so we come full circle for the stupid decision to remove the 3.5mm jack. wonder if apple will backtrack on that just like they did with their stupid decision on macbook ports.
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HomePod and HomePod mini to Gain Support For Apple Music Lossless Audio in Future Software Update
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You can still buy a new one directly from Apple.
So I’m confused. Will the lightning to 3.5mm cable allow Airpods Max to play lossless? What does not “completely lossless” mean?
my point is Jon Prosser is lame ,
bad record
I feel sorry for Apple, they had to include Lossless support because Tidal and Spotify have made it a talking point, but my guess is that users will be happiest/most impressed by Doly Atmos support. Either way, this will be enough to get me to sub back to Apple Music after letting my subscription lapse for nearly a year. I switched to a job where I don't get to listen to music while at work, so it didn't make as much sense. But I'll probably be moving into a new position that will give me more time for music while working, as well my Apple TV subscription will be ending soon, and my latest trial of Apple Arcade is proving to be more useful than I realized it could. Given that I'm already paying for the 200 gig iCloud plan, the Apple One Family plan feels like a good buy.
AirPlay 2 doesn't support lossless streaming as of right now.
One could argue that Apple cares for its customer base
I am really happy about this announcement. Love my paired HomePods, have Apple Music - now waiting for this update.
Apple writes exactly this:
"HomePod and HomePod mini currently use AAC to ensure excellent audio quality. Support for lossless is coming in a future software update."
I wonder if this means that another transmission technique is already build into HomePods/minis? Anyone any idea what this could be?
I doubt there is another transmission technique already built into HomePod. HomePod is just a UI-less iPhone running a A8 chip with a better speaker attached so anything an A8 iPhone can do it can do also technically speaking (including receive a software update to stream lossless ALAC). When you play music on HomePod, it streams directly from Apple's servers over WiFi like any iPhone would. On the other hand, the headphones are not streaming directly from the cloud, they have to stream audio from the phone via bluetooth which is currently very limited when it comes to transmission of chunky music files. The headphones are limited by the fundamental hardware installed on them; the HomePods are not.
I don’t think it’s that. I think it’s because AirPod Max is a digital computational headphone so when you send analogue to it it will be re-converted to digital one more time.
It will play lossless file but due to the digital to analog conversion some quality may be lost and therefore not completely lossless.
what I’m confused is they say that AirPods don’t play lossless audio, but directly after that say that apple Music will still stream lossless file to AirPods over Bluetooth but the output won’t be lossless, but it will still play the lossless file? I originally thought Apple Music just wouldn’t play lossless on AirPods at all
Agreed. Based on how the article is written I thought maybe there was something new and that this would be enabled down the road (could happen but they’re not committing to it the way they are the HomePod update so I’m not getting my hopes up… nor am I terribly concerned about it.)
“AirPods Max can be connected to devices playing Lossless and Hi-Res Lossless recordings with exceptional audio quality. However, given the analog to digital conversion in the cable, the playback will not be completely lossless.”
I believe Apple has the superior lossless tier out of all of them so I don’t think they had to include if they could’ve just provided the bear minimum
I watched one and only one of his videos (the recent one about a next gen, colorful MacBook Air)… yeah. Can’t do it. Too obnoxious
Ok this makes much more sense. I wonder why Apple didn’t make this clear when they first announced lossless audio. It would have cleared up a lot of the confusion and negative reactions.
Seems like it’s the distinction between what file is played on the device vs. what kind of data is sent over Bluetooth to your headphones (AAC).
Some people argue that, when listening to an AAC music file, the audio is being sent directly to the headphones unchanged, and decoded on the AirPods. If this were true, I don’t see what advantage there’d be to playing back a lossless file since theoretically you’d end up with the same AAC output on the other end as if you didn’t do any transcoding.
Other’s say that, because there is other audio that also goes to the headphones (system sounds, potentially other audio from the device), that the signal coming from the device has to be encoded as a new AAC stream to send to the headphones— in which case, there could be a benefit to playing back a lossless file— less lossy compression being applied to the music.
While AAC is apparently very efficient at transcoding from other codecs at minimal quality loss, for myself, as a Spotify user— I will happily use their lossless files when they launch, because their lossy music is not in AAC so it’s guaranteed there’s (lossy) transcoding going on to get that music to my headphones.
Hah… Apple would wait until I finally caved and started using wireless headphones to FINALLY make lossless available.
Apple just need to make a Lightning to USB-C that can transfer sound (the current one can not) and this problem can be solved. Well, in theory anyway.
Repeat after me: Dolby Atmos is NOT the same as Spatial Audio!
Dolby Atmos is an audio format from Dolby that allows sound to be positioned around the listener. The producer needs only to define where in space a particular sound should be, and the listener’s compatible hardware works out how to recreate that intent either through multiple surround speakers, a sound bar, or earphones.
Spatial Audio is different: it uses sensors (gyroscope, accelerometer, and U1 chip) in the earphones to track the listener’s head movements. The position of the listener’s head when the audio starts to play is fixed as the ‘forward’ point. If the listener then turns their head to the right, the audio ‘pans’ to the left earphone to make it seem as though the sound is still coming from the same place.
A piece of audio can be both Dolby Atmos AND Spatial Audio. But Dolby Atmos is NOT Spatial Audio.
They don’t, though— we don’t need a cable that can carry sound, that’s basically what the 3.5mm to lightning cable does (Unless you’re saying you want a USB-C cable that has an Analog to Digital converter in it for plugging directly into USB-C ports…)
Apple makes USB-C to lightning cables that could certainly transport the lossless audio data to the AirPods Max, which have the hardware to convert digital to analog. I couldn’t tell you if it’s technically capable for the APM to function as USB-C headphones, but it might be. It’s more a question of whether Apple would enable it *if* it is capable.
Customer service. Or was that sarcasm?
Opps, I meant carry digital data. my impression is that the current one can not. It’s for charging only. I could be wrong though.
Well, this makes me feel a little better about spending $550 on the AirPods Max and $35 on the cable. Perhaps someone with more A/V knowledge than me can explain why Apple can’t release a Lightning-to-Lightning cable to support a fully digital pipeline, right until the speakers generate the analog sound waves. Is it just a lack of interest in doing so or is there a technical reason?
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I guess I’m not 100% certain either— I assumed it could carry data because you can still transfer data between an iPad / iPhone and a Mac over a cable… I haven’t tried it with the USB-C - Lightning cable that now comes with iOS devices though.
Yeah. It’s completely unlike apple to support discontinued products for five years. They’ve never released a new version of iOS with new features for old phones and iPads before… 🙄🙄🙄