I have some fine $300 bookshelf speakers and tpa3255 chipamps setup in the living room and office; it's great yeah. I tend to think most people will end up with sub-par gear if they try to go secondhand, won't fully appreciate what value you can just buy new just looking at online recommendations in your price range, but if you want to be persistent & picky & eventually eventually snap up a steal secondhand does come up with some buried treasure sometimes.
I do have to switch inputs between Chromecast Audio and the computer that's plugged in. That's annoying. And I'd rather have Chromecast alike built into the amp like Nexus Q showed. At the very least these chipamps could offer me a 5v1a for powering my Chromecast. There are a couple fancy semi-expensive amps that do have Google's audio casting, but they're big-ish fuller-sized receivers and honestly expensive.
This setup I have has been kind of portable, but mannnn I don't love it. I literally have a chipamps velcroed to the side of a speaker. There's a 6s lipo for the chipamps and a USB battery bank for the Chromecast, plus cables for both power supplies. Audio cables from Chromecast to chipamps to speakers. I've gone long on making this a portable useful anywhere system and it rocks.
The one simplification is using some powered speakers. Micca PB42 and Neumi BS5p both will self-power off the 6s lipo batteries, are ~$150.
But it's just absurd & wild that speakers with networked audio are so un-mainstream. That I had to velcro this package together myself is absurd. How has the ecosystem only narrowed and narrowed? (Meanwhile Sonos is busy committing deep-cut enshittification/de-networkization).
I do have to switch inputs between Chromecast Audio and the computer that's plugged in. That's annoying. And I'd rather have Chromecast alike built into the amp like Nexus Q showed. At the very least these chipamps could offer me a 5v1a for powering my Chromecast. There are a couple fancy semi-expensive amps that do have Google's audio casting, but they're big-ish fuller-sized receivers and honestly expensive.
This setup I have has been kind of portable, but mannnn I don't love it. I literally have a chipamps velcroed to the side of a speaker. There's a 6s lipo for the chipamps and a USB battery bank for the Chromecast, plus cables for both power supplies. Audio cables from Chromecast to chipamps to speakers. I've gone long on making this a portable useful anywhere system and it rocks.
The one simplification is using some powered speakers. Micca PB42 and Neumi BS5p both will self-power off the 6s lipo batteries, are ~$150.
But it's just absurd & wild that speakers with networked audio are so un-mainstream. That I had to velcro this package together myself is absurd. How has the ecosystem only narrowed and narrowed? (Meanwhile Sonos is busy committing deep-cut enshittification/de-networkization).