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Apple lossless official announcement

eas

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I can't even count the number of people I know with surround systems on one finger. It's simply not a thing.

I expect this varies a lot based on who you know and where you live. I live in a relatively expensive, relatively large US city. I own a single-family home in an older residential neighborhood of the city. I don't have room for a surround system, though I do have three stereo systems I've cobbled together, none of which have optimal speaker placements. Most of the people I know are in the same situation, space-wise. I think many have stereos, some may have less-than-optical home theater setups. Most probably have some sort of bluetooth or smart speaker the earbuds that come with their phones, or an inexpensive replacement. AirPods seem pretty popular, too. My brother, on the other hand, lives in a suburb. He has a room set up with a HD projector and basic 15yo surround sound system. His neighbors probably have similar or more expensive setups.

Most people are going to be introduced to music in Atmos on EarPods (and eventually some new cars) before deciding whether to go to the trouble of trying to get it on an existing home theater setup. What I've heard so far using headphones isn't make a strong case for going beyond that.
 

Beershaun

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sweetchaos

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Funny isn’t it…we talked about the iPad solution here, then Darko fella published the article about it a few days later.
1623558186019.png
 

Zensō

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Funny isn’t it…we talked about the iPad solution here, then Darko fella published the article about it a few days later.
View attachment 135299
I don’t know if he read the comment, but I posted about the iPad on his YouTube channel a few days ago. In his followup article he used the Dragonfly to test the sample rate, not sure why he didn’t use his ADI-2.

I watch his channel primarily because of the high production quality, but he sometimes gets the technical details wrong and he also goes too far into audiophile woo territory with his listening tests IMO. I’d like to see him do some real equipment tests, but that’s probably asking too much and likely wouldn’t appeal to his core audience.

3BBF3D68-0881-40BE-8BBF-795C6185079E.png
 
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Beershaun

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I don’t know if he read the comment, but I posted about the iPad on his YouTube channel a few days ago. In his followup article he used the Dragonfly to test the sample rate, not sure why he didn’t use his ADI-2.

I watch his channel primarily because of the high production quality, but he sometimes gets the technical details wrong and he also goes too far into audiophile woo territory with his listening tests IMO. I’d like to see him do some real equipment tests, but that’s probably asking too much and likely wouldn’t appeal to his core audience.

View attachment 135300
Sure. He’s spot on for piecing together digital audio solutions and figuring out the options pitfalls and complications and which solution works best for who. As for the subjective sound quality reviews...we all know that without measurements they aren’t meaningful.
 

DavidMcRoy

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Re: sweetchaos, I thought everybody did it this way! My old iPhone 6S Plus or iPad Air 2 feeding a Topping D30 DAC via Lightning Port to an Apple Camera Connection Kit is my preferred way to stream, from even before I recently picked up Apple Music, ditching TIDAL and Qobuz. I have a D30 feeding my speaker system and another feeding a VMV VA 2 headphone amplifier, or alternately an E1DA 9038D with the Rube Goldberg wiring I concocted to power the latter so the phone and pad don’t pitch a fit about it gobbling too much power. Old phones and pads never die: they just go into semi-retirement to perform more specific tasks. I believe in squeezing every ounce of use out of my thousand-dollar investments. I use them to run apps for signal generators, spectrum analyzers, as DSP controller remotes, you name it. The iOS versions of those apps usually aren’t as comprehensive as the versions for MacOS or PC, but they get the job done. (AudioTools for iOS is somewhat buggy, but very useful.)
 
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bluefuzz

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I expect this varies a lot based on who you know and where you live. I live in a relatively expensive, relatively large US city.
I live in north Zealand in Denmark - the richest part of one of the richest countries in the world. It's not that people can't afford a multichannel setup but houses are generally not large and probably more importantly the prevailing 'Scandi minimalist' æsthetic does not allow for multiple ugly little speaker boxes in the living area. If there are people with multichannel setups then it is probaly in the provinces far from the big cities where house prices are cheaper and there are perhaps fewer other attactions.

Apple has pretty high market penetration here so if anyone can make people want multichannel setups its them, but I honestly don't see it being more than a tiny fraction of a corner of a niche. The hurdles are too great for an rather limited payoff.

Personally, I can accept it's theoretically possible to use spatial audio in a musically interesting way, but I haven't yet heard any evidence of it. Typical multichannel movie effects are simply annoying ...
 

DavidMcRoy

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I live in north Zealand in Denmark - the richest part of one of the richest countries in the world. It's not that people can't afford a multichannel setup but houses are generally not large and probably more importantly the prevailing 'Scandi minimalist' æsthetic does not allow for multiple ugly little speaker boxes in the living area. If there are people with multichannel setups then it is probaly in the provinces far from the big cities where house prices are cheaper and there are perhaps fewer other attactions.

Apple has pretty high market penetration here so if anyone can make people want multichannel setups its them, but I honestly don't see it being more than a tiny fraction of a corner of a niche. The hurdles are too great for an rather limited payoff.

Personally, I can accept it's theoretically possible to use spatial audio in a musically interesting way, but I haven't yet heard any evidence of it. Typical multichannel movie effects are simply annoying ...

There is a large preexisting infrastructure of home theater systems here in North America. Many are already 5.1 and ripe for expansion.
 

AdamG

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For those of you who are interested in learning exactly what Dolby Atmos is in relation to the way you can set up your room, speaker placement and options. This .pdf is a pretty good guide with graphics to help explain room layout.
Dolby Atmos® Home Theater Installation Guidelines
 

mkt

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I have not read all this thread b/c life is short, and perhaps others have pointed out that Apple Music Atmos "works" for 5.1 w/o an AVR.

I am doing Mac -> USB -> multichannel DAC -> 5.1 active monitors and it's neat. (Already a multichannel fan).

In my case I had (?) to upgrade to Big Sur, which I had been putting off. (In Catalina there was no option for lossless or Atmos in in Apple Music preferences). Some tracks in the Spatial Audio playlist don't seem to show the Dolby symbol or give multichannel output. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
 

abdo123

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I have not read all this thread b/c life is short, and perhaps others have pointed out that Apple Music Atmos "works" for 5.1 w/o an AVR.

I am doing Mac -> USB -> multichannel DAC -> 5.1 active monitors and it's neat. (Already a multichannel fan).

In my case I had (?) to upgrade to Big Sur, which I had been putting off. (In Catalina there was no option for lossless or Atmos in in Apple Music preferences). Some tracks in the Spatial Audio playlist don't seem to show the Dolby symbol or give multichannel output. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

you managed to get a multichannel output via USB?

Can you try an iPad or an iPhone and see if it works?
 

mkt

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you managed to get a multichannel output via USB?

Can you try an iPad or an iPhone and see if it works?
That requires the lightning -> USB camera kit? I don't have one of those.
 

vhild§

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Re: sweetchaos, I thought everybody did it this way! My old iPhone 6S Plus or iPad Air 2 feeding a Topping D30 DAC via Lightning Port to an Apple Camera Connection Kit is my preferred way to stream, from even before I recently picked up Apple Music, ditching TIDAL and Qobuz. I have a D30 feeding my speaker system and another feeding a VMV VA 2 headphone amplifier, or alternately an E1DA 9038D with the Rube Goldberg wiring I concocted to power the latter so the phone and pad don’t pitch a fit about it gobbling too much power. Old phones and pads never die: they just go into semi-retirement to perform more specific tasks. I believe in squeezing every ounce of use out of my thousand-dollar investments. I use them to run apps for signal generators, spectrum analyzers, as DSP controller remotes, you name it. The iOS versions of those apps usually aren’t as comprehensive as the versions for MacOS or PC, but they get the job done. (AudioTools for iOS is somewhat buggy, but very useful.)

This is interesting: iPhone 6S works with Topping D30 but my iPhone X with the same set-up doesn’t.
 

Blaspheme

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There is a large preexisting infrastructure of home theater systems here in North America. Many are already 5.1 and ripe for expansion.
Someone has to buying those AVR boxen. North American whatever and Scandinavian interior design minimalism are barely on the same continent ... oh wait.
 

Blaspheme

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I don’t know if he read the comment, but I posted about the iPad on his YouTube channel a few days ago. In his followup article he used the Dragonfly to test the sample rate, not sure why he didn’t use his ADI-2.

I watch his channel primarily because of the high production quality, but he sometimes gets the technical details wrong and he also goes too far into audiophile woo territory with his listening tests IMO. I’d like to see him do some real equipment tests, but that’s probably asking too much and likely wouldn’t appeal to his core audience.

View attachment 135300
Yes, I imagine Darko received a few direct emails as well. But reading ASR? Doubtful.
 

DavidMcRoy

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This is interesting: iPhone 6S works with Topping D30 but my iPhone X with the same set-up doesn’t.

I suspect that getting any iPhone to work with an outboard DAC can be tricky. My 6S Plus recognizes the Topping D30, and this is the signal path that I’ve found works:

DAC USB out > Apple Camera Connection Kit USB-A port in
USB Power > Apple CCK Lightning port in
iPhone or iPad Lightning port > Apple CCK Lightning male

This configuration powers the iOS device, but in order to prevent the iOS device from yelling about power consumption by the DAC (which is getting its power independently) you have to wait until all connections are completed before you turn on the DAC.
 

vhild§

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I suspect that getting any iPhone to work with an outboard DAC can be tricky. My 6S Plus recognizes the Topping D30, and this is the signal path that I’ve found works:

DAC USB out > Apple Camera Connection Kit USB-A port in
USB Power > Apple CCK Lightning port in
iPhone or iPad Lightning port > Apple CCK Lightning male

This configuration powers the iOS device, but in order to prevent the iOS device from yelling about power consumption by the DAC (which is getting its power independently) you have to wait until all connections are completed before you turn on the DAC.

Thanks, I’ll bookmark this and try it later!
But I couldn’t quite figure how you power the whole assembly…just put power straight into the CCK power-in port?
 

DavidMcRoy

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Thanks, I’ll bookmark this and try it later!
But I couldn’t quite figure how you power the whole assembly…just put power straight into the CCK power-in port?

In my case, the DAC has it’s own AC power supply plugged into a wall outlet. Only the iOS device gets power through the CCK’s Lighting input port.
 

vhild§

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In my case, the DAC has it’s own AC power supply plugged into a wall outlet. Only the iOS device gets power through the CCK’s Lighting input port.

Ok, just like I’ve done. But I’ll try powering up the dac AFTER the connections are done.
 
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