Looking for a wifi turntable solution for a Chromecast Audio system.

[Jackie Treehorn]

I have an integrated amp with CCA in the optical port to cast my FLAC music collection via WIFI from a NAS Drive. That system drives indoor and outdoor Monitor Audio speakers. I want to add a turntable that gives either a lossless or non-compressed signal to cast to the CCA. I understand Yamaha's Vinyl 500 wireless turntables and the MusicCast app of theirs won't work with CCA?. Any ideas how I might get a high fidelity signal from a remote turntable to my CCA based system? Thanks-

 

[iMark]

What is the brand and model of the amp? Is it necessary for the record player to cast to the amp? That makes things more complicated and the choice much narrower.

 

[Jackie Treehorn]

It's a Yamaha A-S501.

 

[Al ears]

I think you are going to have issues there. All vinyl is lossless but you are mixing the wrong formats

 

[iMark]

The Yamaha has got a pretty good phono stage. I would buy a record player with a decent MM cartridge and plug it into the A-S501. No need to buy a record player with a built in phono stage because you already have one.
I can recommend getting a Pro-Ject with electronic speed changing. That's useful if you need to switch between 33 and 45, like https://www.project-audio.com/en/product/essential-iii-sb/

 

[Al ears]

Yes, I was at a lost as to why you would want a turntable to cast anything, just plug it in to the amp.

 

[Jackie Treehorn]

My home construction doesn't allow me to hardwire a turntable. My NAS drive is also remote which is why I cast that source to a ChromeCast Audio using Music Streamer which can play FLAC files. So my interest now is getting a remote turntable, convert the signal to WAV or FLAC or some other complete or lossless file, and then having it played by my sound system.

 

[iMark]

I've been trying to get my head round your home construction and the reason why can't have a record player near the amp. Obviously your situation is very different to our situation with a hifi rack with a record player on top and a stereo network receiver. 🙂

Yamaha does offer a lossless solution for streaming the sound from a record player through MusicCast. You will need the Yamaha record player with MusicCast, the Vinyl 500 and a separate MusicCast receiver, the WAXD-10. (if you can find one!).
There's a review of the record player here: https://www.techhive.com/article/3403020/yamaha-musiccast-vinyl-500-review.html
There's a review of the WAXD-10 here: https://www.techradar.com/reviews/yamaha-wxad-10-musiccast-add and the Yamaha page here: https://uk.yamaha.com/en/products/audio_visual/accessories/wxad-10/index.html

I'm not aware of any other brands than Yamaha offering lossless vinyl streaming. But there may be other solutions out there.

 

[Gray]

I've been trying to get my head round your home construction and the reason why can't have a record player near the amp. Obviously your situation is very different to our situation with a hifi rack with a record player on top and a stereo network receiver. 🙂

Yamaha does offer a lossless solution for streaming the sound from a record player through MusicCast. You will need the Yamaha record player with MusicCast, the Vinyl 500 and a separate MusicCast receiver, the WAXD-10. (if you can find one!).
There's a review of the record player here: https://www.techhive.com/article/3403020/yamaha-musiccast-vinyl-500-review.html
There's a review of the WAXD-10 here: https://www.techradar.com/reviews/yamaha-wxad-10-musiccast-add and the Yamaha page here: https://uk.yamaha.com/en/products/audio_visual/accessories/wxad-10/index.html

I'm not aware of any other brands than Yamaha offering lossless vinyl streaming. But there may be other solutions out there.

Do all of the above or try to put the TT in the conventional location?.........decisions decisions.

 

[Jackie Treehorn]

I've been trying to get my head round your home construction and the reason why can't have a record player near the amp. Obviously your situation is very different to our situation with a hifi rack with a record player on top and a stereo network receiver. 🙂

The placement of the amplifier is on an exterior wall in order to connect to both indoor and outdoor speakers. Unfortunately the area is a high traffic spot for humans and pets and it won't work for a turntable. The design of the house is industrial with concrete floors so there's not a way for a cabled solution from another area. There's a protected area I'm having built out about 20 feet from the amp that will be a secure turntable area but it will require either I opt for the Yamaha solution (they have a WXAD 50 now that replaces the WAXD-10 for of course a few hundred dollars more) but I'd love the option of using something other than a Yamaha turntable. It's been suggested I could even temporarily use a phono preamp like the Project Optical Box ePhone and then connect the signal from that to my wifi network and pick that up with the Chromecast. I could then allow the market to mature and find a high qualify replacement of that preamp over the next year or two. I have to confirm all the Optical Box stuff but I would find it tough to make my first turntable in 3 decades a Yamaha!

 

[iMark]

Maybe a funny question. But do you own any records?

 

[Jackie Treehorn]

Maybe a funny question. But do you own any records?

Great question! My 60s and 70s vinyl has all disappeared in my travels but a local record shop owes me a bunch of money and I'll be picking a selection of new and used records to start over in vinyl.

 

[iMark]

I asked the question because I wouldn't bother in your situation to get a record player integrated in your system if I were starting out without any records.

I've had another look at the Pro-Ject website. It's unclear to me what bluetooth codec they're actually using. If it's apt-x you would get very decent sound when streaming to an apt-x equipped receiver that you would plug into the amp.

 

[Jackie Treehorn]

I asked the question because I wouldn't bother in your situation to get a record player integrated in your system if I were starting out without any records.

I've had another look at the Pro-Ject website. It's unclear to me what bluetooth codec they're actually using. If it's apt-x you would get very decent sound when streaming to an apt-x equipped receiver that you would plug into the amp.

I grew up in the era of high fidelity equipment and I was immersed in the business as options like quad cartridges and amps were being rolled out. I've been disappointed seeing Silicon Valley succeed in diminishing the quality of music most people find acceptable and I am looking forward to putting on an album side and letting my guests listen to music the way we did in the 60s and 70s. An album with a strategic track listing, etc. I didn't realize the Pro-Ject was BT- my first glance through their website made me think the 24bit / 96kHz resolution suggested it would deliver a lot better signal than BT.

 

[Deleted member 108165]

I've been disappointed seeing Silicon Valley succeed in diminishing the quality of music most people find acceptable and I am looking forward to putting on an album side and letting my guests listen to music the way we did in the 60s and 70s.

With the inevitable pops and clicks included 🙂 You are intending on using Silicon Valley technology to play legacy kit... something will have to give...

 

[Jackie Treehorn]

With the inevitable pops and clicks included 🙂 You are intending on using Silicon Valley technology to play legacy kit... something will have to give...

No doubt I'm put in the position of hybridizing, but I gave into that 4 years ago when I converted my 6000 CDs to FLAC to allow me to play higher quality music but with the ease of an iPad app.

 

[Gray]

I converted my 6000 CDs to FLAC

You're a special case Jackie - with what you're planning to do and what you've done.
(Took me months to FLAC only about 1000 CDs). Respect to you 👍

 

[iMark]

No doubt I'm put in the position of hybridizing, but I gave into that 4 years ago when I converted my 6000 CDs to FLAC to allow me to play higher quality music but with the ease of an iPad app.

We've had a hybrid system for quite a few years now, starting with an Apple Airport Express many years ago to be able to stream from the iTunes library (all our CDs are ripped to ALAC, stored on a Mac mini in another room) while at the same time having a record player. We later added a DAC for digital components like the TV.
To be able to limit the nummer of boxes and have full control with the Harmony universal remote app we decided to buy a Yamaha R-N602, because it also does AirPlay. Hybrid with maximum flexibility is the way forward. 🙂

You're actually not the first one to look into lossless streaming of vinyl. There have been some interesting ideas in the past like connecting a record player to a Mac and monitoring the audio in Garageband and then stream it via AirPlay with an app called AirFoil.
Another person tried a similar thing on iOS: https://davidbo.livejournal.com/795.html

The main advantage of a setup like this that you can basically use any record player and a device with USB.

Pro-Ject have at least one turntable with a USB converter built-in: https://www.project-audio.com/en/product/essential-iii-recordmaster/ It converts at 16/48, so similar to CD quality and uncompressed.

 

[Tonestar1]

Can you not just stream between the record player and the amp?

WT-1 | Wireless Transmitter | Monitor Audio

Monitor Audio's WT-1 ultra-compact wireless transmitter can be used in conjunction with the WS-10 subwoofer to create a wireless subwoofer system.

www.monitoraudio.com

 

[Jackie Treehorn]

An update on this- I had a call from Pro-Ject today and they say it's as easy as using their preamp E Phono mod and route the optical output to my ethernet via an Optical to Ethernet cable. Once the digital turntable signal is in my network/wifi I just need to find an app compatible with Chromecast Audio that will capture the turntable signal.

 

[iMark]

Interesting. I obviously missed the Optical Box E Phono in their range of useful boxes.
What do you do with the digital signal to get it to your ethernet cable? Wouldn't you need a Toslink to ethernet converter?
I also notice that the Optical box has an output of 24/96 (switchable to 48). Can the Chromecast handle a high resolution signal?

 

[Jackie Treehorn]

Interesting. I obviously missed the Optical Box E Phono in their range of useful boxes.
What do you do with the digital signal to get it to your ethernet cable? Wouldn't you need a Toslink to ethernet converter?
I also notice that the Optical box has an output of 24/96 (switchable to 48). Can the Chromecast handle a high resolution signal?

Yes on the Toslink to ethernet converter. There appear to be a number of options there. My impression is the CCA can handle a lot more signal width than 24/96, but Tonestar1 may be on to a better solution of simply sending the full analog system to the amp with a solution like the Monitor Audio dongles he suggested. All my speakers are Monitor Audio but their US distribution looks scarce on this particular product. I understand there are some other providers of full audio spectrum wireless transmitter/receivers that could do this pretty efficiently without any data conversion. If it works out this way I'll let the forum know whether the solution (as I understand up to about 10 metres) sounds great!

 

[iMark]

I can see this working with two Toslink to ethernet adapters.

Record player -> Optical Box E Phono -> Toslink to ethernet -> ethernet cable -> ethernet to Toslink -> digital input amplifier. This way the DAC in the amp will receive the full 24/96 signal from the record player. The DAC in the Yamaha is better than the one in the Chromecast.

I don't yet see how you could do this wirelessly unless you add a ethernet to wireless adapter at either end. I also don't see (yet) where the Chromecast would fit in the chain.

The good thing about a setup with toslink to ethernet adapters is that full range 24/96 is available over Toslink.

It's an interesting project. But I'm glad I can simply plug in my record player into my amp.

 

[Gray]

I'm glad I can simply plug in my record player into my amp.

✔