Transport of audio between devices using a sparse stream

A first network device interconnected to a second network device, the first network device comprising:

• a processor coupled to a memory and constructed to
• divide multichannel audio data by channel into a plurality of individual channels;
• determine during a system setup whether an entirety of an individual channel from the plurality of channels is an active channel depending on whether audio is being sourced to the individual channel for each individual channel from the plurality of channels;
• and
• package, in response to a determination during the system setup whether each individual channel is an active channel or an inactive channel, each active channel of the plurality of individual channels together with a corresponding sampling set of audio data into a single packet, wherein each active channel is packaged into its own packet and the packet for each active channel may be silent;
• and
• a network interface constructed to transmit each packet that includes one of the active channels having an active sampling set of audio data over a network in order to perform audio playback using bandwidth that is dynamically allocated based on the number of the packets and a variable size of the packets.

A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing executable program instructions which when executed by a first network device interconnected to a second network device to perform a method for transporting audio data between the first network element and the second network device, the method comprising:

• dividing, by the first network device, multichannel audio data by channel into a plurality of individual channels;
• determining, during a system setup whether an entirety of an individual channel from the plurality of channels is an active channel depending on whether audio is being sourced to the individual channel for each individual channel from the plurality of channels;
• packaging, by the first network device, in response to determining whether each individual channel is an active channel or an inactive channel during the system setup, each of the plurality of individual channels that are active channels together with a corresponding sampling set of audio data into a single packet, wherein each active channel is packaged into its own packet and the packet for each active channel may be silent;
• and
• transmitting over a network in order to perform audio playback, by the first network device and to the second network device, each packet that includes one of the active channels having an active sampling set of audio data using bandwidth that is dynamically allocated based on the number of the packets and a variable size of the packets.