Tired of IR and frustrated with audio zone offerings

[Timoh]

Hi folks,

As always in the fall, I start planning my cocooning for the winter months. This year it's going to be getting rid of IR control of all my zoned audio equipment.

I have always been frustrated with IR control. I felt it was cumbersome, awkward and just plain unreliable. My IR zoning was based off an Ocelot + secur16IR, being controlled by Housebot. My zoning was 4 commercial stereo amps. In fact this was why I had to go with zoned IR in the first place, they all use the same remote, so I couldn't use an IR blaster.

The other factor driving my move away from (zoned) IR is that I am also moving off the Ocelot. Ocelot has run it's course and just hasn't kept up with the times. Since moving my HA setup to a diskless & fanless thin PC running Windows and Housebot, the reliability & self contained advantage of the Ocelot has vanished.

My original intent for dumping zoned IR was to replace the Ocelot zoned IR with a dedicated (usb?/ethernet?) zoned IR unit. But I could not find one. Sure there are the Global Cache products, but at $100 for 3 zones, I think it's steep for what it is. + I would still have all the problems of learning, emitters, and other oddities that IR has given me over the years.

I am fairly proficient in electronics, so my next idea was to do a hardware hack directly into my stereo amps. These are 4 line in + radio, 200W amps I picked up a few years ago for about $80 each for the sole purpose of doing whole house audio. My original stumbling block here was that the audio and input selector are rotary and feed input to a microcontroller chip in the amp. However, when I started poking around the other chips in the amp, I discovered a whole new class of audio chips I never knew existed. Audio processing chips.

These audio processing chips come with vol, mute, bass, treble and many come with multiple inputs... up to 4. These chips are controlled by an interface called I2C which is specifically designed for easily controlling chips and circuit design simplicity. It would be very easy for a design to incorporate USB functionality to control the audio processing chip. The total value of the components would easily be less than $50... And that is being very generous.

So my question is this... Why doesn't anyone make an INexpensive 4x4 (at least) audio zone controller? Very much like the Nuvo Simplese, but without the amp, keypad support or IR. Most HA folks have touchscreens, tablets, other controllers already, so the keypads are just a waste. Most HA folks use computer media, media players, internet radio so IR is just a waste.

Either I am way off the mark or I sense some prototyping in my future.

Tim

 

[DavidL]

Use a PC as your audio source. Use PC automation software to do zone control. You can then use TCP, IR, serial, UPnP, whatever as control inputs. Keep your "dumb" amps on 75% volume. Control the volume via the PC.
Media Center (J River flavor), Cinemar's MusicLobby3, Proximis Girder etc can control the zone works.
You can reuse your IR hardware and ocelot, etc. where you see fit.

Your budget is pretty tight, but the above gives you a ton of additional functionality you might need.

Oh, look on eBay et al for cheap used audio switchers. I think I might have one around here somewhere that I might just get rid of

 

[sic0048]

You can probably find a used 4x4 (or better) autopatch analog stereo switcher for not a lot of money.

Something like this.

 

[drozwood90]

Use a PC as your audio source. Use PC automation software to do zone control. You can then use TCP, IR, serial, UPnP, whatever as control inputs. Keep your "dumb" amps on 75% volume. Control the volume via the PC.
Media Center (J River flavor), Cinemar's MusicLobby3, Proximis Girder etc can control the zone works.
You can reuse your IR hardware and ocelot, etc. where you see fit.

Your budget is pretty tight, but the above gives you a ton of additional functionality you might need.

Oh, look on eBay et al for cheap used audio switchers. I think I might have one around here somewhere that I might just get rid of

I use homeseer with USB soundcards. My total cost...about $300 for 9 zones

--Dan

 

[pete_c]

I'm at around 12 sound zones today from the HA rack. I don't have my main HA server doing any MM. I initially started with just one amp / 8 zones / and an 8B8SS.
I've always kept the media room separate maybe only using "smart remotes" with RF/IR only. My old MM reciever does have an IR link (via cable) to other equipment and came with an RF / IR repeater. I also have an Ocelot which I purchased in the late 1990's but never really used it much.

HACS

Recently in the last two years I wanted to add more zones and an RS-232 controlled zoned amp but didn't want to spend over $1000 for the amp.

I knew it was going to either be a Russound or Nuvo that I wanted. There was no rush as everything that I had in place worked fine. I can across a like new Russound CAS44 and purchased it for around $160. Even though I was going to control the amp via RS-232 I purchased keypads for it again like new for about $50-$60 each. I am still moving slow in this realm but now have 4 sound zones controlled by the Russound, 4 controlled by the AB8SS and 4 independant (with a choice via manual switches). I also added two more main stereo amps (in the same rack-three altogether with the Russound). I still have three (4) other distinct zones with their own sources / amps (bedrooms) that can be switched between local and zoned sounds. I have noticed though my PC sound is good but not as "clean" as directly sourced to distribution amp MM sources to zones. I am also thinking now of buiding two MM servers; one to serve sound only and the other one to serve video only via UPNP.

I figured why re-invent the wheel (and spend a lot of time and money) relating to my home audio zones. Lately the technology is moving so fast that its difficult to keep up with the HW but easy to purchase older 3-4 year old (technology) for very little. Personally I like (always) having direct HW control (either via older RS-232 or newer network based) for HA versus IR / wireless so I am a bit biased in this sense.

Lately playing with a very small NMT (with a 2.5" SATA drive). It's no bigger than maybe 4 stacked CD cases. It'll play audio/video from its own HD, internet, network NAS or UPNP server. Its very "tweakable" and can be controlled via the network / RS-232 / IR making it both independant and or dependant on the local HA. Best thing about it was that it was only $50. I've been leaving it on (more tweaking than using right now) 24/7 and its operating temperatures are good. I am comparing this box to my MS Media center box (which is mostly off) running on a mini AOpen PC which was more like $500 plus which can also work independantly or in conjunction with the network.

 

[Timoh]

Hi folks,
Thanks for the input so far. I entertained the idea of multiple sound cards a few years ago, but I guess it just slipped off my radar since I wasn't thinking about it for this solution.

My setup supports multiple sound cards so definitely worth a try given the price of USB sound cards. However, I'm reading a few horror stories with sync issues between the cards giving sound on some zones delayed with respect to other zones. I suspect this is more of an issue with lower performance PCs and possibly USB sound devices.

Tim

 

[jwilson56]

Well I personally have 6 zones using the Ocelot and see no problems with IR. Also since I use the receivers tuners as an audio source controlling volume with the internal sound cards isn't an option for me. Also even when using the sound card you still need an amplifier. I have yet to find cheap RS-232 receivers to control. I only turn on the receiver when using that zone so power draw is low.

What problems do you seem to have using IR?

 

[Timoh]

I wouldn't say there is a single thing that frustrates me about IR. It's more a culmination of lots of small things.

One of my biggest "small" things is that I don't know the status of the amp. jwilson56 solved this by detecting if the switched plug on the receiver was on or off. I don't have any switched plugs on my receiver-amps. Next up was the overhead of tweaking my software to how IR behaves for the device. My remote had selector buttons for bass & treble, and then common + and - buttons. Note there is no volume selector button. The system would automatically revert back to vol ~3 seconds after the last bass or treble keypress. So now I had to write delays into my HA config forcing it to wait to issue a vol command, if a tone command was issued in the last 3 seconds.

Repeating commands such as vol + 10 or 20 times would issue the ir sequence faster than the amp could handle, so my real vol slowly drifted out of sync with my HA vol. Again, fixable with reducing/tweaking the repeat rate, but I never found that sweet spot of reducing it enough where it worked well, but not too much so it didn't feel sluggish.

I use my tuners too, and that was limitting my thoughts for a while. But with most radio stations on the internet these days, it's easier to launch an url to the radio station that it is to tune the receiver with IR. So I don't plan on using the built in tuners at all.

I've just asked myself recently... There's got to be a better way of doing this!

I am just amazed there is no low cost/diy/HA audio controller given the cost of components.

Tim

 

[electron]

I personally am looking at Squeezebox myself, which supports sync'ing (granted, only seems to work 100% if you use the hardware players), but it's definitely frustrating how there are no other affordable out of the box solutions.

 

[pete_c]

However, I'm reading a few horror stories with sync issues between the cards giving sound on some zones delayed with respect to other zones. I suspect this is more of an issue with lower performance PCs and possibly USB sound devices.

I've tested the multiple USB sound device scenario (included virtual audio cable in the mix) on high end PC's (dual and quad core) and still don't get audio syncing with both just music and or/TTS standing in front of two speakers.

I've switched from analogue radio in the house (AM, FM & Digital) to pure internet based radio. I do listen to Sirius radio though in the automobiles and via satellite DTV in the house (not much these days though). Today I am feeding multizone TTS and some wave sounds to the three amps via three sound cards (basement, main floor and 2nd floor) for TTS testing the scenario in vivo. I get a bit of an echo but not sure if its the distance or the 2nd and 3rd sound cards. Not paying too much attention though lately.

I've noticed conventional off the shelf MM amps are getting a bit more intelligent relating to network control and these may be common in the next couple of yesrs.

 

[pete_c]

I personally am looking at Squeezebox myself, which supports sync'ing (granted, only seems to work 100% if you use the hardware players)

I also tested Squeezebox (installed it on an old Roku and OmniFi). It worked relating to audio but didn't pay attention relating to the syncing of audio. I'll try a side by side test with the server. With the TVersity server (UPNP) it appears to create separate threads / UPNP connections so I doubt that they would be synced (but I'm buying a second PBO small footprint NMT) and can test.

Do the Sage devices sync audio when playing from the server?

 

[sic0048]

Do the Sage devices sync audio when playing from the server?

No - SageTV doesn't have the ability to sync devices.

 

[nexus99]

You could use a Casatunes XLi as a non amplified matrix (5x6). And the Casatunes software from any PC or handheld device can control zones, sources, volume, tracks.

The 5th source can be external to the PC so it could be whatever you want it to be.

All you need to do is run RCAs from the music server to your zone amps. I bet this is in place already.

 

[drozwood90]

Hi folks,
Thanks for the input so far. I entertained the idea of multiple sound cards a few years ago, but I guess it just slipped off my radar since I wasn't thinking about it for this solution.

My setup supports multiple sound cards so definitely worth a try given the price of USB sound cards. However, I'm reading a few horror stories with sync issues between the cards giving sound on some zones delayed with respect to other zones. I suspect this is more of an issue with lower performance PCs and possibly USB sound devices.

Tim

Yeah, I was going to use a solid state relay to "mux" the zones together through an amp (so each one gets the same sound, without influencing the other zones). Essentially use one zone as an overall player to all zones.

Haven't gotten that far yet. With the new house, I've not finished re-running all the wire I had in the last house (had the syncing issue). It's only really annoying when you are playing audio for long periods of time (IMO). Such as if I started 1 Winamp for each zone, playing the SAME audio, they all get out of sync eventually. So, the way Homeseer works, you can have announcements over certain zones, by setting up 1 speaker client per zone. I would funnel all WHOLE HOUSE announcements to one zone, which would be the Winamp / Speaker client hooked to the USB soundcard that deals with the amplifier. I would MUX OUT the other zones (pausing audio if necessary, turning on the other speaker's power if necessary) to this zone, wait for the voltage to settle (.5sec?) then play the sound that I want to play. When done, switch everything back.

Just need to buy / build the mux and amp. I have a design I came up with...but haven't had time to do anything about it. So, if I get the other zones wired up, I think we'll just live with it being out of sync for a bit (until I get around to making the amp/ relay box...or finding one online).

If you want, I posted a pretty detailed description of my setup over on the Homeseer forums. I'm sure you can lift most of the ideas. Let me know and I'll digg up a link for you.

--Dan

 

[drozwood90]

Casatunes XLi as a non amplified matrix (5x6).

Wow, I don't think I spent that much on my whole setup!

--Dan