Nuvo System Help grand concerto!

[petervr6]

Hi Ladies & Gents

As you know we do plasma, normal av installations, but have no experience in mulitroom systems, anyway the time has come for me to put a system in my place and i like the look of the nuvo grand concerto.

I understand it has 6 inputs (3xserver, 2xradio,1xipod) but can i put my normal cd player into it and be able to control it through the system?

what about putting my tv through it so that 1 zone could be my tv coming through speakers in the celing? i understand i will loose another input (maybe the radio) but again could i control the other item?

I have quite a good knowledge of av stuff in general but the mulitroom systems dont seem to have a massive amount of info out there?

any help would be much appreciaited!

Pete

[ufo22jim]

Hi Pete,

I'm not an expert on this, but I have also being thinking about buying a Grand Concerto. From what I can gather the unit has 6 inputs that can be used with an output from any hi-fi source, as it has standard phono plugs. It seems that the Grand Concerto kit (NV-18GMS) comes with the amplifier, 6 room controllers and 6 IR emitters. I think that the 6 IR emitters are stuck partially over each of the 6 IR "eyes" on whatever device you want to connect to it. This is usually okay if you can have all your AV kit in a single rack, but you might want to bear this in mind if your amplifier is going to be mounted a fair distance from your TV, because the wired IR transmitter might not reach! Another slight problem with the Concerto and Grand Concerto is you either need to get a Nuvo dealer to program all your IR connections or buy the NV-I8DLS EZ IR Learning Station and software required for programming. This kit is only supposed to be available to dealers, but I have seen people in the USA selling them.

Incidentally, I haven't seen a Grand Concerto for sale here in the UK - just the normal Concerto (which seem to use the same amp but the room controllers are not as high-tech). This also needs the IR learning station to set-up the link to your inputs. I'm thinking about buying a Grand Concerto from the US, which I've been quoted around $2450 + $200 shipping for. This is a great price, but I'll need to pay import tax and VAT on that. There doesn't seem to be a compatibility problem - the amp uses standard IEC (or kettle) plugs and the PSU can auto-sense between 110-240V. Have you found a UK supplier for the grand concerto? If so, please let me know the details.

I've had a look at the Sonos and Russound offerings, and the Nuvo kit is more advanced than Sonos and seems to be comparable with Russound, but at a better price. It seems to give you lots of features for a reasonable price. The only disadvantage I found with the Nuvo concerto is it uses Cat-5 for the cabling to the each of the room controllers and you need to run separate speaker cables to each of the rooms from the main amp. They say to use 16 gauge speaker cables, but I think it might be better to run thicker cables especially if the wires are going to be over 20m in length. There are a few other multi-room manufacturers that run the sound information to the speakers over cat 5 cables (un-amplified of course) and then have an integrated amplifier in each room controller. This is the best way to do things, as it keeps the speaker cables shorter. Unfortunately it is also more expensive to go down this route. That's why I'm looking at the Grand Concerto myself.

I'm planning to emigrate to South Africa and build a house out there on a plot of land that I have already purchased. I like the features of the Grand Concerto and it has an integrated RS-232 interface that allows it to interface with home automation equipment. I'm now reading up on home automation to see what the best way forward on this - hopefully I will be able to integrate multi-room audio, some simple home automation/lighting and security control. I still don't know if I should do this via a media center PC or whether to do it via touch screens. If anyone else has some good links/advice about this then please let me know.

Cheers,
Jim

[hornydragon]

I have seen and used lots of multiroom systems never come across Nuvo a couple of points to consider with a distributed system input control you need to know if the IR outpus are discrete if they arent you cant have 2 of the same component ie cant use 2 Denon Tuners would need to be one Denon tuner and one onkyo tuner etc. as for control with IR only you dont get feed back with RS232 you get feedback but few components have RS232, the lack of feedback can be a real pain wih a server full of music one way to get round the lack of inputs is to use a mini system like the little Denon as a multi source unit with CD tuner etc canalso be used for adding a turntable or another ipod there are huge number of systems out there picking the right one is incredibly diffcult making it work 10times harder.

[AJENT68]

I have recently installed a NuVo Grand Concerto plus the T2 twin tuner , M3 three stream music server and iPod dock in our demo rooms. Very impressive sound and intuitive keypads. Only issue we had being the EZ port hub which Nuvo use to connect all the Cat5 wires for the key pads. This mounts in the wall behind our rack but was too big for a double gang J box (which its supposed to fit) which meant a small mod to the J box plastics .... cutting it in half ! Still its all firmly in place now and given the cost we thinks its a terrific system.

[ufo22jim]

Originally Posted by AJENT68

I have recently installed a NuVo Grand Concerto plus the T2 twin tuner , M3 three stream music server and iPod dock in our demo rooms.

Hi AJENT68, it's good to hear that somebody is bringing the Grand Concerto into the UK. Newmarket isn't that far from me so I might come along to see and hear the system in action. What is the name/address of your shop?
Cheers,
Jim

[philipt18]

Anyone seen or heard of using a Macintosh to load music onto a Nuvo M3 Music Server?

I'm trying to load music from my Mac, using Windows emulators but I'm not having much luck.

If not, has anyone been able to use any application other that Windows Media Player 11 to load music onto an M3? I have Nuvo SyncMate installed and it recognizes the server as there, but when I load up Windows Media Player 11, it doesn't recognize it as being present.

Thanks,

Philip

[ufo22jim]

Originally Posted by hornydragon

points to consider with a distributed system input control you need to know if the IR outputs are discrete if they arent you cant have 2 of the same component ie cant use 2 Denon Tuners.

I got hold a 3 input Nuvo tuner in 1 box, so that 3 of my inputs gone if I connect all 3 up! I still haven't found if the IR inputs are discrete on the Concerto, but I suspect they might be as thaey are supplying a 3 O/P tuner themselves.

Originally Posted by hornydragon

with IR only you dont get feed back with RS232 you get feedback but few components have RS232, the lack of feedback can be a real pain with a server full of music.

Nuvo does it's own music server, although it is a bit pricey. It seems to use a proprietary interface to communicate with the Concerto (called NuvoNet). The RS232 seems to be reserved for basic home automation, although there doesn't seem to be much information about this. It seems that Nuvo and HAI have went into a joint venture and are compatible. Both are US companies, so I don't know that much about what the boxes are capable of when interlinked. As for a music server, I might go down the Media center PC route for storing music rather than buying the Nuvo M3 music server, as it be more flexible and would have more storage (and should be able to control it via RS232).

Talking about RS232, I got hold of a cheap Crestron AV2 video controller on eBay. I was going to incorporate this into my home automation system, but hit a problem as the software for it is only available to dealers and registered installers. Now I know why they go cheap on eBay!!

Originally Posted by hornydragon

there are huge number of systems out there picking the right one is incredibly difficult making it work 10times harder.

How right you are!!

I've now virtually committed myself to buying Nuvo, as I've already bought the Nuvo 3 O/P tuner and I've also bought some Nuvo speakers. The in-room controllers are what really sells this system. They use clever touch technology in place of real buttons and the display is bright and has a good viewing angle.

[yarwoob]

I have just bought a Nuvo Grand concerto from the US and am concerned the power supply will only take a 120V and not a 240V supply. Can anyone confirm that it is ok to plug it straight into the mains in the UK.

The label on the back says 120V but the fuse says 5A 250V. There are only two pins in the iec socket as well, no earth pin which seems a bit strange.

[i-B]

No Do Not Connect This To The Mains!

[i-B]

NuVo PSUs are LINEAR not switched mode and you WILL blow it!

If you are lucky it will fry the PSU, worst case it will fry everything including your house.

The rating on the fuse in the IEC socket is the MAXIMUM permissable through the inlet NOT what it is supplying, 2 pins are std for Nuvo as they are double earthed.

You have 2 options

1. Transform Down to 110vac before the mains lead
2. Swapout the US spec linear psu for a european one

We have seen this issue and have experience before!

If you want help then get in touch with me - We've been installing these systems up and down the UK for the last 18 months and are ACCREDITED NuVo installers/distributors.

Wouldn't normally blatantly jump in and shout about ourselves like this (it's a breach of forum rules) but you need help urgently.

CALL US

Intelligent Buildings Ltd.

[i-B]

Originally Posted by hornydragon

I have seen and used lots of multiroom systems never come across Nuvo a couple of points to consider with a distributed system input control you need to know if the IR outpus are discrete if they arent you cant have 2 of the same component ie cant use 2 Denon Tuners would need to be one Denon tuner and one onkyo tuner etc. as for control with IR only you dont get feed back with RS232 you get feedback but few components have RS232, the lack of feedback can be a real pain wih a server full of music one way to get round the lack of inputs is to use a mini system like the little Denon as a multi source unit with CD tuner etc canalso be used for adding a turntable or another ipod there are huge number of systems out there picking the right one is incredibly diffcult making it work 10times harder.

Horny

FYI

There are 6 discrete source IR outputs on the GC plus two summing ones as well, there is a GUI programming interface (RS232) for creating control macros and it will happily control multiple instances of the same source kit.