avneron

A Plan to build your own multi-room audio video distribution system with Boxee

santopoliti:

My fascination with multi-room audio video distribution continues but I still don’t understand why manufacturers don’t use IP to solve this problem. Most solutions still require discrete cables for audio, video and control. Newer solutions require a pair of cat 5 cables to the location but still transfer A/V using a modulation scheme rather than IP packets.

Ages ago, Bijan and I worked together on Broadcastle - a company we seeded that set out to solve this exact problem over IP.  We had a very talented team and a working prototype but in the end did not to move forward with a bigger investment. We figured the market was small,  the distribution channel was complicated and hardware costs looked to be prohibitive for a long time.

When we started Spark, we revisited the same problem again, and looked into a free hardware reference design models around MythTV. So when Avner and Boxee showed up (the second time around), we knew that was it. Since then, Avner and his team have taken the concept above and beyond my wildest imagination with a rich social interface, an open API and a great app store with a growing number of very interesting applications.

Now that Boxee is about to show up in custom hardware, (hopefully) in large quantities, built by CE manufacturers and distributed widely over retail,  maybe it is time to re-visit  the whole house A/V distribution problem again. Boxee is a very powerful platform that one could create more complex custom applications like  whole house audio video distribution without compromising its richness.

The world has changed so I don’t know if anyone needs it anymore, but if you are not going to cut the ‘cable’ and still believe in whole house automation, with Boxee  and a few select readily available hardware components, you too could turn your house into your very own IPTV deployment.

Here is how I would put together a system:

A/V matrix switch:
In my house, I want to switch 4 sources to independently to 4 different locations , so I would have to buy a 4x4 A/V Matrix switch. These things used to be very expensive but now you can get a great one from companies like Zektor, or Gefen for very reasonable prices. If you already have a multi-room receiver, you may not need to buy this.

UPNP MPEG  Encoder / Streamer:
This is the device that would convert your video stream into IP. You need as many of these boxes as sources you’d want to switch. I could not find any cheap alternatives for this. You can buy a VBricks streamer or use an Intel Atom PC with Linux and VLAN Software encoder.

iPhone IR Repeater:
This is the box that receives commands over IP from an  iPhone (or iPod touch) and translates it to IR locally. You’d use this box to control all your A/V components from a remote location. There are a bunch of these, like RedEye or Bobby Universal Remote but they are somewhat expensive.

Class D Amplifier:
I am suggesting, pairing Boxee with a Class T (aka Class D) amplifier. You need an amplifier to power your speakers unless you are going to use your TV speakers directly.  I suggest Class D, because they can be tiny like the Nuforce Icon and can get up to 40W per channel of very clear audiophile quality sound.

iPod Touch:
This is your remote! The cheapest one I think is around $199 but I suspect now with iPad, they’d go down to  $99 quickly - so buy as many as you like and sprinkle them around the house. When you are not using them as your remote, check your email, browse the web or play a game.

The catch here of course is integration and GUI. All this would actually work out of the box. You’d need to know how to install Linux VLAN  working, the GUI would be cloggy and you’d have to program the iPhone remote but it will work (or so I think, I’ll find out soon).

The interesting thing here is there is no limit to what could be done with rich open platform(s) - in this case Boxee + iPod touch - even in consumer electronics. What was prohibitively expensive 7-8 years ago is not any more. You rarely need to build any custom hardware, systems cost less and buyers should be willing to pay for the software.

PS. If you are interested in building this with me, and your programming skills are not as rusty - please let me know!