Play streaming audio on home stereo

[Lonnie]

Anyone doing this? What hardware are you using? I was looking at the wireless stuff from Radio Shack. Just wondering what your experiences were.

BTW, what is the voltage at the PC speaker connection?

[willawake]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

could try
http://www.icecast.org/

[willawake]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

hmm i see what you mean. I would prefer to do that streaming from one pc to the other which is connected to the stereo. preferably connected with lan cables not wireless.

there are quite a few solutions from the various manufacturers (d-link, linksys, logitech, creative, apple) but i can imagine that they would be not perfect.

[Lonnie]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

If the PC speaker connection was line voltage I could just use RCA cable into an Aux connection. If it's less I'll need a preamp, which most newer receivers don't have. This would be the simplest and least expensive solution.

[willawake]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

what receiver is it anyway?

the best solution would be if your receiver has s/pdif input. that would be a nice solution then connected to a soundcard with s/pdif out, the DAC inside the receiver would be decoding the digital signal from the computer to analog sound. This would avoid using possibly low quality soundcard dacs and also avoiding any interference to the analog sound caused by the computer.

[Lonnie]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

It's a Harman/Kardon AVR 500, I'll have to dig out the manual.

[willawake]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

ooh its a nice one. yes it does have both optical and also coaxial s/pdif inputs so you could use either depending on which you have on your board or soundcard.

i believe it should work. how far away from the computer is it?

[Lonnie]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

15ft as the crow flys. 35ft to route cable around the room.

Now that I looked op the definition of s/pdif I knew I had the inputs, duh..

[Lonnie]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

Now for some more dumb questions from a computer illiterate. I don't see s/pdif connections on the rear of my new Dell Dimension E-310. Do I need a better sound card?

[willawake]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

35ft = 10m thats kinda on the limits....

yeah you would need a new soundcard then

[Lonnie]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

Thanks for all the help and info...

[willawake]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

for soundcards i like the http://www.m-audio.com/ ones
i have the audiophile 192 and the audiophile 2496
but any card with the via envy24 chipset or similar is nice (also good dac chips if you are using the analog outs).

i will check for you also the voltage on the soundcard line outs.

[Per Hansson]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

With Optical you can go about 30m without problems

With Coaxial it's not advisable to go beyond 10m, too much signal loss

Analog sound I don't know, but you get the added problem of the cables acting like antennas and picking up noise along the way...

[WNG]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

line out from most soundcards work fine with RCA inputs of receivers.
Some cards have a bit higher power outputs, so trim it with the PC before it enters the receiver.

I listen to streamed music (DI.FM) on my receivers w/o trouble. I don't have the cabling issues you do though because I have a dedicated PC for the entertainment system.
For the computer room, 4 PCs are connected to a receiver via all its line inputs, and power a pair of sat/sub speakers.

For such analog runs, it's best to keep it within 3 meters.

[Per Hansson]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

and also FYI, if you decide to go digital note that with most soundcards you will only get Stereo if you go Digital, because you are still not sending an encoded Dolby Digital or DTS signal so the receiver can't send it to any specific speakers... (unless you are actually listening to encoded material like a DVD or other AC3 material)

There are soundcards with Dolby Digital Live encoding tho, the Auzentech X-Meridian and other based off the C Media CMI8788 chipset for example...

[willawake]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

actually with the m-audio cards and probably quite a few other cards you are supposed to be able to pass the multichannel sound through the digital out even though the card is not capable of actually playing it.

the 2496 here
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/Produc...uctCode=361112
notes :

S/PDIF digital I/O with 2-channel PCM
digital I/O supports surround-encoded AC-3 and DTS pass-through

the revolution 7.1 does that and plays it
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/Produc...uctCode=123301

the cheapest envy chipset card is the chaintech
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/Produc...uctCode=292003
which actually has an optical out unlike the m-audio cards
dunno if it does the pass-through though.....

i use one of these to convert to optical when i need
http://www.core-sound.com/co2/1.php

[gonzo0815]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

Well, i just solder some optical transmitter & jackets in on of the outputs. This box is probably not more ( plus some 5v regulator and if you want good signals a logic ic to refresh the singal edges). All in al it is worth abouth $5 plus the case. Most motherboards feature an digital out header today. There is all you need, even the 5v supply. Only adding the Transmitter. Digital receivers are usually prepared for an optical o/p, thus you only have to solder the parts in.

[Per Hansson]

Re: Play streaming audio on home stereo

Most cards does pass through, that was what I meant in my previous post... You either have to send a pre-encoded signal (with S/PDIF pass through)

Or you have to encode it yourself (and send via S/PDIF) (either on the fly with cards that support it or offline and view later)

To get surround sound (5.1 or whatever) using analog you have to decode the sound first, and send it through the analog cables... There are many solutions for this, some soundcards has it (hardware decode function) most software DVD players (but you usually need the most expensive version) and the free AC3 Filter on sourceforge :P