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linuxguy · 2013-03-21, 19:12

I would like to send the audio output from an XBMC session to a DLNA renderer to be played by it.

How does one redirect the audio from XBMC to a stream for a DLNA renderer ? I'm trying to do this in Fedora if that matters.

Thanks

nickr · 2013-03-21, 20:13

I think you would need to be using pulseaudio and use something like pavucontrol to send to a dlna renderer.

linuxguy · 2013-03-21, 20:21

(2013-03-21, 20:13)nickr Wrote: I think you would need to be using pulseaudio and use something like pavucontrol to send to a dlna renderer.

I wasn't aware that pulseaudio could send output to dlna renderers. I'll look into it.

What if the client was running Windows ?

~~Ned Scott~~ · 2013-03-22, 04:52

Try a nightly build (wiki) of XBMC. In Settings -> Services -> UPnP -> enable "look for remote UPnP players"

Select the file you want to play, right click or bring up the contextual menu (C on a keyboard) and select "play using" and see if it finds your DLNA renderer. With luck, it should. It's a feature currently in development.

~~Robotica~~ · 2013-03-22, 08:17

@ned Scott: Great! Last t ime I looked it was just for video's and not for music nor pictures.

linuxguy · 2013-03-22, 17:05

(2013-03-22, 04:52)Ned Scott Wrote: Try a nightly build (wiki) of XBMC. In Settings -> Services -> UPnP -> enable "look for remote UPnP players"

Select the file you want to play, right click or bring up the contextual menu (C on a keyboard) and select "play using" and see if it finds your DLNA renderer. With luck, it should. It's a feature currently in development.

WIll it send *just* the audio and leave the video playing on the current display ?

This feature is critical to the whole house AV system I am building.

nickr · 2013-03-22, 22:07

Squeezebox/logitecmediaserver may be a better solution for a whole home music systrm

linuxguy · 2013-03-22, 22:36

(2013-03-22, 22:07)nickr Wrote: Squeezebox/logitecmediaserver may be a better solution for a whole home music systrm

I'm building a whole house AV system, not a music system. I want to play a movie on my local HTPC and send the audio portion to a DLNA target (ie renderer) located in the AV closet, where all the wiring and amps is for the sound zones in our house.

The only thing I need XBMC to do is stream its audio output to a DLNA renderer.

I'm wondering if I could accomplish this in the OS somehow, by creating a virtual soundcard and streaming the stream that is sent to it.

nickr · 2013-03-22, 23:43

I am not sure why you want the audio all around the house while you are playing the video locally, but maybe I am not completely understanding your use case.

I don't have an immediate solution, but if I think of anything I will post back.

VLC has many output options and plugins. Perhaps using it as the player?

linuxguy · 2013-03-22, 23:53

(2013-03-22, 23:43)nickr Wrote: I am not sure why you want the audio all around the house while you are playing the video locally, but maybe I am not completely understanding your use case.

I don't have an immediate solution, but if I think of anything I will post back.

VLC has many output options and plugins. Perhaps using it as the player?

Large house, 8 audio zones, some with displays (TVs). The zones with displays will have HTPCs, running XBMC.

The speakers in all the zones are wired back to a central room, the AV closet. Speakers are connected to multi channel whole house amplifiers. Its a pretty common setup.

The whole house amps used to be connected to a radio receiver, CD player, etc. I'm doing away with that and installing DLNA renderers so that people can stream whatever music they want to the amps and thus the speakers in a zone.

People would like to use the speakers in the room when they are watching TV. Thus the need to divert the XBMC audio stream from the local HTPC sound device to the DLNA renderer that is connected to the amp channels for the zone.

Clear as mud ?

nickr · 2013-03-23, 00:14

I can see what you are doing. Seems to over complicate the xbmc setup though.

linuxguy · 2013-03-23, 00:20

(2013-03-23, 00:14)nickr Wrote: I can see what you are doing. Seems to over complicate the xbmc setup though.

If I didn't use the whole house amps, I'd have to have an amp in each room and I'd have to rewire the entire house.

nickr · 2013-03-23, 00:37

Yeah I see that. Not much WAF there :-)

So the only way to get audio to the amp is over the lan via upnp?

linuxguy · (This post was last modified: 2013-03-23, 00:51 by linuxguy.)

[quote='nickr' pid='1374747' dateline='1363991834']
Yeah I see that. Not much WAF there :-)[/qote]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wife_acceptance_factor

[quote] So the only way to get audio to the amp is over the lan via upnp?
[/quote] The only other way would be to run (wire) preamp level signal from each HTPC back to the whole house amps. That would require rewiring the house. And the path is long, it goes through the mechanical room and is susceptible to pick up a bunch of noise.

The other way to do it would be to locate all the HTPCs in the AV closet and run HDMI, remote control IR, mouse and keyboard signals back to it. Not a nice solution either.

The easiest way to solve this problem is to use a DLNA renderer to supply signal to the amp for each room.

FWIW, lots and lots of houses have been wired this way. I'm surprised that I seem to be the first person who wants to do this.

nickr · 2013-03-23, 01:17

DLNA would obviously involve less wiring, but I wonder if the network latency would make the audio out of sync with the video, even assuming we can get the audio streaming to dlna working?

I have never seen the point in wiring like that given my reliance on media PCs in each room, but I know it is common.

Perhpas this helps? https://live.gnome.org/Rygel - there are rygel plugins for pulseaudio.