses the typical 3.5mm audio jack, the type that can plug into a computer to play sound from that computer. However, instead of playing from the computer, you want to play from your smartphone to these speakers. While you can do this with an audio cable connecting to the phone, it is cumbersome with the tethering. You want to lose the cable and send the audio to the speakers over the network via wifi. You can do this with a $30 tiny device called Sabrent WF-RADU Wifi Audio Receiver. It supports both the DLNA and Airplay protocol which should make it compatible with almost all smartphones and tablets out there.
The device is small enough to fit comfortably in your palm and lightweight. It has a 4-inch tethered USB cable that is meant to power it and not for data. This means if you plug this into a computer, the computer will not detect it as a device in need for a driver. The computer will only provide it power. There is no battery in the WF-RADU so it has to be tethered to a computer or any 5-volt USB power source during its operation. I used the USB charger that came with the iPhone 5S because the WF-RADU package does not include this adapter.
The WF-RADU also has a female type-A USB port that I am not sure what is used for. I assume it is there so you can use a longer detachable USB cable with both ends of type-A. Incidentally, this kind of USB cable is not part of the USB specification standard which means it is used for specific proprietary purposes. For all the gory details of USB technology and its myriad connectors, I highly recommend you visit this online resource.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USB
The Sabrent comes with a useful sheet explaining its use. If you want additional information, here is its product page. http://www.sabrent.com/category/audio/WF-RADU/
Actually, its product page on Amazon.com has the best info on using this devicehttp://www.amazon.com/Sabrent-Receiver-Supports-Portable-WF-RADU/dp/B00L26YDA4/
As you can see from the Amazon info page, you can use this WF-RADU in either ad-hoc or infrastructure mode. In ad-hoc mode, you do not need a wireless router acting as middleman so you can set this up in cars whose audio system has a 3.5mm audio in jack. This ad-hoc connection can be encrypted with WPA so that unauthorized people cannot easily latch onto this ad-hoc network. However, if you are at home, it's worth your while to set this up in infrastructure mode so that your portable devices can connect to the home network including the Internet while playing to the WF-RADU. If you have a computer such as a laptop that has both wired and wireless connection, you can connect to the WF-RADU with the wireless connection via ad-hoc and to the Internet with the wired connection. This way, you can stream to the WF-RADU and still access the Internet. Or, you can get a wifi adapter so that your computer has two wifi connections: one used for connecting to the WF-RADU while the other to the Internet using wifi.
Below is a screenshot of the product page on Amazon. It basically has all the setup information you need.
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