Oh my, such a broad question. There are literally endless combinations of combined and discrete configurations. It will all depend on your priorities, budget and objectives. Perhaps one way to give you an option tree is to describe what we have.
Ours is truly an audio and music retreat. We have at least seven separate stereo audio systems across the house, ranging from a five figure high end system, down to a modest integrated amp system and budget bookshelves. Mid century German table radios in bedrooms. Tubes, high power SS, large floor standing speakers, bookshelves, modern amplification, vintage classics from the golden era . . . we have it all going on. All have Squeezeboxen, from Transporters down to Classics, most with Touches, some with improved PSUs, some with better outboard DACs. And three SB Radios, extending all the way out to an outbuilding some 60 feet from the main house. All can play together synchronized or seperately. All synchronized, you would hear the same beautiful music everywhere. But you are talking about an enormous investment in Squeezeboxes and complete audio systems. We have spent over 45 years in audio as a passionate hobby. Most people would never make that sustained investment over such time. And most importantly, we NEVER listen to our systems that way. Some of the systems are serious music machines, and would be wasted as passing background sources singing in unison. These are systems for when you sit down in a room and want a musical experience. But that is one option. But we also have a twelve station Nutone intercom system, over 50 years old, and fully restored. Back when the stations had passable sounding speakers. And into that we have connected a single Squeezebox Receiver, remote wired into a closet below the master station. And THAT is what we listen to when we want whole house background music to follow us around. One squeezebox, playing everywhere. No, it is not super high fidelity. But it sounds plenty nice as you move about. I am sure there are modern intercom systems, wired and wireless, that could do the same for you if you wanted a whole house solution using a minimum of players. That is another option. And in later years, as the community has developed plug ins, you now have the option of Chromecast. Sometimes, when we donÂ’t want to fill the entire house or burn a nice stereo, we have LMS stream to a TV soundbar or other Chromecast device. Some soundbars with subwoofers actually donÂ’t sound too bad. And there are a universe of tabletop devices and even powered speakers that have Chromecast. If you donÂ’t want to invest in a full Squeezebox ecosystem, a series of self-contained Chromecast devices fed by LMS might be the next best thing. And the key to it all is centralized, portable, control. When slim devices first started, most of the time you had to sit down at a computer to exert full control over multiple players. Now, while you can control most Squeezeboxes from any of them, a single portable control is the breakthrough to move about convenience. Years ago, the only way to enjoy that level of hand held control was with a Controller, and we have one of those . . . that we hardly use. Today, the indispensable contol option is without question iPeng. With that wonderful app, you can tote around total control of your entire Squeezebox ecosystem, whether individual systems, a whole-house option, or a flock of Chromecast substitutes - or all of them - in your pocket on your iPhone or pad. OrangeSqueeze offered a similar solution for Android users, but frankly iPeng is head and shoulders better. The other necessity for a strong ecosystem is a stable and reliable network backbone. While most of our devices are ethernet wired through smart enterprise grade switching, a more modern wireless router can keep the bits flowing smoothly, especially when high resolution streams are involved. So as you see, there are many ways you can use Squeezeboxes, either a few or many, or even one, to move music to as many or as few locations as you like. It is an extremely flexible platform, and we have stayed with it and will continue to stay with it as long as the hardware and server code will allow. It was a profound mistake for Logitech to have abandoned it. It was and remains superior to Sonos and is still competitive with the latest music streaming solutions. Good luck in whatever configuration you decide upon. I hope a peek at ours helped show you some options. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ sgmlaw's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=13995 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=109764
_______________________________________________ discuss mailing list discuss@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/mailman/listinfo/discuss
