Kitchen audio - looking for some guidance

[4hero]

Hello,

I'm in the middle of re-designing my kitchen and am now planning audio. The job hasn't started yet, so it's a blank canvas pretty much.

Currently have a Sony HTI-S100 in the living room, just a few meters from the kitchen/dining room. Also going to get an HP Touchsmart 600PC for the kitchen, which will be used as the tv also.

What I'm looking for is a way of hooking the two up, and playing audio through ceiling mounted speakers in the kitchen/dining room (if this is possible). Also not sure about ceiling mounted speakers, what's best? Can you get separate subs which are also ceiling mounted? Pretty keen to get some higher-end stuff, and there's no fixed budget (although my wife may not agree when our cooker is downgraded due to cost of audio ).

I'm sure there will be more questions, but for now any help would be excellent!

Thanks in advance,

Neil.

[jamcam23]

Hi Neil,

Just to clarify, you're keeping the Sony 5.1 system in the Living room and you want new speakers (In Ceiling) in the Kitchen, but with the ability to run the audio from the HP PC into them?

Firstly can you get cable from the kitchen to the living room? You may want to look at a Home Cinema that has 2 or more extra zones, so that the amp is running the main zone and then powering a pair of ceiling speakers off of it's additional amplifiers. This would mean probably having the amp in the living room so you can wire it to the Sony system, but then you would need speaker cable from the kitchen speakers running back to the Living Room, you would also need 'phono' / 'balanced audio' cable running back to the amp in the Living room to carry audio from the HP to the amp then back to the kitchen speakers. That would also mean you can use the HP as an audio source in the Living Room and play music content from the HP through the Sony system, Hope that makes sense?

It's just a case of being able to get the cables around the property with minimal fuss, the amp will let you control the the volume and what you want to watch via the Sony system on Zone 1, but will also let you control the volume of the kitchen and the HP PC independently. It also has a wi-fi card inside which means you can control the volume and source selection from Pioneers own apple app, so everything is done from a iPhone or iPod Touch.

Pioneer Amplifier / iPhone control (Multi Room system)

http://www.pioneer.co.uk/uk/content/press/news/ico...

As i said, hope that makes sense, as for Ceiling speakers, look to pay around £450 - £600 for a good pair and you probably wont need a subwoofer

you can email me on [e-mail] if you need any further help, i've been istalling and supplying AV for over 10 years now.

[4hero]

Thanks a lot for the info James!

Yes, I do plan on keeping the existing sub/amp in the living room.

Getting cables around isn't a problem, there's a new ceiling going up in the kitchen, and getting cables through to the living room isn't an issue either. It does make sense about using the HP as the Audio source, but I've already got the PS3, XBOX 360, and wii networked to my media centre upstairs, and they are all hooked up to the sony sub in the living room, so that's not an issue. I'll be networking the HP (CAT6) so this too can handle music etc from upstairs also, mind you, being able to continue the music through from the kitchen/dining room to the living room would be excellent (say after a meal, and we want a comfy seat, nothing worse than having to close down one system to start another), decisions...

I'm guessing I was trying to avoid buying another amp, but thinking about it now the 2 zone system makes a lot of sense! Would one pair of ceiling speakers be enough for a 4.8m x 2.5 metre room?

That Poineer system looks nice, and like the idea of being able to turn the audio up with my iphone

Lots to ponder on, but thanks again for your help!

Neil.

edited to add: the Pioneer system states "Multi-Zone, Zone2". Does this mean it can handle two zones? Sorry for being thick, pc's are more my thing

Edited by 4hero on Monday 24th May 22:44

[jamcam23]

Hi Neil, no problems with the info, some of the Pioneer Amplifiers even do 3 zones, the main zone being your living room and zone 2 being your kitchen area, with a third zone for added use, as the room is quite big you may want 2 pairs of speakers (look at the 'Speakercraft AIM' range), the only problem is the Pioneer is set up to run 1 pair only, so you may want to get a QED speaker switch which can power 2 pairs of speakers from a stereo feed, this switching unit would sit on top of the Pioneer Amp).

If you get it all set up, try the programme Boxee which will control all your media
on your PC and they have an app which means you can control all your content on your PC from your iPhone, its a great bit of software

Cheers

[Zod]

The Touchsmarts make very good kitchen TVs. I still can't get my wife to use it fro Ocado ordering though. She insists on going upstairs to her office to add an item.