My BIL wants wireless music system in their new [old and grade 2 listed – so can’t be messed with) house. I would go the itunes/airport express route and although they have a couple of Macs/iPhones/iPad in the family, he’s not an Apple fan and he’s paying so I’m guessing this is out which is a shame as it also have done video streaming and they have a lot of DVD’s.
So what else do you recommend? I would imagine they’d like music in 4 or 5 rooms probably streaming through existing hifi systems if possible.

I would go the itunes/airport express route and although they have a couple of Macs/iPhones/iPad in the family, he’s not an Apple fan and he’s paying

He’s got all that kit from Apple, but he’s not an Apple fan? 😯
You’re right, the obvious solution would be Airport Express receivers dotted around, but, really, the most obvious route would be Sonos. Pretty much regarded as the industry standard for quality and ease of use, from everything I’ve read. There may be others, but Sonos seem to be about the only serious choice.

Would’ve previously said Squeezebox as Sonos is a bit pricey, but Logitech’s no longer making Squeezeboxes.

So Sonos or Apple Airport Express are the main options.

Just going through the same thought process.

Don’t have any Apple gear, had pretty much decided on either a Sonos Connect + amp or Sonos connect:amp wired to a speaker switch box, but then realised I could achieve the same thing by plugging a laptop into said amp/switch box. The only downside would be we can’t use our Android phones as a remote control, but then I’m not sure they will control say your itunes library anyway, I think you need the iphone for that.

I just want to easily play stuff on the speakers around the house rather than tying the laptop to one hifi just so I can listen to Spotify, the budget appears to quickly go through the roof it you want true multiroom with a Sonos device in each room 🙁

Edit: Looking at the Sonos range, I reckon it would average out at £300 per room, using a mix of Sonos players and Sonos Connects to use existing speakers/home theatre.

I just want to easily play stuff on the speakers around the house rather than tying the laptop to one hifi just so I can listen to Spotify, the budget appears to quickly go through the roof it you want true multiroom with a Sonos device in each room

I have a horrible, sneaking suspicion that the cost is inevitable. Even with Airport Express, you have to buy the individual receivers, which will be around £100 each, IIRC, then an amp of some sort, and the speakers. There doesn’t appear to be a cheap option, or at least, one that works.
Even if you bought AirPlay capable portables for each room, they’re going to be fairly pricey.

we can’t use our Android phones as a remote control, but then I’m not sure they will control say your itunes library anyway

TunesRemote+ on Android works a treat with iTunes, including playlists and independent volume control of a couple of Airport Express units (and a phone acting as an Airport Express using ‘Airbubble’).

With all that Mac kit I’d be recommending an Airport Express. Simple and easy to control, just works, streams music to amp or active speakers (plus you can connect a printer or extend your network).

That app looks promising, thanks. However, I have just spent the last hour troubleshooting and messing with Ports on my router and Windows firewall and it still won’t work 🙁

Airport express and decent quality active speakers (with built in amps)

KRK active speakers from £250 per pair up to £450 per pair, i use KRK Rokit 6 speakers, fantastic sounding.

Audioengine active speakers , i have the audio engine A2’s in my bathroom plugged into an airport express in the attic and they sound very good indeed.

I went from nothing apple to 2 x airport express and 2 x apple TV and now an iPhone purely because airplay looked the best option to me. I think the iPhone OS is a step down from my lovely previous HTC Sense android phones but I don’t regret the move. I considered sonos but airplay gives me more options for less money (partly due to existing hifi being used)

I was able to use my android phone but ultimately it didn’t work quite well enough for me. There is a remote on android for itunes that worked very well but I don’t always want a computer turned on. There are also some airplay players available and some are quite good but not quite perfect and battery drain was a little higher than I’d like. Honey player was my favourite, double twist OK but it only saw the Apple TVs not the airport express and twonky looked good but was a right flaky nightmare.

Going all apple has made the whole system work very smoothly. I can stream from my phone to any airplay device with the inbuilt functionality. I can also stream from my NAS to any airplay device using third party apps. The only improvement I’d like to see is the ability to simultaneously stream from my phone to multiple airplay devices. At present I can only do this from a computer running itunes though this can be via the remote app on my phone.

Spooky, annoying, sorry to hear that. All I had to do with our kit was install the app and type in a 4 digit code in iTunes to authorise the pairing.

Soma, those little active speakers are interesting, I’d never thought of active speakers, at least, not quality ones; pretty obvious, really, but I’m hopelessly out of touch with audio kit. I’ve bookmarked those, could be useful in the future!
Thank you 😀

Was just reading through and thought of active active monitors ..used some at my old job as broadcast monitors.

These are good value and some even feature built in a DAC for connecting digital sources
active monitors

A bit pricey but ..

Dynaudio Monitors

Glad I could offer advice count zero, beware of using some active speakers though as the more expensive variants are more suited to music production or mixing down tracks in a acoustically neutral studio and as such are incredibly detailed and often analytical/grating to listen to for extended periods of time, especially if they are fed poor quality mp3’s, by poor I mean anything under a 320bit rate. The audioengine actives are rather outstanding “musical” sounding speakers, I bought my a2’s 3yrs ago and since then my parents have bought a set plus the matching sub for their home cinema set up, my brother has bought a set of a2’s for his kitchen and for his living room, another mate who was a BBC sound engineer for 25years has bought three sets of the larger a5 versions and one sub, one set for his kitchen, one set for his 30″ monitor / supercomputer mac studio set up wi the matching sub despite owning £15k worth of custom built PMC speakers and meridian hi-fi set-up and finally one set for his bedroom. All the above controlled using airport express’s, needles to say we all use iPhones/macs but you can use pc if thats what you want.

The audioengine speakers are phenomenal little wonders that have a very warm and inviting sound, I don’t think there is one review of them that doesn’t give them full marks.

I use my krk’s for mixing and for my laptop/studio desk setup.

I just picked up the a2’s plus the d1 dac, hooked up to an apple tv, liking it a lot!

There is DLNA streaming over wifi, works well with android but don’t think there are any off the shelf multi-room solutions.

In theory you could use android mini pcs as clients and play from either your phone, tablet etc or use those as a remote to direct from a nas with UPnP apps? XBMC is worth looking into, and would stream video too.

If it were me I’d probably get a streaming nas and fork out on a couple of Onkyo TX-8050s, they have 2 sets of speakers each and multi zone control from their android app. Probably cost the same as sonos, but sound a hell of a lot better if the sonos demo I got recently is anything to go by.

He’s got all that kit from Apple, but he’s not an Apple fan?

Yep! My sister, her son and daughter all have macs and iPhones but he sticks with PC. He was bought an iPad but doesn’t really use it himself! Very odd.
They have a few mini hi-fi systems hanging around and I think I could persuade him to go the AE route, especially when I point out the cost difference compared to a Sonos system.
Somafunk those Audioengine speakers look good.

My view was that there were two options.

Sonos = must be streamed from a NAS or PC, each player costs £250 to £350, audio only.

Airplay = stream from iphone or ipad or android device (may be hassle) or PC, many players available at various prices, audio and video.

I thought airplay won by a mile.

Just got to say thanks to Gravity-Slave, got the TunesRemote working and it is great…I can now stash an old laptop in a cupboard, (which is useless as the trackpad doesn’t work) plug it into an amp and speaker switch box to a few speakers dotted about, and play my tunes from the comfort of my sofa/bath/bed (perhaps even garage!) using a posh touch screen remote control (my three year old android phone)

Looking at similar stuff, it seems there are other remotes that will control everything you could want on the PC, including Spotify :d

Sorry, I know this isn’t particularly helpful to a grade II listed building that needs a wifi solution…

Well a little progress. Turns out my sister already uses iTunes and my brother was looking for a present for them – I’ve suggested to him that he buys an Airport Express which means a number of things:
1) Bro is chuffed with me as I’ve given him a pressy idea
2) Sis will be happy as she likes Apple gear and it will get them going along the route of wireless tunes
3) If BIL is grumpy ‘cos it’s more Apple stuff in the house then he’ll be grumpy with bro and not me 🙂
4) BIL will eventually recognise that a few AE around the house will be much better than coughing up for multiple Sonos installations
5) If BIL decides to take another route then I’ll buy the AE ata reduced rate 8)

Sounds like a good, relatively cheap solution if they already use itunes and have iphones/ipads to use as wireless controllers, the larger AE 5’s have a socket on the back to plug your airport express into so it’s a neat solution with minimal wiring, when you go down the sonos route it gets very expensive for multiple room set-ups and there is no sonic/audio benefit to using it.

Brownie points for you this xmas then?.

Not tried it myself but could you do it on the cheap using powerline adaptors to run cat 5 around the place?

Each room could have 1x power line adaptor, 1x cat 5 to phono adaptor and 1x pair of powered speakers (which need to be plugged in anyway) all fed from 1x central amp/laptop/dock….

Not sure of costs but that seems like some form of solution without drilling or getting industrial with listed buildings. I use powerlines adaptors here to run Wi-Fi downstairs when the upstairs signal wouldn’t quite reach

Ahh yes ever hear of the simple audio room player ?
This uses powerline technology so you don’t have to worry bout wiring .
There is a player which connects to your existing hifi or one with a built in amp.

Simple Audio Roomplayer

Really interesting and educational thread this. Somafunk, the detailed nature of those speakers wouldn’t bother me, most of what I have in iTunes is ripped at 320Kb, just the few bits and bobs I download are at 256.
Sharkbait, if they’ve got several mini-systems kicking about, then the AP route is just so obvious, it barely needs to be stated.

There has been a recent update to sonos so you can steam straight from your iPad or iPhone.

If you want a reliable fuss free system
Sonos without doubt

CountZero : I should’ve made it clearer in my post, i wasn’t referencing the AudioEngine speakers when i mentioned detailed/analytical/grating to listen to for extended periods of time – i was making reference to “some” types of Active monitors as the vast majority are specifically designed for studio work, My KRK Rokit’s are a very happy medium slightly above the AudioEngine and below high end active monitors with regard to listening to music, they are ideal when paired with the KRK 10 sub as they are pretty much all everyone could wish for in a simple but unbeatable home 2.1 set-up.

I also have a pair of the KRK VXT6 active monitors and i find myself using these less and less these days (i’m not buggering about wi my tunes/mixes nearly as much) as they’re not so much of a easy listen due to the very exacting and precise nature of the sound signature which does sound fantastic when playing about with high bit rate stuff but for mp3’s, even on 256kbps they can highlight a world of difference (pain?), which isn’t always a good thing. And yet again i have a pair of Genelec 8030A nearfield monitors that i used to use when i was attempting to be serious about perfecting that one “kick drum” or “weeble-wobble” ( my generic term for an unspecified sound) in my electronic tracks, needless to say i didn’t quite set the scene on fire 😉 so a mate is using them at the minute with rather more success than i ever could.

The AudioEngine’s are more than capable of putting a 2ft wide grin on 95% of the populations faces, the KRK Rokits will satisfy the other 4.5% especially if paired with the KRK 10 sub and the likes of the VXT’s/Genelec/Adam active monitors will satisfy the final .5% of beard strokers, of which they’re are many in the scene, it’s even more splintered than MTB’ing 😀