Home stereo or car stereo?

[digesterman]

Sound bars are great. Get the Bluetooth enabled ones and wireless sub.

For in dash I am putting in the apple CarPlay since my son has converted me to Apple everything else. 7 inch screen big enough that even I can see it..


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[mung]

I am in the process of mounting a double DIN DVD car stereo in the 4104.  I had it in a car that I traded in, so I pulled it to put on the bus.  It has wiring for a backup camera so I will be using it for that as well.  I also have an amplified computer type speaker setup from the PO that runs of of 120v.  When all of that isn't good enough I will just use my Bose Compact PA system.  In fact I am planning to use my Bose PA and projector/screen to do movies at camp sites and for DVD purposes, I can run the projector off of the car audio DVD player. 

[sparkplug188]

Tape? CD? DVD? What are those things?  My generation is moving away from tangible forms of storage.  Head units and home theater systems were made to play physical media.  There is no need for a head unit when there is no physical media.

Radio -> Pandora, Grooveshark, or iHeartRadio
CD -> MP3 or FLAC files stored on the cloud or on a media server.
DVD -> Netflix, or MKVs stored on the cloud or on a media server.

I have a cell phone and a signal booster.  The smart phone streams music over Bluetooth to a Bluetooth receiver that is connected to an amplifier.  The phone IS the head unit.  Easy.

This is the setup I used when I was driving truck coast to coat.  It worked 100% of the time on the interstates and US highways and 99% of the time on state/county highways and secondary roads.  Add a local media server running Plex with a couple solid state drives and you will have more music than you know what to do with no matter how far you get away from the cell phone towers.

So, Home or car stereo?  Neither.

Edit: If you want to listen to a local radio station and they still aren't on iHeartRadio- there are phones with built in offline FM tuners.

[mung]

Oh, yeah, the DVD car stereo I am mounting does have an SD card with all of my music on it.  We are full Roku in the house and on the bus, but I am going to be setting up a wireless network on the bus including a wireless client with a big antenna for when there is WIFI at camp sites.  I am also going to have a media server running Plex and will mirror everything on the home Plex server to the bus so we have all of the content on the road. 

[sparkplug188]

Vern-   It is so nice to see someone else using technology to its fullest!  

You may want to consider setting up two routers for your bus wifi.  Run one router in client bridge mode to receive wireless internet from an external network, like a campground or tethered to a phone. Hardwire the first router to a second router.  Run the second router as an access point to rebroadcast the wireless signal with your own network name and DHCP server.

Trust me, you want your own onboard DHCP server so that devices within the bus can communicate with each other even when you are not connected to an external network.

When the time comes to set up the router(s), PM or call me.  I can give you a lot of tips to make your life a lot easier.

[Oonrahnjay]

I am in the process of mounting a double DIN DVD car stereo in the 4104.  I had it in a car that I traded in, so I pulled it to put on the bus.  It has wiring for a backup camera so I will be using it for that as well.  ...   

     Same here (except for the trade in part).  It's a Pioneer 2400 ... something.  Double DIN, backup camera, iPod round input, SD slot, USB port (I use the "thumb drive" thingies -- that's the technical term that those of us who are graduates of the Clifford LuvRBus School of Technology use for those little things), Sirius ready, BlueTooth capable (not that I even know what those things are much less how to use them - see note on my technical education above).

     I think that Pioneer has a line of these double-Din's, 2400, 3400, 4400.  A friend of mine has just put one of the top-of-the-line models in his pickup and it's pretty awesome.  (But since I'm no longer a useful, productive, appreciated citizen and I'm fodder fuh dem Gummint Death Panels and I live with my snout in the Gummint trough, I go with the cheap one ...)

     I really like the sound from my unit (and the 4400 or whatever it's called is even better).  The one in my car is hooked to the VW "Monsoon" booster/amp audio system and that's totally great but I've seen them installed in "party buses" with and without extra amps and they're really good in those, too.

(PS if you install a switch to ground on the parking brake circuit, you can manually switch on the DVD/video while the vehicle is in motion -- that that I'd do that, of course, or that you'd want to, but you could ...)

[digesterman]

Sparkplug that's exactly what I did with the wifi, I used Apple routers wired together, front back, and one wired to cradlepoint with data card when under way. When at home I unplug cradlepoint and wireless link first Apple router to home network. Works extremely well.


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[oldmansax]

     Same here (except for the trade in part).  It's a Pioneer 2400 ... something.  Double DIN, backup camera, iPod round input, SD slot, USB port (I use the "thumb drive" thingies -- that's the technical term that those of us who are graduates of the Clifford LuvRBus School of Technology use for those little things), Sirius ready, BlueTooth capable (not that I even know what those things are much less how to use them - see note on my technical education above).
 

I WANNA GO!!!! I WANNA GO!!!

How much is the tuition???

ROFL!!!!! 

TOM

[goutoe]

I went with 2 Sonny in dash AM. Fm. with CD player also has a USB port for ipod or digital music I have one in the dash that just plays in the driver area and the other in the coach that plays throuhout the bus, works great also has a remote, >>>> John

[Dave5Cs]

Remember when a Radio had 2 knobs and 5 buttons. You had to push one of the 5 if some idiot had changed your channel. Other than that you just drove and listened. If you had hooked up the light wire you could see it at night too. In high school I saved my money until I had 20.00 and bought a "reverberation" unit that hooked to the radio and when you flipped it on it kind of echoed when music played like AL Green and your girl was sitting next to you.

If you hit a bump it would also echo sometimes and sooner than later the dam thing drove you nuts so out it came. Then we had to have the 8 track and played every tape we had (read both) until they got caught in the player and you would pull all the tape out trying to fix it and then into the garbage it would go.
Now we have Tapes cassettes, CD, I pods, sticks with USB, (and we all say USB but do any of us really know what it stands for? seriously, United States Bureau of ?)LOL.

Now it's the light thing that we have never figured out. It's like those flippin light shows we had in the 60's. Why do we need that in our radio? Text on a screen so small you would be wrapped around a tree before you could read it anyway. And scan button, does it really find you stations. Mine seems to keep going around and around and when it finally hits some music I like and I start singing or taping the steering wheel to the beat the dam thing takes off again. Whats up with that.
Ok I have said my peace hope yours are better than mine.......

Dave5Cs

[mung]

The dual wireless is exactly what I plan to do.  Will probably use something above normal consumer grade for the client radio.  I used to build wireless networks and data-centers so I have a lot of experience in that area.  I will probably use a Mikrotik router/radio setup as they are small and get the job done quite well.  Something like this would be my preferred way to go.  http://routerboard.com/RBSXT5nDr2 

[sparkplug188]

Vern- How would that compare to a Netgear R7000 with Kongs DDWRT firmware connected to a set of outdoor antennas?  It looks like the SXT Lite5 only has one 5ghz radio-- Wouldn't it be beneficial to have two wireless radios and the ability to connect to both 2.4ghz and 5ghz networks?

My R7000 with original antennas can reliably connect to a 2.4ghz G external network 1400ft away. 5ghz AC connectivity on the R7000 drops off around 200ft.  I have very limited experience with enterprise networking hardware.  Just curious how the two pieces of hardware compare in terms of performance.

[RJ]

Vern & Sparkplug -

If you guys haven't already, you need to become friends with Chris & Cherie of Technomadia!  Talk about talking the same language!

[mung]

That was just an example of a possible radio to use, yes would either want a dual band or 2 separate radios.  The big difference is that the MikroTik devices are true external radios with high gain antennas on them, that is going to give you a lot more range.  The MikroTik routers are real routers unlike the consumer brand routers, you can do a lot more with them and they are much more secure.  I am running a MikroTick router board for my main router in the house and it handles all of my servers as well as my local computers.

[eagle19952]

@ Spark and Vern....
Although I understand very little of what your saying...I do understand $$'s....how much cash are you guys spending to make this happen ?
Retail $$'s ? 
The "I know what I'm doing and know where to look" $$'s. costs ?