Associate
Hey all,
Apologies if this has been asked before or it isn't the right place but I can't find an up to date answer for what I am looking for so I am hoping someone may be able to help me
A while ago I bought a load of Nest Audios, Google Homes and Chromecast Audios to rig up in the house and in the garage to a receiver that runs two sets of outdoor speakers.
Overall, the system works really well and allows the devices to be grouped into multiple groups which can seemlessly play audio without delays. My only gripe with it is that if the internet goes out then due to the way Chromecast stuff works you can't cast to the groups and all the devices disconnect from the WiFi even though most media we stream to the is local from an Emby server.
Recently I've been thinking about expanding them however I would like to move towards a system that supports a "fully local" setup as whilst our internet doesn't go off often it's kind of annoying that it kills the home audio if/when it does.
Likewise Chromecast Audios were discontinued a while ago and getting a hold of the left over ones means paying 4-6x the price they were sold at for something which Google might decide to bin off in a few years time.
I've had a look at a few systems such as Sonos, WiiM etc but all seem to have pros/cons that are less balanced than the used CCAs. Ideally I would like to have a system that can work with the following:
Apologies if this has been asked before or it isn't the right place but I can't find an up to date answer for what I am looking for so I am hoping someone may be able to help me
A while ago I bought a load of Nest Audios, Google Homes and Chromecast Audios to rig up in the house and in the garage to a receiver that runs two sets of outdoor speakers.
Overall, the system works really well and allows the devices to be grouped into multiple groups which can seemlessly play audio without delays. My only gripe with it is that if the internet goes out then due to the way Chromecast stuff works you can't cast to the groups and all the devices disconnect from the WiFi even though most media we stream to the is local from an Emby server.
Recently I've been thinking about expanding them however I would like to move towards a system that supports a "fully local" setup as whilst our internet doesn't go off often it's kind of annoying that it kills the home audio if/when it does.
Likewise Chromecast Audios were discontinued a while ago and getting a hold of the left over ones means paying 4-6x the price they were sold at for something which Google might decide to bin off in a few years time.
I've had a look at a few systems such as Sonos, WiiM etc but all seem to have pros/cons that are less balanced than the used CCAs. Ideally I would like to have a system that can work with the following:
- Stream audio from phones/PCs
- Stream from Emby or SMB shares
- Support multiple audio groups
- Be able to connect to a seperate amp/receiver/speakers
- Possibly have their own speakers (For smaller rooms)
- Connect to Home Assistant to manage volume levels
- WiiM - Works similar to CCA and supports casting however unsure if this will have the same issue of needing to be online all the time, fairly pricey but not obtusely expensive, unsure how volume levels are managed
- Wired speakers - Seems to be the most agnostic solution since you can just swap out the central receiver but a massive pain in the butt to run cables to all ends of the house, relies on having decent seperate speakers and a central app, also unsure on how volume levels would be managed remotely
- Sonos - Has its own casting system and doesn't support Google Cast, can use receiver units or IKEA/Sonos speakers, can work offline, quite expensive but the most well known, eco system which is pretty locked down
- Snapcast - Uses Raspberri Pi and some addon boards, vendor agnositc and just needs connecting to a seperate amp, looks to be the cheaper of the options but potentially very faffy to setup and maintain
