iTunes 4.6 Now Available

[Jeff Harrell]

It's not a digital jack because the jack supports standard powered speakers. It is similar to the headphones jack on the iPod or other portable device.

Erm. No. The data sheet says "3.5mm mini-Audio jack for analog or optical digital sound."

It's not hard, guys. It's not a big mystery that y'all have to figure out by piecing together the clues. No secret decoder ring is required.

Just read, you know? Just read.

(The socket, incidentally, does not provide power.)

Edit: If you want to know more, google "miniplug." That's the name for 3.5 mm combo analog/optical audio connectors.

 

[voodoofish]

Does me no good to have a high quality digital optical signal if it's coming from a 16-bit 48kHz sample. I might as well throw my $250 A/D converter in the trash and lose a huge portion of my clarity if I want to use AirTunes.

You do realise that 16-bit 48kHz is higher quality than CDs? CDs are 16-bit 44kHz samples, if you want to get higher than 16-bit 48kHz you needs SACD, which will never be available to play on a computer due to Sony's fear of it being hacked like DVD-Videos, or DVD-Audio, which, as far as I'm aware, will only play at greater than DVD-Video fidelity (which is 16-bit 48kHz, usually compressed with lossy compression) on a computer if you have one of those Creative Audigy 2 soundcards for a windows PC.

So yeah I don't really understand what you are compaining about

 

[stevietheb]

There are three issues with iTunes that need resolving (in my opinion), does anyone know if any of these are fixed?

1) The continuous play thingee (sounds like that one isn't resolved)--really sucks when I'm listening to my boots...er..."field recordings."

2) The ability to create multiple libraries. I think this would be useful.

3) If I rip a CD in my account, and then switch over to my wife's account--the new song's wont show in the library (even though I have it set to share the same iTunes music folder). The files will be in the proper place and then I have to manually add them in--which isn't a big deal...but would be if I had more than two users.

Yea for Apple!!!

(and my $.02 is that it's fine to express whatever you like in your signature, provided it's not vulgar--so the "Anybody But Bush 2004" should be removed for being vulgar... )

 

[spankalee]

I don't think you can gain quality that is already lost. Audio experts can flame me at will...

Explain? Where did you loose the quality? I have no idea what you're talking about now.

 

[PlaceofDis]

anyone else now having problems with "Party Shuffle"? mine wont refresh or let me change to a different playlist. think deleting prefs would help? any advice? thanks

 

[Trekkie]

So what? iTMS is not the only thing i*TUNES* offers, and iTMS happens to have absolutely nothing to do with this upgrade--- it's an AirTunes enabler, which dialup users can use if they wish.

One could guess that when the AE ships you would have a CD that includes iTunes 4.6 with it saving the person from downloading 10MB over 10 hrs...

 

[runeasgar]

Spaz? I'm not spazzing, I've just wanted this technology for a long time and am dissapointed that it is completely antiwi-fi.

1) It's non-digital. I don't even know how they put that on the site. That's a powered-speaker/headphone jack. It probably even has power running over it.
2) Ripping all my cds in apple lossless does not change 1 important thing. When a song is stored digitally, it eventually has to be converted to analog for a speaker to use it. THAT is my concern. The airport express must be doing the converting, and I'm sorry, but that tiny little thing cannot have very good converters. Even if it is recieving an analog signal and directly outputting it to the jack, then you still have your computer doing the converting and at no point do you have the opportunity to create a better analog signal.

The point of the story is, whatever is going on with airport express, your analog signal is derived from a 16-bit 48kHz sample, AT BEST. For anyone who has studio grade loudspeakers or reference monitors, that's noticable. That's VERY noticable. It affects the clarity of your monitors enough to bother you alot if you are used to have a good A/D converter.

I just want to see this technology in a more proprietary format. I want to be able to do the A/D conversion myself, all I want airport express and airtunes to do is send the signal to my speakers. That's it. Right now it's doing conversions as well, and that's a bottleneck.

 

[ccuilla]

I am a little surprised that Apple did not add two features to iTunes, given the utility of this new AirTunes/AirportExpress combo:

1. Sleep timer
2. Alarm clock

I mean, think about it. Wouldn't it be cool to:

1. Stream the music to the bedroom, and turn on a sleep timer for (60 minutes or so), and/or:
2. Set the alarm clock to start a certain playlist, streaming to a certain AirportExpress (in the bedroom, of course) to go off at 6:30 AM.

This seems obvious. Maybe iTunes 4.7.


P.S. Yeah, I know AppleScript and all that.

 

[runeasgar]

You do realise that 16-bit 48kHz is higher quality than CDs? CDs are 16-bit 44kHz samples, if you want to get higher than 16-bit 48kHz you needs SACD, which will never be available to play on a computer due to Sony's fear of it being hacked like DVD-Videos, or DVD-Audio, which, as far as I'm aware, will only play at greater than DVD-Video fidelity (which is 16-bit 48kHz, usually compressed with lossy compression) on a computer if you have one of those Creative Audigy 2 soundcards for a windows PC.

So yeah I don't really understand what you are compaining about

upsampling voodoo, I don't have a fully analog system, therefore upsampling is good.

 

[legacyb4]

In that case, it sounds like you'd be better off not using iTunes and the whole compressed digital music thingy if that is your concern.

You remind me of a buddy of mine; loves to rag on anything to do with Apple's efforts to make digital music mainstream when his biggest beef really lies in the fact that he claims that MP3/AAC will never match up with "the real thing".

So while the rest of us ignorant peeps enjoy our wireless show, you can definitely continue enjoy your cabled world.

Cheers.

I notice that now, thanks. However, it still doesn't solve the problem. =] Does me no good to have a high quality digital optical signal if it's coming from a 16-bit 48kHz sample. I might as well throw my $250 A/D converter in the trash and lose a huge portion of my clarity if I want to use AirTunes.

a note: previous mistake, my audiophile doesn't have TRS out, it has S/PDIF coax out. Forgot the TRS is only input (i never use it anyway).

 

[evil_santa]

Does anybody know whether this update fixes the problem in 4.5 whereby big music libraries couldn't be shared via Rendezvous? (Documented here: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=93805)

Yes, I know, I could just download it and find out for myself, but what are Internet messages boards for if not to get others to be your guinea pigs?

yep working with my 9973 tracks / 54gb

 

[voodoofish]

Spaz? I'm not spazzing, I've just wanted this technology for a long time and am dissapointed that it is completely antiwi-fi.

1) It's non-digital. I don't even know how they put that on the site. That's a powered-speaker/headphone jack. It probably even has power running over it.
2) Ripping all my cds in apple lossless does not change 1 important thing. When a song is stored digitally, it eventually has to be converted to analog for a speaker to use it. THAT is my concern. The airport express must be doing the converting, and I'm sorry, but that tiny little thing cannot have very good converters. Even if it is recieving an analog signal and directly outputting it to the jack, then you still have your computer doing the converting and at no point do you have the opportunity to create a better analog signal.

The point of the story is, whatever is going on with airport express, your analog signal is derived from a 16-bit 48kHz sample, AT BEST. For anyone who has studio grade loudspeakers or reference monitors, that's noticable. That's VERY noticable. It affects the clarity of your monitors enough to bother you alot if you are used to have a good A/D converter.

I just want to see this technology in a more proprietary format. I want to be able to do the A/D conversion myself, all I want airport express and airtunes to do is send the signal to my speakers. That's it. Right now it's doing conversions as well, and that's a bottleneck.

Nooo, the output supports both optical digital aswell as analogue, just like my 4 year old minidisc player has an input port which does the same, this technology is not exactly new.


If you use the digital optical out, the A/D conversion will be done by whatever you're plugging the optical TOCLINK into so, so the A/D converter can be as fancy as you want to give super duper sound quality.

CDs are 16-bit 44kHz, so you're not gonna get any better quality out of that from any system which sources it's audio from CDs.

 

[voodoofish]

upsampling voodoo, I don't have a fully analog system, therefore upsampling is good.

How can you add sound quality that isn't there in the first place?

That's like saying why buy a 4megapixel digital camera when you can just buy a 2megapixel one and up the resolution when you put the pics onto your computer.

 

[Porchland]

what? play contiuously...in what way does iTunes not play continuously!?

There's a slight gap between tracks on both iTunes and iPod.

 

[voodoofish]

I am a little surprised that Apple did not add two features to iTunes, given the utility of this new AirTunes/AirportExpress combo:

1. Sleep timer
2. Alarm clock

I mean, think about it. Wouldn't it be cool to:

1. Stream the music to the bedroom, and turn on a sleep timer for (60 minutes or so), and/or:
2. Set the alarm clock to start a certain playlist, streaming to a certain AirportExpress (in the bedroom, of course) to go off at 6:30 AM.

This seems obvious. Maybe iTunes 4.7.


P.S. Yeah, I know AppleScript and all that.

Yeah I know I need that so that I can replace my current CD player. You can do alarm with an iPod connected to speakers, but then that's not the point of AirTunes.

 

[keysersoze]

Nooo, the output supports both optical digital aswell as analogue

AMEN. Would every non-believer of the airport express NOT being optical-digital out, please READ THE APPLE SITE! It IS OPTICAL-DIGITAL (hopefully for the last time)!

 

[Mitthrawnuruodo]

Nothing new. That's a 4.5 feature.

I know it's not a new feature, I was mearly answering valve83, who seemed a bit unsure if this was possible...

 

[runeasgar]

i repeat, upsampling.

And for whoever was arguing about me hating apple and their music attempts, wtf are you talking about?

I'm wild about iTunes, iTMS, apple lossless, AAC. don't brand me. This is like.. 1 of maybe 2 things in my history that i don't like that apple has done.

 

[voodoofish]

I know it's not a new feature, I was mearly answering valve83, who seemed a bit unsure if this was possible...

I don't know why this feature is windows only, I mean I don't use wma but sometimes you can get WMA streams of acoustics etc. from radio websites and it's annoying having to use a windows PC to get these onto iTunes. Maybe it's because Microsoft built Windows Media Player into windows so tightly iTunes can just access it to do the conversion, whereas it couldn't on a Mac?

 

[nacl99]

yep working with my 9973 tracks / 54gb

All Legal I'm sure...

 

[voodoofish]

i repeat, upsampling.

I still don't understand how that increases quality. That's like taking a JPG on your computer and increasing the resolution - it won't increase the quality. Same with taking a 128kpbs MP3 file and re-encoding it at 320kbps - it won't make it sound better, if anything it'll sound worse. You can't add detail that isn't there.


Please explain, I'm confused

 

[runeasgar]

Nooo, the output supports both optical digital aswell as analogue, just like my 4 year old minidisc player has an input port which does the same, this technology is not exactly new.


If you use the digital optical out, the A/D conversion will be done by whatever you're plugging the optical TOCLINK into so, so the A/D converter can be as fancy as you want to give super duper sound quality.

CDs are 16-bit 44kHz, so you're not gonna get any better quality out of that from any system which sources it's audio from CDs.

I'd have to have.. like.. a $1000 - 2000 converter minimum to process an optical digital out.

Also, in addition to my statement to whomever was branding me earlier, this technology will go hi-fi, it's just that apple will not do it. So I won't be enjoying my 'cabled' world for long.

YOU are just like the people who will, rather than taking note of anything that could even be construed as negative, will argue that everything is completely perfect. Apple is awesome, best computer company out there, no doubt about it. Lots of things are awesome. But if you want to sit in your little fairy world where everything is PERFECT, go right ahead.

Just because your standards are low don't mean that everyone's standards are low.

Also, if I'm going to keep hearing arguments about upsampling, why don't you go look it up before you keep arguing that sound can't be 'improved'.

 

[AmigoMac]

Not really...

I still don't understand how that increases quality. That's like taking a JPG on your computer and increasing the resolution - it won't increase the quality. Same with taking a 128kpbs MP3 file and re-encoding it at 320kbps - it won't make it sound better, if anything it'll sound worse. You can't add detail that isn't there.


Please explain, I'm confused

It's more like taking a 16 bit pic and increasing it to 32 bit... (Depth I mean) and will do nothing... Hope to be right..

 

[nesbitt_a]

Is this new? Album art with visualisations?

-A.

 

[voodoofish]

I'd have to have.. like.. a $1000 - 2000 converter minimum to process an optical digital out.

Also, in addition to my statement to whomever was branding me earlier, this technology will go hi-fi, it's just that apple will not do it. So I won't be enjoying my 'cabled' world for long.

I don't think a $1000-2000 AirPort Express would have mass market appeal.

I also doubt that the new Hi-Fidelity (SACD, DVD-Audio) formats will replace CDs - I think that is far more likely to be done by digital music on a PC (ie. iPod, iTMS).

I'm not saying this to be argumentative, I'm just being realistic. I know loads of people with iPods and who use compressed music, but the only person I know with a Hi-Fidelity disc is me, who only bought it to see what it was like and won't bother again because it is such a hassle to get onto an iPod.

As far as I'm aware there is no way to rip these Hi-Fidelity discs in the same manner as an Audio CD - I had to do it by ripping the audio track from the DVD-Video section of the disc (which wasn't even encrypted btw). This means it would actually be impossible for Apple to offer a true Hi-Fidelity AirTunes.