Output to Echo/Alexa Multi-room Group

[acpotato]

I'm heavily invested in the Amazon Echo/Alexa ecosystem. I've 10 devices (inc Studio and Sub) throughout the house and constantly use it for multi-room music.

I would love it if my WiiM Pro Plus could output to Echo Multi-room music groups.

Currently Output choices are physical line outputs (Coax, Line, Optical), Bluetooth, or Airplay 2. The Airplay 2 addition is awesome, and I currently use it to output a CD Player to a pair of Apple HomePods (the only 2 non-echo devices in my house used for the Apple TV).

I'd much prefer to be able to output to an Echo multi-room group however to take advantage of all speakers in the house, and not just our TV speakers!

Amazon released a device to do this, the Echo Link, but it's been discontinued in many geos (namely Australia), and never worked well outside of the US.

WiiM supporting this would make for an awesome replacement to a deprecated Amazon product.

Casting in the Echo eco-system is very limited, and only available on Amazon Music and Spotify, but if Wiim could output to a multi-room group and have it as an output option, it would open up a world of opportunities, since not being able to cast to Echo is a major pain point. I've several projects that I'd purchase a Wiim for if it could integrade as an output to Echo, and not just as an input.

 

[Brantome]

Sorry, not possible due to the lack of a public published protocol from Amazon. Search the group for echo link and line in (re)distribution, for example this thread https://forum.wiimhome.com/threads/steaming-turntable-to-echo-speaker-group.1875/

 

[acpotato]

Thanks for the quick reply. I feared a lack of public API might be the issue here .

Hopefully Amazon open this up at some point.

In the thread you linked, you mentioned a possible workaround for non US geos to redistribute to Echo. I work in tech, and am happy to tinker and have a kuldgy solution. Did you have any more details on the workaround?

 

[Brantome]

Thanks for the quick reply. I feared a lack of public API might be the issue here .

Hopefully Amazon open this up at some point.

In the thread you linked, you mentioned a possible workaround for non US geos to redistribute to Echo. I work in tech, and am happy to tinker and have a kuldgy solution. Did you have any more details on the workaround?

The Echo Link is the only device I’m aware of that can distribute line in audio to other echo devices and that was only ever supported for USA versions - the UK product page still excludes line in distribution despite the USA having had the ability for over two years. But that’s typical with Alexa outside the USA unfortunately.

Normally to get access to USA features in other regions , you’d need to change your preferred region/marketplace under the preferences section of “manage content and devices“ in your Amazon account. That has the downside of messing up your subscriptions, kindle marketplace, region specific skills etc, and while some have done that to get access to Alexa Guard etc, I’ve not deemed it worthwhile. However, the workaround for the Echo Link I came across on Reddit suggested that in order to access the USA features of the Echo Link it was sufficient to change its location under its device settings in the Alexa app to some USA address. I’ll see if I can find the original thread.

Edit: here you go

https://www.reddit.com/r/amazonecho/comments/t5pqtw

 

[Doublej]

I think it could be done if the WiiM Pro Plus can run a media server on it. See this discussion. What do you think?

Wiim Smart Speaker

I'm hoping to see a Wiim "smart" speaker sometime soon. Really, just a standalone speaker with Wiim smarts inside would do it for most of my needs. In other words, put a Wiim Pro inside of a powered speaker. It would be nice if two of them could be setup in a stereo pair. Some locations around...

forum.wiimhome.com

 

[Brantome]

I think it could be done if the WiiM Pro Plus can run a media server on it. See this discussion. What do you think?

Wiim Smart Speaker

I'm hoping to see a Wiim "smart" speaker sometime soon. Really, just a standalone speaker with Wiim smarts inside would do it for most of my needs. In other words, put a Wiim Pro inside of a powered speaker. It would be nice if two of them could be setup in a stereo pair. Some locations around...

forum.wiimhome.com

That’s me replying there too

 

[acpotato]

I wasn't aware of My Media for Alexa - I just checked it out. It's very similar to the Plex Skill, which will allow you to stream music from a local Plex server to Echo devices. As you've stated, it should be technically possible to replace the local media file with a line input, and could be done in software. Ultimately, it's just an Alexa Skill picking up a byte stream and playing it on an Echo device. The problem here is:

1. you need a skill to make it work - not that big of a deal
2. MRM still isn't exposed by Amazon to the skill, so you can only play on a single* Echo/room from the skill

* the workaround here I had noticed myself, as I have a few rooms in my house with multiple Echo devices, and they're all grouped into rooms in the Alexa app. My lounge has 4 Echos (Studio, 2 x Echo, and Sub) for instance. I noticed with the Plex skill if I asked it to play music on one of the Echos in the Lounge, it would actually play from all 4, so long as the room in the Alexa app was configured with all the devices and set to 'Always' play on all speakers at any request. While I'm sure this is using the same underlying tech used in MRM, it's not MRM per-se - in that I can't ask the Plex Skill to play on a MRM group specifically, or transfer the already playing music to a group. It's just Amazon using the protocol to play on all Echos, but all done by Amazon, and not the skill builder who still doesn't have access to the MRM API from Amazon from what I'm learning. While I could technically add and remove Echos from specific rooms to create a MRM like set up on the fly, it's not very user friendly, and requires reconfiguring the rooms of all my Echos everytime I want to change the MRM group. Since an Echo can only appear in a single room at a time, it's also pretty limiting. This is in contrast to something that fully supports MRM like first party Music services (Amazon, Spotify, Apple, Tidal, etc). With these services I don't need to reconfigure the rooms, and can simply ask to "move music to x group" which it will immediately do. Full MRM doesn't even need Echos linked in a specific room, and an MRM group is an abstraction beyond rooms since you can have a room with Echo(s), then have a group that encompases multiple rooms, or even 'Everywhere'.

Hope that makes some form of sense! My Media for Alexa has documented the workaround here -

My Media for Amazon Alexa

My Media for Amazon Alexa lets you stream your local music library to your Amazon Alexa device such as the Echo or Dot. Ask Alexa to play your personal album collection or stream your local iTunes library.

www.mymediaalexa.com

MRM has been such a pain for me - it works perfectly with Spotify (or Amazon Music which I tried for a while), but both are unable to play your own digital media or cast a line input. This is what I was hoping WiiM would solve, but looks like it's totally an Amazon problem in that they only expose MRM to first party music providers, and only Amazon Music and Spotify actually allow casting from within their apps (Apple Music, Tidel, etc are only available through voice control, which is painful!). It's just a pity that Amazon don't support some form local casting solution like AirPlay or DLNA - ideally with multi-room.

 

[acpotato]

The Echo Link is the only device I’m aware of that can distribute line in audio to other echo devices and that was only ever supported for USA versions - the UK product page still excludes line in distribution despite the USA having had the ability for over two years. But that’s typical with Alexa outside the USA unfortunately.

Normally to get access to USA features in other regions , you’d need to change your preferred region/marketplace under the preferences section of “manage content and devices“ in your Amazon account. That has the downside of messing up your subscriptions, kindle marketplace, region specific skills etc, and while some have done that to get access to Alexa Guard etc, I’ve not deemed it worthwhile. However, the workaround for the Echo Link I came across on Reddit suggested that in order to access the USA features of the Echo Link it was sufficient to change its location under its device settings in the Alexa app to some USA address. I’ll see if I can find the original thread.

Edit: here you go

https://www.reddit.com/r/amazonecho/comments/t5pqtw

Ah gotcha, so the workaround still requires a physical Link device - was hoping it was a software workaround, as getting my hands on a Link isn't that easy. Thanks for the info.

 

[Brantome]

It's just a pity that Amazon don't support some form local casting solution like AirPlay or DLNA - ideally with multi-room.

The only ”local casting” solution echos support is Bluetooth, but as Alexa MRM is primarily a cloud construct, you can’t Bluetooth to it. Even the USA Echo Link doesn’t do line in distribution for Bluetooth input, you need to plug a separate Bluetooth receiver into its line in Another very messy solution…

 

[richaardvark]

I just want to shout out and say after using pretty much every one of the local music streaming skills/services for Alexa over the last four+ years (My Media for Alexa, MyPod App, OurJukebox, Plex, and iBroadcast) I have personally found iBroadcast to be the best of the bunch. It's a cloud service though. There is a very robust app and you can configure all sorts of HQ audio settings. However if you would prefer a local server then yes, My Media for Alexa is probably the best way to achieve this, followed by OurJukebox.

 

[Brantome]

I just want to shout out and say after using pretty much every one of the local music streaming skills/services for Alexa over the last four+ years (My Media for Alexa, MyPod App, OurJukebox, Plex, and iBroadcast) I have personally found iBroadcast to be the best of the bunch. It's a cloud service though. There is a very robust app and you can configure all sorts of HQ audio settings. However if you would prefer a local server then yes, My Media for Alexa is probably the best way to achieve this, followed by OurJukebox.

Did iBroadcast finally release their Premium version so you could play back tracks higher than 128kbps? It's been a while since I checked it out.

I fortunately managed to upload around 14k tracks to Amazon Music before they retired that service, although of late access to those tracks has been a bit hit and miss, particularly via search

 

[richaardvark]

Did iBroadcast finally release their Premium version so you could play back tracks higher than 128kbps? It's been a while since I checked it out.

I think so? There is indeed a premium version now, yes.