Airplay or Sonos for multi room and multi users?

Can anyone tell me the advantages of building an airplay system?

I currently don't have a Sonos system so I really can't offer much there, but I do have a fairly extensive audio system based on AirPlay.

AirPlay is nothing more than a means to transmit audio & video over the network. The network can either be wired or wireless or a combination of both.

There are basically three things needed to get AirPlay working:

1. An AirPlay Server. A typical AirPlay Server is a Mac, PC, iPod, iPad, or iPhone device that is hosting iTunes. You can actually stream other audio sources outside of iTunes as well.
2. A network.
3. An AirPlay "Speaker." This can be an AirPort Express Base Station, an Apple TV, or any number of other AirPlay Ready devices created by other manufacturers.

The following Apple Support article should give you an idea of one way to setup an AirPlay system.

My daughter's school recommends we get an airplay printer so she can print from ipad, so I am open to getting either.

Actually they would be recommending that she get an AirPrint printer. This is different than AirPlay. Printers that are AirPrint Ready support printing from iOS devices (iPhones, iPads, iPod Touch, etc.). They require a wireless network to work. This wireless network can be provided by any manufacturers' wireless router, not just those provided by Apple.

We are accustomed to apple set ups and we are not technically inclined. If something work, then doesn''t, we get annoyed and are not inclined to figure out the problem. We have 2 children and their music needs to stream to a different room while other music is streamed as well. Not looking to spend a fortune to get this up and running, but at the same time, I want to buy something we can build upon (as opposed to a single docking station speaker).

One of the advantages of an AirPlay system is that they are very easy to set up.

In my case, I have four AirPlay "speakers." An Apple TV and three AirPort Express base stations. Each of these are physically connected to either a pair of self-powered speakers or to an audio receiver. I can stream from any of my computers or iOS devices to any or all of them simultaneously.

I started with just a single AirPort Express and eventually built-up my system over a few years.

You say "Each of these are physically connected to either a pair of self-powered speakers or to an audio receiver."

Do they have to be physically wired?

Yes and no. The AirPort Express has an audio port. This would require a physical audio cable to be connected to either self-powered (AC or DC) speakers or an audio receiver.

The Apple TV uses either a HDMI or digital-optical connector for audio output. This would also require a physical connection.

Some AirPlay Ready devices, like wireless speakers and audio receivers that have built-in wireless, use a wireless connection to receive AirPlay streams and thus do NOT require a physical connection.

Do the self powered /wireless speakers need electric charges?

These types of speakers typically get their power from one of two (or both) sources: 1) Internal batteries, or 2) An AC-to-DC adapter that plugs into an electrical wall socket.

What is the advantage of having an audio receiver?

If you're an audio affectionado, you will probably not be satisfied with the sound quality from wireless speakers. The advantage of an audio receiver is that these devices have much greater audio output power and can be connected to much better quality speakers. Also, you can get whole-home audio receivers where they can support sound in multiple rooms. You can then stream from iTunes to one of these types of receivers and play a song throughout your whole house. But, as you can imagine, these come at a much steeper cost.

One of the biggest advantages of Sonos up to now was that it supports multirooming audio - playing audio on multiple speakers simultaneously or different music in different rooms - without the need for an extra Mac or PC running (which was the case for AirPlay up to now).

There is a new iPad app called

"AirPlay Multiroom Player by WHAALE"

available which brings this feature also to the AirPlay-world.

(The iPhone/iPod-version of this app will be released soon.)

If you want, you can also use the free App

"AirPlay Speaker Tester"

to check if it is running in your environment.

Ulrich

As someone who has a 5 room setup with airplay devices, it's something of a mixed bag.

What I like:

It was super easy. With current software everywhere, room speakers show up on macs and ios devices.

It's sync'd from room to room so you can play something all over the house.

It's cheap. Even buying new aiports and powered speakers, $150 a room is reasonable. or craigslist...

What I dislike:

It's fiddly about wifi. The kitchen will drop out when the microwave runs. It's just not very robust.

It's not Sonos. itunes with the remote app works passably but at the end of the day, you are dealing with the same old itunes experience. This was great 10 years ago but it hasn't really moved forward.

Why you should buy Sonos:

You have too much money. Seriously... $500/room for the sonos::amp?

You want multiple people to use your music system. Aiplay/itunes is a painfully single user experience.

Volume control. Sonos has it figured out. Airplay is all over the place.

You like consumer grade stuff. Airplay is still in the early adopter mode and my friends have all tried and it found it interesting but not compelling.

All it would take is Apple to get motivated and write a cool itunes airplay party jukebox.

I have found the best solution to be something called audio|acacia by a group called Plethra.

audio|acacia lets you play music from your iTunes / iPhone / iPad / iPod / Android Device / Internet Radio / etc. to any AirPlay device including your AirPort Express / Apple TV / iPhone / iPad / iPod / Computer / etc. Not only can you play to all of them, but you can play to all of them and have them be in sync with each other. You can also play one song to a group of speakers and a different song to another group of speakers at the same time. It's pretty awesome.

It was hard for me to find, but I found what I was looking for.