# Getting sound to the outdoor pergola area...



## jhillremote33 (Apr 30, 2011)

Hi to all on this forum. I am a new member and was really hoping to get some advice. 

Currently i have a home theatre room... well, its coming along i should say. I purchased some av plates not too long ago. This included a plate with 2 speaker points and a network point in the middle followed by another 2x more plates each with their own 2 speaker points & speaker wire. Anyway, these are all installed for the home theatre room. The previous house owner was nice enough to install some blank face plates (2x) in the wall where the amp goes in the theatre room. I used one of these with the 2x speaker / network plate. The other blank face plate is still available next to it. 

My amp has the usual setup (AMP being Yamaha RX-V1900) along with 6x PSB speakers including subwoofer, but also has additional zones 2 and 3 that can be run off the amp. I have an outdoor pergola which already has a flat screen t.v installed into (again thanks to previous house owner). Inbetween my theatre room and the pergola area, i also have a bar room.

What i would like to do is install at least 2 outdoor speakers in the pergola area so i can get music / radio out there. I am trying to figure out what the best set up / av plates to get if i wanted to be able to do this from my amp in my theatre room say from zone 2... but also have the option to run a small system in the bar room as well to the speakers in the pergola area. During the occasion / social event i would then pick which system i would like to use. The area where the main amp is also has a multimedia system attached to it which is also connected to the internet via that network point mentioned above. I was hoping that both systems could connect the speakers.

If i choose the amp system in the theatre room i'd either have to choose the radio or tee up a number songs. (little control) If i have access to a small system in the bar room, i could at least choose the radio, pick songs, turn the sound up and down easily etc.... as the room is just next to each other. The theatre room is on the other end of the house. I have heard there are some kind of remote repeaters etc...? but i don't know much about these.

One question i have is, can you have two systems both connected to a set of speakers without damaging the equipment on each end that would produce the sound. Or is it a thing where you must make sure you either have one or the other system on – but not both.? ??

One idea is to connect a speaker plate in the theatre room that has 4x speaker points which then runs to the bar room. From the bar room, you could then choose whether to connect two plates together (so it makes the connection to the speakers outside) or unplug the left plate and plug it directly into the 2nd sound system located in the bar room to get sound to the speakers... , or would you just run both systems directly to the speakers so it doesn’t matter which system you turn on, sound will come out? Or does anyone have a better suggestion? 

I had a friend recommend i do something with wiring the amp up to the t.v and then let the t.v do the output from the av points? / HDMI... but not sure again what would be the best scenario. The t.v does have hdmi etc... as it is only a few years old. 

Anyway, hoping this makes sense. Any feedback or suggestions would be much appreciated! :help:


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## mechman (Feb 8, 2007)

I would just connect it to the bar system and be done with it. I'm a bit unsure what your home theater ssytem will offer that your bar one won't.


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## jhillremote33 (Apr 30, 2011)

mechman said:


> I would just connect it to the bar system and be done with it. I'm a bit unsure what your home theater ssytem will offer that your bar one won't.


Hi Mechman, Thanks for the reply. :T To answer your question the home theatre room would be offering both live streaming from the internet and my multi media system which has all my cd collection, itunes etc... loaded. The bar stereo (which i haven't purchased at this point of time) i am assuming would only offer the basics... mind you, these new systems these days seem to offer alot of 'basic' items now standard.

I guess if i was to look at doing something HDMI from the theatre room to the bar / pergola area, i could take advantage that this does both video and sound - but i would need a REALLY long HDMI cable - something like 20m. :yikes: So thats the other option. Anyway, food for thought. Thanks.


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## Wayne A. Pflughaupt (Apr 13, 2006)

> One question i have is, can you have two systems both connected to a set of speakers without damaging the equipment on each end that would produce the sound. Or is it a thing where you must make sure you either have one or the other system on – but not both.? ??


No, you can’t connect speakers to two separate amplifiers at the same time.

The simplest solution would be running a line-level signal from the HT room to one of the inputs on the bar system. You’d have to “choose radio or tee up songs” from the Yamaha itself, but you would have local control of volume at the bar. The Yamaha could provide the signal to the bar system via its Zone 2 or 3 output jacks. Naturally, this would require running the appropriate shielded cable between the two, as you can’t use speaker cable for line-level.

Regards,
Wayne


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## sga2 (Nov 14, 2009)

If you chose to go with the bar system to power the pergola, could you network an inexpensive media player to the media server to take advantage of your library?

To answer your question about the IR repeaters... they are very simple and inexpensive. I use this one in my home theater to control equipment located in a closet next to the theater room. The system consists of a receiver (located near the user), a power block (provides power/processing, usually located near the equipment you want to control), and emitters (usually one mounted on each piece of equioment you need to control). Some equipment, like my Onkyo TX-NR3007 receiver, allow you to plug the output from the power block directly into unit instead of gluing an emitter on the front.

You'd need to run some Cat5 with the speaker wire from the pergola to the AVR for the IR receiver (need 3 conductors). It should work fine as long as the receiver is not subject to direct sunlight and sufficiently protected from weather.

Regards,
sga2


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