Starting small
Our smartphone capability – (audio memos, sound recording apps for Android and Apple music recognition (Shazam) and streaming services.
The terminology and technology involved in audio is mind-boggling. You really have to be an expert to get your head around it – and I’m not going to try. There are a wide range of differences in Audio Formats – What is HiRes Audio? It would appear that Spotify has only just recently entered the field of HiRes audio. I’ll just take it as read that I want the best, if I possibly can get it. Currently Apple seem as good, if not better, than the rest.
How to play hi-res music and lossless audio on your iPhone
To get the best quality audio for iPhone and for Android, you may need to dip into those two articles. For the Apple user, you can use AirPlay to stream audio (Apple) to a different device (eg a TV or HomeHub), or use Bluetooth (both Apple and Android) – but Bluetooth is generally not up to the mark on both platforms. Alternatively you should seriously consider using a wired connection using the headphone jack (some Android) or a lightning to aux (headphone jack) dongle (Apple). On my MacBook I do have a headphone jack and when on the desktop it’s connected to a pair of powered Logitech speakers.
Streaming services and their apps
As mentioned above, there a huge set of services requiring you to set up accounts, and install apps – unfortunately (but understandably) most of the free ones are not ad free, which can be distracting …
Best free music apps 2023: free music on Android and iPhone (from What Hi*Fi?)
The best free music apps for iOS and Android (from Digital Trends)
The 7 Best Free Music Streaming Apps for iOS and Android (2023) (from LifeWire)
8 Best Streaming Music Services With an Offline Mode (from LifeWire)
My conclusions from this? We use Apple Music with the recently launched and integrated Classical service as well. Both of these are part of our Apple One subscription which we share with other members of our family. Three of the family still use Spotify, but our son in Australia uses Tidal (for HiRes streaming) and Soundcloud (for new music). You can (and I have) convert Spotify playlists to Apple Music playlists (and vice versa) and I have using this app – Songshift but there are other apps.
Then we turn to Audiophiles, and the world of digital to analog convertors. By an audiophile (in this instance) I’m really just talking about someone who wants to connect a better set of speakers to their digital devices than the internal speakers that are supplied with the device. [In other words I’m setting the bar very low.]
The starting point is to begin to understand the world of Digital to Analog convertors (DACs), so this video hopefully will give an introduction and explain what’s going on in this mysterious world of interconnecting equipment.
I’ll follow this with a couple of articles that you might wish to peruse ..
What is a DAC? And why do you need one? (from What Hi*Fi?)
What is a DAC and why would you need one? (from Digital Trends)
You want to use your mobile device as your music player? Use a lightning to USB dongle to connect Apple to a DAC and then to your speakers, or headphones, but be sure to get a Samsung ACTIVE USB to AUX dongle for Android phones, or a USB-C to USB-C (or USB-A depending on your DAC) dongle to connect to your DAC, and on to the headphones or speakers.
So, if you’ve got this far, you might wish to really play your music at the best quality that it has been stored in digital format on your device Watching these two videos might help – or confuse you even more!
For Android …
For iOS …
Recording and editing music/sound on your device – use Audacity, Garage Band (iOS, MacOS) or BandLab (Android or iOS).
Then we turn to digital sound playing systems.
A wide field of options including the portable MP3 player – but would anyone want one of these nowadays – and the smart home speaker (with voice assistant) – which we looked at last year, and is definitely a device to look at.
Finally integrating with your home HiFi system.
I wrote about my setup in 2016 and again in 2019 for the group. I also wrote about my experiences on trying to make iTunes work for me better back in 2018 – from this latter post, the MacMini and Plex still remain as part of my setup but I don’t use either to stream music, and iTunes is thankfully dead and buried – well almost!
So what has changed from 2016? Well the external speakers connected to the Marantz amp have disappeared to be replaced by a Sonos Beam Soundbar connected to a new Samsung TV. All the other HifI components remain and are connected to the Marantz amp which is in turn connected to the Sonos Connect “hub”. The Bose speakers are still connected to the Marantz amp, but are rarely used now as we now have an Apple HomeHub which I can stream to using AirPlay, and which can be integrated with the Sonos speakers (I now also have a Sonos Move portable speaker) to provide home wide sound.
It has to be said this is a technological project, rather than an audiophile one, as my hearing has deteriorated to the point where I couldn’t detect HiRes from ordinary sound anyway, and the last time we actually had the same music in the whole house must have been the week after we bought the HomeHub.
The Apple HomeHub is a delightful device – we can “talk” to it using Siri or from Apple Music, and link the Sonos devices to it so that we can direct music to different speakers as required. It’s also the heart of our SmartHome project – more another day, and will provide moths of technology challenges for me using the Apple HomeKit and the interfaces that are being developed to link smart devices to that platform.
The next project – we’re installing solar panels this week, with a battery and a gateway to link to link to the Grid (using Octopus flexible tariffs) – definitely a topic for next year when we’ve got it all sorted.
Jonathan sent me his Sound setup which I reproduce below …
Just for info. – my home audio/cinema set up has some similarities to yours.
When we moved to Cardiff we bought a new house in Pontcanna which was still being built and I took the opportunity to have wiring installed in the walls to ceiling speakers in three rooms. I took advice from an AV specialist who advised Sonos, Spotify, blu-ray player and mini mac for my digital collection.
Sonos serves all 3 rooms, plus a portable speaker, via a marantz amp in the main tv room ( surround plus sub ) and Sonos amps in the other two ( stereo )
Spotify provides all my music needs and I never now use the mac. Nor do I have a CD player in the house since the blu ray/receiver packed up. My cds are all packed up in boxes in the loft! The only stuff I miss is Neil Young and Joni Mitchel after Neil left in a huff!
I have Samsung tvs in 4 rooms – 3 of them Smart and all of them now support Spotify, Youtube, netflix etc. We subscribe to Sky with a main Sky Q box in the main tv room and mini boxes in 3 others.
I’m really happy with it but conscious that the Sonos gear is now 12 years old. They keep trying to get me to upgrade. One day it will be inevitable I guess. Sky might be considered an expensive luxury but we all need one or two of those. It’s brilliant!