Hairbrained idea?

[wandererrob]

In a recent discussion with fellow haunters, we were discussing ways to fade speakers in and out so that voices, music, whatnot could "move around" the haunt so to speak. This got me thinking. I have some code I got somewhere that fades pins in and out at random to emulate fireflies. Could this be done with speakers in place of LEDs?

My thinking is to have each pin act as a switch on a different speaker, all fed by a single audio source. Now the big question is, can this be done without frying the Prop-1? Would the 5V fading in adversely effect the speakers? If it's any help, I'd be doing this with a 20W, single channel amp on your run of the mill 8ohm speakers, or possibly 4ohm car speakers.

I have no idea what sort of voltage runs through a speaker wire, so I figured I'd pose this to the experts.

Can this be done straight off the prop-1, or would such a thing require relays?

[reddragon]

It will work use relays to prevent any power going to the prop 1. like you said the relays will act like switches the only down side is you have a lot of wire to run. but i would use a small speaker wire so that you will get a good tone out of all speakers. keep the watts low and depending on your number of speakers your amp might have to be bigger then 20 watts.

[JonnyMac]

It won't work.  You'll need a specialized distribution board that can take an audio signal in and route it through multiple distribution points -- kind of like a multi-channel audio card.  JB an I have talked about different ideas but haven't yet stumbled on anything practical.

[wandererrob]

It won't work. 

bummer. :(

Out of curiousity, can you give me a handle on why it wouldn't work? Not that I don't believe you. Far from it, actually. You know your boards far better than nay of us. :)

I'm just curious about the details.

Thanks.

[Jeff Haas]

Just thinking here...is there a way to "network" a group of Prop-1s so that you'd have a master (maybe a Prop-2 or a Prop-SX) that would send trigger signals to three or four Prop-1s scattered around a room?  Then each individual Prop-1 would have its own sound board, and when it saw a specific input it would play a sound associated with that input.

[JonnyMac]

Fading = linear amplification (up or down); with an audio signal (that is very complex) this requires special circuitry to preserve the integrity of the signal while changing its amplitude.  Relays provide on and off.  Period.

I know of one customer who switched (not faded) speaker outputs using the DC-16 -- this let him move sound around his garage in a fashion.  In his program the code would select the speakers to use and then start the audio.

Sometimes technical things are more difficult than we want them to be.... trust me on that.

[wandererrob]

Sometimes technical things are more difficult than we want them to be.... trust me on that.

I do indeed :)

Thanks for the info, Jon.