PoE speakers for college PA and evac

[BWMerlin]

I was just wondering if anyone had come across reasonably priced PoE speakers that could be used for a college PA/evac/bell system? We currently have nothing other than bells for evac/lockdown/period change and the business manager would like a PoE speaker solution to try and save costs from running audio cabling and buying amps etc. Anyone have any suggestions? I am based in Australia so realise that not all suggestions I maybe able to get locally but if there is the right product things can always be brought over.

[dhicks]

I was just wondering if anyone had come across reasonably priced PoE speakers that could be used for a college PA/evac/bell system?

 

In our dining hall, where we have a lot of noisy children at various times during the day, we put an Algo 8186:

 

Algo IP Horn Speaker | SIP | Loudspeaker Paging System | Loud Ringer | POE

 

Elsewhere, we simply got cheap telephones, took off the handsets and permanently stuck down the hook switch, set them to listen to audio being transmitted on a given IP address and nailed those up in corridors around the school.

[synaesthesia]

UniFi Edu might be worth a shot - wifi AP with such a speaker system built in; maybe 2 birds with 1 stone there.

[BWMerlin]

UniFi Edu might be worth a shot - wifi AP with such a speaker system built in; maybe 2 birds with 1 stone there.

 

I did see this mentioned in another thread and the business manager seemed interested in it but we do have a Meraki wireless network so might be a bit of a hard sell to dump the Meraki for the UniFi.

[PotNoodleTech]

Problem you've got is, POE speakers tend to be as expensive as the WAPs so you'd be basically getting the WAPS for free!

[BWMerlin]

In our dining hall, where we have a lot of noisy children at various times during the day, we put an Algo 8186:

 

Algo IP Horn Speaker | SIP | Loudspeaker Paging System | Loud Ringer | POE

 

 

Thanks, the website says that it is just under 13 watts of power. For such a noisy environment does it work well? Are staff and students able to hear announcements? We have been recommended 30 watt speakers for our larger/noisier areas so wanted to know if something that is half the wattage is enough.

[BWMerlin]

Problem you've got is, POE speakers tend to be as expensive as the WAPs so you'd be basically getting the WAPS for free!

 

Expensive and low wattage. I did find a PoE amp that looked to be perfect but when I did a quick price check on Amazon it came back as ~$500 which is just too much. The other place I have looked is Alibaba and there are some promising looking speakers but not sure how I feel about the quality control etc.

[dhicks]

Thanks, the website says that it is just under 13 watts of power. For such a noisy environment does it work well? Are staff and students able to hear announcements? We have been recommended 30 watt speakers for our larger/noisier areas so wanted to know if something that is half the wattage is enough.

 

Check that the 30 watt speakers support the PoE you are using - according to Wikipedia, 802.3af supports 13w and 802.3at supports 25w:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_over_Ethernet#Standard_implementation

 

Yes, the speaker seems to work well - we've given it a test a couple of times with the room fairly crowded with noisy children, and it seemed okay to me. It does auto-adjust to the ambient sound, too.

 

We also have a SNOM PA1:

 

https://www.snom.com/broadcasting/public-address-system/

 

For really noisy areas you can hook that up to powered speakers, but of course you will need a power outlet nearby. You could do your couple of really noisy areas with those and use cheaper solutions (really, the phones with the handsets off work very well, and were something like £30 each...) in less noisy areas.

[FN-GM]

If you're looking to save money I am not sure POE will be the way to go. POE switches can be expensive. Also you will need to consider the cost of additional data points.

[Chris_Cook]

You could also look at 100v line speakers. These are just daisy chained with an amp at one end.

 

Although I would also investigate the unifi option to see if its loud enough. Maybe see if you can get a demo unit.

 

Have you got the cat5 in place to where you need the speakers?

[SamanthaD]

Traditional method for this would be 100v line. If this is part of your evac system then it should be as robust as possible, with automatic switchover to fire bells etc. (Not sure on regs in your part of the world!)

 

If you want to go fancy and try a PoE solution, Yamaha have just released the VXL1-16P. It's rated at 15w but delivers a significant 102dB when using PoE+, and has full Dante capability which will sit on your network quite nicely. If you want a networked audio solution, Dante is the way to go. But being in Australia you'd already know that? ;-)

[BWMerlin]

If you're looking to save money I am not sure POE will be the way to go. POE switches can be expensive. Also you will need to consider the cost of additional data points.

 

From all the reading and advice I have gotten PoE speakers just don't seem financially viable/sensible, I really love the idea of them and the business manager seems dead set on them but I just can't see them at a price point that the business manager will actually want to pay for them. The vast majority of our switches are already PoE and run the wireless AP's so that isn't so much of an issue although there are some none PoE switches (I haven't had a chance to do a proper head count of all network devices) and some that are only PoE and not PoE+.

 

You could also look at 100v line speakers. These are just daisy chained with an amp at one end.

 

Although I would also investigate the unifi option to see if its loud enough. Maybe see if you can get a demo unit.

 

Have you got the cat5 in place to where you need the speakers?

 

Yep, lots of networking cable already existing. I have shown the business manager the UniFi system (found an older thread on here with them mentioned) and they were a little interested in it but not super keen to replace our existing Meraki wireless AP's but then mentioned at his previous work they replaced all the switches with UniFi switches as they were a fraction of the cost of higher tier brands (and reportedly there are no issues with them). Not sure if I should be worried about that, I have really enjoyed working on the HP switches here.

 

Traditional method for this would be 100v line. If this is part of your evac system then it should be as robust as possible, with automatic switchover to fire bells etc. (Not sure on regs in your part of the world!)

 

If you want to go fancy and try a PoE solution, Yamaha have just released the VXL1-16P. It's rated at 15w but delivers a significant 102dB when using PoE+, and has full Dante capability which will sit on your network quite nicely. If you want a networked audio solution, Dante is the way to go. But being in Australia you'd already know that? ;-)

 

Audio is not my strong point so I don't know much about what numbers mean watt but it seems that the higher the wattage the more power. I don't know how ohms (resistance that much I know) factors into it and dB is loudness??. Anyway will look into it. Everyone from the installer to people on the net suggest a hybrid solution using a Barix (or similar that us just the brand I have worked with at my previous job and what is being recommended/pushed here) SIP converter into a traditional amp with speaker chained off that using standard speaker wire is the way to go. I am just fact hunting and ultimately I can only relay my findings to the business manager and I will get no/very little say in what actually happens.

[PotNoodleTech]

Traditional method for this would be 100v line. If this is part of your evac system then it should be as robust as possible, with automatic switchover to fire bells etc. (Not sure on regs in your part of the world!)

 

If you want to go fancy and try a PoE solution, Yamaha have just released the VXL1-16P. It's rated at 15w but delivers a significant 102dB when using PoE+, and has full Dante capability which will sit on your network quite nicely. If you want a networked audio solution, Dante is the way to go. But being in Australia you'd already know that? ;-)

 

Great idea. Did not think of Dante as it's studio grade stuff.

[SamanthaD]

Watts = power used. Doesn't necessarily mean more watts = louder, you need to look at the dB sensitivity figure (again this is relative, standard that should be 1w @ 1m). You can have a really inefficient speaker that needs 150w of power to produce 93 dB, or a more efficient speaker that only uses 50w to produce the same output.

 

Another reason to not look at Watts is the different ways is can be expressed - you have RMS, Continuous, Max etc. I only use this to match a power amp to the speaker (twice the power that the speaker needs).

 

If the PoE speakers aren't a go-er, you can look at using Dante to get the audio to the locations then just use powered loudspeakers locally. There's simple output devices available to get the audio out where it's needed. But I would highly recommend investigating it to manage your audio routing.

[Andrew_C]

If this is going to be an evacuation critical system, then it will HAVE to be made and installed to relevant standards. In the UK that will include volume and intelligibility; which PoE systems might do, and fire resistant wiring: which they won't, and back up power which they might.