Multizone setup help

[bymyhand]

I am a newb to Xlobby and trying to find information on how to do a multi-zone setup. I am currently looking for an 8 zone setup. I was planning on running the speaker wires directly from main distribution box and amplifying the signal before the signal gets from xlobby PC to the distribution box. Then the drops would run from main box to the speakers. I was planning on using 14 gauge speaker wire. I am going to have runs up to 130 ft.

Would this to be long to run amplified speaker wire? I know it’s not exactly the topic of this forum but I imagine you guys have done this quite a bit.

The next question is that I am looking at how to setup multi-zones in xlobby. I have setup winamp and foobar2000 and tried them both. But when I try to change the wave out sound card config for the first installation it changes it for the second install I have. That's one issue, but I then went under the general screen I just added both foobar and winamp (with different sound card configs) in the zone section and when I went to the multi-zone page its didn’t seem to do anything. I am thinking there is some kind of configuration script I have to make or something like that, but I can't seem to find anything information in the help section or in the forums.

Also I am curious on what is the best sound card to get. I have already purchased the M-Audio 1010LT thinking this would be the best solution but I have read the forums and saw this card had issues with multiple synced play. Through right now, for testing, I am using my onboard sound and an Audigy card I have. Do a lot of other sounds cards have this same issue? Is there one you guys would recommend?

Honestly I don't want to recable my house again. I was originally going to go for a hardware based multi-zone solution where cat 5 terminated at each light switch and speaker wire came from there but I think this solution would be more upgradeable for future use.

So any help here would be greatly appreciated. Or just point me in the right direction where I could find the documentation.

Thanks!

[P3rv3rt B3ar]

Audigy u have is fine choige:

http://www.xlobby.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4704

[bymyhand]

Great one question down! Thanks for the info on which sound card to use. Anyone have any docs on how to setup multi-zones in xlobby. I found the documentation on how a client connects to a server and picks the zone but no configuration example on how they are originally setup. Could someone post their config? Any ideas on the cable length question?

Thanks!

[rhinoman]

You need to copy your winamp or foobar to seperate folders using a folder name as the zone name, setup each seperate instance to use a different output, then just add each sperate path to the exe in the music player setup.

[bymyhand]

Yea I figured it out! Winamp was setup to use my profile settings. So it was using the same settings for all the copies of winamp. Then I didn't know you couldn't change any of the zones (Or see them for that matter) unless xlobby was setup as a server and you were connecting to it from a client. Once I did that everything worked perfectly. Well except for the syncing. It works great until, what seems like something else on your system, needs the resources. Then it lags one of the copies of winamp. I am going to do some more testing with sliming down the open services, using winamp light and trying to increase winamp’s cpu priority. Maybe it will perform better after that. But I still think there would be issues trying to run 8 copies of winamp and keeping them in snyc. That's where delta comes in. It’s got a multi out that will just use one copy of winamp but spits the audio out of all the ports. So I guess it worth it to just use this then having to deal with getting the drivers to do what I need. Thanks for the help guys!

[rhinoman]

Sync wont work across 8 zones, see my spec in my sig, theres not much room for improvement....

It would appear that the issue is trying to pull 8 streams from the same hard-drive(s). I've done extensive testing and it only works when you are not reading multiple streams from a hard drive.

[bymyhand]

Yea that’s why the delta is cool. If I have 8 zones it would mean I would need two Delta 1010LTs. Then each Delta has a multi out. This is a virtual out that puts the same audio out all its ports. So then I would only need to only get two copies of winamp syncing with both set to multi to have the same music played out of every speaker. To be practical I would probably set my “most likely party places” on one card and leave the other one for the bedrooms and such. This way I wouldn’t even need to sync anything. Just make a new zone called the party zone and when I used that zone it would just use one copy of winamp. I know it could be done with regular creative labs sound card but I think this less messing around with drivers and such. Call me lazy!

[P3rv3rt B3ar]

I know it could be done with regular creative labs sound card but I think this less messing around with drivers and such. Call me lazy!

Lazy!!

[P3rv3rt B3ar]

I know it could be done with regular creative labs sound card but I think this less messing around with drivers and such. Call me lazy!

Lazy!!

take acount though that my kXd plugin allows u to simultaneously and individualy inspect and adjust levels of any zone inside XLobby, currently u cant achieve that with any other cards than Live/Audigy suite.

[bymyhand]

This brings me to a good question. Would you be able to give me your skin for 8 zones? That would be awesome because I wasn't sure how I was going to make the skin go the next page and such. Thanks!

[bymyhand]

[/quote]

take acount though that my kXd plugin allows u to simultaneously and individualy inspect and adjust levels of any zone inside XLobby, currently u cant achieve that with any other cards than Live/Audigy suite.[/quote]


When I tried last night I synced both zones then went to one zone, turned down the volume under the control menu, and it turned down the volume for just one of the zones. I turned that up and then went to the other zone and it worked for that one too. I guess you would not be able to do this with the "party zone" since its only using one instance of winamp but I guess this is what your talking about. Using the CL card, even with the party zone, you would still be able change the volume up and down for each output in xlobby, correct?

[P3rv3rt B3ar]

What i mean is with CL card (using kX drivers) u can custom make your DSP however u like from kX plugins (for example stereo mixers and load of others). User Marbles_00 has experimented this quite a bit for multizone, u should see his version of DSPs in link i gave to u. Now my kXd plugin allows u to control these kX plugins on DSP trough XLobby.

What that means in context of multizone is, that u can make a screen where u can control levels of each and every zone separately from different sliders/bars (all these sliders can shown simultaneously, theres no need for u to select right zone, just hit slider for the zone) also party zone can be implemented and controlled as well.

Now that can be achieved, but ull have to see little effort for it. First ull have to familiarize yourself with kX DSP stuff, and make your DSP. Then u need to familiarize yourself with my kXd plugin (which is in alpha test phase at the moment), setup it, configure it, and finally to make Xlobby screen for controlling your DSP trough kXd.

Now i guess most common users will not wanna see all that trouble but rather chooge more direct ruote, but i just wanted to tell u your options since i think u have perfectly good card already in your possession, and would be shame if u would replace it, without being aware of all possibilities.

[Marbles_00]

bymyhand,

Have you tried to run speaker lengths 130ft yet? The only problem I see here is that the added inductance (with the speaker inductance) of the cable could drive some amplifiers "squirrelly". What I mean by that is that the amp will start to oscillate (sound like crap) due to the rise of impedence caused by the inductance of the cable (and speaker coil). What some people do is install a simple RC (resistor/capacitor) circuit on the amps outputs to stablize this. This is called a Zobel Network. Now normally a Zobel is used in parallel with a speaker's voice coil after the crossover, but 130ft speaker wire length is not "normal". Most amps have a zobel circuit so chances are you won't have to worry about it, but just take note, that if the music sounds crappy, and the amp is getting overly warm. Then you may want to add this simple circuit.

Here is a few articles that I quickly found explaining the Zobel Network:
http://www.trueaudio.com/st_zobel.htm

http://users.ece.gatech.edu/~mleach/ece ... /zobel.pdf

http://howthingswork.virginia.edu/page1.php?QNum=925

http://www.rane.com/par-z.html (about 1/2 way down the page)

Hope this was helpful.

p3rv, haven't forgotten about ya, but just been really busy with life, and other problems with my music server. Please bare with me.

[bymyhand]

Thanks for the info on the cable length question. I did find this too.

http://www.crutchfieldadvisor.com/ISEO- ... _wire.html

This gives you an idea on the gauge of wire you need for the distance you want to run. There is also a pdf further down that has some other useful information on running cables. So I guess as long as I have the right gauge of wire it shouldn't be issue. That’s what I am hoping at least.

Also it seems like the multi out on my 1010LT didn't seem to do what I was expecting. After talking with their support and not getting anywhere, then looking at their knowledge base, which I should have done from the get go, it seems to only work with software that is enabled for surround sound. Like WinDVD or programs like that. So I went on winamp’s website looking for a surround sound plugin and I found something so much better. The plugin I found lets you use multiple output plugins. So I just copied to wave out plugin and renamed it to different names, then setup all the wave out plugins to different physical outputs on my card. I then enable just the ouputs I wanted and it played it out all the analog outs on my sound card with one copy of winamp. I think this would fix the syncing issue completely. If you wanted to snyc you open up a different copy of winamp, you then, through xlobby, choose the output plugin you want to enable and this could be chosing the zone you want to enable. This can span multiple cards and still only use one copy of winamp. Very very cool!  Here is the link. Then if we could get his and some kind of generic volume control in xlobby that just controls each output what windows sees then that would be the perfect solution. Since just through windows you can control each output from the volume control icon. Just have to select the different sound card or output. This way it would work for any sound card.


http://winamp.com/plugins/details.php?id=147344

[CiXel]

Ahh This discussion

http://www.xlobby.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3257

Biggest probelm with the multi-ouput control is the lack of direct volume control from within winamp. You could control some other mixer (like a sound card or one of the like)

I'm ready to revisit this. sigh. The long and hard battle