My Multi Room Audio quest can you help ?

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  • flipside
    Automated Home Jr Member
    • Aug 2007
    • 26

    My Multi Room Audio quest can you help ?

    Hi im about to go through a house renovation and am looking about but i cant seem to find anything that matches my wants without costing ten of thousands of pounds

    The Plans are to be able to stream audio to 8 rooms in the house and the garden and this is the wish list

    1) Allow local sources to be attached in each room to give flexibility to play my non ripped vinyl etc

    2) Have FM/DAB (though this could attached via 1 above)

    3) I store my music on a basic NAS ( Looking about moving to a QNAP / Infrant or poss a windows home server shortly) and would like the system to stream from this rather than using a propitiatory server storage system. Mainly as i like the flexibility of these solutions.

    4) Control flexibility , control via web interface etc rather than just a propitiatory remote as is the case with sonos as we misplace remotes like no ones business

    5) reduce remote clutter and being able to control the volume and music choice from one remote

    6) Browsing via album art

    7) minimize the number of boxes and thus the number of power points needed as some of the rooms such as the bathroom will have ceiling / in wall mounted speakers and id liek to keep power usage down.

    8) Hard wired rather than wireless.

    9) Budget under £10k well under preferably :lease:

    So far the SONOS system seems to come closest but the limited control options puts me off,i like the openess of teh Squeezebox stuff but am willing to look any where


    Thnaks and apologies if ive asked the impossible but you dont learn if you dont ask and after a month of looking im confused
    Last edited by flipside; 5 January 2008, 10:20 PM.
  • toscal
    Moderator
    • Oct 2005
    • 2061

    #2
    Sonos does have a 3rd party web interface. Have a look here http://www.purple.org/sonos/
    Sonos does seem to fit all your requirements, and you can daisy chain zone players together via the ethernet ports on the back of the modules.
    IF YOU CAN'T FIX IT WITH A HAMMER, YOU'VE GOT AN ELECTRICAL PROBLEM.
    Renovation Spain Blog

    Comment

    • flipside
      Automated Home Jr Member
      • Aug 2007
      • 26

      #3
      and as ive just found out it has the desktop client shame there is no limux version or touch screen web skin, hmmmm still any other suggestions ?

      Comment

      • toscal
        Moderator
        • Oct 2005
        • 2061

        #5
        Originally posted by flipside View Post
        and as ive just found out it has the desktop client shame there is no limux version or touch screen web skin, hmmmm still any other suggestions ?
        Are you refering to the web interface. As it says on the site "Server software - runs on any system that supports Perl, tested on Windows XP, OS X, and Linux"
        IF YOU CAN'T FIX IT WITH A HAMMER, YOU'VE GOT AN ELECTRICAL PROBLEM.
        Renovation Spain Blog

        Comment

        • Paul_B
          Automated Home Legend
          • Jul 2006
          • 608

          #6
          I'd go Squeezebox over Sonos ;o) Also looks like a new SB called the duet maybe coming out with an announcement at CES.

          Discover the innovative world of Logitech and shop everything MX, Keyboards, Mice, Webcams, Headsets, Software, Video Conferencing, and more


          Logitech's Squeezebox Duet is a handheld receiver that uses 802.11g to wirelessly route music throughout your house, emanating from strategically placed little receivers—the first one included in the $400 starter kit. If this sounds familiar, it's because the most excellent but also more expensive Sonos Digital Music…

          Comment

          • TimH
            Automated Home Legend
            • Feb 2004
            • 509

            #7
            I think Xlobby can do all of this, but I have a couple of questions:


            Originally posted by flipside View Post
            The Plans are to be able to stream audio to 8 rooms in the house and the garden and this is the wish list

            1) Allow local sources to be attached in each room to give flexibility to play my non ripped vinyl etc
            Would you want to operate all local sources at the same time, or just be able to move your turntable from room to room? I think a couple of sources would be ok, but 8 might be pushing it without additional source switching.
            8 zones means two "7.1" soundcards in your Xlobby PC along with some special drivers for the cards. Each pair of outputs from each soundcard becomes the stereo input to one zone.

            Originally posted by flipside View Post
            2) Have FM/DAB (though this could attached via 1 above)
            Would streaming internet radio be ok instead/as well?

            Originally posted by flipside View Post
            3) I store my music on a basic NAS ( Looking about moving to a QNAP / Infrant or poss a windows home server shortly) and would like the system to stream from this rather than using a propitiatory server storage system. Mainly as i like the flexibility of these solutions.
            No problem with Xlobby

            Originally posted by flipside View Post
            4) Control flexibility , control via web interface etc rather than just a propitiatory remote as is the case with sonos as we misplace remotes like no ones business
            Yup, Xlobby has web-client versions and can also be used with RF remotes AIUI.

            Originally posted by flipside View Post
            5) reduce remote clutter and being able to control the volume and music choice from one remote

            6) Browsing via album art
            Browsing music via cover art on a small remote won't be much fun, but would be ok on a pocket PC etc.

            Originally posted by flipside View Post
            7) minimize the number of boxes and thus the number of power points needed as some of the rooms such as the bathroom will have ceiling / in wall mounted speakers and id liek to keep power usage down.
            Your Xlobby PC can be stored away with your NAS and provided you've run cables out to your zones there'll be nothing else to see apart from local sources & speakers.

            Originally posted by flipside View Post
            8) Hard wired rather than wireless.
            The remotes will/can be wireless but unless you decide to go for "video sender" technology to get audio out to the zones, it would normally be hard-wired.

            Originally posted by flipside View Post
            9) Budget under £10k well under preferably :lease:
            easy peasy

            Originally posted by flipside View Post
            So far the SONOS system seems to come closest but the limited control options puts me off,i like the openess of teh Squeezebox stuff but am willing to look any where

            Thnaks and apologies if ive asked the impossible but you dont learn if you dont ask and after a month of looking im confused

            The slight sting about Xlobby (www.xlobby.com) is that its undergoing a transformation from a free product to a paid-for application. There is talk of re-offering the last free version as an unsupported product alongside the new paid-for supported ones. I'm not up with current developments, last time I looked, pricing wasn't announced.

            Xlobby has lots of plugins, including X10 & xAP, so there's automation possibilities too.

            Here's a couple more links, one is to a thread on the Xlobby forums and the second is a link from there to someone's own write-up on what they've done. He's going for 7 zones and a couple of local sources so I thought that was relevant.



            I'm part-way through building my Xlobby PC but I'm having some "hardware" issues. Should be up & running soon though, and I'm going for 3 zones initially feeding through a 4-zone amp to ceiling & cabinet speakers. Also looking to integrate control of some X10 modules into things too.

            Good luck,

            Tim.
            My Flickr Photos

            Comment

            • flipside
              Automated Home Jr Member
              • Aug 2007
              • 26

              #8
              @ Toscal/otto mate

              Yes it looks good but ive read about a 50,000 limit on tracks and im currently on about 44500 with a few hundred CD's still to go

              @ Paul_B

              OOH i do like SB (being a tweaker) do you know if the duet has an amp in as the spec doesn't really

              @ TimH

              Hmmm interesting i hadn't really thought about the use of the ability to send out multiple sources out from one card in a PC and nice to see xlobby still about i played with it a few years back and it was good then

              1) Each room could have a different souce say ipod in kitchen , turntable in office , dab tuner in the living room

              5/6) i was thinking about nokia n800 tablets

              My main con for this route is time, it needs to be relatively quick to setup/fix as i a 20 month old with another one on its way (due in May) and my wifes patience is getting shorter


              Matt

              Comment

              • Otto-Mate
                Founder
                • Jan 2004
                • 882

                #9
                Increasingly I just don't have the time or inclination to cobble together systems. I want stuff to "Just Work". And that's Sonos.

                That new SB above looks interesting. But xlobby or anything that requires PCs and messing about would not compete with Sonos in my opinion.

                Yesterday my mrs couldn't view her soaps on our MCE box and I was away from the house. Turned out the USB IR receiver had thrown a wobbly, needed unplugged and plugged back in and away it went. Thats the sorta thing that drives me nutts and the reason we got a Sky+ box recently.

                Just my experience and opinion. Other people have other priorities, budgets and thresholds for problems.

                M.
                Editor AutomatedHome.co.uk


                www.facebook.com/AutomatedHomeUK
                www.twitter.com/ottomate
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                • flipside
                  Automated Home Jr Member
                  • Aug 2007
                  • 26

                  #10
                  @otto mate

                  Im with you on the time/inclination thing but the file limit of sonos still bothers me.

                  Comment

                  • TimH
                    Automated Home Legend
                    • Feb 2004
                    • 509

                    #11
                    Originally posted by flipside View Post
                    @ TimH

                    Hmmm interesting i hadn't really thought about the use of the ability to send out multiple sources out from one card in a PC and nice to see xlobby still about i played with it a few years back and it was good then

                    1) Each room could have a different souce say ipod in kitchen , turntable in office , dab tuner in the living room
                    OK, would you potentially want all local sources to play in each zone instead of "other" music, or would only being able to play one or two sources (of the eight) be enough?

                    Originally posted by flipside View Post
                    5/6) i was thinking about nokia n800 tablets
                    Nice
                    I'm planning on using a few low-spec tablet PCs, and now the kids have Nintendo DS Lites, that's looking like another option too

                    Originally posted by flipside View Post
                    My main con for this route is time, it needs to be relatively quick to setup/fix as i a 20 month old with another one on its way (due in May) and my wifes patience is getting shorter

                    Matt
                    Yup, I agree, it is more time consuming to set up than Sonos but (IMHO) it can do so much more. Xlobby also does video, photos, weather, xAP, IR as well as multi-zone audio and is fully skin-able. Maybe I'll feel different once it's (eventually) running, but when I was looking for a solution nothing else came close for the price.
                    Mainlobby looks good, but that too is paid-for, and the plug-ins are at addional cost as well.

                    My biggest hurdle to getting it going is my desire to use an existing, but old, PC. Nothing insurmountable, but the hardware is just older and its taking some time.

                    Cheers,

                    Tim
                    My Flickr Photos

                    Comment

                    • TimH
                      Automated Home Legend
                      • Feb 2004
                      • 509

                      #12
                      Originally posted by Otto-Mate View Post
                      Increasingly I just don't have the time or inclination to cobble together systems. I want stuff to "Just Work". And that's Sonos.

                      That new SB above looks interesting. But xlobby or anything that requires PCs and messing about would not compete with Sonos in my opinion.

                      <snip>

                      Just my experience and opinion. Other people have other priorities, budgets and thresholds for problems.

                      M.
                      I hear you, the best example for me is *why?* am I struggling on with this old PC for Xlobby instead of buying this HP server for £150? (http://www.wordpress-1219309-4387497...Server-PC.html)
                      I don't know is the answer, other than I don't really like throwing things away, and often for me the journey is more interesting than the destination...

                      More generally, for me at least, it comes back to one of two things:
                      a) either a collection of systems that work great by themselves but don't really talk/interact with each other, or,
                      b) a more integrated approach - one thing accomplishing multiple tasks - that has a greater level of apparent "interoperability" and appears more seamlessly integrated. Getting the set-up right does take more time though.

                      I think its the same as the one-for-all remote control argument. You could either have a coffee table full of remotes, each perfectly capable of operating its target device, but all the buttons laid out slightly differently etc.
                      Or, you have a Pronto, or Harmony, etc. that can control *all* your devices. Then the layout & buttons etc. can be similar for each device, but it takes a more configuration time.

                      Which is best? well, whichever your happiest with - it would be very boring if we were all the same

                      Cheers,

                      Tim.
                      My Flickr Photos

                      Comment

                      • Otto-Mate
                        Founder
                        • Jan 2004
                        • 882

                        #13
                        Originally posted by TimH View Post
                        and often for me the journey is more interesting than the destination...
                        Good point Tim, and I've been there many times and enjoyed the thrill of getting something to work.

                        I guess old age is setting in now

                        M.
                        Editor AutomatedHome.co.uk


                        www.facebook.com/AutomatedHomeUK
                        www.twitter.com/ottomate
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                        Comment

                        • iainshaw
                          Automated Home Lurker
                          • Mar 2007
                          • 7

                          #14
                          Getting Squeezebox to work is great and it's really cool that it can do so much. It's not at all cool telling SWMBO that you need to reboot whatever's running Slimserver because yet another unpredictable combination of OS/ MySQL version / Bizzare flaw in your MP3 metadata has sent the bloody thing into a terminal spin.

                          I've had 3 SliMP3s, 2 SB2s and my hand has hovered over the "buy me now you sucker" button for a Transporter far too many times. SB is a geeky, hobbyist toy because of its dependence on SS. Sonos is as close as you can get to an appliance in this arena. It's closed, it works, it works well.

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                          • flipside
                            Automated Home Jr Member
                            • Aug 2007
                            • 26

                            #15
                            Yes this is what ive picked up from reading forums etc , the only issue that keeps coming up sonos wise is the 50k file limit.

                            If i could get any assurances that this is set to change dramatically id be sold but sonos are all tight lipped though they have said in the forums there will be no annocements at CES whilst SB seem to be moving and teh jive / ss7 setup could be interesting

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