Airtunes dropouts with Mac mini to Airport Express

04-26-09: Jeanluc07
Edo_musica,
When you run itunes for your main audio system or office system, can somebody use the computer (mac) for movies with sound coming thru the computer? Therefore the mac would be real multitasking.

Sure you can run anything you want along with itunes playing. The processing resources are there. but you cannot dicate where the audio is sent for each app. All audio goes to the same output. For instance, I can have iTunes running and Pandora running and the audio from both overlap one another. I don't know of a way to send Browser or DVD player audio to output A and iTunes audio to output B. It would be awesome to be able to route the audio to different outputs!

04-26-09: Jeanluc07
If I run ethernet from my mac mini to my airport express, i can hook the toslink from the airport to the DAC. Will this work?

I haven't seen that done.

BTW, I also have a 9ft Toslink cable from my computer to my AVR receiver as a alternative/backup. Sounds OK, but obviously using the AVR's DAC.

Update:
I changed my router channel to an un-used channel. So far for 2 hour, no dropouts yet. This is an improvement but I dont know how long it will last since wireless is a trickery thing. Mean while I will continue to work (or think about) making the set-up wired (instead of wireless).

Dropouts are UN-ACCEPTABLE for serious listening (for me).
Cheers,

You can run ethernet from your mac to an airport express, just have to configure it with the airport setup utility. I did this with my old ibook which didn't seem to have enough juice to keep a steady flow of music going without hard wiring it.

Etep29,

Does the configured AEx show up in the Speakers pulldown in iTunes? Therefore it would be an optional Airtunes speaker. It would help to know for those looking for hardwiring options.

It doesn't seem possible that the Ethernet would be a choice in the System Prefs via Audio Midi Setup settings for Audio Output. But maybe it shows up in the outputs after the AEx is connected?

-ed

I finally finished with getting the AEx hardwired to the mac mini. Problems solved. Using with the iTouch is great as a remote.