Just bought a house with Russound built in. But I have a 7.1 Onkyo AVR

Been a long time since I have been able to post at AVS. Nice to be back.

Anyway, we just bought a house which has a Russound CA6.4i

Now I understand what this device is doing in sending audio to zones in the house. It have 4 source inputs. And there is where I am totally confused. If I pass all the audio to those 4 source inputs, then what do I send to my Onkyo AVR.

Now my Onkyo is 7.1 (which is funny cause in the 6-7 years I have owned it, I have never been able to set up all 7 speakers. Only always 5.1. First because out house when we got the Onkyo had a slanted roof that prevented wiring in the the last 2 speakers. Now we move into this house which already had in wall speakers and wiring installed, and of course it is 5 speakers for the TV. I actually have a pair of Polk Monitor 30s speakers sitting in an unopened box that I got 6-7 years ago just waiting to see the light of day when I can finally set up 7.1

Also, there is a button on the wall in the TV room, that when in will be the 5.1 sound of speaker wire directly into the wall, and when out will use just 2 of the speakers for the Russound.

I am planning on not hooking the Onkyo audio out center to the wall speaker for center channel. I have another speaker I want to use, and the wall also doesn't have a subwoofer, which I have and will be coming directly out of the Onkyo

OK. so what hooks into what in regards to the Russound and the Onkyo.

Here are my inputs

1) Apple TV
2) BluRay player (for the wife to play her exercise videos) Otherwise I have only used this twice since I bought it 5 years ago. (The Samsung UI is the worst UI ever built, very unfriendly)

I used to plug those into the AVR, and then the HDMI out to the TV. Speaker wire to speakers.

But now I have the Russound, and man do it have lots of cables to plug in. I am really glad the previous owner really labelled the heck out of them.

So what plugs into what? Audio and Video wise.

Thanks for your help

Mark

Thanks Gramin.

Yeah, no CD player for me. Just the BluRay and the AppleTV.

So the Apple TV will show video, but also with iCould Match I will stream my music library. But I believe that Apple TV only has one output the HDMI cable, which I definitely want to plug into the AVR.

So then with the AppleTV into the AVR (HDMI), then AVR into Russound(Speakers) and AVR to the TV (video). will be the wiring. Which means the keypads in the zones will only be able to control the volume. Since the only device attached is the AVR.

Does the Russound have its own internal Radio tuner?

Thanks

Mark

So I did take my BluRay audio out to the Russound, while still having the HDMI out to the AVR. So the sound goes to both the AVR and the Russsound and that worked perfectly.

On my Onkyo, I took the Zone 2 Audio out to the Russound, but that does not work. No sound at all. I made sure Zone2 was on on the Onkyo and its output device set to a device that was outputting audio. Went to any of the other rooms and tried everything but no sound would come out. Now I really wanted that to work because I have an AppleTV connected to the AVR and wanted iTune Match to play music that would play in the other rooms.

So now I am looking for an alternative device to do that from say an iPhone or iPad not connected to a dock. Airplay would be perfect, but I think that is only on the newer Russounds.

There is a Bluetooth source for Russound here
http://www.russound.com/product_detail.php?i=3280

But not sure if from my office to downstairs is close enough for the BlueTooth to work.

Maybe if my iPhone and Russound are connected to the same network they can see each other. But again, I am not sure if the Russound is new enough to have that IP Address browser display feature.

Thanks

Mark