Networking

[Benj Heard]

First of all, let me say that I've read some of the other topics, and I clearly don't belong here haha. I'm not at all knowledgable about electronics and the inner workings thereof. I'm working on a concept of wireless networking audio devices, and I want to know if my idea is possible using your hardware and radio protocols. I'm not sure that this is the right place to ask this question, but here it is.

I'm looking to create a mobile, private, network of low latency audio transmitters that can be received by any proprietary receiver in the immediate area. I would need to be able to have up to 16 transmitters going at the same time in a confined space. I also want all of them to be able to be received simultaneously by one device (so that device would need to be able to pick up all 16 channels at the same time). It's important that these transmitters can be received by multiple devices at the same time as well.

Example: private audio network where transmitters 1-4 are picked up by a potentially infinite number of receivers, that in turn can use each stream individually, or mix them together. Each receiver would need to function independently of the transmitters, as well as other receivers on the network.

Is that possible?

I don't know if I explained that very well. Feel free to contact me for further clarification.

thanks!

[Marc Nicholas]

You're missing some things here:

• Audio bandwidth and bit depth?
• What do you consider low latency?
• Are you expecting the radio like to provide a synchronous stream so that you don't need to buffer the audio?
• Given that you're looking to stream multiple channels of audio, are you expecting them all to be in sync? Have you given thought to how to generate a timecode base and decode that?

The 16 channels is a bit of a stretch. An nRF24 series can do 8. Conceptually, you could use two in each device and marshal them in software...

Hope that helps :)

-m

[Bastiaan]

Thanks for your reply Marc! -I wouldn't go any lower than 16 bit 44.1. I would prefer 24 bit 44.1, but I can manage at a lower bit depth for this application. -I consider low latency to be less than 10ms. The reason I'm attracted to your platform is actually because of one of the implementations that you have on your website that claims the lowest latency in the world for digital audio. It's a wireless guitar jack that sends multiple streams of data packets and combines all of them to fill in the gaps of lost packets. At least that's the way I understand it. -Because of the nature of the application, I can't allow for much buffering, if any. So I would say no to buffering if that's possible -I haven't really thought about including a clock at all. I wouldn't think it would be necessary unless I'm looking for a clear stereo image, and in that case, maybe the mono transmitters would be close enough together that I could actually physically link them and slave both converters to the same clock. -Yeah I figured I would have to build it out with multiple devices in one for now. Maybe if I could get enough backing, I could convince you guys to make something special for me, but right now, I just need proof of concept.

Thanks again for all of your help!!

b

[Guest]

Thanks for your reply Marc! -I wouldn't go any lower than 16 bit 44.1. I would prefer 24 bit 44.1, but I can manage at a lower bit depth for this application. -I consider low latency to be less than 10ms. The reason I'm attracted to your platform is actually because of one of the implementations that you have on your website that claims the lowest latency in the world for digital audio. It's a wireless guitar jack that sends multiple streams of data packets and combines all of them to fill in the gaps of lost packets. At least that's the way I understand it. -Because of the nature of the application, I can't allow for much buffering, if any. So I would say no to buffering if that's possible -I haven't really thought about including a clock at all. I wouldn't think it would be necessary unless I'm looking for a clear stereo image, and in that case, maybe the mono transmitters would be close enough together that I could actually physically link them and slave both converters to the same clock. -Yeah I figured I would have to build it out with multiple devices in one for now. Maybe if I could get enough backing, I could convince you guys to make something special for me, but right now, I just need proof of concept.

Thanks again for all of your help!!

b

[Marc Nicholas]

You may be best off with an nRF2460 and I2S compatible ADCs/DACs. Likely the simplest implementation -- especially if this is your first rodeo.

There's a dev kit available, AFAIK.

Do bear in mind that a 16-bit, 44.1Khz audio stream is ~0.7mbits of data!

-m

P.S: I don't work for Nordic!