Help me configure an HTPC with multiple audio outputs.

that would be a more elegant solution, to drive the audio locally. The problem is just that then you lose the ability to play the audio in all three places. I don't mind infeasible solutions, as long as they're cheap and functional. Maybe I can set up a three-frame view of three different iterations of a web interface. [back to researching...]

The problem is just that then you lose the ability to play the audio in all three places. No. You can still run audio cable from the HTPC to throughout your home. Then it just becomes a matter of selecting the source in each room (assuming your amps or pre-amps have more than one input.) I don't mind infeasible solutions, as long as they're cheap and functional. Generally an "infeasible solution" would be one that is neither cheap nor possibly functional. Both products I linked to above have lots of back end support and web interfaces, you should take a closer look at them.

Haha, I was being ironical. While also meaning, if it's a pain in the neck (or even overly complicated), that's OK, as long as it's cheap and works as intended. I appreciate your suggestion, especially software-wise. The hardware solution you offer still leaves me with a need to route audio all over the place, but adds localized control, which is great, but much more expensive. Putting three sound cards in one PC is not expensive or complicated -- as far as I can see, the difficulty lies mostly in the a) software control problem (possibly solved by a web interface, I will have to read more about them) and b) audio routing complications.

Looking at your links more closely, I see they are all hardware -- but nonetheless the web interface smells like a promising, possibly-customizable option.

You're gonna have a big problem with line levels. When you have two stations switched to Source A, the volume will be much lower, and if you go to three, it will be lower still. If a station switches away, then anyone else on that source will suddenly get much louder. It's just not a good solution. Squeezeboxes would work a lot better. They're designed to do exactly what you want, and they work very happily over wireless, so you don't even have to run cables between the rooms. You just need a small amplifier and speakers at each station. The downside is that it's kind of expensive, but it will solve the problem very elegantly. And each room can be controlled entirely from a local remote control, using the local Squeezebox display, so you save the money on tablet PCs. If you want to see how the system works, download and install the free Slimserver from Slim Devices. (there's a link up above.) Once you have Slimserver running, in the Help section, there's a Softsqueeze Java program you can run. It almost perfectly emulates a hardware Squeezebox, although it won't sound as good because Windows mangulates sound pretty badly. (another reason not to do it the way you're thinking.) That will let you play with the interface, and see how you like the system, without spending a dime. The Soundbridges are cheaper, but they're quite a bit inferior in terms of sound quality; several of their models won't even properly do lossless audio. Squeezeboxes, on the other hand, are audiophile-class devices at computer-class prices.

Malor, tell me about the ability of the Squeezeboxes to play the same audio stream at the same time without phasing problems (i.e. if sound bleeds from one room to the next, it won't be anachronistic). If it can really stream in real-time from the HTPC to three different outputs without any delay, or at least a perfectly uniform delay, then you two are right and it may work well.

Looking at your links more closely, I see they are all hardware Both boxes are http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UPnP_AV_MediaServers, so you can choose from dozens of different software packages to run them. Most have advanced web interfaces and other gizmos, plus there are lots of people out there writing their own scripts and such. Putting three sound cards in one PC is not expensive or complicated I think you'll find that it is more complicated than you think - particularly when you're trying to find software to play the music.

In the past, I have had success using Winamp via DirectSound to power more than one playback device -- many sound card drivers offer each paired channel as a separate output. With three different instances of the same program, it's not too hard to have three different things being played, and fitting three interfaces onto one screen doesn't sound too hard either. Right now I'm looking at the VLC web interface, which apparently is not too hard to personalize. I love the elegance of y'all's solutions, but the sticker price is hard to deny. 3 separate slingboxes would be somewhere in the neighborhood of $750-$900. If I purchased amplified splitters, which would fix the line level problems, they'd run me about $150 for all three. The switches are much less complicated and would be closer to $20-25 each, so add $75 to be generous. It's like 12 dollars for a 30 foot stereo cable, and I'd probably need 6 or 7 of those, so add $80. That comes to a little over $300. I already have the required tuners (3) and a 7.1 audigy SE is $25 including shipping. We're at like $330, and my infeasible, inelegant first thought seems to have the same functionality as the slingboxes (but more flexible, because the only software interface between me and the HTPC is the same one you'd have if you were looking at the HTPC's own screen), for at least $450 less. I appreciate your thoughts, but since price is fundamental in this case, my original plan still seems to be ahead. Is there some way to do what you're suggesting more cheaply?

Embryo, no system of this sort will ever be "perfect", as in free from measurable delay error. It just can't happen, as there are differences in individual electronic circuits and distances from the server that can't be corrected for. Even a physical sharing approach like you're talking about is going to be badly out of phase from one room to the next, because the signals get there at almost light speed, but the sound propagates at about 600mph. This means you will get phase errors at the transition points. It physically cannot be perfect from all listening positions. The sync between Squeezebox hardware units is pretty damn good. I can't imagine finding it unacceptable, as long as you have a reasonably good wireless-G signal in your house. The sync between hardware units and the Softsqueeze emulator is much poorer, however, particularly with streaming audio. After a period of time, you will almost certainly notice the software player being a second or two out of sync. With local sources, it resynchronizes at the start of every track, so they don't slip enough to notice, but with streaming sources, they do. This is just between hardware and software -- multiple hardware units stay very closely matched. The drawback to synced music is that you will get a very small gap between each song as the players resynchronize. If you use the normal single-player mode, you can play concept albums like The Wall straight through without a hiccup. But if you are syncing two players, then there will be a tiny pop at the start of each track if there's no silence between the songs. I don't think there's any way to avoid this unless you rip the entire album as a single large MP3 or FLAC. You can, however, settle for not syncing the units, and just hitting play at about the same time. You'll probably find that quite acceptable. Personally, when I hear the streaming audio sync problem between hardware and software players, I don't mind it much at all. It's noticeable, but not annoying. In the special case of concept/soundtrack albums, I'll think you'll find hitting multiple Play buttons at about the same time works well enough. If this is an issue for you, ask on the Slim forums about it. I'm running a slightly downrevved version of the server, since I'm happy with it and don't feel the need to change, so it's possible they may have figured a way around this in more recent versions.