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DLNA + Internal Player at the same time?

Posted: Mon Dec 09, 2019 5:01 pm
by Coincident
Hello.

First time poster here, but long time fan of MM.

I recently bought some Yamaha Music Cast speakers that link to one another and allow me to play synchronized music in the whole house.
I was thrilled to know that I could keep using MM as a player: I right click the player, and then Choose Player: "Yamaha Kitchen" (or whatever), and I get music in the whole house...

... except in the study, where my computer is! Here, I have a pair or good old stereo speakers connected by cable to the computer.

Is there anyway to make Media Monkey cast to DLNA and at the same time play to the internal player?
If not, is there any other way to do this with external software? Maybe using Windows Media Player/VLC/something to "listen" to the DLNA that MM is casting?
Any other ideas?

I really didn't want to buy another Yamaha speaker for the study when the desktop speakers I already have are top quality.

Thank you in advance! :)

Re: DLNA + Internal Player at the same time?

Posted: Mon Dec 09, 2019 6:29 pm
by Lowlander
DLNA doesn't provide for this (timing is an issue). This is only implemented with proprietary solutions from the different manufacturers.

Re: DLNA + Internal Player at the same time?

Posted: Wed Dec 11, 2019 9:58 am
by Coincident
Thank you for the reply. I know that spending 150€ on an extra receiver from Yamaha solves the problem. But I really didn't want to spend that money.

But I understand what you mean. Recently I've been experimenting with the application: "Stream What You Hear", which allows MM's Internal Player to output sound, and transmit through DLNA at the same time. But as you accurately said: timing is an issue; all the DLNA-receiving speakers are 10 seconds behind the computer audio...

I still want to try some software to delay the audio on the computer by 10 seconds. But I'm afraid that it might also delay the transmission, which will then become 20 seconds behind...

Anyway I will post here if I find a solution, so other people with this problem that search for this thread can know the outcome.

Re: DLNA + Internal Player at the same time?

Posted: Mon Dec 16, 2019 10:10 am
by Coincident
I found a solution to my problem, which requires installing 2 windows apps: "Stream What You Hear" and "Equalizer APO".
- First, I launch Media Monkey and start playing music normally, from the Internal Player.
- Then, I launch Stream What You Hear, and send the DLNA stream to my Music Cast speakers. They all start playing in sync, but are about 11 seconds behind the audio of the computer.
- Afterwards, I go to the editor of Equalizer APO, add a "Delay" plugin, and enter a delay of 11000ms.
- Finally, I stand in between 2 rooms to listen to the computer speakers and Music Cast at the same time to see who is ahead/behind, and make smaller adjustments to the delay in Equalizer APO. Usually I end up with 11500ms when everything is in perfect sync.

This allows me to have a single instance of Media Monkey running, and stream audio to the whole house + the computer at the same time, in sync.
It also allows me to activate cross-fade, or continuous (gapless) playback through DLNA, which are usually not supported over DLNA.

Now the problem: the delay is not always the same. If I restart my computer and launch everything again the optimal delay might now be 11650ms. On the next restart I might need 11300ms. Each time I have to test it and adjust it again. Even if I don't restart the computer; after playing music for a long period of time, things get slightly out of sync again, and I often need to add/remove 100ms from the delay every 2 hours or so.

So this requires a lot of manual intervention. This is not perfect; it's the cheap solution. As Lowlander accurately said before, the only perfect solution is to spend money on a receiver from Yamaha (or Sonos, or whatever your brand is), and connect that to the computer speakers for automatic always-in-sync music.

Re: DLNA + Internal Player at the same time?

Posted: Mon Dec 16, 2019 10:21 am
by Lowlander
MediaMonkey 5 can actually do this, but the timing can't be synchronized, thus the above solution might be better.