Any Airport Express Users?

Paul I have not heard one but the premise should be along the lines of a squeezebox or what ever, the things are the latest wireless spec so should be able to shift a fair amount of date quickly.

As such you might want to experiment with bit rates to see where you can trip the thing up. if nothing else I think they can be used as a 'booster' for wireless.

one good trick is to turn off volume control in itunes when using remote speakers. you'll have to control volume at your preamp, but it keeps you from losing bits in the digital transmission.

also, you can't send data at anything but normal cd bitrates. sadly. especially cuz i've got mine running to an external dac that could probably take a higher bitrate.

I have one as well but I do not run it to my main system so sound quality is not so vital.

I guess an external dac using the optical output is probably the main way to maixmise the sound as mentioned by Videocrew. If you dont have an external dac or 2 box cd player, you could try an optical input on your home theater processor if you have one.

I mainly bought my Express for the wireless printing which works a treat.

Kind regards

Simon

Thanks all.

Hoping signal strength/loss won't be an issue as it's about 3 metres from the Mac.

It's "only" going into a Nait 5, I suppose experimentation is the name of the game but I'll remember the comment regards turning off the volume control.

It'll be interesting to see how good or bad this thing is - I have to admit that I seem to spend more and more time listening to background music through my Mac these days simply because it can play a totally random selection and I don't have to use my brain to think what I want to listen to

cheers,
Paul

Paul if you have a power mac I seriously suggest a 3 metre optical cable to your dac, you can then play around in the audio utility in the utilities folder to set a variety of parameters.

Because the audio is exiting via optical it by passes any sound controls as well which significantly improves quality.

I got a 10 metre optical cable off ebay for something silly like a tenner and it goes into an old meridian DAC. I use the iBook and Chicken of VNC to control the primary mac from the sitting room, 9000 tracks on tap (when I can't be arsed to change records lol)

G5 iMac.

I didn't really think about the offboard DAC route, and if I did I'd also have to invest in a USB sound adaptor a USB speakers to continue playing other audio via speakers connected to the Mac.

Presumably if a CD burned from a bunch of mp3s sounds alright via my system the same played back over an airport will be passable.. guess we'll find out

Paul

Paul the audio output socket on the back is both analogue for headphones and digital, by my book thats one lead and one dac you need to get.

quote:

Originally posted by garyi:
Paul the audio output socket on the back is both analogue for headphones and digital, by my book thats one lead and one dac you need to get.

I still want to be able to have some half-way decent speakers attached directly to the iMac, so you're right it's one lead and one dac, but it's also either a separate USB soundcard to attach the existing speakers to, or a new set of USB attached speakers - it just starts to get a little more expensive than I'd like for the moment.

Paul

Sorry, yes understood.

No worries. Haven't even got the damn thing yet and I'm already thinking "should I have got a Roku Soundbridge"

If the sound is being pumped to another room and you don't have a laptop, then yes you should have got a roko or squeezebox as you will have to get up to change the music etc

I have an Airport Extreme and 3 Expresses all set up analog to three different audio systems in my house. works like a charm with itunes off four different macs. good luck getting it set up. If you just have one, the defaults should work for you. With multiples, you have a full day ahead. but it is the coolest thing going. get airfoil at rogueamoeba.com. then you can get xm wireless or streaming internet audio. Obsess over the dac thing if you want, but try analog first. you will be pleasantly surprised. I use apple lossless and it works exceedingly well. Have fun.

Thanks all.

I have already been pointed to Airfoil which I intend to have a look at.

I'm starting to explore some of the default iTunes radio favorites and the thousand of radio stations listed at Shoutcast and I think the radio stations might be of more interest than some of the stuff I have in iTunes.

Paul

You can put them into itunes but its as a stream in your music library.

Arrived today and took about ten minutes to add to the existing wireless LAN.

Maybe I'm easily pleased but first impressions are positive

Any suggestions on how to get the best out of this on a Nait5? I see there are various iTunes options about "remote speakers" and the Nait supports Unity Gain which I'm not sure if I want to be on or off etc.

cheers,
Paul

Your best bet for a fuller flavour is to goto itunes prefs and turn off the cross fade and sound equalisation.

Then insure that the EQ is set to off.

I am stuck after this because I don't know if there is a way to tell the mac to output line level with no volume control to the express, that would be best I guess as it would work like any other source.

quote:

Originally posted by garyi

I am stuck after this because I don't know if there is a way to tell the mac to output line level with no volume control to the express, that would be best I guess as it would work like any other source.

iTunes preferences...Advanced...Disable iTunes volume control for remote speakers

That's what I do