Wireless Surround for HT

wmarant · June 2009

I'd like to add a set of Monitor 30's or 40's for the surround sound in our home theater. What I'd like to do though is avoid running wires across the room, tucking into baseboards and or drilling through the floor as we rent. I'd prefer to do this wirelessly, I've seen a couple of products that support this, anyone have a recommendation of which to choose?

thuffman03 · June 2009

I have never heard a pair of wireless speakers that I liked. Though it was years ago that I went down the same path you did renting and wanting rear speakers. There might be some better ones now but I doubt it.

My solution was to tack the wire to the base board and to buy some throw rugs and live with it the best I could till I bought a house.

ky_polkie · June 2009

I agree that wireless speakers are mostly subpar.

What is your hesitation with tucking the speaker wire between the baseboard and the floor? (assuming you have carpet). I have done this 3-4 times with various apartments and it has worked very well.

Much better than some crappy wireless "solution" that you are going to end up hating.

superjunior · June 2009

I've thought about this as well and quickly dismissed the idea. Remember those type of speekers both have to be plugged in to an outlet. As the other guys said, baseboards, throwrugs, whatever fits your decor in a temporary set up is the way to go.
jr

wmarant · June 2009

Well I'm glad everyone decided to tell me just what I said I didn't want to do......anyone care to actually recommend a product? I'd prefer to have a clean install and the placement of the speakers (on top of a built in, with access to a outlet) really don't lend themselves to trailing some speaker wire up the wall.....

superjunior · June 2009

bose

tcrossma · June 2009

wmarant wrote: »

Well I'm glad everyone decided to tell me just what I said I didn't want to do......anyone care to actually recommend a product?

Nice attitude.

I know nothing about this product, but a quick internet search found this for you:

http://www.amazon.com/Rocketfish-Universal-Wireless-Rear-Speaker/dp/B000VEP3XO/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1246317250&sr=8-1

Edit: Or this:

http://www.amazon.com/Amphony-L1550-Transmitter-Transmission-compression/dp/B000VTSPS4/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1246317580&sr=1-2

TECHNOKID · June 2009

You might want to try this, I have been testting this one all weekend and I am kind of surprised with the end result. You might want to test with the existing amp and possibly try with a more powerfull amp if need be. Over the weekend, I have tested with my M-AUDIO powered speaker (with powered speaker or additional amp you need to keep low signal coming from the receiver) and I even tested with RM10 with surprising success since I was simply using pre-amp to the Tx instead of amp to the TX as recommended by the user manual. What is nice, if you don't like you simply return. I have tried a different one from RS and this Rocketfish is better. The only drawback is you do not have adjustable/variable frequency with the Rocketfish.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=8275528&st=rocketfish&type=product&id=1171058476489

http://www.polkaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?t=69711&highlight=rocketfish

http://www.polkaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?t=84814&highlight=wireless+speaker

I haven't tried that second one tcrossma is proposing but 5.8 should even be better than 2.4 check the specs and pricing from this page (url)
: http://www.amphony.com/products/l1550.htm

Cheers!
TK

TECHNOKID · June 2009

Just looking at the user manual for this one, it seem to be more efficient??????? Must try to prove?????

http://www.amphony.com/download/pdf/manuals/ManualL1550.pdf

TECHNOKID · June 2009

http://www.hometoys.com/htinews/dec07/reviews/amphony/wireless.htm

svtjoe · June 2009

I have the rocketfish unit. Very nice. Sounds great too.

TECHNOKID · June 2009

svtjoe wrote: »

I have the rocketfish unit. Very nice. Sounds great too.

I have been testing it since you have mentioned it in a different thread and it isn't too bad. I guess the other unit that has been proposed in thread might be worht considering since the "F" is 5.8 thus more reliability of audio. The only problem is it doesn't seem to be available in store and I wonder about the return policy...

wingnut4772 · June 2009

Kef has a wireless system that has received very good reviews ( for a wireless rig)

TECHNOKID · June 2009

wingnut4772 wrote: »

Kef has a wireless system that has received very good reviews ( for a wireless rig)

Can you provide with a link?

Is this the one you are talking about : http://www.uncrate.com/men/gear/home-audio-speakers/kef-wireless-audio-system/ If so, looks good but so does the price tag...

Way too expensive for a 2.4GHz system! http://www.audioholics.com/news/press-releases/kef-ship-innovative-high-resolution-wireless-speaker-system.html http://www2.kef.com/gb/technology/wireless

wingnut4772 · June 2009

TECHNOKID wrote: »

Can you provide with a link?

Is this the one you are talking about : http://www.uncrate.com/men/gear/home-audio-speakers/kef-wireless-audio-system/ If so, looks good but so does the price tag...

Just Google Kef Wireless. There's a lot of info. Look at the Cnet reviews.

Cnet Kef

wmarant · June 2009

Sorry trcossma for what appeared to be attitude..... I had asked in the original post that I wanted to do A, didn't want to do B, although I've seen products that support A (meaning I can search in google too...) who's got actual experience with any of those solutions and can give recommendation based on that....like technokid, svtjoe and wingnut kindly did.....instead what I got was "B sucks, just do A stupid...." seriously who cares why I want to do A, cripes I'm only hooking up entry-level Monitors for rear surround not trying to power up SDA's with AA batteries and a coat hanger 200 feet away.....:D

Hillbilly61 · June 2009

wmarant wrote: »

Sorry trcossma for what appeared to be attitude..... I had asked in the original post that I wanted to do A, didn't want to do B, although I've seen products that support A (meaning I can search in google too...) who's got actual experience with any of those solutions and can give recommendation based on that....like technokid, svtjoe and wingnut kindly did.....instead what I got was "B sucks, just do A stupid...." seriously who cares why I want to do A, cripes I'm only hooking up entry-level Monitors for rear surround not trying to power up SDA's with AA batteries and a coat hanger 200 feet away.....:D

For a long time, I was considering the route you are wanting to take for my rears. What kept putting me off is battery life. Having a handy AC outlet nearby would be the ideal, but that is not part of the equation I was dealing with and if I have to wire for AC, hell, it is easier to rig for a direct connect from the amp to the speakers.

Have you seen anything much on battery life? Just curious. Batteries can become a major expense item, unless having a bad assed rechargable AC-Delco battery (or similar) nearby is part of the decor scheme. Again, just curious.

Speakers are only 1 or 2 percent efficient concerning the power needed, verses the sound produced. In other words, they are power hogs.

coolsax · October 2009

wow.. this might be just what I need to put surround in full in our family room.. as the wife does not want me running wires all over the place nor tearing up the carpet to run it undernath. If anyone else also has some experience with this and feel it is a decent product please say so

coolsax · October 2009

also is this really the only product that does this? you would think that this would be a popular product and that Yamaha, Denon, Onkyo, Sony would make affordable ones to be used with their AVRs that are not part of HTiBs, the only other one i can think of is the one that Panasonic makes to be used with their HTiBs...

coolsax · October 2009

wouldnt' the amp itself have to have wireless capabilities or can you use the aux in conjunction with the Kit?.. its obvious how it would work with powered wireless speakers but the way it looks to me you'd have to have a wireless external amp.. do they have those?

nm, I didn't see the output on the back.. so you would need two of the Auxs but you could do it through an external amp. by inputing from processor/AVR/Preamp and then sending it to another one AUX, since they can be linked, that output to an external amp.. do I have that correct?

on the links provided.. sorry I missed those before.. the KEF is the only one that seems to be a little pricey, all the others seem to be pretty decent options then for an affordable wireless solution.

TECHNOKID · October 2009

coolsax wrote: »

wouldnt' the amp itself have to have wireless capabilities or can you use the aux in conjunction with the Kit?.. its obvious how it would work with powered wireless speakers but the way it looks to me you'd have to have a wireless external amp.. do they have those?

nm, I didn't see the output on the back.. so you would need two of the Auxs but you could do it through an external amp. by inputing from processor/AVR/Preamp and then sending it to another one AUX, since they can be linked, that output to an external amp.. do I have that correct?

Typically, going through an external amp you need an RF receiver that doesn't have any built in amp which you would simply connect as an input (yes aux in should work). You would set your Tx at the main amp sending some speaker or line level but at the receiving amp you would need to set your NON amplified RF Rx at the pre level in of that receiving amp. There are multiple ways of doing such IE: I din't want/need to use an amp at the TX and used the TV audio out to send my signal to a pre-amp, then transmitted to unpowered speakers thus using powered (amp) receiver. I also used powered speakers with both the Rocketfish powered receiver (simply need to keep your level VERY low, this works but may be a hazard for the NON technical person) and used unpowered Tx/RX with great success.

Cheers!
TK

bigaudiofanatic · October 2009

thuffman03 wrote: »

I have never heard a pair of wireless speakers that I liked. Though it was years ago that I went down the same path you did renting and wanting rear speakers. There might be some better ones now but I doubt it.

My solution was to tack the wire to the base board and to buy some throw rugs and live with it the best I could till I bought a house.

I agree I have also heard that they sometimes can be a big delay in the sound. I would go wired.

TECHNOKID · October 2009

xcapri79 wrote: »

With the Rocketfish RF-RBKIT I don't notice any delay by ear listening to a multichannel mix. I would need a scope to see a difference.
There is a decrease in audio level, so I bumped up the channel by 3db.
The sending unit works well with either the receiver speaker outputs or the pre-amp outputs.

One thing I learned was to disable the 4 channel lock when testing and changing channels. They need to put that in bold letters in the manual.
You live and learn.

I didn't notice any delay either with my Rocketfish neither with other brands. I think RF sender has improved greatly since afterall let's think about it, radio and TV broadcasting have been using frequency modulations as carriers for many years already and without any great issues. The higher rate of the frequency senders is also much higher than it use to be thus improving the communications greatly. What do you mean by "disabling the 4 channels lock"? I would be tempted to think that locking on a specific frequency would be the right thing to do, that is the sole purpose of such feature!?!

Cheers!
TK

coolsax · October 2009

will you need two of the RF-RBaux or will they work off of the kit you already have? or is that what you are checking?

TECHNOKID · October 2009

xcapri79 wrote: »

To continue, I have the RF-RBAUX powering a LSi7 via an external amp.
The output is less than what the amp would get from a typical receiver input, so I had to adjust the gain significantly on the channel to bring it to a similar sound level as the other speakers.
There is too much football on right now to continue with these audio testing. Back later.

If I understand you correctly, yo mean your level is lower than what you would be getting from a receiver pre-out. If this is what your are talking about it would make sense as the key word pre and if you have a pre-amp available that should solve your problem. Keep in mind most AVRs have builted in pre-amp while seperate amps will more likely require a pre-amp in order to get the proper level.

Cheers!
TK

Wireless Surround for HT

Comments