Whole house a/v system

BoardsMember

Not sure where to start with this. Have done so much reading, and taken so many notes, I think I am more confused than ever. So I'll start at the start.

I am soon to renovate my house. I plan to wire for speakers & network to multiple rooms, and to bring all cables back to a well ventilated media control point. I'll be putting in a free to air satellite as part of this for SAOR view.

I'd like audio in multiple rooms: radio & music from hard disk or ipod or smartphone (I have all and can commit to whichever is most appropriate).

I'll have "televisions" in multiple rooms. I'm happy to limit myself to one "proper" cinema room. I already have this in my sitting room with a good 5.1 system.

The amp is a good modern one, Onkyo NR609, its on my my network, it has a good tuner, internet radio, naptster, spotify etc. The Onkyo has multiple sources attached via HDMI: a WesternDigital media player (with a USB disk attached), a mini mac which I use for streaming Sky Sports package from web, Blu Ray player, UPC box, Onkyo iPod dock.

The Onkyo also supports 2 zones. I have the 5.1 as the primary zone, with zone 2 having 2 speakers in dining room. It can play different sources in different zones).

I have another UPC box in the bedroom.

What I envisage is being able to play music or radio throughout the house. Each zone could be playing the radio or ipod, or be off. Volume for each zone could be individually controlled. I woudn't need different zones to play different radio channels or music tracks.

Regarding video, it would be great to be able to play movies I have on disk (thru western digital or mini mac) in different rooms, i.e from the telly be able to select what you want to watch - be it browsing movies on disk, or selecting the UPC or SAOR view source/channel. Subject to the number of tuners I have, be able to watch different programmes in different rooms.

So the big question - how do I do all this. Or should I consider the audio & video as separate requirements and pursue them individually?

I know Sonos is regarded as a good option for the Audio, which suits fine. Or are there better options?

How do I make best use of the Onkyo, particularly for the tuner/internet radio etc? Or do I need to consider this as standalone system in the sitting room? I'd really like to be able to listen to the same music in the sitting room as is playing in other zones, but if the Onkyo is doing the 5.1 maybe this is not achievable.

Sorry for the big long post. If anyone has any experience with approaching something like this I'd appreciate input - be it on what to do or avoid on the wiring side of things, or on what to read up on or who to go & see regarding the AV side of things.

Thanks!!

BM

eddiem74

Probably get more responses here.

Cuddlesworth

Nice plan but in a normal sense its very unworkable. You would be better off with cheaper separate systems in each room. Unless your budget is practically unlimted and you can afford to splash out on a decent control system throughout the house. And they can run well above 30k for what you will be looking for.

BoardsMember

Ouch, ok, thanks for the feedback. Maybe I need a simpler implementation!

Maybe I need to leave video out of it and concentrate on music only. In that scenario, presumably I should look at Sonos and other system like this.

Can speakers be wired to two different sources. e.g. I'd like to be able to play the same music in kitchen, living room, dining room. But speakers in sitting room are already attached to the Onkyo. In order for them to be playing the same music as elsewhere I'd need them available to whatever is playing the music.

Cuddlesworth

You could just split the RCA leads off the AMP and pop a small stereo amp in each room. Not sure on the distances of RCA leads off the top of my head though.

In a ideal world it would work but you always come back to the issue of control. Speakers in the kitchen if wired back to the AMP in the living room for example, would create a considerable power draw on the amp and would always be on. A separate amp in the kitchen could be turned on or off, but choice of music would be dictated by the unit plugged into the AMP. Which would either be quite close or could be rather far away. You could use IR receivers but then you would have to program and leave remotes in every room. Which in itself would get confusing.

If it was me, I would make a point of having every room networked and get a really good NAS in place on site. Then as I need or want to, you can set up each room with separate systems that integrate and use the net/NAS for video/audio via DLNA.

Looking at it, it does seem like the SONOS system has the ability to synchronize songs across multiple devices. Interesting niche in the market I suppose.

I don't think you would find something similar with video, synchronizing multiple video streams would require a decent bit of hardware. You could have a single PC, with a splitter on the video out and it being pushed via Cat5 to multiple monitors, but again the ease of use and control of the host machine just become a annoying and unusable solution.

Bigus

Will there ever be teenagers in the house in time ? Worth considering.

Everything dates especially in housing lifetime terms,

so I prefer standalone throwaway sounds and vision, room by room. It's also hard to beat an on off button for when you're annoyed or drunk.

PogMoThoin

This is easy do, just do it through the TV's with XBMC in each room using something cheap like a Raspberry Pi/Android on a Stick. Run 2x cat5 cables the each TV point and have a central NAS storing all the media. You can easily add better a better speaker system in the rooms if needed if you're not happy with the sound from the TV.

BoardsMember

Thanks all for the responses.

The more I read the more inclined I am to go with good cabling: cat5+ cabling throughout the house to all TVs, with speakers in all rooms back to NAS. Probably end up with all separates initially, for simplicity/budget.

There are kids, 2 boys, hopefully no more

Some rooms will have speakers and no TV. I think smart TVs and not integrating video is the way forward. Not interested in having any more than 1 surround sound room, the TV audio will do for other rooms. I could always add a sound bar to one of the rooms if it started to piss me off.

superleedsdub

BoardsMember wrote: »

The more I read the more inclined I am to go with good cabling: cat5+ cabling throughout the house to all TVs, with speakers in all rooms back to NAS. Probably end up with all separates initially, for simplicity/budget.

There are kids, 2 boys, hopefully no more

Some rooms will have speakers and no TV. I think smart TVs and not integrating video is the way forward. Not interested in having any more than 1 surround sound room, the TV audio will do for other rooms. I could always add a sound bar to one of the rooms if it started to piss me off.

Most Smart TV`s have decent built in media players that can easily stream from a NAS, laptop, desktop PC or Mac.
I suggest you do some research on XBMC (particularily with a raspberry PI as Pomothoin recommended) and Plex.
If you are planning on buying a NAS I would recommend a Synology one. The OS is excellent with tons of media sharing features and there are a number of free apps for IOS and android that are great with media. For example, I can use the DS audio app to easily access my NAS remotely (I`ve even been able to stream music to my car stereo while driving).

BoardsMember

Thanks all for the responses. I'm a bit concerned this is all getting quite techie.....is it possible that all this is over-complicating a requirement that can be simplified? My wife gets very impatient when things dont "just work", and I'd prefer if it was not overkill. Is there an "easier" approach considering the following revised requirements? By easier, I mean less parts to the puzzle I suppose.

I'm happy to leave Video out of the equation, I think having smart televisions on wired network will make it fairly straightforward to play video from a central location.

Regarding audio, I want to be able to listen to MP3s or radio upstairs in bedroom & bathroom - realistically this can be one zone.

Downstairs I could get away with kitchen & dining room being 2 zones. Again, listening to radio or mps would be the source. These would be two zones, separate sources & volumes.

Outside would be another zone.

PogMoThoin

You're over analysing things. It can be modular, done in stages and built upon by adding new equipment. Start with a network of 2x cat5 cables from every TV point to a central location where you would add a NAS (network assisted storage), Desktop PC or low power media server that could be accessed by any Smart TV/Home Theatre PC/Android on a Stick or Raspberry Pi type media device over this network. You do not need to overspend to get a good system in place. A network capable of audio is also capable of video.

BoardsMember

Ok, thanks for the response Póg, I appreciate the patience!!

I'm still a little confused....are you suggesting amplifying in the zone, rather than at the source?

What wiring/controller are you suggesting for audio, for example 4 speakers in the dining room, which would have no TV point.

PogMoThoin

Yes, treat each room separately, all each room needs is a link to the network (ethernet socket) and some sort of frontend (player) to play content from the network. Check out the Logitech Squeezebox range and the software developed around it. There are free addons for XBMC which allow you play the same source on more than one XBMC. I can have the same music going in two rooms simultaneously using XBMC all controlled on my phone and all for free, I do not even own a Logitech Squeezebox, I just install their software on my server and use it with my XBMC devices.

http://www.logitech.com/en-roeu/support/speakers-audio
http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=134943
http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=Add-on:XSqueeze
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.logitech.squeezeboxremote&feature=search_result#?t=W251bGwsMSwxLDEsImNvbS5sb2dpdGVjaC5zcXVlZXplYm94cmV​tb3RlIl0.

BoardsMember

Thanks a mill for clearing that up, have been on a lot of those links (and others) already.

ilovesuarez

what you need is a multi-room audio system with a video matrix like Russound, Nuvo, Niles, etc, not sure what your budget is, but you'd be looking at 4/5 grand i'd imagine.