PC controlled speaker switch

DavidL-

I still don't understand how you do your zoned HA announcements with this setup. What if the cheap receiver in a particular room is off? Also, how do you view artist/track info in the various rooms with the cheap receivers? Put PCs at every music location?
 
I know you didn't ask me, but you guys help me so much with the HA stuff, I thought I would help out with that which I do know [HT]...

Also, how do you view artist/track info in the various rooms with the cheap receivers? Put PCs at every music location?
Use the server to oversee it all and give you this data. No need for multiple PCs, unless you want in-room control over the source. Even then, you could use that Fujitsu 3400 touchscreen tablet PC for $250 that I got.
I know some folks who are using cheap receivers to distribute CDs via a Delta-410 multi-channel PCI card ($60 off eBay). They put that in their server, split the outputs to the multiple locations, and use their servers to tell them what's on. That way each receiver only has the one input setting, and the server decides what to send them.
You use MainLobby or in my case, CQC, to manage the playback, in which case it knows what's on.

Here's my screen for that, keep in mind that I seperated zones from sources. You can see on this screen what the source is playing, and look on the wrapper for what source is on in which room.

I could just as easily have put this on my "floorplan" view, but if multiple zones are playing the same source it would be visually confusing.

VladStudio_Sources.jpg
 
Mike,
Everything that IVB said.
Plus, the receivers are always on. The only reason to makesure they are at least IR is in the possible chance that someone turned one off, or you wanted to kill sound on that output for sure, or there was a power failure and the unit defaults to off, or if you want to save energy and only turn on an outdoor set of zones for example, when you know you will be out there. Of course, RS232 is better, but much more expensive and hard to find in a garage sale!

Being that the receiver has usually multiple input sources one can also reuse the IR to change sources for announcements. You could also do same on the input side using a matrix switcher. Or, blend in an announcement at the PC side with control over the sound card. The latter is how I do it. I pause MusicLobby and my MainLobby MLSpeak plugin says what has to be said, then I unPause MusicLobby.
 
My setup uses seperate small speakers and a small amp for announcements. HS can mute the amps or pause all the zones in JRMC (I do that on a phone call). Also my setup is designed to turn on and off the amp in each zone as you use them. The HS software keeps track on the power and mute state for each zone and indicates these states on the Now Playing screens as small LED lights on each button. No sense wasting electricity for nothing. I also use descete on and off IR commands so when you hit on it will only turn the amp on.. even if its already on.

To control/view the music library (as well as lighting, weather, ect) I have Now Playing installed on my PC in my den, a couple of touch screens and I also have a PPC version of Now Playing that can be used anywhere. Once you go touch screen with an interface like Now Playing, CQC or MusicLobby you will never go back. To have hundreds of CD's and playlists at your fingertip is just awesome.

John
 
jwilson56 said:
My setup uses seperate small speakers and a small amp for announcements. HS can mute the amps or pause all the zones in JRMC (I do that on a phone call). Also my setup is designed to turn on and off the amp in each zone as you use them. The HS software keeps track on the power and mute state for each zone and indicates these states on the Now Playing screens as small LED lights on each button. No sense wasting electricity for nothing.

To control/view the music library (as well as lighting, weather, ect) I have Now Playing installed on my PC in my den, a couple of touch screens and I also have a PPC version of Now Playing that can be used anywhere. Once you go touch screen with an interface like Now Playing, CQC or MusicLobby you will never go back. To have hundreds of CD's and playlists at your fingertip is just awesome.

John
John-

I see what you are doing but not really sure why that is any better than speaker switching. If I use a small amp for announcements like you do, and instead of small dedicated speakers simply switch the music speakers in a given area from the music amp to the announcement amp, then I have pretty much the same thing without the extra speakers. Muting is not required since the speakers disconnect from the music source and speaker loading is not an issue unless your music amp is a tube design that doesn't like an open speaker load.

I also don't think a touch screen in every room where there is music is something that is realistically going to happen in my house.
 
Mike, Not many installs have touchscreens in each room. Just the principal and well trafficked rooms typically. The rest are filled in with wireless tablets or pocketpcs that go with you to each room you want to control your music and rest of setup. Usually found on the coffee table.

Of course Homeseer provides for voice recognition for music control, but that is IMHO just for the cool factor and not practical.
 
DavidL said:
I pause MusicLobby and my MainLobby MLSpeak plugin says what has to be said, then I unPause MusicLobby.
But if you only need to announce to one zone and you pause MusicLobby, doesn't that stop the music in the other zones that aren't getting the announcement? Even if it does pause just the one zone, wouldn't that process put that zone out of synch with the others when you unpause it?
 
John - how did you attach that image using a thumbnail? I'm using the IMG tags, but it results in that huge screen showing...
 
Can't imagine switching your speakers from a 200 watt receiver to a small amp while your playing music at a loud level. I would think that could damage your audio amp. It would be better to use IR to switch a line level input and pipe the anouncement in their or mix it in like David suggested. For me the announcement aamp is on all the time and the audio zones are not. So it made sense to keep them seperate for me.

John
 
You can independently control each zone and even software zone synch music across zones. But, if you are Synched and then Pause, then all zones Pauase so they stay in Synch. Most don't synch zones but treat each independent for multiple users in multiple areas with individual music playlists.

I suspect you should look more deeply into a Russound as it adds hardware synch and a input sourcing and announcements.
 
My setup has a hardware sync. I do not like the software sync under JRMC v11 and had the hardware solution already in place so I left it.

John
 
jwilson56 said:
Can't imagine switching your speakers from a 200 watt receiver to a small amp while your playing music at a loud level. I would think that could damage your audio amp. It would be better to use IR to switch a line level input and pipe the anouncement in their or mix it in like David suggested. For me the announcement aamp is on all the time and the audio zones are not. So it made sense to keep them seperate for me.

John
It is functionally the same as flipping the A-B speaker switch to OFF while you are playing a loud song. No loading issue and no speaker thump as it is after the amplifier. Probably the lowest risk way to handle very powerful amplifiers.
 
DavidL said:
I suspect you should look more deeply into a Russound as it adds hardware synch and a input sourcing and announcements.
Going back to my original question, this is what I am trying to learn more about. The specs don't tell me enough about how announcements are actully handled from a switching perspective. Is it all or nothing with those systems? Can you announce to individual zones if you control it through the serial port?

By hardware synch do you just mean source switching?
 
thanks for all the replies. it really helps me understand my setup a whole lot better. there are just so many options and ways to do this. i visited russounds site trying to find out more info on their CAA66.

There wasn't much detail information regarding some of the features. I'm assuming that the RS232 will allow any HA software to control but is it a safe assumption. Maybe someone can verify it.

What about the RJ45 link port? Can that be use to connect to my PC instead of the RS232 port? And will any HA software be able to control the unit thru the RJ45 port?

I have also looked at the AB8SS and it is alot cheaper. However, from my calculation, there will be 12 pairs of speakers that will be installed on the main floor. I'll probably install more for the basement as I finish it later. It's probably an overkill installing 12 pairs but it's undecided yet. I may not install speakers in the bathrooms at all. If that is the case then I'll end up with only 9 pairs. I guess I can eliminate another if I were to not install a pair over the dining area. It's a tough decision since everything involves $$$$ and time. If I don't install all of them during construction then it'll be hard to install them later on after the house is completed.

If I was to use the AB8SS, will I need 2 of them if I have more than 8 pairs of speakers?

Sorry for all the newbie questions. But with your help, at the end of this project... I'll be able to offer my adive to other newbies as well... :D.

sean
 
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