mfjv4 Posted March 20, 2006 Share Posted March 20, 2006 A potential client asked me if C4 could support up to 16 concurrent MP3 streams through his home (he has lots of kids and family living in the home . Does anyone know the actual MC/HTC specs for simulaneous streams? Can I cascade multiple MC's or HTC's to get more?.. marcel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danlevine Posted March 20, 2006 Share Posted March 20, 2006 7 Simultaneous Streams is the limit. I think you can do more than that but it's not technically supported. I'm guessing you could do more by making two separate networks but that might be a little tricky for you.Dan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mfjv4 Posted March 20, 2006 Author Share Posted March 20, 2006 Thanks Dan.. I'll put my mind around that suggestion and let you know what I come up with.. marcel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slemay Posted March 20, 2006 Share Posted March 20, 2006 Bandwidth wise - you could have more then 30 streams... CPU wise on the MC or HTC - you could have also about as many. Practical is 7 - 10... what C4 supports = 7. So there is no limit, but you're opening up a can of worms to ask it to support more. It may do it just fine... but it could slow other systems down (zigbee lighting for example). Why would you customer need 16 different zones of audio? That seems a bit excessive for a house - no? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TrikinCurt Posted March 20, 2006 Share Posted March 20, 2006 Netstreams DigiLinX could handle that without a problem, unfortunately the price would go up about 10x.Curt Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slemay Posted March 20, 2006 Share Posted March 20, 2006 There are a ton of other solutions out there that could do it as well - but Curt, you hit it on the head, the price goes up quickly! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mfjv4 Posted March 21, 2006 Author Share Posted March 21, 2006 Thanks again guys. I'm only trying to respond to the customer's request to support 16 simultaneous. I did try pushing back but he insisted that this was the requirement. He was impressed with the C4 capabilities overall so he asked me to find a way to do with using C4. The only approach I can think of is if he only needs additional music streaming in a subset of his HTC/MC's then I could split the C4 universe so that the rooms that will party/session are on one HTC/MC (along wth all the lighting stuff, call that HTC1) keeping them to 5 streams and placing the other rooms' audio only on one or two more HTC/MC's (Call these HTCs2 and 3). Here again I can group the rooms so each of these will be able to party/session among each other. All the HTC/MC's would be independent C4 projects. Ironically however, the use of an NFS hard drive with the music will be accessible to all of these independent projects. This approach retains the cost to the area of scaled C4 solution. The disadvantages are that the party/session mode cannot span the across HTC1, HTC2 and HTC3, nor can lighting be controlled by the same remote or M/T used by rooms linked to HTC2 and HTC3. I don't know if there will be any negative effects of operating 3 projects in the same home. I can also offer as you suggest the 10x solution and maybe the requirement will dissolve into the reality we'd all prefer to see. I appreciate all your wise advice and inputs.. thank you ... marcel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chambrick Posted March 23, 2006 Share Posted March 23, 2006 Have you mentioned the concept of a local source to your client? That may fill his needs. Do local sources through the MTS in a room with MP3 players, etc.So the 7 streams could be "whole-house", but then any room with a local input capability could do whatever they want thereby creating system that could handle 7 + x number of C4 devices that support local audio.Corbin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danlevine Posted March 24, 2006 Share Posted March 24, 2006 Have you mentioned the concept of a local source to your client? That may fill his needs. Do local sources through the MTS in a room with MP3 players, etc.So the 7 streams could be "whole-house", but then any room with a local input capability could do whatever they want thereby creating system that could handle 7 + x number of C4 devices that support local audio.CorbinCorbin I thought that if the MTS is receiving streaming Audio it counts as a separate stream. Even if it is plugged in to a local amplifier. If thats not the case couldn't you use 16 speaker points? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Samer Shami Posted March 25, 2006 Share Posted March 25, 2006 All the HTC/MC's would be independent C4 projects. Ironically however, the use of an NFS hard drive with the music will be accessible to all of these independent projects.Alarm bells went off when I read this. To share the NFS drive (unless you have a multi-homed NFS server), all HTCs/MCs would have to be on the same subnet. This means all the Directors will appear on the same subnet. Problems are almost guaranteed to occur in this configuration. You should only have one Director per subnet. Weird and intermittent things start happening otherwise.Now if I read your client correctly, they want 16 simultaneous MP3 streams. It doesn't sound like they want 16 different simultaneous streams. Are they happy with having potentially 7 unique and different streams going to 16 zones? If this is the case, then this is achievable using Control4. However, I would strongly urge you to keep the Control4 traffic segregated from the LAN traffic to ensure that you have full bandwidth for streaming audio. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mfjv4 Posted March 28, 2006 Author Share Posted March 28, 2006 Shamir, tks again... you've got me thinking that when I prep'd an HTC in my home I placed it on the same subnet as my home HTC and somehow my home HTC got wiped out, i.e. not functioning. When I tried to reidentify it with the second HTC on the LAN it had problems. When I removed the prep'd HTC for cusotmer delivery, I returned to my home HTC, reidentified it and all started working again. Was the problem I had in my home the same as what you're referring to here? If so, I saw it first hand. Good point on clarifying 16 simultaneous vs. 16 different. I'll have to do that. I think with the number of folks in the household 16 simultaneousl is all that's necessary.I responded to you on the forum thread dealing with subnets. I usually put the C4 and media servers in a LAN cul-de-sac. Thinking goes along the lines that VoIP ONLY egresses the premises and requires CoS treatment so it's the first service input into the voice terminal adapter/router, the next LAN switch in the LAN attaches to all the PCs because they egress the home for internet access like email but access the NFS in the cul de sac from time to time, and the C4 gear and NFS plug into the last LAN switch (the cul de sac) because these devices RARELY need to egress the premises - the only times I can think of is when the composer is attempting to acquire meta data for the DVD/CDs or send an email. else.. all the C4 gear and media servers seek to intercommunicate to each other and NOT the PCs in the upper LAN segment layer. It's a little trick that works nicely on a flat, single LAN segment. ... marcel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Samer Shami Posted March 29, 2006 Share Posted March 29, 2006 When I removed the prep'd HTC for cusotmer delivery, I returned to my home HTC, reidentified it and all started working again. Was the problem I had in my home the same as what you're referring to here? If so, I saw it first hand.Afraid so.Good point on clarifying 16 simultaneous vs. 16 different. I'll have to do that. I think with the number of folks in the household 16 simultaneousl is all that's necessary.I have seen houses that require 24 different streams. This number of streams is easily in Crestron territory, both in cost and complexity. Control4 doesn't have any allusions of competing within this market space. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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