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Forgive my thread hijacking, but I suspect this is a place with people who might know the answer to my question. Given that I have a pair of reasonably nice sp

by colinb 4y ago

Forgive my thread hijacking, but I suspect this is a place with people who might know the answer to my question. Given that I have a pair of reasonably nice speakers but a lack of convenient wiring opportunities, I had thought to come up with something like an RPi based amplifier connected to each, with WiFi linking the two to form a stereo pair. I.e. I have two speakers. Putting both of them near mains electricity is easy. Having wires connecting both to the same amp is a PITA. What cover thing could I do?

lifty 4y ago
Not an expert but I think synchronising the signals might be challenging if you hack it yourself. I know Airplay 2 has the feature to pair speakers so perhaps if you can get Airplay 2 working on rpi then it might work. But in my experience the rpi experience is sub par; it was working great while it was working and then all of a sudden it stopped working.
Kaibeezy 4y ago
Bookshelf speakers in a small room only really need to be 4' apart, up to 6' or 8' for floor-standers in a large room. You could run the wires behind items on a shelf, under the floor, through a "wiremold" cover, paint the wire and tack it along a baseboard, or try "flat speaker wire".
qbasic_forever 4y ago
It's very difficult and fighting an uphill battle to get two totally independent wifi music receivers to together output a single stero signal split across them. I don't think even dedicated systems like Sonos support it. Run speaker wire around the room perimeter to an amp and you will be infinitely happier.
- fuckstick 4y ago
  > I don't think even dedicated systems like Sonos support it. They do. So do HomePods, other mass brands. Not my cup of tea, but people seem to love them when they work.
- hnlmorg 4y ago
  It’s a massive challenge implementing this yourself but various smart speaker protocols have supported syncing speakers for a while now. I can’t speak for if they also split stereo signals (I think I read Yamaha can) but splitting a stereo signal is very easy even without comparing it to the challenge of syncing speakers.
softwarebeware 4y ago
I'm unclear of the exact problem. Are you having a problem with powering two passive speakers from the same amplifier? Or you have two active speakers (each with its own internal amplifier and plug into the wall) and you have a problem with connecting a stereo music source to them?
bluGill 4y ago
If you want to attempt this you should use jack and one of the real time jack network protocols. I had it working for an hour, but the setup is too complex for leave everything in place setup. Was cool when it worked. I might have played more but I discovered that I couldn't do a mixer in the one room and keep the sync. (I was trying to do live music with listening in the next room so latency was important and I couldn't add delay to cheat) I wish someone would spend time making the above easy, jack has some neat abilities that are lacking in all the whole house systems i've seen. Or maybe I just want to do weird things?

by colinb 4y ago

lifty 4y ago

Not an expert but I think synchronising the signals might be challenging if you hack it yourself. I know Airplay 2 has the feature to pair speakers so perhaps if you can get Airplay 2 working on rpi then it might work. But in my experience the rpi experience is sub par; it was working great while it was working and then all of a sudden it stopped working.

Kaibeezy 4y ago

Bookshelf speakers in a small room only really need to be 4' apart, up to 6' or 8' for floor-standers in a large room. You could run the wires behind items on a shelf, under the floor, through a "wiremold" cover, paint the wire and tack it along a baseboard, or try "flat speaker wire".

qbasic_forever 4y ago

It's very difficult and fighting an uphill battle to get two totally independent wifi music receivers to together output a single stero signal split across them. I don't think even dedicated systems like Sonos support it. Run speaker wire around the room perimeter to an amp and you will be infinitely happier.

fuckstick 4y ago
> I don't think even dedicated systems like Sonos support it. They do. So do HomePods, other mass brands. Not my cup of tea, but people seem to love them when they work.
hnlmorg 4y ago
It’s a massive challenge implementing this yourself but various smart speaker protocols have supported syncing speakers for a while now. I can’t speak for if they also split stereo signals (I think I read Yamaha can) but splitting a stereo signal is very easy even without comparing it to the challenge of syncing speakers.

softwarebeware 4y ago

I'm unclear of the exact problem. Are you having a problem with powering two passive speakers from the same amplifier? Or you have two active speakers (each with its own internal amplifier and plug into the wall) and you have a problem with connecting a stereo music source to them?

bluGill 4y ago

If you want to attempt this you should use jack and one of the real time jack network protocols. I had it working for an hour, but the setup is too complex for leave everything in place setup. Was cool when it worked. I might have played more but I discovered that I couldn't do a mixer in the one room and keep the sync. (I was trying to do live music with listening in the next room so latency was important and I couldn't add delay to cheat) I wish someone would spend time making the above easy, jack has some neat abilities that are lacking in all the whole house systems i've seen. Or maybe I just want to do weird things?