whole house audio

[njabara]

I have searched for and found a few articles dealing with whole house audio. I am building a new home and it is all framed up but no sheet rock. so this is the prime time to wire it up. i need only to konw what wire you recomend and if there is an article that would detail this for me as i am totaly new to this.

I have thought about limited mics (maybe 4 with push buttons not open mics) but because of the discuraging results everyone has had i have all but forgoten it.

I do want to have a whole house audio and maybe video where i need more info on the wiring for this. and i cant find it.


Thanks for any help.
-NJabara

[toddgraham]

You can check both Russound and Nuvo online sites which provide sample wiring diagrams for their house house systems.


Todd

[njabara]

how about with an "ocelot"

how would HS know where im at in the house in oreder to respond on the
correct speaker.

i guess my question is how do i wire everything up to be zoned.

thanks,
Nathan J

[dantelope]

When you say "whole house audio", what very specifically do you mean?


Some people mean they want music to play
Some people mean they want announcements from HS
Some people mean they want intercoms
Some people mean they want hands-free telephones

Which do you mean?

[njabara]

I want music to play,
I want announcements from HS


but i would like to be able to say paly music in living room. and have only the living room recever come on and play music. (with ocelot ir stuff?)
this is one of my questions do i run all speakers to the recievers in each room or do i run them to the recivers and to HS or to HS only ?


i think also that i will set up motion senors so HS will know where im at?
or maybe I should use mics? or a combo what is the best way? (or most economical way

thanks

[dantelope]

The original way to handle this is best covered by James Lipsit's website:

http://www.james.lipsit.com/home.htm

Do you have computers in each of those rooms? If so, you may be able to script something together using HS2's Speaker architecture.

If not, you'll need to be able to control your receivers remotely.

[toddgraham]

A whole house audio system such as the Russound, Nuvo, or even the AVS8x8 will do what you need. All speakers and sources are wired to a central location. For my setup (with Nuvo) I have once input source as the PC speaker line output. Then, when HS needs to make an annoucement the zone source is changed to the PC input on the Nuvo by HS, the announcement spoken, and then the original source toggled back on. I also use this same output for streaming online music, mp3's, XM radio , etc from the PC.

Todd

[christopherhallowell]

Here's my setup

Here's my setup...

I have 1 speaker in every room for whole house announcements which Homeseer controls and executes. (Using a PC controllable speaker switcher, Homeseer can very easily turn on/off any combo of speakers)

Then I have another speaker in every room for zone music from the PC(JRMC). I use the M-Delta 410 for 2 zone output right now. Each output from the sound card goes to a cheap receiver. Again this is controlled via HS.

If I want whole house music from my PC, then I use an input from the speaker switcher above and the music is played through the annoucement speakers.

It was very cheap since I already had 2 receivers laying around and I bought really cheap car audio speakers. For the speaker switcher, you could use the parallel port to control which speaker is on/off or relays and universal modules.

[jwilson56]

If you have not looked at my Now Playing whole house audio project here are some links

http://www.cocoontech.com/index.php...&hl=now+playing

http://board.homeseer.com/showthread.php?t=100339

http://www.promixis.com/phpBB2/view...t=playing+20005

http://www.promixis.com/downloads.php?mode=list&id=777


John

[njabara]

Wow thanks guys great ideas. when you use a M-Delta 410

do you have to run input/output to all recevers you want to be able to send audio to? or is there something im missing?

if you do run input/output from all recevers to the M-Delta 410 what kind of wire?
will the ends be rca and is rca a 3 wire wire.


thanks again.

Nathan

[jwilson56]

The Delta 410 has 10 channels... these can be paired up for 5 'stereo' zones. Channels 1 & 2 are SPID digital coax. The rest are normal RCA line jacks. I use mine with JRMC which supports 5 independant zones in my setup. My main zone is optical for best quality and the other 4 goto my Technics 2 channel stereo receivers for my auxilary zones. Great card.

John

[njabara]

when you run the rca thruout the house what kind of "base" wire can it buy... like at homedepot. or do you buy a 75 ft rca cable that has the ends on it already.

thanks again
Nathan J

[jwilson56]

Well I don't wire the RCA cable throughout the house (that would not be recommended as the low level signals would no doubt pick up hum). What I did was to centrally locate all my zone receivers to one area of the basement and just run the speaker wires to each room. Much better setup. I control all the receivers with IR through my Now Playing via Homeseer & Slink-e.

John

[njabara]

DANG well that might mess me up how long is to long? 25 ft.

i have already wired the recevers in the rooms upstairs. i was then going to run the and output from the computer to each recever. not a good idea?

[pkoslow]

Nathan,

You can probably make the distance with low-level RCA cabling provided it's a good quality shielded cable. You'll want to keep it as far away from noisy electrical devices as possible, and not run parallel with any high voltage wiring (try to cross them at 90 deg).

In the end, you may still pick up 60hz hum, but it's possible this will be a result of a ground loop and will require a "ground loop isolator" at one end to correct the noise.

Best practice dictates that you run low-level signal cables as short of a distance as possible, but give it a try and if you're careful with how you run the cables it will probably work.

Paul