alexa can control the volume through either voice command, or app, "Voice control music selection and playback with your compatible Echo device or the Alexa app"
I think a $99 Harmony Companion remote setup could make your Denons do what you want and still support Alexa. A much cheaper solution though it may take some time programming the remote just right.
Can I use this to tie in my Sonos Alexa-enabled speakers so that I can play music through them at the same time as I play music with my Alexa Echo/Fire TV/Show/Flex speakers?
I watch a lot of UA-cam videos and this is by far the most annoying background music noise I’ve experienced. In the beginning I thought I was having audio issues. Videos like this are supposed to appeal to the masses. Other than that it was a great video.
Hey bro, congrats on the setup and thank you for the video. Do I connect a one echo with a specific amp or I can use any of my echos to control the amp
Can those amps drive 4ohm speakers?...the specs are a bit vague and only mention 8ohm speakers...would definitely open up a lot of options for speakers if they can...most of my speakers are
I did have an issue with this at another house when I integrated echos and links and there is more affordable solution that I have found that solves this problem. Unfortunately you don't need the link and will need a standard Echo Dot ( amzn.to/3oyCTM9 ) and a 3.5mm to toslink converter. ( amzn.to/3cwy6Zw ). I set the Echo in the room with the speakers behind the amp then the Microphone from the echo will sync the audio to the rest of the system. drive.google.com/uc?export=view&id=1f8vuv2eTsxsnNHRcm7i_7rjrQJiH8QZY
How do existing volume knobs on the wall In each room work with this set Up? Do they just stay at max volume and then actual Volume is adjusting by Alexa amp via voice or knob on amp?
Hello Joseph, I removed my volume knobs and hardwired through to speaker and control via app or voice. You can leave knobs in and leave volume at full to control with app and manual override with the knob but if its left turned down its a hassle to lift that and say volume or vice versa. I have yet to miss the knobs since installing this setup.
@@diy-phd155 hi, I just did what you did. Can you please let me know how you removed the knob on the wall? Also, one of my in ceiling speaker isn't coming in clear, any advice what that could be? I'm not technology savvy so please forgive my ignorance.
Great video. I’m debating these or upgrading to sonos but it’s def $$ the sonos route. The big question is can these power a 5.1 setup in the main TV room area for tv viewing?
Sorry for the late reply my notifications weren't coming through. If you set that amp as a preferred speaker tied to any Echo it will automatically play music through the amp and speakers. If you want to connect multiple that is in the multiroom setup then you name that group and call that name when you ask to play music and it will play across multiple amps and echoes together.
Great set-up, don't know why folks spend 3x as much for the "other" amps out there. I noticed you had an echo sub in your list. Does the sub work wirelessly with the Echo Link Amp for a stereo 2.1 sound?
I never understood why someone needs whole house audio, do you walk around from room to room while a song is playing? Are you not staying in one main room when at home? I guess if you have a McMansion you need this.
Sorry For the extremely delayed response. I have just found a bunch of comments that were not showing in my video manager. I am running an Eero Mesh Wifi System and have about 150 devices hooked up at once with all of my smart home items. I have not once seen an issue with any of my devices since going to the Eero System amzn.to/3cBjBUl
Don’t think it’s wise to have your address on display like that bro. But great video. Crazy setup as well... it’s way cheaper to do it this way that to go the Sonos route.
There is. For each zone, rather than pay for a $300 amp, just purchase a 2nd/3rd generation Echo Dot or Echo Input (all over eBay for $15 each) and pair it with a $35 100 watt amplifier from Nobsound, Pyle, or Fosi. Name each Echo according to their zone in the Alexa app (Kitchen, Bedroom, Living Room, Outside, etc.) and you just saved yourself $2K+. You can group speaker zones together (I have living room, dining room and kitchen in a group for dinner parties) and my favorite... I have my kids' 3 bedrooms in a group which I play Enter Sandman on volume 10 at 7AM so they can wake up. (They're heavy sleepers!)
@@BiGYeNz172 that’s awesome that you wake your kids up to Metallica. Do you have any model numbers of the brands you suggested? Because they’re Bluetooth, does that mean they’re compatible with Amazon Alexa? You pair the amp to the echo dot via the Amazon app?
Too bad, the audio normalization setting or volume leveling in Spotify, Tidal, Amazon Music and other streaming apps dont work through Echo Link. So you will end up with songs some are loud some you barely hear. Disappointing.
Do these amps support Bluetooth speaks or do the speakers have to be hard wired? Also, Say I want to watch tv and use my surround speakers for that, I would need to wire my surround speakers to TV, would they also be able to be routed to one of these amps to stream music at a different time. TIA!
They do not run Bluetooth speakers. You can run audio out of your tv to the amo to run a pair of stereo fronts but that would be it. You could prefer speaker it to an echo to nm play music through front surround speakers and then carry tv in stereo through composite connections.
If you add Fire TV Stick to your TV that can be added to Mult-Room Groups. No need to run any new connections. However, one not of caution is that I noticed the Fire Stick TV can be out of sync with the rest of the multi-room setup but you can add a delay in on the Fire TV app to sync the audio back with the rest of the house. Just a thought to save time and money re-wiring to another Link.
I hate to break it to you but the amount of money you just spent on all those links You could've just spent about $500 on a Denon with heos. And you can control up to 32 different groups Simultaneously with a maximum of 16 zones in each group... thats HEOS technology.. PS.. I own a low voltage company that deals a lot with AV and I've tried using these links for just 2 zones in a in a 25000 ft² home with multiple ubiquity wireless access points in a in a mesh layout layout and the links In the main Rack always seem to want to jump off network even though they are hard wired. Fun fact I had to call Amazon for this one. They never wanted to put an American on the phone which kind of sucked. so I sat and talked and it turns out even though you have it hardwired it still goes through Wi-Fi... These things are trash I don't recommend using them or the amp, the link amp is even worse. Alexa's great but it works better with HEOS. Just sayin......
That would only control one zone. Unless of course you split the output. This setup allows individual simultaneous payback in each room or grouped playback across the entire home. Unless I'm not understanding. I like the idea but to my understanding won't have the full flexibility in use.
@@diy-phd155 I think what is saying is that an 8 zone amp has 8 stereo inputs and 8 stereo speaker outputs. One zone per room and one dot per room. They could still be grouped into multiple zones right?
@@ByThelakeFL instead of $300 for the echo link amp, I think indorock is saying x8 echo dot's ( audio out cable to speaker amp), get x8 speaker amplifiers for a fraction of the price. The grouping would be done by each echo dot.
Hello Thomas, I actually had 2 Denon AVR-X6500h prior to this install. These are priced at $2,200 each. I needed 2 to cover most of my whole house audio, a total of 8 zones. The Denons do 3 zones each so it covered 3/4 of my needs. But the main problem with high end receivers are they are only seen as 1 zone no matter how many individual zones the receiver might be able to control (Specifically in the Alexa Universe) My needs are I wanted master bedroom echo to run that room. Kitchen to run kitchen. Patio to run patio etc. etc. etc. This unfortunately isn't very compatible with high end receivers and Alexa. I am by no means saying this is a hi fi system or anything for clarity. This is to simply play music where I want in the house from that location in the house. If there is an update to HEOS or any other system that breaks out zones in alexa for the amp I would love to know about it. As well as a $2k receiver that can handle 8 zones in my search I only came across 3 zones. Please please please let me know if there is something new out there. I would love to do another upgrade and another video for the channel. Thanks for the comment and I hope there is something new out there I would love to get my hands on!
@@diy-phd155 why not just put an echo dot in each room with POE RCA cables back to a monoprice 12 zone amp? you can mount these dots with wall or ceiling based mounts and save a tone of money, the amp is about $600 and an echo is around $30 per room
@@diy-phd155 I want to do exactly what you're trying to do and unfortunately came to the same conclusion, that running a 3-4 zone amp would be a nightmare versus just wiring it into separate Sonos or Alexa amps
Good video but, please, what's the point of the godawful backing music? How does this add anything to the information being given in the video? It is distracting and just plain annoying.
I have been looking for this solution for a long time! Thank you for showing how you did it! Bravo!
You, sir, are a fanatic :-) I thought I was the only one that many boxes of stuff
I hope you own that house (AKA have it paid off) because If not. That’s a great upgrade for the next owner that buys your house 😳
I wish you showed how you control the VOLUME for each Zone through the app
alexa can control the volume through either voice command, or app, "Voice control music selection and playback with your compatible Echo device or the Alexa app"
This guy sounds like a very tired Ryan Reynolds.
I’ll be doing this same setup soon. Thanks for the video! Super helpful.
I think a $99 Harmony Companion remote setup could make your Denons do what you want and still support Alexa. A much cheaper solution though it may take some time programming the remote just right.
Can I use this to tie in my Sonos Alexa-enabled speakers so that I can play music through them at the same time as I play music with my Alexa Echo/Fire TV/Show/Flex speakers?
thanks for this.. was seriously contemplating denon for heos..
Thank you. Great video showing everything I'd want to know about how this thing works.
Glad it was helpful!
Would love to see more details on the ventilation mod you did.
I'll Work on Getting a video of that for you.
great idea, very creative, thanks for sharing.
I watch a lot of UA-cam videos and this is by far the most annoying background music noise I’ve experienced. In the beginning I thought I was having audio issues. Videos like this are supposed to appeal to the masses. Other than that it was a great video.
That's some quality hate there sir lol
If you want to only have one amp both for an indoor hometheater and then to also run a second zone such as a patio the demon amps will work amazingly
I have a denon with 2nd and third zones, but how do you keep zo e's 2 and 3 on when the main tv is off (which turns the receiver off)
Thank you, this video helped me a decision to go ahead and purchase these amps.
Hey bro, congrats on the setup and thank you for the video. Do I connect a one echo with a specific amp or I can use any of my echos to control the amp
Can this plug into a TV and play on patio speakers?
How many speakers do you have connected to each amp?
thanks, excellent video!
Are you able to pair a fire stick to the echo link amp? In the Alexa app, you can make a speaker group and wanted to know if that works with these.
Can those amps drive 4ohm speakers?...the specs are a bit vague and only mention 8ohm speakers...would definitely open up a lot of options for speakers if they can...most of my speakers are
I see you’re a Mr.Robot fan with that wifi name
Awesome video. I thought using Sonos would be the only way but that had some limitations (plus it’s twice as costly!).
Absolutely!
Can they be daisy chain since it has input/output? For example, if I play CD through a CD player for all zones.
Awesome video
what is the quality of the sound?
I have paired my echo link with a dot and show in multiroom speaker . Facing significant delay in audio out through toslink . Please help
I did have an issue with this at another house when I integrated echos and links and there is more affordable solution that I have found that solves this problem. Unfortunately you don't need the link and will need a standard Echo Dot ( amzn.to/3oyCTM9 ) and a 3.5mm to toslink converter. ( amzn.to/3cwy6Zw ). I set the Echo in the room with the speakers behind the amp then the Microphone from the echo will sync the audio to the rest of the system. drive.google.com/uc?export=view&id=1f8vuv2eTsxsnNHRcm7i_7rjrQJiH8QZY
How do existing volume knobs on the wall
In each room work with this set
Up? Do they just stay at max volume and then actual
Volume is adjusting by Alexa amp via voice or knob on amp?
Hello Joseph,
I removed my volume knobs and hardwired through to speaker and control via app or voice. You can leave knobs in and leave volume at full to control with app and manual override with the knob but if its left turned down its a hassle to lift that and say volume or vice versa. I have yet to miss the knobs since installing this setup.
@@diy-phd155 hi, I just did what you did. Can you please let me know how you removed the knob on the wall? Also, one of my in ceiling speaker isn't coming in clear, any advice what that could be? I'm not technology savvy so please forgive my ignorance.
Nice work!
Thanks!
Great video. I’m debating these or upgrading to sonos but it’s def $$ the sonos route. The big question is can these power a 5.1 setup in the main TV room area for tv viewing?
It will not. This is not a 5.1 amp.
Not one, not two...... But eight.... 😂
Does it allow us to stream audio from iphone or an Ipad? Like streaming something airplay2 etc. thanks
Did you have to setup anything special so that when you ask Alexa to play music, she only plays it in the room you’re in?
Sorry for the late reply my notifications weren't coming through.
If you set that amp as a preferred speaker tied to any Echo it will automatically play music through the amp and speakers.
If you want to connect multiple that is in the multiroom setup then you name that group and call that name when you ask to play music and it will play across multiple amps and echoes together.
DIY - PHD Awesome. Thanks!
Great set-up, don't know why folks spend 3x as much for the "other" amps out there. I noticed you had an echo sub in your list. Does the sub work wirelessly with the Echo Link Amp for a stereo 2.1 sound?
nice
Does anyone know or have any experience of pairing a Link with a FireTV remote (either as a preferred speaker or a FireTV "home theatre" group)?
I never understood why someone needs whole house audio, do you walk around from room to room while a song is playing? Are you not staying in one main room when at home? I guess if you have a McMansion you need this.
With this set up can you use Alexa to make announcements to the speakers in the other rooms wired to the amp?
I have this same question. Can you use the "drop in" feature so your speakers become intercoms?
Drop in will still come through the actual Echo Device Unfortunately only music will pass through the speakers at this time.
Which music did you use in this video while you were installing the amps?
I use artlist.io for all of my music I have a very large library that I have used and can't find the exact song my apologies.
@@diy-phd155 I found the song a few months ago it’s called “Not for Nothing” and it’s by Otis McDonald
Can you control the volume on Spotify or on the app
Yes you can.
3:05 has ethernet port, why would you tie up wifi with these things
same question here, eagerly awaiting a response.
Sorry For the extremely delayed response. I have just found a bunch of comments that were not showing in my video manager.
I am running an Eero Mesh Wifi System and have about 150 devices hooked up at once with all of my smart home items. I have not once seen an issue with any of my devices since going to the Eero System
amzn.to/3cBjBUl
What gauge of speaker wire did you run?
16 Gauge is what was put in the home when built I used that for my purposes.
Don’t think it’s wise to have your address on display like that bro. But great video. Crazy setup as well... it’s way cheaper to do it this way that to go the Sonos route.
@Jay Dee This is a mock address not to my specific location Thanks for the worries though!
This is a mock address not to my specific location Thanks for the worries though!
Ha, White Rose.
How does this video have less than 1 million viewers!!?
Man. At $300 a pop x8, you’d think there would be an easier, less expensive and more streamlined solution to this problem.
There is. For each zone, rather than pay for a $300 amp, just purchase a 2nd/3rd generation Echo Dot or Echo Input (all over eBay for $15 each) and pair it with a $35 100 watt amplifier from Nobsound, Pyle, or Fosi. Name each Echo according to their zone in the Alexa app (Kitchen, Bedroom, Living Room, Outside, etc.) and you just saved yourself $2K+. You can group speaker zones together (I have living room, dining room and kitchen in a group for dinner parties) and my favorite... I have my kids' 3 bedrooms in a group which I play Enter Sandman on volume 10 at 7AM so they can wake up. (They're heavy sleepers!)
@@BiGYeNz172 that’s awesome that you wake your kids up to Metallica. Do you have any model numbers of the brands you suggested? Because they’re Bluetooth, does that mean they’re compatible with Amazon Alexa? You pair the amp to the echo dot via the Amazon app?
@@BiGYeNz172 how do you pair the echo dot with the $35 amp?
@@robertchambers1981 AUX cord
I would have went with For Whom The Bell Tolls. Lol
did you know there are multi-zone amplifiers ? so buy 1 and get the same 8x results
Too bad, the audio normalization setting or volume leveling in Spotify,
Tidal, Amazon Music and other streaming apps dont work through Echo
Link. So you will end up with songs some are loud some you barely hear.
Disappointing.
Do these amps support Bluetooth speaks or do the speakers have to be hard wired? Also, Say I want to watch tv and use my surround speakers for that, I would need to wire my surround speakers to TV, would they also be able to be routed to one of these amps to stream music at a different time. TIA!
They do not run Bluetooth speakers. You can run audio out of your tv to the amo to run a pair of stereo fronts but that would be it. You could prefer speaker it to an echo to nm play music through front surround speakers and then carry tv in stereo through composite connections.
If you add Fire TV Stick to your TV that can be added to Mult-Room Groups. No need to run any new connections. However, one not of caution is that I noticed the Fire Stick TV can be out of sync with the rest of the multi-room setup but you can add a delay in on the Fire TV app to sync the audio back with the rest of the house. Just a thought to save time and money re-wiring to another Link.
Ahh, that's why Amazon got rid of the 3.5mm jack...
This over kill mate
Overkill
NOT SURE BUT CHECK OUT A SONOS SET UP WITH THE DIFFERENT ZONES
What music do you use in this video?
I hate to break it to you but the amount of money you just spent on all those links You could've just spent about $500 on a Denon with heos. And you can control up to 32 different groups Simultaneously with a maximum of 16 zones in each group... thats HEOS technology..
PS.. I own a low voltage company that deals a lot with AV and I've tried using these links for just 2 zones in a in a 25000 ft² home with multiple ubiquity wireless access points in a in a mesh layout layout and the links In the main Rack always seem to want to jump off network even though they are hard wired.
Fun fact I had to call Amazon for this one. They never wanted to put an American on the phone which kind of sucked. so I sat and talked and it turns out even though you have it hardwired it still goes through Wi-Fi... These things are trash I don't recommend using them or the amp, the link amp is even worse. Alexa's great but it works better with HEOS. Just sayin......
Why didn’t you just get just one 8 zone amp and put an echo input in the closet? Then all your echos in each room would talk to your amp.
That would only control one zone. Unless of course you split the output. This setup allows individual simultaneous payback in each room or grouped playback across the entire home.
Unless I'm not understanding. I like the idea but to my understanding won't have the full flexibility in use.
@@diy-phd155 I think what is saying is that an 8 zone amp has 8 stereo inputs and 8 stereo speaker outputs. One zone per room and one dot per room. They could still be grouped into multiple zones right?
1:17 can't hide money
You could have achieved the exact same result for probably 1/4 of the price, using 8 cheap mini amps + 8 Echo Inputs
You got my attention. Can you share how please
@@ByThelakeFL instead of $300 for the echo link amp, I think indorock is saying x8 echo dot's ( audio out cable to speaker amp), get x8 speaker amplifiers for a fraction of the price. The grouping would be done by each echo dot.
8 of those echo amps cost over 2k. You could find a high end amp that can do much more for less than that.
Hello Thomas,
I actually had 2 Denon AVR-X6500h prior to this install. These are priced at $2,200 each. I needed 2 to cover most of my whole house audio, a total of 8 zones. The Denons do 3 zones each so it covered 3/4 of my needs.
But the main problem with high end receivers are they are only seen as 1 zone no matter how many individual zones the receiver might be able to control (Specifically in the Alexa Universe)
My needs are I wanted master bedroom echo to run that room. Kitchen to run kitchen. Patio to run patio etc. etc. etc. This unfortunately isn't very compatible with high end receivers and Alexa.
I am by no means saying this is a hi fi system or anything for clarity. This is to simply play music where I want in the house from that location in the house.
If there is an update to HEOS or any other system that breaks out zones in alexa for the amp I would love to know about it. As well as a $2k receiver that can handle 8 zones in my search I only came across 3 zones. Please please please let me know if there is something new out there. I would love to do another upgrade and another video for the channel.
Thanks for the comment and I hope there is something new out there I would love to get my hands on!
@@diy-phd155 why not just put an echo dot in each room with POE RCA cables back to a monoprice 12 zone amp? you can mount these dots with wall or ceiling based mounts and save a tone of money, the amp is about $600 and an echo is around $30 per room
@@diy-phd155 I want to do exactly what you're trying to do and unfortunately came to the same conclusion, that running a 3-4 zone amp would be a nightmare versus just wiring it into separate Sonos or Alexa amps
What kind of speakers did you install on your ceiling.
Good video but, please, what's the point of the godawful backing music? How does this add anything to the information being given in the video? It is distracting and just plain annoying.
He talks too much... get on with it