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[simonmason]

I am switching my whole house audio system from a Crestron controller (older ST-CP model) to Media Center running on a dedicated PC.  I am doing this for a couple of reasons but mostly because Media Center can handle more tasks internally and I want to get away from a dependency on Crestron touchscreens that you have to mortgage to buy.

For the touchscreen interface to Media Center I have been playing with Cinemar and this looks very promising.  For remote interfacing (from my multi room audio controller) with Media Center I have been using IR so far.  I would like to use a direct RS-232 connection or IP interface but I have only found that possible through Girder and I want to minimize the moving parts. So, here is the wish list:

* Direct interface to Media Center through IP or RS-232
* Direct access to volume level in each zone in the form of a direct number, say 0-100 - so I can say Zone 1 - Volume 100 instead of just volume up and down.
* Ability to add a track to Now Playing as the next track - currently it only adds to the end of Now Playing.  Ideally I would like this in two steps - "Add as next", and "Add as next and play" - this is particularly useful from the touchscreens - if someone is playing with the Now Playing interface in Cinemar and wants to add a song to the existing play list but wants to hear it right away Media Center only allows you to replace the entire Now Playing list with that new song
* Text to speech interface - allow speaking of events through a given zone or all zones - "someone at the front door", "phone is ringing", "now loading playlist", etc.

I will append other ideas as I come across them.  Please feel free to add or let me know if these are possible currently.  Thanks.

[JimH]

Have you found this  page?

Other possibilities are Netremote (promixis.com) and

Zoner/Hyslopc's Multi-zone with Russound CAV6.6 in-wall keypads
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=534233.

Also Mastiff's pretty good on Girder, etc.
Mastiff's Tour of Multi-Zone http://home.powertech.no/mastiff/multizone.htm

Good luck with your project.  Keep us posted.

[honnt]

I don't do any real multi-zone stuff, and Mastiff is definitely the master there, but I do everything else you've mentioned with MC, Girder, and Netremote. My system speaks 'playing now' information (track,artist,album) upon being asked, as well as accepting voice commands (I can speak artist name, and then choose from available albums by that artist, or random album by that artist, or random full album from any artist, or any playlist/smartlist, or one of several web media radio stations). All thru the integration possible between MC, Girder and Netremote...

______________________
Terry

[simonmason]

Between netremote and girder which application do I need to achieve each of the following (if it is possible):

Serial control of Media Center?
Text to Speech played through Media Center Zones?

Thanks.

[Mastiff]

Girder. If you have separate sound cards for each zone you can use Girder, which has a text to speak function where you can choose the output sound card. As for why you want to use serial control, I have no idea. But there is a serial input/output plug-in for Girder that can accept serial commands (you need to know the protocol, of course), and you probably should be able to use those as triggers for commands to MC.

[simonmason]

The serial is for the Crestron - I am not completely elliminating it - lighting control, etc.  I could also use an IP connection, but serial is easier to work with.

[Mastiff]

OK, I'm not sure if Girder can do that.

[Chad]

Getting text to speech for current playlist or track or whatever, that's done by Girder or MC? 

Does it work with multizone output with say, a 7.1 soundcard going out to 3 stereo pairs as separate zones?

What does it use for the speech sythesis?  Do I need a specific type of audio, like Directsound or ASIO or whatever?

I have a Sonance DAB1 system, and I'd like to be able to hit a button on the keypad and hear, in the zone where the button was pressed, the name of the current playlist.   That way I can scroll through a list of playlists without having to have a display. 

Thanks,
- Chad

[Mastiff]

You can do text to speech with Girder no problem, and it uses regular wave, just like the Microsoft speech engine (actually I think that's what it uses). There's another thread on the forum right now about Girder that discusses this. Basically, if you're able to address the three stereo pairs as seaparate sound cards you should be OK.

[Chad]

So the OS has to see 3 sound cards?  It's not something specific to MC? 

How do I find out if a sound card would work this way?  Is there a thread on supported hardware?

And Girder can differentiate which sound card to route the speech to?  Meaning I can say "speek this text on this output channel"?

- Chad

[Mastiff]

I'm not completely sure if Girder must see three cards, but I know that it will always work if it does. I have never used any of those high end cards that support this, I stick to Creative and SPDIF playback. Your best bet is simply to install the trial version of Girder and go from there.

And yes. You can create commands that works like that. Basically you have two commands in a macro, the first one says which output you should use, and the second one speaks the text.

[Chad]

I've never had a complaint about Creative hardware, my ears aren't good enough to tell what's not working with them, but their software is so obtrusive, I was afraid to put it on a dedicated MC/Girder machine which I'm trying to keep as clean and slick as possible. 

Maybe I should just shop at my local CompUSA or Best Buy and try some audio cards and just return them if the drivers are aweful.

- Chad

[Mastiff]

Yeah. Actually even better and a lot cheaper: Get a few Sound Blaster 5.1 cheap on eBay and use the KXProject drivers (Google them). Then you can address every output pair as a single sound card, and that I know works! I have used that before, the only reason I don't use it now is that I never got the line in switching right. If you're only going to do output from MC, you can do that without any problems. That's my recommended first option.