News
Kensington Home Technology has been featured in The Sunday Times, as their Tech Consultant under the banner 'Ask the Experts':
We have just
moved into a new home and all have different tastes in music. Is there
a system that works with iPods and CDs that will let us access music
individually, in separate rooms?
WJ, Cheltenham
If you want to minimise the amount of building work, disruption and cost, I would suggest a retrofit solution, such as Sonos multiroom hi-fi, which works wirelessly and is easy to set up. You can install up to 16 Sonos players on one system, creating multiple zones. Each zone “talks” to a server with all of the family’s music stored on it, in Windows Media Player or iTunes. This means you can play up to 16 different albums or tracks or radio stations at one time in different rooms. If you are refurbishing, then this is the time to run all the wires for your high-tech needs, such as category 5 (data), speaker wire (music) and coaxial cabling (AV). A system such as Opus or SpeakerCraft could be installed, with face plates built in every room, allowing users to access and control media from multiple sources (eg, MP3, CD, radio and video/DVD), all of which would be stored centrally. You could also wire in ceiling speakers: I would recommend B&W and Polk. If you are embarking on a full refurbishment, it’s worth contacting a home-tech firm endorsed by the Custom Electronic Design and Installation Association (Cedia) for advice. As a guide, five rooms could be set up for sound using hard-wired or wireless solutions for about £6,000.
Malcolm Stewart is co-founder of Kensington Home Technology, a custom installation company e-mail your questions to propertyexperts@sunday-times.co.uk |