Difference between Wave Shield and VS1053 Codec

[rahatmaini]

I am so confused about the difference between the Adafruit Wave shield and the new Codec. Both seem to be able to connect to Arduino and play sounds, although the Codec seems to be higher quality and overall a better product.

Why buy a Wave shield over that?

[pburgess]

The Wave Shield has some (maybe esoteric) features like the ability to change the playback speed, or the recent voice changer tutorial. Also, can drive a small speaker directly. If you just need to trigger sounds from an Arduino with no funny stuff (and have an amplifier), the codec board might be a better thing now.

[rahatmaini]

Can the VS1053 output sound to a small speaker like the wave shield or is it not powerful enough?

[rahatmaini]

Never mind, just read the description again and got my answer