Now that the snow has melted, the ground has thawed, and the days are growing longer, you’re probably turning your thoughts to warm spring weather and spending more time outside. What could be a better accompaniment to your outdoor chores or a gathering of friends than music? Before you drag your speakers to the nearest window and crank up the volume, there are ways to add tunes to your outdoor entertainment areas that are much more elegant and better sounding.
The Speakers
Let’s start with the speakers. Unlike the philosophy behind the choice of speakers inside your house, bigger is not always better in the backyard. Here, you’ll achieve a much more pleasing effect by purchasing and installing a few smaller speakers than one pair of larger ones. With this principle established, here are some tips to follow when adding several speakers to your outdoor area.
Scatter them around, and place each at an equal distance from your main listening zone. This might be the swimming pool, a gazebo, or a patio. The goal is to cast a wide net, which will allow you to more easily maintain a nice, even volume level for everyone.
Get the speakers off the house. Unless your backyard is extremely deep and you have no neighbors, the music level will be more balanced and more easily controlled by placing the speakers out into the yard and facing them towards the house. This approach allows the sound from the speakers to project out toward the house, where it bounces off and directs back into the yard. The alternative, placing the speakers on your house, is a bad idea because the sound is less contained and will travel further out … possibly into your neighbor’s yard. Also with this type of arrangement, you may need to blast the speakers (again, think of your neighbors) so that the people in the yard can hear the music, but the people on the deck near the speakers will need earplugs.
Outdoor speakers come in a variety of different styles. You may want to invest in several different types so that all areas of your yard are aptly covered. Wedge-shape outdoor speakers are designed to be mounted under an eave, but follow the advice above (i.e., multiple speakers), and instead install them on 4”x4” posts in the yard (near bushes is nice). Then there are the rock speakers. Some look like rocks and others look like hunks of melted plastic. Before you buy them, visit an A/V retailer to see and touch them to make sure you like the way they look. One of the biggest trends in the outdoor audio market are speakers that resemble (and sometime function as) landscape lights. These rather small-size speakers often sound better when paired with a matching in-ground subwoofer.
Wiring Them Up
Now that you have the speakers positioned in your yard, you will need to connect them to your stereo system. There are many ways to do this, such as using the “Speaker B” terminals on your audio/video receiver, or adding an external amplifier to your stereo system. If you aren’t really sure what to do, consider hiring a professional home systems integrator. Why? Your amplifier can suffer damage when too many speakers are connected together. There can also be volume control issues, like when you’d like to have the indoor and outdoor areas at different levels. Then there’s the fact that some outdoor speakers are 70v and need to be wired differently than standard speakers.
Speaking of connecting, you might be wondering what type of speaker wire to use. Any wiring that’s installed outside of your home should be rated for outdoor use; this means the cable is sunlight resistant and approved for wet locations (sometimes you can find a W in the suffix of the UL rating printed on the wire). Even if you plan to install the wire inside plastic conduit in the ground—a good idea to protect your outdoor cabling from being sliced by shovels, spades, and other gardening tools—you’ll still want this type of wire.
Once everything is connected, the next logical step is setting up a way to control the music—surfing stations, adjusting the volume, and so forth. Because signals from a standard infrared remote won’t reach the A/V equipment inside, invest in a universal RF (radio frequency) remote. You’ll be able to take it outside and skip through bummer songs. Some companies even make weatherproof ones.
What about getting to the music on your phone? Sonos offers a popular and high-performing solution. Simply purchase the appropriate pieces of Sonos equipment and connect it to your stereo; actually if you already have a stereo then you would purchase the Sonos “Connect” unit. You and your guests could then simply download the free Sonos app onto your mobile devices and pick songs from your respective libraries for an instant and easy backyard party. In order for this to work they will need to be on your home’s Wi-Fi network, so check and make sure you are able to get good wireless coverage outside. EH
David Devanna is a seasoned home systems integrator at EDG (Electronics Design Group), Piscataway, N.J. EDG, a pioneer in residential and business electronics technology, is recognized by its peers, associations, trade professionals, and technology journals as one of the top systems integration firms in the country.
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