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[talyn21]

I currently have MC set up with six zones.  Each zone is Creative USB sound card.  Unfortunately they do not have an ASIO driver for this product.  btw - their web site is a bit misleading.  They have a page that states all X-Fi products have this driver but in some small print on some other page it says with with exception of USB devices.    If I link two zones the sound from the speakers is not even close to being sync'd.  I can only get Zone Linking to work using the Direct Sound driver.   I guess this is a multi part question.

#1
As mentioned the USB sound card does not support ASIO.  However I can select WASAPI and WASAPI - Event Style and as long as I do not have a zone linked to any other zone it works just fine.   But as soon as I link two zones the music stops and I get the following error message.   

Playback could not be started on the output WASAPI - Event Style using the format '44.1kHz 24b 2ch'.
This output format may not be supported by your hardware.  You can use DSP Studio to change the output to a compatible format.

Why would this driver work just fine when playing back on a single zone but linking them causes this issue? 


#2
Is there any way to make the hardware I currently have link multiple zones and output from all the speakers be sync'd?

#3
If #2 is not possible, is there a recommendation of hardware that will accomplish this?   Keeping in mind I eventually want to get to 12 zones for the whole house audio setup. 


Thanks for helping out a newbie to MC

[talyn21]

A little more info.  While typing the first post I opened the properties boxes to get everything correct and noticed that when I changed the driver from Direct Sound to WASAPI - Event Style that the selected device goes to Default.  I have no idea why playing an unlinked zone still worked just fine and Linking does not.  I went back and changed the driver back to WASAPI - Event Style and then changed the device from Default to the appropriate USB sound card.  Now the two zones will play while linked.   So there is still just the issue of the sound being well out of sync.  New information here as well.   I had been doing all the testing using an internet radio station.  I changed it to an song from my NAS box and I can not hear any sync issues at all. 

So is there some inherent reason internet radio stations will never play sync'd?   

[Matt]

#1
As mentioned the USB sound card does not support ASIO.  However I can select WASAPI and WASAPI - Event Style and as long as I do not have a zone linked to any other zone it works just fine.   But as soon as I link two zones the music stops and I get the following error message.   

Playback could not be started on the output WASAPI - Event Style using the format '44.1kHz 24b 2ch'.
This output format may not be supported by your hardware.  You can use DSP Studio to change the output to a compatible format.

Why would this driver work just fine when playing back on a single zone but linking them causes this issue? 

If each USB device powers multiple zones, it would be normal to not be able to open the device for exclusive access from two zones at once.

But if each USB device is only a single zone, I'd expect it to work.  If it doesn't, it seems like the driver isn't well behaved.  Maybe it uses global variables, so two instances just won't work well.

#2
Is there any way to make the hardware I currently have link multiple zones and output from all the speakers be sync'd?

Have you tried adjusting the zone link timing?  I would expect you to be able to get pretty close.

It might be good to use 'WASAPI - Event Style' on all the devices.  Don't use exclusive mode, but instead configure DSP Studio > Output Format to output in the card's mixing format.

[Matt]

So is there some inherent reason internet radio stations will never play sync'd?   

Zone Linking is playing the file multiple times at once.  We must be able to seek quickly and with millisecond precision.  This is only possible with local files, not live streams like Internet radio.

[talyn21]

Matt,

Thank you for the info.  Just for my curiosity, if/when you have a spare moment.  Why does Zone Linking play the same source multiple times vs processing the source once and copying it to all linked zones?  It would seem this would eliminate any sync problems.

Thanks again,
Tim

[Matt]

Why does Zone Linking play the same source multiple times vs processing the source once and copying it to all linked zones?  It would seem this would eliminate any sync problems.

This was a fundamental question when building Zone Link.

There are advantages to both, but the reason we chose the path we did is that it allows the idea to extend to remote zones or DLNA (if we find a device that reliably supports high-resolution seeks).

[talyn21]

Can you add an option to select what way Zone Linking is processed?     As mentioned I am new to MC but so far I am impressed.  And I am very picky and rarely say such things.