iHome AirPlay wireless speaker system is revealed on company teaser site

The iHome AirPlay wireless speaker teaser site is up. iHome has unveiled a completely new design for a completely new category of Apple audio accessory.

The picture and copy on the teaser site show a stereo all-in-one speaker design, with a metal base and black cloth grille. A capacitive touch panel on top rounds out the visible form-factor elements. The copy states that the speaker includes a rechargeable battery, which if you let your imagination run with it, means you can achieve a completely wireless listening experience using AirPlay, no strings attached.

AirPlay speakers will allow point-to-multipoint streaming of content from any iTunes 10 (or later) library running on Mac or Windows operating systems. As Apple mentioned on Wednesday, AirPlay functionality will also extend to the iPad, and presumably all iOS devices, when iOS 4.2 is released at the end of 2010. So users could stream audio directly from iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad to an AirPlay speaker.

AirPlay is the new name for AirTunes, the wireless audio technology that has been used for the past five-plus years by Apple to stream audio from iTunes to the Airport Express and Apple TV. Audio is streamed using Apple Lossless Audio Codec (ALAC), meaning whatever format your audio is stored in within iTunes, if iTunes can play such a file, than it can send it via AirPlay, after it is "transcoded" to ALAC. Since ALAC is "lossless," it transmits the audio without any additional degradation, or music data loss, compared to the source file.

For the first time, this wireless audio functionality is now available to Apple's third-party licensed accessory makers, and iHome is one of these, being one of the most prolific in the space over the last five years.

AirPlay by Apple enables iHome, others, to bring wireless audio home

I've written about AirTunes in the past. Since late 2004, I've played with Apple's wireless audio technology as a feature of iTunes and the Airport Express. I never tried it in concert with Apple TV, but for a couple years, I enjoyed three separate zones of home audio using two AirPort Expresses and a Mac mini. In the context of offering a solution for simple music playback across the home, it has always been a great solution.

For those who don't know, AirTunes lets people stream music from any computer running iTunes to any AirTunes receiver located on the same local-area network. So you could have AirTunes receivers (up until now, only the AirPort Express and Apple TV), in any number of rooms in your house, and using iTunes, or an app from Apple called Remote, control what music is sent where. Users could then listen to music from any audio system plugged into either of their AirTunes devices, which presented basic line-level audio signals.

Well, today was a big day. Widely reported elsewhere, Apple announced a host of new products in their latest keynote address (new iPods, new Apple TV, iTunes 10, and an iOS 4.2 preview). Layered into the announcement was the fact that AirTunes has now been "re-branded" as part of a larger wireless media feature-set from Apple, newly dubbed AirPlay, which also encompasses video and photo sending around the home.

The AirPlay story is embellished by their website and press release, and is the feature most relevant to wirelessaudioblog readers. Apple announced that AirPlay speakers and audio systems will soon be available from third-party manufacturers. iHome, Denon, Marantz, JBL, and Bowers & Wilkins are all now readying systems that will use AirPlay to receive audio from a user's iTunes library, and when iOS 4.2 releases later this year, it seems as though AirPlay speakers might receive audio directly from many tens of millions of portable iOS devices. This wasn't super explicit during the keynote, but would seem reasonable.

After working in the wireless audio category for 6 years, it's gratifying to see the technology get situated for wide-spread adoption. The fact is, the Apple team is a band of user-experience aficionados, but as we all also know, they are commercially brilliant as well. So there is finally real hope that more people will realize some of the promises of wireless audio for multi-room home audio networking. By opening up AirPlay to third party accessory makers, Apple opens the door for more affordable, lifestyle focused product concepts to reach the masses. For product makers that have been wrestling with existing wireless audio technologies – home-grown wireless audio solutions (i.e. Logitech, Sonos), RF ASIC-based solutions from STS or Avnera (Klipsch, Panasonic, Sony, Best Buy) – AirPlay is offered as a technology solution that not only has Apple's robust wireless audio protocol inside, but also the promise of Apple's market-making, 3rd party developer support. The accompanying marketing platform is composed of strong messaging from Apple and a huge installed-base of complimentary AirPlay products, i.e. Apple's iTunes, iPhone, iPad, iPod touch...

Readers of wirelessaudioblog know I work in product development now at iHome. One of our most exciting projects this year has been designing and developing our first AirPlay speaker. Apple's technology enables us to deliver a product that is uniquely wireless, uniquely AirPlay, and particularly beneficial to existing iPod, iPhone, iPad customers, i.e. iTunes users. The iHome AirPlay wireless speaker will reach the market this holiday season, and it offers consumers the ability to send iTunes audio to any room of the house, multiple rooms of the house, and control it all with Apple's Remote app for iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad.

I'm really excited to see AirPlay mature in this way, because it's always been an impressive, promising take on wireless audio. Now Apple has put the full commitment of their third-party hardware developer support team behind it. This should keep things really interesting, and I'm actually really looking forward to see what other device-makers have planned.

Rocketboost. Engage.

Bestbuy.com has just posted the four newest Rocketfish SKUs. The noteworthy element here is that they are all Rocketboost-enabled devices. The underlying digital wireless technology is based on Avnera's AM2G wireless audio solution, which has undergone a spiffing up via some API goodness added to their solution to enhance interoperability for device makers and foster ease-of-use for consumers.

Currently, the initial RocektBoost devices are four unique Rocketfish-branded pieces of hardware that are sold as two bundles, and two add-ons. Let's break it down.

The Bundles

The two main experiences that the bundles... or maybe more apt, the starter-kits address are:

1. Adding wireless speakers to your HD home theater receiver. (see RF-RBKIT below)
2. Playing music outdoors wirelessly to a weather-resistant speaker. (RF-RBWS02 below)

Bundle 1: RF-RBKIT - $199.99

As a follow-on (and significant upgrade) to the RF-WHTIB, the RF-RBKIT is composed of a "sender" and a stereo amp receiver, also sold standalone as the RF-RBREC. Compared to the original RF-WHTIB, which was meant to be a wireless surround enabler for entry-class HTIB systems, the new "KIT" is targeted more at higher end home theater systems... it adds more amplifier power (50 Watts per channel output) for two surround speakers, as well as support for two more wireless channels. This was a feature requested often by buyers of the original RF-WHTIB kit. This means that the new KIT can be expanded upon by adding an additional RF-RBREC (sold sep for $99) to enable either 4 channels of wireless surround sound for 7.1 setups, or alternatively, a set of Zone-B wireless speakers in another room for a 5.1 + zone B arrangement. Actually, it can enable more than a set... try 8 zone B receivers total on top of the surround speakers doing their thing in peace. Range for transmission is at least 100 feet indoors. YMMV.

Bundle 2: RF-RBWS02 - $149.99

The second bundle at retail is the RF-RBWS02. The bundle's first piece consists of a transmitter, also sold standalone as RF-RBAUX, which is a cool little widget because it can receive audio too... very powerful (see RF-RBAUX below), along with a "wireless indoor/outdoor speaker." The RBAUX takes any audio input via 3.5mm minijack and transmits it wirelessly to the wireless speaker. Again, range is 100 feet indoors... but outdoors may be quite more depending on obstructions impacting line of sight.

The Devices

Let's review the four devices to clearly understand what capabilities each device brings to the Rocketboost ecosystem.

RF-RBREC - $99.99

The RF-RBREC is very simple. It's a 50W x 2 (into 6 ohms) wireless stereo amplifier. It can be matched to any 4 to 8 ohm traditional (passive) speaker. The wireless amp's design makes it suitable to hide at the back of the room, or to place on a bookshelf and control via the included IR remote.

RF-RBKIT-Sender (not sold separately as of this writing)

The sender has two stereo inputs in the back. Each stereo channel has speaker-level and pre-amp level connections via terminal posts and RCA (via included mini-jack adaptor), respectively. For any audio gear-head, a quick look at the back panel makes it simpler than it sounds.

When connected, each stereo input becomes a wireless Rocketboost "source" and is denoted on the front panel by "A" and "B" indicators, adjacent to the source enable/disable buttons. So now, any compatible wireless receiver can select either "A" or "B" content to render. Also, to satisfy the home theater application requirements, each source can be made "HD" by pressing an HD button. This allows the sender to meet the stringent SNR and latency requirements for Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD system approval. Home theater geeks may find this appealing, though I dare any normal person to tell the difference.  Another great feature, if i do say so myself, is the 4-channel lock switch.  This makes A and B receivers have exactly the same gain level, ensuring home theater AVRs can precisely tune the surround channels using whatever advanced features it has to do so.

RF-RBAUX - $59.99

The RBAUX is my favorite, and yes it's simple, and because of this, it's also kind of awesome. It's sold separately, as well as included in the RBWS02 speaker bundle. When included in the speaker bundle, the device serves as a wireless stereo transmitter. It takes line input stereo and sends it wirelessly. The real beauty of this device is that it also has a line output, so it can be used as a wireless receiver for any Rocketboost wireless source device.  The output can also serve as a loop-back for the line input... which means you can "splice" the RBAUX into your PC's audio output, as an example, and still play the audio back through your desktop speakers, in the meantime trasmitting that audio to the rest of the Rocketboost network. Tres cool.

You can use the RBAUX in so many ways!  It's like the 2x4 Lego piece... super useful.  Based on the Rocketfish SKUs, however, it is most obvious to use the RBAUX as either a Zone-B wireless receive adaptor for a powered speaker system (by pairing with the RBKIT sender), or as a transmitter for whatever audio device you want (to send to a outdoor speaker, a RBREC, or another RBAUX).

RF-RBWS02-Speaker (not sold separately as of this writing)

 The wireless speaker is a bi-amplified, woofer+tweeter arrangment. It can be used alone as a mono speaker, or if you have additional speakers, you can let one render the R channel, and one the L channel, or both depending on your arrangement. The speaker is rated at 22 Watts, and can run on AC, alkaline batteries, or NiMH rechargeable batteries, which also charge via the AC adaptor - no removal of the batteries required to charge. Just be careful not to try and charge the alkalines... there's probably a switch and a clear warning against this as is typical in this category.

Expand and customize your Rocketboost mix to suit your world

The point of all these devices being Rocketboost is this: all these devices work together! Yep. So, as a couple examples above illustrate, you can now really tailor your wireless audio experience to suit your needs as a unique consumer living in a unique home environment.

At the simplest level, anything that can receive audio, can playback audio from any device that can send audio.

A few advanced facts about Rocketboost that can help feed the creative/curious mind

• Audio is sent across the Rocketboost network as 16-bits, 48 KHz, uncompressed PCM audio. i.e. slightly better than good ole CD-quality.
• End-to-end latency for a standard definition audio stream is fixed, and around 18 milliseconds. HD is less. I'm not sure how much was settled on.
• To start a Rocketboost network, the user must select one device to act as the "hub." Only one device per Rocketboost network can be configured as the "Hub." Any device which can serve as the hub has a switch on the back.
• The hub will take care of all the pairing for adding devices to the network, as well as coordinate all the advanced RF channel hopping, quality of service magic, and interference avoidance that goes on. It's the network coordinator. It's probably best to make the hub something that is plugged into the wall.
• If your needs demand it, don't worry, you can set up as many hubs as you want, but just know that when you do so, you'll be creating parallel universes from a network perspective, so devices paired to one hub cannot send or receive audio to devices paired to another hub. (To get real geeky, each network also will need one-third of the available RF 2.4 GHz spectrum. So in most cases you will be limited to 3 audio networks.. but you might get more, if they aren't heavily utilized, because the intelligent adaptive channel hopping capabilities of Rocketboost are quite astounding... just so long as you aren't in a crazy WiFi hotbed... as with all 2.4GHz stuff, YMMV.)
• Any one network can support 10 devices, or nodes.
• Any audio input will become a wireless audio source. I am pretty sure the sources are jack-sensed, e.g. RBAUXes won't be eating up audio transmission bandwidth unless there is an audio device plugged in.
• The audio network can support up to 5 simultaneous (stereo) sources transmitting at the same time. Any device on the network can be the source of audio.. not only the hub.
• Inherently, any wireless audio source is one-to-many capable.
• ... because of the last four notes, you can see that the end-user created topologies for audio flow in the home can vary widely. That's the point.

Hint: It's useful to think of Rocketboost like plugging in and "erecting" local radio stations. Then, each audio receiver, whether it's a speaker, an amplifier, or a line-out adaptor, can simply "tune-in" to one of these local radio stations. That's kind of the notion underlying the original system design by Avnera. Think about it this way, and you'll start to envision how you can apply the products to your world.

Rocketfish's initial Rocketboost devices more or less leaves control of your actual content up to you. It is more about connectivity and audio robustness. It's lots of wireless audio sophistication crammed into simple, versatile end-products.

Have fun. Share your experiences here.  I'm sure readers would like to know how folks make the most of this new wireless audio capability.

Disclaimer: When I was with Avnera, I worked on numerous aspects of these products, from the early wireless chip definition, to supporting the spec phase of the end-products for the customer. That was a long time ago and things have evolved a bit since in the process of bringing them to market. So I am not an official authority by any measure... but I am a believer ;-).

Sony and Best Buy coordinate on S-AIR wireless audio

Sony released a story today about their invigorated S-AIR wireless system and new ALTUS product line.  They presented the story as a tale of Best Buy partnership.  Interesting.  Certainly in order to market an iPod story, a PC story, a Blu-ray HTIB story, and an add-on story, Sony had to collaborate on nailing feature requirements in order to secure broad buy-in across the Best Buy merchandising teams.

Which explains the EVP quote:

Mike Vitelli, executive vice president of customer operating groups at Best Buy Co., Inc., added: "By working with Sony throughout the product development process, we were able to focus directly on our customer to better understand their needs and interpret how best to present ALTUS in a retail environment."

At Best Buy, you gotta engage the veeps if you want to coordinate a cross-departmental buying decision like the one Sony has paid for pulled off.

It's clever on both sides, and it is the kind of thing that happens when a single retailer dominates the industry – i.e. they get to have more influence.  It also behooves those, like Sony, who wish to drive sell-through through all their channels, to strive harder, to engage earlier, and to fund special programs that service the needs/wants of the major retailers in the channel.  It's like Best Buy is an only-child... it gets what it wants, and in doing so, can tell a story at retail that no other electronics retailer can.  In order to get what it wants, the industry implicitly gets in return a set of channel-optimized product requirements to incorporate... it's just that we have to have faith that Best Buy's merchants and floor personal are truly sowing the right insight from consumers, who, ultimately, validate the entire approach.

Sony's S-AIR system is an STS-based wireless audio system (as can be seen from teardown photos at FCC) that has seen duty in products from Klipsch, earlier Panasonic wireless HTIBs (now Avnera), and a number of other brands with less successful executions.  Sony is one of STS's most persistent integrators, and have weathered the earlier weaker product concepts to arrive at this current generation.  It's actually nice to see a coherent attempt to tell their marketing story. Afterall, this stuff is not your ordinary consumer purchase.

My only gripe about the product is the price points of their retail SKUs.  They're a little scary to look at.  See below for the basics of what all is in the packages, with crude call-outs for the cost-driving technology that product makers typically puke at when undertaking wireless designs:

• ALT-SA31iR - $700 - iPod dock, S-AIR remote control, two wireless speakers - total of 4 STS radios, 3 power supplies


• ALT-SA10Ti - $400 - iPod speakerdock, S-AIR remote control, wireless subwoofer - total of 3 radios, 2 power supplies


• ALT-SA32PC - $500 - USB S-AIR transmitter, two wireless speakers - 3 radios, 2 power supplies


• ALT-A33PC - $200 - USB S-AIR transmitter, universal RCA output receiver - 2 radios, 1 power supply


• ALT-SA34R - $350 - 2 small form factor wireless "socket" speakers, remote control - 3 radios, 2 power supplies.


• BDV-E500W - $800 - Blu-ray Home theater receiver with wireless surround speakers. - 2 radios, 1 power supply

Sony Electronics Release.

I'm sure I'll talk more about these products in time.  For now... enjoy the hype.

Would love to test the new Panasonic SC-ZT1 system

It's a bit disappointing to see the lack of distribution this system has in the market almost 9 months after its launch at CES.  No doubt the unconventional system configuration and the terrible price point have hurt what could otherwise be a slick wireless home theater success story.

Just read some of the forums, the buyers that the ZT1 appeals to have spoken.  HTIB buyers hate the plenitude of crappy little speaker strung about, and soundbar buyers out there miss out on true surround audio, but at US$1799.00, the ZT1 ain't going to compete well.  It's a shame too because the wireless home theater makers have been sorely under-utilizing the benefits of wireless, but not so with the ZT1.  The head-unit can be placed anywhere in the home theater.  (In my case, it would want to be in the back of the room near my cable hookup and the Panasonic projector I have.  My current challenge is not being able to get multi-channel audio up to the front of the room where I am using my existing HT receiver.  The ZT1 would allow me to replace all my current nonsense... it's absolutely PERFECT for this use case.)

Unfortunately, I am not going to spend 1800 bucks in this market.  I'll wait for a price reduction, or a demo system...

Which brings me to my last point.  For any product that offers a new approach to satisfying a set of customer problems, the marketers absolutely have to educate the market and get the word out.  The Panasonic product page is pathetic, there is nary a informative review to be found via Google, and that lack of sell-through due to terrible launch pricing means trusted sites like Amazon or Best Buy are not carrying the product and so will leave curious consumers short on early adopter testimonials.  These are travesties for a new product launch.  But it's one I am willing to do my part to help address if they need it.