Monday
Apr092007
Rocketfish Wireless Rear Speaker… a simple “cut-the-cord” solution.
Monday, April 9, 2007 at 3:25PM 
The sleeper aspect to this product is that it can actually be used for more than just surround sound... so tune-in.
The folks at Rocketfish, a customer of ours, have put together a nice solution for anyone with a home theater system. Traditional home theater amps have a couple connectivity challenges that are solved elegantly and reliably, and it's rather affordable too at a reasonable $99.
Problems to be solved:
The first, connecting surround-channel speakers up to the amp. Stringing speaker wires from the front of your TV-room to the back of the TV-room --- it typically yields a trip-hazard, and is often unsightly. Not wife-approved. So many consumers have to get crafty, sloppy, or give in altogether and forgo their surround experience.
The second, not utilizing your Zone-B speaker outputs (common on many mid-to-high end AV receivers) to enable some cool party mode music scenarios, or patio audio. Who the heck knows what to do with their B outputs? Few houses are pre-wired for speakers anymore, and hardly anyone is really willing to dive into the nuts and bolts of solving the routing issues for speaker wire to secondary rooms.
The Solution:
The RF-WHTIB is comprised of two main components: (1) a little black box called an audio sender, (2) a slightly larger black box that is simply a wireless stereo amplifier... and not a bad one at that... it can easily can light up a large room with it's full dynamic range, and killer wireless audio link.
What the solution essentially does is let you "cut" your speaker wire, and move the two ends up to 100 feet from one another. The rest of the challenge is taken care of by the latest high fidelity wireless audio system that must be heard to be believed. It is arguably the most bullet-proof wireless audio system ever created. This is not hyperbole. No cordless phone, microwave oven, or WiFi enabled laptop is gonna phase this thing.
Simple to install and use:
1. First, you take your the speaker wire that feeds the signal from the speaker outputs on the back of your receiver (this output can be for surround speakers if you are going for the home theater, or the "B" output if you are looking to light up the next zone in your house), and you plug it in here:
(That's the sender)
2. Walk up to 100 feet away, through a few walls, or a floor even...
3. Then you take your favorite pair of high quality passive speakers (the old fashioned kind, i.e. the ones that sound good), and you plug those in here:
(That's the wireless amp)
4. Plug both devices into a wall outlet.
5. Done.
The devices supposedly come pre-paired from the factory, so the connect buttons are only there for field service reasons, to be honest.
You will forget this is a wireless system within minutes. Just enjoy what ever sound effects or music you throw at your new wireless speakers! Once they are setup, they behave like any other wired speaker you could have plugged into that speaker output you chose in step 1 above.
Verdict:
Well, that's not fair. I can't give an objective opinion. I know the details a little too well (disclosure -- the company I work for supplies the wireless mojo), and really believe this is a darn savvy piece of marketing by the Rocketfish guys. They nailed a solution for a frustrating pain point that anyone with a home theater system knows all too well. I wrote this rambling and unprofessional review just to say, that if you are one of these folks, there is help for you now
I personally know more than ten people who can use this product, like yesterday. Well, Best Buy says they can ship them in 1 day, so you can have yours day after tomorrow... go get one.
Reader Comments (333)
How much power is the amp in the receive unit?
Specs in user manual state 2 x 25W into 4 ohms, RMS.
Keep in mind, for surround channel audio, that is plenty.
Here's the frustrating part for me: I want to mount my rear speakers on opposite sides of the room (pretty obvioius, huh?). Now I've got this big black box that has to feed both of those speakers.
Where do I put the black box? Do I mount it on a wall and then still have to run speaker wire to each speaker?
I guess it's not a bad solution if you have a bunch of furniture on the back wall or the speakers are fairly close...don't know. But this falls short to me.
What I would like is the BIG black box to go with my receiver then two little black boxes that attach to each speaker. But...then again, I have to run the power cords, so now, I've got to hide that cord.
Only kind of a solution.
Shannon,
These are valid points, truly. However, as you so effectively argue with your self, there are tradeoffs in any solution to this problem.
Rocketfish performed numerous market studies, and found a sweet spot in offering a solution to a common frustration.
For the independent black box scenario (one for each rear speaker) costs go up, because now you have to double up on power supplies, wireless receiver ICs, and use mono amplifiers (of which there are few, so you are really ending up burdening your system with more cost)... so as you can see, does your ultimate solution warrant spending what would be around $160? And then you are still left with the power plug issue.
Bottom line, trade-offs do exist. But the primary pain point for the majority of users remains the wire that goes front-to-back of room.
Thanks for the post.
Is the wireless signal digital? if so, can it take a digital signal input (TOSLINK, Digital Coax, or HDMI)?
Does the wireless signal travel through the power lines? If so, does X-10 affect it, or vise versa?
Looks great!
Thanks.
What is the frequency response range?
Ken, The wireless signal is digital. It transmits uncompressed stereo, 16-Bits, 48 KHz audio over the air. That being said, the inputs and outputs of this product are tailored specifically for the powered-speaker stage of the audio signal path, therefore the inputs and outputs are speaker-level analog.
Your application sounds like it will require one of the future products we are enabling. ;-) But for the home theater, surround speaker application, this product will do you a major solid.
Stay tuned.
Chris,
Frequency response is the full 20-20,000 Hz. As mentioned in the post, this makes it useful for full range audio as well as typical surround effects.
Incidentally, it works awesome with some great DTS 5.1 content I personally enjoy.
Check out some of these titles.
http://www.dtsonline.com/shopping/catalogue/music.php
What is the wireless frequency? Is it running at 5.8Ghz? Is there 'no' hissing? 2.4Ghz solutions tend to have intereference with phones and Wifi (actually can slow down Wifi network).
What is the amplifier? Is it a compact T-amp?
TIA
The wireless transmits at 2.4 GHz. There is "no" hissing.
Rocketfish was VERY in tune with the wireless coexistance issues with WLAN and FHSS phones. Nuisances like interference noise and such tend to result in product returns... and high product returns generally result in changes-of-career-path for marketing folks. So they selected the wireless technology keeping this in mind. The company I work for is responsible for the wireless portion and I am not at liberty (just yet) to say much more, other than our system knows where yours and neighboring WLAN systems are, and avoids them in real-time. Marketing b.s. aside, the wireless system is best-of-breed, and Rocketfish is not the only mass consumer device company designing us in at the moment.
The amp is similar to a T-amp (in that it is a switching variety), but was chosen because it sounds better, and produces less of that annoying "hiss" so common with switching amps. In fact, the amplifier stage is very similar to what is commonly used in mass retail HTIB systems, which is to say, it will work for most folks. Full disclosure: audiophiles should not expect miracles for $99.
[...] marketing. trackback The Rocketfish Universal Wireless Rear Speaker Kit (RF-WHTIB) that I reviewed last week made it into the Minneapolis-based retailer’s weekly ad [...]
Looks like it could be a great product. Just a couple questions...
Does adjusting the master volume on my main amplifier adjust the volume of the rear speakers as well??
Also, it would be nice(?) to have (variable?) line level outputs on the remote receiver so I could use my own amp if I wanted to.
What do you think?
How does the wireless system adjust for volume? I would hate to adjust the volume manually on the back of the Rocketfish receiving device.
Wayne
Emjay and wayne,
Have no fear. I know exactly the issue you are concerned about and it is taken care of seamlessly.
When you turn the volume up and down using your main system, the level of the rears will also change just as your wired speakers would.
Volume adjust on the back of the Rocketfish receiver is for one-time setting only to tune the level for your installation -- slight variances in speaker sensitivities and placements -- so it's essentially a "trim" feature. This is actually a cool feature, because a lot of entry and mid level HTIB systems don't have level tuning features for surround speakers.
Emjay,
Line-level outputs or pre-amp output on the Rocketfish receiver would be interesting for the reason you mention. Stay tuned, as there will be other solutions that may address your needs in the near future.
Dang impulse buy. I bought one of these today and no joy. You state 'plug both devices into a wall outlet' - it only comes with one transformer/plug and that's for the sender unit. The reciever doesn't seem to have anywhere to plug power into and nothing in the box to perform that task. Sender turns on and starts blinking looking for its receiver brother but power button on the receiver does... nothing. No clue where the darn thing is supposed to get its power.
Goes back tomorrow. Question is, do I exchange it for another because something is seriously amiss, or just return it?
Power cord is neatly hidden in a compartment under the unit. Slide open the door and there's your AC power cord. The reciever is sleek enough to perhaps not notice where the power cord is stashed. See if that jumps starts a little joy.
Holy crap, how stupid of me. I only skimmed through the instructions - don't need no stink'n instructions, ya know - but missed the open the 'cable' compartment under the receiver unit step. I'd even called the 24x7 support and all they could suggest was to return it. Should have told me to RTFM.
One errand off my list and hopefully more joy tonight. Thanks!
Craig, pls post your feedback.
Im about to pull the trigger, but would like to see your comments.
I also have the problem where my 2 back speakers span the room. I'm hoping I can buy 2 of these, one receiver for each speaker ( i have outlets near the speakers), and link the 2 receivers to the same "sender". Is this possible?
Or will I need to use both senders, 1 for each speaker?
Dale, Big spender! This generation, you'll need to use both senders.
Also, it may not be necessary, but it may be good to separate the two senders physically from one another by a foot or two. If you do play with this, let me know how it goes.
I used to have an amp that only went on when a signal passed through it. It went into hibernate when the tv went off. Does this unit go into hibernate when you turn off the receiver and tv or do you have to manually have to turn the power off on these? I like to conserve power and would not like to have to turn the units off separately.
Amazing how much better these work when both units are powered on. :-)
Only ran a few brief tests but this seems to work just fine. Linked right up once turned on and had no issues with the sound or response from the unit. Nice to finally get rid of the wires that have been trailing around the perimiter of the room.
Dale - I really don't understand your 'span the room' comment. You just run the existing wires from your rear speakers to the receiver and hook the outputs from your amp to the sender. Why again would you need two of these? I guess that would work, use one set (they cannot be purchased separately) for left only and the other set for right, but I don't see why you'd need to do that. Just curious.
G - Units are always on and don't hibernate. So if you wanted to conserve power you'd need to manually turn both off when not in use.
Just bought this yesterday and plan to hook it up tonight. I was considering running wires through the wall behind the TV, up through the attic and back down behind the couch on the opposite wall, but was saving up to buy the right pieces. Figured I'd give this a shot because, worst case scenario, I can still go the in-wall wire route (maybe even install in-wall speakers) in the family room, but use rocketfish to send the rear signal in my office. Can't really go wrong (unless the product signal doesn't work well). It'll be a real test because I've got wireless lan, phones on 5.8GHz (which shouldn't interfere) and who knows what else.
The only disappointment is that I've got a 6.1 speaker system and short of buying another rocketfish, I don't think I'll be able to hook up the rear center channel speaker. Seemed like the ultimate, cheap solution...but alas....I guess there will always be some limitations.
Now they just have to make a weatherproof version so I can use that Zone B to send the signal outside -- otherwise I guess I'm looking at an even more extensive wiring project. I'll try to post a review after the install...hardest part is going to be either a) accessing the back of my receiver...too many things already plugged in in a cramped space and b) getting this installed without my wife noticing I shelled out $100 for something she just won't appreciate like I do. ;)
Oh and Craig, I didn't read the manual either...though I did find the cover on the bottom of the box and was starting to get pissed thinking I was going to have to change D Batteries every months (there was definitely no mention of that on the box) -- can't tell you how relieved I was to find the power cord wrapped up in there (which coincidentally allows you to decide the wire length to extrude from the box) -- pretty smart design in that respect.
I guess in my case, RTFM too.....but of course, I won't.
Craig:
My rear speakers are on either side of the room, i can cant run the speaker cable to a central receiver unless i rip up the carpet, or go through the roof.
This is no back wall on this room, its a great-room arizona style
dale