sorry .......im a newbie

a1y

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first thing hi,

I'm looking into fitting a better sound system into our house. What i would like (not sure if i can do this) is to fit speakers in the bathroom(2), kitchen(2), main bedroom(2) and garden patio area(2) then to be able to select which room had music on or to have all rooms with music on if that makes sense....

i looked in to the apple air thing but just dont trust the whole wireless thing!

So my budget is not massive and will build it over time ie fit the speakers while doing each room up and then buy the amp at the end..

What amp/receiver would beable to do this for me?
anything else that i need to think about?

oh i would also like to run it off an ipad/ipod

Thankyou in advance
 
looks like you are talking 4 separate areas. many amplifiers have outputs for two different sets of speakers. so you could do this with two separate amplifiers one amplifier could be linked to the other output to imput. With all the sources going into a the first amp.
Or you could use for separate amplifiers each daisy chained to the other. There is a particular advantage to this you may want things to be at different levels in different areas and this would give you a separate volume control for each area. It would also enable you to have the same thing on in every area from one source. You could also have a separate source for each area. For example a different radio station on in each area if different people were doing different things. Or the same TV programme piped to every area so people could follow something as they moved around the house.
 
So how could I go about sending the music to each amp? Would it be a case of a iPod dock connected to each amp.

Also could I use a multi zone amp ?
 
first thing hi,

I'm looking into fitting a better sound system into our house. What i would like (not sure if i can do this) is to fit speakers in the bathroom(2), kitchen(2), main bedroom(2) and garden patio area(2) then to be able to select which room had music on or to have all rooms with music on if that makes sense....

i looked in to the apple air thing but just dont trust the whole wireless thing!

So my budget is not massive and will build it over time ie fit the speakers while doing each room up and then buy the amp at the end..

What amp/receiver would beable to do this for me?
anything else that i need to think about?

oh i would also like to run it off an ipad/ipod

Thankyou in advance

Depends on your budget. Simple Audio will do the job :-
Simple Audio Roomplayer I - Quantum AV
one Roomplayer per zone and is not wireless.
 
the record output of amp 1would go to the input of amp 2, its output would go to the input of amp 3. its output would go to the input of amp 4.
All sources going into amp number one would then go to all the other amps.
Each amp could also have something different and separate pluged into it. But this would only then go to the next set of amps in line. Unless each was also linked backwards to the one before it and output to an input. I think this would be too messy.
 
Lol yeah! , might have to be this apple air thing!
 
Think carefully about what you really want to do?

You are implying at Broadcast system, where a single music source broadcasts to multiple location. But where is that single central music source. If you are in your bedroom, either first thing in the morning or last thing at night, you have to go to the living room (assuming that is the central location of the stereo) and turn it on and select your music.

However, with wireless 'Pull' system, each user in each room can pull music from a central archive, usually a home computer. This can be done over both wired and wireless networking. In this case, you get up in the morning and pull music content or Internet Radio to your bedroom, mean while the kids get up and each pull personalize content to their locations. Then you go down stairs for your morning coffee, and pull new content into the kitchen.

Logitech - Squeezebox TOUCH

However, this requires a receiver, amplifier, and speakers in each room. However, they to make all-in-one units that are like large portable desktop radios.

Logitech - Squeezebox RADIO

Another alternative is a Line Level distribution network, where the pre-amp outs of your main stereo are fed to the remote locations an into a small stereo system.

Then speaker level distribution systems. A single amp with mutiple amp channels, say 8, making a power source for 4 remote stereo locations. The location can have a volume control that turns the music DOWN ONLY. But this still requires the source to be activated at the central location (living room). These multi-channel distrubitution amps tend to be on the expensive side.

Today, most prefer the independent control systems like the Logitech linked to above. These give the most flexibility, each room can 'pull' different content from a central server. The Logitech Touch (linked above) has a USB input so an external USB Thumb Drive or a local USB hard drive can contain and play music. I'm pretty sure these also give access to popular Internet Radio stations like Spotify, Pandora, etc....

If you truly want a central Broadcast system that can be done, but it is the most complicated and least flexible option.

If you want independent systems with local rather than central control all pulling content from a central server, then the modern Network systems are the best choice.

I'm told that these PULL Network Systems do have Broadcast capability, but I've not quite worked out how that is done.

Sonos, an alternative brand to Logitech, has one system, I believe the ZP120 that has both a network receiver and an amp built into one unit, which means you simply add speakers. The Logitech appeal to me because they have nice bright LED displays.

Just a few, hopefully helpful, thoughts.

Steve/bluewizard
 
Right so , this Logitech Squeese box links to a pc/iPad to retrieve music and then it would be wired to an amp which feeds the speakers.

If so that sounds like what I may need! , the sound quality won't be to bad as its wireless will it?
 
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Right so , this Logitech Squeese box links to a pc/iPad to retrieve music and then it would be wired to an amp which feeds the speakers.

If so that sounds like what I may need! , the sound quality won't be to bad as its wireless will it?

SQ will be the same as if hardwired, the issue would be the strength of signal your wifi has and the thickness of your walls etc. You may experience drop out as opposed to deterioration in quality. Audio streaming uses a lot less bandwidth than video so you can accommodate quite high bitrates over a wireless network in relation to audio, but a wired connection is still preferable in order to facilitate a more stable stream that is less likely to be impeded by other factors that would effect a wireless connection. Audio over wifi is still considered to be inferior to audio via wires, but I doubt you'll notice any difference unless using high end amplification and speakers?
 
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