Multi-Room Setup with App Control - Need Advice

[crayz16]

Hi all - been really looking for years on what to do and am finally looking to take the plunge.

My goal is to have easy and seamless music control throughout the house. For multi-zone control, I've been testing out the DAX-88 from Dayton but I'm really struggling to just simply open up YouTube Music, push it as a source and then play with inputs.

1. The most common way that I stream music is via YouTube Music, which seems to be problematic for most solutions as it isn't a natively integrated service
2. The other solution is ideally I'd like to still keep my TV trigger that input and sound when I use it for watching (I use an Nvidia Shield for IPTV). Otherwise, I would use those speakers as another zone when entertaining.

I have an Onkyo TX-NR797 which is decent for my use case. All speakers in the house are/will be hardwired. Here's the layout:

• Family room - 2 speakers
• Dining room - 1 speaker (potentially adding a 2nd)
• Backyard - 2 speakers
• Front porch - 1 speaker
• Basement Main area - 2 speakers
• *Theatre Room - 5 --> 7 speakers

*The Theatre Room will likely JUST run off of the Onkyo receiver as it'll be a dedicated theatre room, isolated from the rest of everything else.

Any advice or thoughts would be greatly appreciated!

 

[BMXTRIX]

You should be using a main source which supports the service you want to use natively. The switching solution for your audio should be completely separate and should really be considered as a solution which will likely be made 'archaic' in a matter of years, which is just the way companies like Russound and Dayton work. They make it, support it for a few years, then move on.

Another potential issue is getting a quality playback device which actually supports YouTube Music as a service. The Bluesound Node would be a product which would really work well with several solid services with great audio and solid phone app control. But, they don't appear to support YouTube Music.

If using any audio sources, that you want to play in the theater, then you need to loop that source from the DAX-88 to the AV receiver as a stereo input. If your receiver has internal downmixing of surround sound, and a zone 2, then you could loop zone 2 into the DAX-88 as a source as well.

It typically takes a few button presses to get things going if you don't have a unified control system running everything, but the native app which runs the YouTube Music app will often be the app you want to be in to run the show after music is routed to the rooms in use.

I use Sonos, and the Sonos app, with my streaming services to my home, and I use Crestron as my switching/control solution. I can pick the Sonos to play in any number of rooms without issue.

One real note: STEREO! TWO SPEAKERS!!! Put at least two speakers in each room or a single stereo speaker in the room. Your music is stereo, it comes in using stereo. Plan your entire setup around using stereo in all rooms. This will really keep things much easier overall. This is why the DAX88 has stereo inputs as well as stereo outputs on it. Keep it stereo, keep it simple.

 

[crayz16]

You should be using a main source which supports the service you want to use natively. The switching solution for your audio should be completely separate and should really be considered as a solution which will likely be made 'archaic' in a matter of years, which is just the way companies like Russound and Dayton work. They make it, support it for a few years, then move on.

Another potential issue is getting a quality playback device which actually supports YouTube Music as a service. The Bluesound Node would be a product which would really work well with several solid services with great audio and solid phone app control. But, they don't appear to support YouTube Music.

If using any audio sources, that you want to play in the theater, then you need to loop that source from the DAX-88 to the AV receiver as a stereo input. If your receiver has internal downmixing of surround sound, and a zone 2, then you could loop zone 2 into the DAX-88 as a source as well.

It typically takes a few button presses to get things going if you don't have a unified control system running everything, but the native app which runs the YouTube Music app will often be the app you want to be in to run the show after music is routed to the rooms in use.

I use Sonos, and the Sonos app, with my streaming services to my home, and I use Crestron as my switching/control solution. I can pick the Sonos to play in any number of rooms without issue.

One real note: STEREO! TWO SPEAKERS!!! Put at least two speakers in each room or a single stereo speaker in the room. Your music is stereo, it comes in using stereo. Plan your entire setup around using stereo in all rooms. This will really keep things much easier overall. This is why the DAX88 has stereo inputs as well as stereo outputs on it. Keep it stereo, keep it simple.

So what would be a good suggestions for zone control that I can do within an app? I really don't want to lose control of this application and at that price point, it would suck to have spent the money on a zone unit like this only to have the app die off.

 

[BMXTRIX]

So what would be a good suggestions for zone control that I can do within an app? I really don't want to lose control of this application and at that price point, it would suck to have spent the money on a zone unit like this only to have the app die off.

I don't have a good answer on this, because long term app support is going to depend on the manufacturer and the company itself. I don't think one brand is particularly excellent compared to another. I've used Crestron, which is a lot of money, but has shown support for well over a decade on their products, with no obvious indication that they will stop supporting things. But, I've seen major manufacturers like Russound, drop support on some products in five or six years. They come in at a better price point, but the lack of long term support kinda sucks.

There are lots of these types of products, and I haven't heard of the Dayton version, and I don't know how long it has been out. It is worth reaching out to Dayton to see if they have any long term plans to drop support or ask what they will do for you if support is dropped at some point. One of the competing products is the system from Home Theater Direct...

MCA-66 Set (No Keypads)

DetailsCat 5/6 cable NOT requiredIt is possible to control our Mid-Level and Lync whole-house audio systems from any iOS or Android smart phone or tablet using your existing WiFi network and our free apps. If the difficulty of running Cat 5/5e/6 cable to Keypad locations has prevented you from...

www.htd.com

Similar overall, but I think the Dayton one may be a bit more of a complete solution.

At the end of the day, I think that you need to accept that if you get 10 years of usage out of a $1,000ish product, then that's about all that you could realistically hope for. If you get more than that, then woo-hoo!

I would be more concerned about finding a really good streaming source for your YouTube Music. With how few devices seem to support it, I think I'd probably pick up a Sonos Port for connectivity to the whole house audio controller.

 

[JLGF1]

Not sure if it meets all your criteria, but the WiiM-Pro streamer supports Chromecast (for YT music). $700 for 5 locations for example ($140/ea).

If you were to switch to a different streaming source (eg Amazon, Tidal, Spotify, Pandora) you could cut the HW cost roughly in half by using the WiiM-Mini. However, the Mini doesn't support Chromecast (or native YT).

Roon support is also coming once it passes certification. WiiM devs push out updates reasonably often and seem on top of issues & requests. The Mini has been glitch free, ime (haven't had it too long). Firmware updates automatically.

Note: [just noticed] If all your speakers are hard-wired to the receiver (ie not using any remote powered speakers & WiFi) you should be able to utilize just (1) WiiM-Pro output to the receiver to feed everything AFAIK.

 

[adk highlander]

Take a look at Roon. Supports zone control and devices that use chromecast, airplay and their own native protocol.