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."

Comments

Audiophile pish

[hedge_death_shootout]

These speakers sound better when you use gold CAT5 cable.

Re:Audiophile pish

[kfg]

Don't forget the little arrows on 'em to tell the bits which way to go.

I'll also be offering my own propriatary technology which filters the datastream to make sure the 1s are all inline with the direction of travel. 1s going through crosswise is the leading cause of signal degradation.

Rigourous highly subjective tests (remember, in Audio World objectivity is a Bad Thing) in my own lab allow me to say that I can say the improvement in all sorts of silly word parameters is astounding. Oh, and "Quantum Flux!"

You can't leave out Quantum Flux Technology if you wish to be taken at all seriously. This High Tech Deep Juju(tm) after all.

I'm working on a series of Internet Ready acoustic treatments for your listening room too, stay tuned to this channel. Oh sure, you thought Digital Ready should cover it. Silly boy. How would I be able to afford a villa in the Cayman Islands if that were the case?

KFG

Re:Audiophile pish

[Waffle Iron]

The other thing to consider is that you'll need a relatively large tower case and a beefy PS in your system in order to accommodate the vacuum tube-based NICs. Those things are big and hot, and most use two or three PCI slots.

Re:Audiophile pish

[Junior J. Junior III]

I always wondered what a ping sounds like.

Caveats

[dada21]

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.

Re:Caveats

[jcr]

true audiophiles will not accept them.

Do you mean true audiophiles, or the clowns who buy power cables for a grand?

-jcr

Re:Caveats

[Anonymous Coward]

It allready exists people. Nothing new.
It's called PeakAudio (or Cobranet)

Upto 96KHZ audio streaming over ethernet. Integrated handling of delays caused by the network so every speaker device is able to produce the output at the same time, thus preventing echo-ing problems.

It's mainly used in very big spaces, like stadiums or trade-show halls.

Re:Caveats

[hackstraw]

Even 20ms delay makes me crazy (~1 frame).

To put it another way. 20ms is about the same as moving a speaker about 20 feet. That should be pretty clear to anybody how significant that is.

Re:Caveats

[Halfbaked Plan]

It's fairly important to acknowledge that there are actual audiophiles out there who do know what they're talking about.

The fact that there are charlatans, too, shouldn't come as a surprise. I've hated 'stereo store salesmen' since back in my youth when those smug f*cks always had an attitude to cop when I came in the store needing audio connectors.

To write off the whole 'audiophile' community is to buy into the shit that certain sales-types want us to believe. In fact there IS such a thing as High Fidelity, and it isn't just sales numbers and/or a table printed in the manual that comes with junk components from Japan.

Speaker Hacking

[wenck]

Just wait until these things become common, and their owners connect them to a wifi network ...

Re:Speaker Hacking

[hedge_death_shootout]

Hmm. Those bloody students downstairs playing their loud music at all hours... on YOUR stereo.

Apple Airport Express

[mysqlrocks]

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.

DRM

[fiver]

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....

IP will give these no advantage at all.

[fishnuts]

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.

Re:IP will give these no advantage at all.

[carlislematthew]

You're right that XLR and existing technologies would be better for *highly* accurate stereo imaging. However, this is an in-ceiling speaker designed for rich geeks and their in-home audio systems. Stereo imaging does not work in these environments and they are often wired in mono. Imagine listening to The Beatles and their insane stereo imaging in your kitchen! Drums near the stove, and the guitar over by the fridge - doesn't work.

Mono is also how 99.9% of retail/hospitality locations are wired, even the high end ones where they spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on the installations.

Also, forget about audiophiles and whether they would like these speakers. Audiophiles will never install in-ceiling speakers, and if they do it's purely for "background music" purposes around the house.

I believe that this product is for the rich geek that wants to be able to utilize his already-CAT5-wired home and be able to show off to their other rich geek friends.

WiFi

[HappyClown]

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).

Re:WiFi

[JediTrainer]

Shame they didn't go one step further and make them wireless.

I heard of this great new technology, something about Frequency Modulation or whatever. Apparently some genius figured out how to transmit sound *wirelessly* (no shit!) for miles, even without line of sight!

I'm sure we'll read about that in Slashdot sooner or later. If you don't catch the first article, you'll be sure to see the dupe.

Nothing special

[commanderfoxtrot]

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.

what about h4x0rz?

[catdevnull]

....when you're 0wn3d: all your bass are belong to us!

Re:Caveats-accessories.

[ettlz]

They also had integrated filters as well. A fact that for the sake of a cheap joke, gets left off.

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?

Re:Latency?

[theonetruekeebler]

Ethernet-level would have better latency than an IP stack, sure, but ties to back a platform-dependent transmission medium---you may as well use a speaker wire. And you have to write your own underlying network layer. If each speaker is running the same stack, it's going to have pretty much the same latency anyway---the worst problems arise combining digital and analog speakers.

The advantage of TCP/UDP/Music-Transport-Protocol is that the medium suddenly becomes less relevant. Take wireless, for example. Imagine being able to cart your Big Speakers outside for a patio party without running a single audio wire. Or just to install speakers on the other side of your house (or in your shed) without having to grovel through the attic or crawlspace.

Imagine how useful this could be for concerts: the sound board now has one wire running to it---the power line. Likewise with your front, middle and back stacks, and your monitors.

Another plus is that we have a nice bidirectional protocol, as well as a chance for side-channel data: speakers can report their health back to the control panel, or to other speakers in the same stack. And since each speaker is doing its own DSP anyway, getting the equalization right for a given speaker is a matter of sending it a message.

You know what? Forget the speaker---sell compact, portable, one-speaker wireless-enabled amplifiers and let people convert their existing speakers into packet-switched audio devices.

You will need this first...

[Sponge Bath]

iptables -A OUTPUT -i eth0 --artist brittney.spears -j DENY