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TCP/IP Speakers
Fallen Kell writes "From the anouncement, "Polk Audio LCi-IP Ultra High Performance In-Wall/ In-Ceiling Loudspeakers are the world's first active Internet Protocol-ready Loudspeakers. They were created for IP networked systems such as the ground-breaking NetStreams DigiLinx system but also provide vast convenience and performance benefits when used in analog systems. Integrated digital amplifiers eliminate remote amplifiers connected via hundreds of feet of lossy, performance-robbing speaker wires." I had the great pleasure of having a demo on September 16th, 2005 of these speakers. The ability of connect to a wired network for sending the audio stream is simply amazing and wonderful innovation in the audio world."
These speakers sound better when you use gold CAT5 cable.
I couldn't load TFA from my PDA, so take with that knowledge:
Remote digital speakers are a great solution for lowfi and mid i systems, but true audiophiles will not accept them.
Integrated amplifiers greatly reduce customizing, additional ADCs and DACs reduce resolution, increase the noise floor and change the sound.
Also, IP isn't my favored priority stream transport. I'd recommend a separate network for sound and I'd be weary of any delays incorporated in the IP transport. Think ping times! Also, encoding with the ADC does not include encapsulation into an IP packet, which can lead to worse lip-sync problems. Even 20ms delay makes me crazy (~1 frame). Of course, if its digital all-the-way, things can look brighter.
But a start is a start. Here's to hoping it continues to improve. Polk has a decent hifi range and a great R&D team. If anyone can find a better solution, its them.
Just wait until these things become common, and their owners connect them to a wifi network ...
Although not quite the same thing, I use an Apple Airport Express to stream music from my computer to my stereo system. It works pretty well and the sound quality is great. I'm not a hi-fi freak or anything, so I'm sure these speakers would be a lot better quality. However, for me the $120 for the Airport Express (which can also be used as a router, wireless access point, and USB print server) is a pretty good deal.
Bradley Holt
An interesting development and one that brings us closer to the time when even your speakers can check if you have a license for content....
They'll be heavier than non-powered speakers because they'll need to contain an integrated power supply, an amplifier, and a microcontroller to do the interfacing. It's completely useless to bring up the "lossy speaker cable" argument, because if you were going to spend the extra money and waste an extra power cable for powered speakers, you might as well just use standard analog speakers with XLR cables (which have been VERY well established as nearly noiseless and lossless for point to point audio distribution). You can reliably have a couple double-shielded XLR cables ran from your pre-amp to your self-powered speakers for less than having speakers that speak IP.
having multiple IP speakers on a network in the same room may also introduce phase offsets, since there's ALWAYS an inherent delay between receiving the network packets, decoding them, and sending the data off to DACs before the signal gets to the amplifier. Even a 2ms difference difference in delay/phase between two speakers in the same room is noticeable, and WILL screw up accurate stereo imaging. 2ms is not uncommon as a delay on an ethernet network.
Of course, mixing analog and IP speakers in the same room is right out.
Want the best audio quality, distance, noise-resistance for your speakers? fiber optic digital audio paths. end of story.
Umm.... shouldn't audio be down at the Ethernet level?
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Shame they didn't go one step further and make them wireless. It would be quite nice to move speakers between rooms on occasion without having to fight with the speaker cable (or coax in this case).
The dream of the RIAA/MPAA.. So they can restrict what you can hear.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I built a networked DAC a few years ago at university. Not too hard- the complex bit is making the timing and sync accurate, with the limitations of tiny chip controllers and rather unaccurate ethernet chip documentation!
Due to TCP/IP delays e.g. switching, you need some sort of buffering, which ends up meaning expensive memory on small chips. Once you have buffering e.g. 0.2 seconds, you should be fine. I ended up using a couple of little Burr-Brown PCM54 DACs, but the system was designed to feed digital into a decent professional DAC.
Disneyland Japan has had audio over ethernet for years as well; the setup there is huge, with hundreds of speakers over a large area.
http://blog.grcm.net/
There's no difference in terms of physical convinience, but potentially a big difference in terms of quality since the less distance an analogue signal needs to travel the better. Plus, high quality analogue speaker cable costs a *lot* more than cat5.
....when you're 0wn3d: all your bass are belong to us!
I might know what I'm talkin' about, but then again, this is Slashdot...
If you want to mod this down, as the parent, feel free. I'll just post it again. But while I'm at it, spot the typo: "From the anouncement". So a slashvertisement, and an obvious spelling mistake. Just wait for the dupe and we'll have the archetypical Slashdot article.
I better tell the experimentalists in the lab below using plain old kettle leads for their instruments that they're doing it all wrong, because some dude on Slashdot reckons there are people out there who can hear mains noise in the playback of their Jethro Tull LPs.
You bought those cables, didn't you?
I have three computers in my office, three different OS's etc. If I could have one pair of speakers that I can plug into my switch and have all systems share would be really nice. (Assuming they opened the spec so someone would write linux drives for them)
Right now, the only solution I've seen, has been to buy a mixer, but that would be more cables to string around. so I use three sets of $20 speakers...
--Aaron Greenberg
For comments like this there should be a scary modifier.
I think he's referring to 'audiophile grade' speaker cable, which as we know is of specified purity, and the metallurgical components of which are tracable all the way back to the name and pedigree of the burro who hauled the copper ore out of the mine in Chile.
But now I'm being silly.
resigned
"You show me someone who claims to be able to hear a 1/50th of a second synchronization gap, and I'll show you someone who is making stuff up to impress people with his 1337 4ud10phy13 5k177z."
Then you are an idiot.
As a musician, I can tell the difference in an audio interfact that is 40ms latent vs 20ms. Its *VERY* easy to tell...and I'm not even that great of player.
I know others that play and 20ms is way too high...I have to routinely tweak a friends machine to get it down to around 13ms so as to sound at a time that is relative to the time he hit the keys (around this time, you get about the same reaction as you would playing piano -- from the time you touch the key til the time the hammers hit the strings).
20ms CAN be discomforting to anyone playing music. Playing video games? I'm not so sure its worth anything because I've never played a game with a decent aural stage that its usable...then again I don't play much in the way of games these days.
All in all, this example isn't even anything that would be consider an audiophile application (musicians use notoriously crappy monitors and otherwise because if you can get your stuff to sound good on that media, it will sound GREAT on the good stuff).
clif
Hmm. Those bloody students downstairs playing their loud music at all hours... on YOUR stereo.
All your bass are belong to us
Sorry, I couldn't help myself.
I can easily detect a 20ms delay.
http://www.calrec.com/product/lipstick.htm
With the onset of high quality television transmission systems, even the small difference of 20-40ms of video/audio delay can cause programme impairment for the viewing audience.
So can most people. Some are more sensitive than others. I can also detect video refresh rate differences and frame rate differences quite easily.
2ms latency over a network IS minimal, but add digital encoding, ADC/DAC delays, and other delays inherent in this type of delivery and you'll see they can add up quick.
Heck, same link above:
However, multi-link MPEG transmission can also result in noticeable delay and loss of lip-sync.
1 frame (33ms) is HUGE especially when watching people talk. I've been to movies where I had to change seats from the delay, and I'm not OCD.
...no one can hear you scream. Hang on.
Patriotism is a virtue of the vicious