Zoned Audio

[cams]

Started on: 2007-1-19
last update: 2007-1-19

Summary:
Zoned Audio

Area:
My Music

Description:
I searched and did not see any info on "Zoned Audio", I just started checking out MP and it seems great, Im doing my whole house w\audio and video distribution and my only problem with MP is that it does not have a Zoned Audio feature

For example, i will have 5 zones in my house (Masterbedroom[Zone1],Kitchen[Zone2],TheaterRoom[Zone3],Backyard[Zone4] & Kids Room[Zone5]) There will be in wall touchscreens in each location with its own speakers, Zoned Audio will allow me to play different audio in each zone while using the same music libaray while displaying "Now Playing in zone info" on all screens..so if im playing 50 cent in zone 4, it will say Play 50 Cent in Backyard, while im looking at any networked MP screen in my house

Im not sure if this is even possible but i think its a good choice to add and make MP stand out from the rest of the media center software's
I looked into alot of MediaCenter Software over the past month, from $1000 to free and they are all good in there own way, MP will have all im looking for with zoned audio

[cams]

Is anyone interested in this??

[cams]

Anyone!!!

[druid9]

The zoned audio issue is more of a hardware matter than anything else AFAIK

in my own case I have distributed audio across the house with independnet switching and volume controls, but allowing different tracks in different rooms is a problem. I am able to have different tracks playing in 2 zones via use of the kx driver for my SB Audigy soundcard. This allows me to direct audio from suitable players to particular ports on the card which is then distributed to the zones. I don't think Media Portal allows fo this internally. I use it for example to allow the kids to play games on the HTPC in one zone whilst my wife and I listen to music in another.

I know that XLobby alllows for this by running multiple instances of Winamp - one for each zone. A google search for XLobby will find the forums and I think I recall a long thread there on the subject.

An internal multi-zone feature in MP would be great, but don't think it is there yet.

[cams]

Yes xlobby does this great but it is also lacking some important features that im looking for, and that is LiveTV w\DVR like MP. I think MP would really stand out from the rest of the MCE frontends....

So basically it its more about adding an internal media player, like winamp and then use the KX drivers then having the MP skinners add that to there skins??

[druid9]

Well I guess so, but I am not sure if the Media Portal engine would allow the multiple instances required.

I believe there is already a Winamp plugin, though I could be wrong.

As you say XLobby does this feature well, but does not have the depth of Mediaportal IMHO.

I actually could care less about the TV features of either, my focus is definitely on the Music side of things, and movies down the track when I get some more disk storage space, so zoned audio would be great if it could be successfully done.

[cams]

after searching, yes you can use winamp as a external player but i dont think MP can run multiple instances and you cant control\configure each output on the sound card(KX drivers) while in MP...

maybe some MP dev's can shed some light on if this could be done and would just require some skinning

[hwahrmann]

nope, can't be done.
you can only play one media item the same time

[cams]

Originally Posted by hwahrmann

nope, can't be done.
you can only play one media item the same time

do you guys plan to implement something like this in future MP builds?

[mzemina]

I'm curious why couldn't it work with the client/server version of MP?

Maybe not now, but sometime in the future perhaps?

With a central music database and shares accessable to any room that has a client PC with attached amp and speakers, couldn't that be similar to zoned audio? Couldn't the audio file be played in multiple locations, or is the audio file locked once it has started to play in one location? I understand using this method you couldn't have synced audio, unless there was a method to remotely play an audio file in multiple locations.

Just wondering if line of thinking is at all possible.