HomePod already works in a ‘Connect’ style…
We had Airplay, then we had Airplay 2.
I don’t think it’s a stretch of the imagination to think there will one day be an Airplay 3.
Maybe they will bring the HomePod style of fetching the stream, to the next update to Airplay.
If only HomePod had a digital out - even with it’s 48kHz ‘limitation’ that would be sweet.
Maybe a future device does have such a digital out and fetches audio the same way as HomePod.
I’m not defending Apple, but from a business standpoint, the hi fi market is so insignificant compared to the vast world of AirPods via Bluetooth, that I doubt it’s even a marketing or engineering consideration. Seriously, if people are willing to spend $400 for a set of buds that one keeps losing, why would they support anything much better?
If I were Apple’s marketing director, I’d say to Tim: “those who are into hi fi can afford to buy the extra gear to connect to their DAC rather than using airplay; it’s not worth our while to support hi fi in airplay.” This is not what you or I want to hear, but the reality of the market…
Also Apple has been very good at being second or third into a segment and come out with a sharp product and take over the segment… So they’re probably not going to do this till they see that someone has blazed the trail and created the market for them to swoop in.
I’m not expecting hi fi until maybe AirPlay 5 if then.
So true , that’s why I rarely even think about Apple.
My only weakness is my iPad 12.9 Pro that I use for Roon .
Their kit in general is overpriced however good it is 
Yep. I’m in their ecosystem because their stuff just works and because their business model doesn’t depend on advertising and collecting data. Or at least doesn’t depend as heavily as…
I can’t get my Mac Mini (late 2014) to send HDMI audio when playing Apple Music. It works OK with Roon, Tidal, and Qobuz. I’ve read just about every post on the interwebs and tried many of the “solutions.” While this doesn’t really matter because it’s not why I got the Mac Mini, I like it when everything just works as it should. Any solutions that you have actually used to get this to work?
I got this working by going through an HDMI extractor that I had purchased for away-from-home use, but don’t need it for that purpose. TV screen works also.
I’ve been toying around last night. When using my iPhone or MacBook Pro to stream Apple Music to either my Marantz M-CR612 or my Cambridge Audio CXNv2, it uses AirPlay 2. Which maxes out at 44.1 kHz here.
However when I use my old Android powered Nokia. And run the Apple Music app from there I can use Chromecast to connect with the Cambridge. And then it streams at 96 kHz.
Every album plays at 96 kHz? Sample rate doesn’t change ?
Don’t you have to change the playback rate using the Apple Audio Midi? I have mine set at 24/192. The sample rated does not automatically change.
It looks like I was mistaken. I was testing everything last night and I’ve mixed up a few things.
The Qobuz app changes the bitrate with each album. Up to a maximum of 96 kHz here through Chromecast.
Apple Music sticks to 44.1 kHz, no matter what the original bitrate is.
Yea that’s my understanding. That’s why I was thinking of using by HQP in between to do the automatic switching.
i didn’t think Apple would give a better experience with CHromecast, vs their own Airplay 
That’s what I’m listening to right now at my desk - Apple Music hi-res on iPad, feeding @jussi_laako 's HQPlayer with correct sample rates automagically.
But I can close Apple Music and open Soundcloud or Mixcloud and any audio gets piped through HQPlayer
Cool stuff !
I’m not locked to hard drive / Qobuz / Tidal, like with Roon.
I have a Roon sub but I love discovering music in different ways - and I get to do that all through HQPlayer
Hi maybe I’m missing something, but I still don’t get it.
Say I have Apple Music on a Mac. And I have a Holo Red DAC which supports NAA. I want to have HQP in between in the signal Path because I don’t want to have automatic bitrate setting. And all connected through the network.
(I assume that you can’t have Apple Music and HQP running on the same machine to do this… I can get a second machine running HQP or a Linux box with HQP OS.)
How can I do that? Sorry for being dense, I don’t know that much about HQP and how it works. Simple language please thank you. 
Hi, I’m a bit confused about this part I quoted because above you wrote:
Confused by do want and don’t want 
As previously mentioned, you can’t have auto rate switching on MacOS - only iPad/iOS supports this (at the moment).
You don’t need to buy a separate machine though - just the 1 Mac can run Apple Music and HQPlayer.
Explained in detail in separate thread already:
Yes you should be confused because I can’t freaking type. I meant I DO want automatic switching.
Can’t be done with macOS as mentioned above
If you have an iPhone or iPad at your Desk - can be done. That’s what I’m doing right now.
But you’ll need to buy an RME ADI-2. The ADI-2 shows itself to HQPlayer in a different way than other interfaces, which is how Jussi has been able to get this working
You might then ask is there a cheaper way to do it - no, if there was I’d be doing it
. Without retyping everything, see this post:
Ok I’m confused now. You’re saying that even if a Mac feeds the signal to HQP, auto rate switching can’thappen?
And if so, how would I accomplish high res output from Apple Music on an iPhone to my DAC? Though a direct USB connection? Is there a way to put HQP in the signal chain for EQ etc?
Correct.
Taking HQPlayer out of it - the same way that if you connect a USB DAC direct to your Mac, you won’t get automatic sample rate switching with Apple Music, right?
But if you hookup an iPhone/iPad to a USB DAC, you do get automatic sample rate switching.
It is a macOS limitation with Apple Music specifically.
HQPlayer can’t magically bypass this OS limitation.
Fully explained in linked post just above Its a long post, don’t really want to retype it all
For Mac OS you can try this method for auto sample rate switching.
Wow cool!!! This might be the ticket and is much much simpler than all the other options.
Thanks!
