iMac to Tuner/Amp 70' away?

[Jim Hefner]

What is the simplest method for taking audio out of my iMac to a HT receiver/amp? I've seen that Apple TV and Airport will handle the task but I'd rather not have another piece of wireless networking equipment. I'm looking for a wired solution. Can I run optical cable that long? Also, I'm not sure where to plug in the optical cable on my iMac.

I also would like to be able to have audio in the room with the imac without turning on the receiver and amp. Is there a way to split the optical out of the imac to drive some local speakers? Local amp required? Ideally those local speaker could also be driven by the main amp too when the other zones are on.

I sure hope it makes sense.

Thanks

 

[forgets]

What is the simplest method for taking audio out of my iMac to a HT receiver/amp? I've seen that Apple TV and Airport will handle the task but I'd rather not have another piece of wireless networking equipment. I'm looking for a wired solution. Can I run optical cable that long? Also, I'm not sure where to plug in the optical cable on my iMac.

I also would like to be able to have audio in the room with the imac without turning on the receiver and amp. Is there a way to split the optical out of the imac to drive some local speakers? Local amp required? Ideally those local speaker could also be driven by the main amp too when the other zones are on.

I sure hope it makes sense.

Thanks

i looked up the ports behind an imac, and it looks like the simplest solution would be to get a 75' 2 rca stereo cable and then a short 3.5mm to 2 rca adaptor. If you're going to be running the cable inside of walls make sure to get a cable rated for in wall use. For a run that long, and considering how low power most computer onboard sound cards are, you may not get very good sound quality out of it. To get slightly better sound quality, try getting some stereo audio baluns, then you can run a cat5 cable in between them. a digital audio cable like toslink would be a good solution too, but you'd probably have to get an external sound card with an output for one, and i don't know of any sound card manufacturers have drivers for mac's like that.

As for playing the music locally as well, you're better off duplicating the 2 rca solution from above a shorter distance, you're almost certainly going to need an amp.. your computers internal sound card probably isn't rated to handle any more than the speakers already built in.. but you can probably score a cheap small amp to drive some local speakers. You could split the signal to drive both the local and far away ht amp, but you're going to have further signal degradation.. in the end it's a stereo audio signal, and not a true hd setup, so it might be fine for some background music quality wise.. but to get the best quality, see if anyone on apple's forums knows of any soundcards that output a digital sinal to a toslink or equivalent cable that'd give you better quality sound.

 

[tmbrown97]

I'm not 100% positive, but I'd bet the iMac port is the same as what's on my MacBook Pro - it looks like a standard headphone jack, but with a little adapter, it can switch to TOSLINK (mine gets tripped sometimes - when it the analog audio stops working, and you can see the light inside the jack).

either solution will work, but you have to pick one or the other - the computer won't do both at once. And, if you plug something into the jack, the computer's built-in speakers will quit working - so if you want to be able to use either local audio and remote audio off the same source without touching wires, your best bet is to get normal amplified computer speakers for local listening, and run a cable to your amp/receiver.

Basically - this looks like exactly what you need - but I can't find them over 50ft;
http://www.cyberguys...rch#page=page-1

so, either use that and another 20ft extension RCA, or make this setup yourself - with a combination of 3.5mm stereo splitter (at the computer) and a 75ft 3.5mm stereo extension cord, and a 3.5mm to RCA adapter. You should be able to pull this off for under $15 from monoprice http://www.monoprice.com/products/subdepartment.asp?c_id=102&cp_id=10218

I'd have no concerns whatsoever about the computer's ability to drive two sets of amplified speakers; it just won't power anything more than a set of headphones without some sort of amplifier (computer speakers are normally amplified and are fine).

 

[Gearhead]

Do you think that this solution will end up with a noisy ground loop?

 

[dBeau]

If you think the Airport Express will fit your needs (it sounds to me like it would), you dont have to run it as a wireless device. Running a single cat 5 will be easier than any other wire you could run and a bit more useful too. I use of few of them around my home and they work great. The only real downside is that you must use iTunes to serve your music. Though I have heard there are some third party tools that will let you use other media managers, I havent tried anything but iTunes myself.

 

[apostolakisl]

75 feet of line level audio is going to be tough. You are likely to have significant loss of signal/noise ratio. If you can use fiber digital or coax digital you will have perfect sound. That would require an amp that accepts digital and that your imac can output digital (which I don't know about). 75' foot toslink can be picked up on ebay for pretty cheap. I would test it before sealing it into a wall space.

If you are forced to go analog, use coax cable with rca adapters on the end. Another option would be to use xlr cable. That would be pricey since you will also need the adapaters at the end to convert back to rca.

If you have a spool of coax already you might just try fitting the ends with rca adapters and test it out to see if the quality is good enough.

If you can get fiber optical on the imac and your amp, far and away the best route is toslink. Very cheap and very good quality sound.

 

[Jim Hefner]

Cool. I super duper appreciate all the replies. I've been busy pulling wire all over the place. It appears I'm going to use the toslink optical cable from the imac to the HT. Or Airport Express w/ Cat V. For my local area audio I've given up on the in-wall solution due to the extra amp requirement. I'm just going to use some standard computer speakers. A friend that is a crazy audiophile actually said some of the new Bose ones sound really good (seriously). I may have to use Apple TV or Airport because the HT will be on a digital signal (apparently is the same 3.5mm headset jack on the imac. like work2play suspected) and the computer speakers will be line level. If don't use one of the Apple solutions and I just split the audio out with cable I'll have to constantly change the audio out in System Preferences. Debeau, Itunes to serve my music is my preference. I'm hoping I can still use Pandora tho. Thoughts?

Thanks again to all!

 

[tmbrown97]

Though I agree that something optical or network based is far superior, I did want to throw in my $.02 regarding the long run of audio... typically when these cables are manufactured, I'd hope they compensate for that; I've done 75ft runs before using shielded cable and had fine results. I have run into the noisy ground loop as Gearhead suggested; when it happens, I work it out until I figure out the cause.

An extreme experiment - a few years ago I was asked to find a solution for music at an office christmas party... picture a long hall with offices along it, a conference room on either end, and a lobby in the middle... And I had no budget to do this, but a few days. I made a bunch of adapters that went from Cat5/RJ45 to headphone jack (several male, and several female) - The final run went computer out to splitter - to local amp, and into the cat5 (down to the server room) - where it came out in a patch panel - using another homemade cable back to stereo jack, into a couple more splitters, then back to RJ45 and back into the patch panels to distribute to the other conference room, the lobby, and two other offices - where I again converted back from RJ45 to stereo jack. This was all driven off a standard HP desktop; each set of speakers was an amplified set of computer speakers. Everyone thought I was crazy, but it worked flawlessly - without any detectable noise or quality degradation. This equated to probably about 1000 total linear feet all interconnected.

So, I'm not saying the loss and noise pickup don't occur - of course they do; but probably not nearly as much as people think it will. It's up to the listener to decide. I'll never forget an excellent article I read once about the CEO of Monster Cable in which he was described as a man who "made his fortune providing a cure for a disease that didn't exist" - I absolutely don't believe in the hype around using $200 cables to plug into a $.12/connector - unless you're combating a specific interference issue. Typically responsible cable routing takes care of this.

</Soapbox>

 

[apostolakisl]

Work2play,

You are right, pretty much. And I totally agree with the monster cable farce. There is an economic entity called "perceived quality". It states that the more you charge for something, the higher the perceived quality, irrespective of the true quality. Grey Poupon was originally a cheap mustard, they fancied up the bottle and quadroupled the price, suddenly it was the rage (in 1980). Same damn mustard!

Monster nailed that one on the head as well.

I also have a 50 foot run of line level audio going to my subwoofer and it is clean. I ran it on quad shielded coax. I wish I could have used fiber because it is cheaper and smaller, but a volume controlled digital subwoofer line out is something I have never seen.

Back to monster and digital lines, who in the world is stupid enough to spend $150 for an hdmi cable. At least with analog stuff you might see improved quality on an oscilliscope, but with hdmi it either works or it doesn't. Get the cheapest one that works!

 

[sda]

Back to monster and digital lines, who in the world is stupid enough to spend $150 for an hdmi cable.

The same guy stupid enough to spend $150 on an "audio grade" receptacle.
http://www.amazon.com/Wattgate-Audio-Grade-Duplex-Socket/dp/B000930W4M

 

[tmbrown97]

WOW - and it doesn't even do surge protection...
and my $3 HDMI cables work Great! I wish more people understood digital, in that "it either works or it doesn't" - as Lou said.

 

[apostolakisl]

Now that is just really special. Do you suppose it would get rid of the hummm on my amp? Maybe it will give me a hummer. For that price it better.

 

[SteveQ]

Cool. I super duper appreciate all the replies. I've been busy pulling wire all over the place. It appears I'm going to use the toslink optical cable from the imac to the HT. Or Airport Express w/ Cat V. For my local area audio I've given up on the in-wall solution due to the extra amp requirement. I'm just going to use some standard computer speakers. A friend that is a crazy audiophile actually said some of the new Bose ones sound really good (seriously). I may have to use Apple TV or Airport because the HT will be on a digital signal (apparently is the same 3.5mm headset jack on the imac. like work2play suspected) and the computer speakers will be line level. If don't use one of the Apple solutions and I just split the audio out with cable I'll have to constantly change the audio out in System Preferences. Debeau, Itunes to serve my music is my preference. I'm hoping I can still use Pandora tho. Thoughts?

Thanks again to all!

Jim,

I think you should reconsider your preference for a "wired" solution. I use AppleTVs to wirelessly distribute audio in my house. The sound from the optical out on the AppleTV into a 5.1 surround sound system is stunning! The reliability is outstanding, the installation is simple, and the cost is less than cables and connectors ($99 per Zone). And the sweetest feature of all is the abiity to controll the entire setup with an iPhone or iTouch. You can even stream audio from your iPhone. And yes, It will work with Pandora also.

Steve Q