2. pc-audio
  3. 138414-107338

Play music from laptop over WiFi to existing audio system: how?

I want to play music from my laptop to my existing stereo system over WiFi instead of a USB cable. I find plenty of systems designed to stream music from the Internet but I'm not interested in that. I want to play the music from my laptop. I also find plenty of USB DAC's but I don't want to have a USB cable. I also don't favor Bluetooth because WiFi offers my bandwidth and options.
I looked at the Yamaha MusicCast WXC-50 and while I see that it can access files over the network using NFS (my preferred network file share protocol), it appears that in this case the laptop act as be a passive storage device. I am hoping instead to use the music player on my laptop to send music to my DAC/preamp as if it were connected by USB cable. But, of course, I want to do this wirelessly.
Is there a solution similar to what I am looking for?
lowoverdrive
djones51
4,947 posts
 
The Yamaha you mentioned might do what you want. It is DLNA compliant so depending on your music player on the laptop you might be able to play from the laptop as well as from the Yamaha. For example with my integrated amp which is also a streamer I can either access media from the amp/streamer or from Jriver on my computer and play it to the streamer, I know BubbleUpnp will also do this . I am not familiar with the players you’re using. If your music player on your laptop can see DLNA media devices it should be able to play to them.
Post removed 
lowoverdrive OP
169 posts
 
Always thought you bypassed the DAC if connected to another via digital cable? Am I wrong thinking that?

I don't want a cable. I want a wireless connection.
lowoverdrive OP
169 posts
 
UPDATE: this may not be my final solution, but I got it working and it did not cost me anything. I just used what I had. However, if anyone has better ideas, I plan to keep experimenting. 

So far this PulseAudio solution is pretty impressive. I think I can do a lot more with it, but right now I am listening to music played back wirelessly though my DAC. I used:  
  • Linux (which already has PulseAudio) on my laptop
  • A spare small computer (NUC or similar) attached to my DAC 
  • My existing DAC

I used these two pages to get it set up:
Network https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/PulseAudio/Documentation/User/Network/

PulseAudio/Examples - ArchWiki https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/PulseAudio/Examples#PulseAudio_over_network 
I don’t know who here cares about Linux, but if anyone is interested I can give more details. Conversely if anyone here has more ideas or suggestions for me, please keep them coming while I am experimenting.


Post removed 
More to discover