[tomtom]

For those with an old iPod dock / speaker thing knocking around with no Bluetooth connection (like me) - and no old iPod/phone that works with it then....

I just got one of these for a fiver from eBay. Plugs into the 30 pin socket thingy and pairs with the phone perfect. No external power etc.. Needed - great!

[dave]

Yo, looking to get new stereo or whatever for new gaff. Want to be able to play CDs (remember them?) for ease of use for the binlids, but also have DAB (not essential) and be able to play contents of itunes library from mac via Airplay (essential). Absolutely not interested in any kind of hacked Raspberry Pi/Lunix/NAS nonsense.

Options seem to be get one or more Airport Expresses and plug them into a stereo/s, or, since we'll have to buy a new stereo anyway, just get one that plays CDs/DAB/Airplay natively (seems to limit our choice of stereos a bit). Anyone gone down one or more of these routes, if so, how's it gone?.

I'm imagining the wifi coverage in new house should be decent as its a compact semi, had some downstairs walls knocked through over the years, has some ethernet cabling built in, and I already have a set of powerline wifi repeaters from old house if needs be.

Finally, it has to "just work".

[Johnny Brown]

Airport express are great on paper but definitely do not fulfil the brief of just working. Faff to setup and then continually drop cponnection.

[dave]

Is the dropping connection deffo to do with them or to do with your wifi? Does it work better on a different channel or manually assigning IP addresses? I went to manual IP addresses to resolve a lot of dropout issues on the wifi at our old house.

Other question is, would Airplay built into a Pioneer/Sony/whatever unit work any better?

Thinking about it, I think my powerline extender kit has ethernet cable output, so I could probably actually hardwire an Airport Express whcih should solve any wifi dropouts, should that become an issue. Kinds overkill on the kit but I've got the powerline stuff sitting idle at the minute.

[Johnny Brown]

Dunno, but you've still got the wireless connection between the airport and the ipad/ phone used to play the music. There were plenty of people on the web with similar issues. Spec is far superior to bluetooth but seems way flakier.

[dave]

If I was playing music from the itunes library on the mac (accessed via Remote app in phone/ipad if need be, works fine for me now) then if the wifi from the phone/ipad dropped it would't make any odds once play had started. Same if I put an album on then left the house. If the mac was ethernetted to the main router (it will be) and the Express was powerlined/ethernetted to the router then it should be pretty bombproof.

[Johnny Brown]

If you're doing that there must be cheaper options than the apple one, as you're not using it's rasion d'etre.

[Paul B]

There are Denon products that meet your spec Dave. Look back at the post by Butters.

Personally I'm going to buy an old amp, speakers and a Chromecast Audio, with the hope they'll add multi-room sync at some point. Can't work out if I need a (better) DAC and to use another output from the CCA into the amp.

[dave]

If you're doing that there must be cheaper options than the apple one, as you're not using it's rasion d'etre.

True, but not sure if third party ethernet airplay units actually exist, or be cheaper? Airport looks cheap compared to the brand new washing machine, tumble dryer, fridge freezer, and dishwasher I'm having to buy this week.

Paul, cheers, Ill check those Denons out.

[SamT]

Out if interest - what's the sound quality like over bluetooth?

Reason for asking is that if I use it on the phone to car stereo - its shit compared to plugging the phone in using the head phone jack.

I'm considering one one of those ipod doc converters.

[rodma]

Out if interest - what's the sound quality like over bluetooth?

Reason for asking is that if I use it on the phone to car stereo - its shit compared to plugging the phone in using the head phone jack.

I'm considering one one of those ipod doc converters.

AFAIK Bluetooth can't handle full FLAC quality without losing a percentage of the data, since it (Bluetooth) doesn't tranfer data at a high enough bitrate.

[butters]

There are Denon products that meet your spec Dave. Look back at the post by Butters.

Personally I'm going to buy an old amp, speakers and a Chromecast Audio, with the hope they'll add multi-room sync at some point. Can't work out if I need a (better) DAC and to use another output from the CCA into the amp.

My recommendation (with more that a few caveats) was actually for an Onkyo but feel free to check it out anyway. [emoji6]  Currently looking at the CN7050 as an upgrade on the living room unit which I think solves some of the issues I highlighted but is a fair few more fuck alls outlay in the first place. Should be noted that I haven't researched this much beyond an initial stage at the minute.

[Obi-Wan is lost...]

Got my Chromecast Audio device yesterday. Seems to work pretty well. Only tried it with Google Music so far, sounds like it should work with Spotify apps etc also but not tried them yet. For £30 seems like a no-brainer if you have existing hi-fi that you want to stream to.

[AndyR]

If I was playing music from the itunes library on the mac (accessed via Remote app in phone/ipad if need be, works fine for me now) then if the wifi from the phone/ipad dropped it would't make any odds once play had started. Same if I put an album on then left the house. If the mac was ethernetted to the main router (it will be) and the Express was powerlined/ethernetted to the router then it should be pretty bombproof.

I use an old Mac laptop as my jukebox on wireless network and have it plugged via an optical cable to amp and speakers - I then have other remote powered speakers plugged into various apple express units/Apple TV - works like a charm and can control everything from an old iPhone using remote app. Have had essentially zero problems with it dropping - but I am in North American timber framed house, so less cement to deal with...

[Paul B]

Got my Chromecast Audio device yesterday. Seems to work pretty well. Only tried it with Google Music so far, sounds like it should work with Spotify apps etc also but not tried them yet. For £30 seems like a no-brainer if you have existing hi-fi that you want to stream to.

Sorry this is a bit lazy; does it have other (none 3.5mm jack-plug) outputs?

[butters]

It's very lazy indeed... 

RCA, 3.5mm and Optical according to the official site.

[Obi-Wan is lost...]

It's very lazy indeed... 

RCA, 3.5mm and Optical according to the official site.

Not quite as simple as that, the only one it appears to have is normal 3.5mm (as well as the micro USB for power), you can of course use a 3.5mm to phono/RCA lead, what is clever is what appears to be a normal 3.5mm jack actually also has an optical output at the back of it, so with the correct Mini-TOSLINK-to-TOSLINK  lead from you can also connect it to an optical input on an amp etc.

https://support.google.com/chromecast/answer/6280276?hl=en-GB

[Jim]

very interested in this Obi-wan, particulary as my old hifi still has lots of sentimental value (and is still quite good as well)
have you used the optical output as I have a seperate DAC on my system?
Whats the quality like?
Does it still work from music held locally on the phone or do you need a streaming service?
Does it eat you phone battery while streaming and lastly, anything else similar to this to consider?
Word

[tomtom]

Shouldn't eat the phone battery as like chronecast it's streamed to the dongle from the router - phone just controls it.

[Paul B]

I just bought one whilst in the states as it's the same price in dollars as pounds.... It's a very neat little thing!

[Jim]

can you get radio stations on it as well?

[Paul B]

Using TuneIn I'd imagine?

[Duma]

says supports tunein online

[Jim]

just picked a chromecast audio up today and using tunein to listen to R6 craig charles show.
Plugged in to my DAC via optical cable, seems really good so far.
Any recomendations for other apps to use it with?

[fried]

No advice, but listening to Craig Charles' show for the first time. Good Saturday toons.