lasthemy

Just a few thoughts on the comparison between a Macbook and a Mac Pro. There are quite a few differences in the overall architecture of those machines that could explain differing sound quality besides the CPU. I believe there was mention on this site that the USB ports on the Macbook use a shared bus, which could introduce jitter to the DAC. The internal clock in the Mac Pro is likely higher quality than the Macbook's, although I think that's a less likely explanation. As to differences between AIFF and compressed, I'd have to assume they're not buffering it optimally (optimally would be to uncompress to AIFF in memory). One test that would be interesting is: Play an AIFF file on the Macbook with no other programs running. Play an AIFF file on the Macbook while a browser is open playing a flash movie (or something to increase the CPU load on the machine). If you can hear a difference, then a faster CPU probably reduces jitter when passing over USB.

Rick, the requirements are pretty minimal. As long as the system can run Mac OS X smoothly it will be fine. The most important factor for how the screen sharing performs is network performance, which beyond using Wireless G or N you can't do much about.<br /> <br /> You mention Macbook specifically, and any of the Macbook line of Apple laptops is more than powerful enough. The 800Mhz G4 iBook I sold recently for $500 would have been sufficient. The main reason I replaced that laptop in the first place was that it wasn't fast enough to play new video codecs (H.264 in particular), and that's not a problem you would run into. Since you're running VNC, the laptop doesn't even have to be Apple, so the Eee PC (mentioned only because it's the cheapest new laptop in existence) should work as well; of course the 7" screen on it might be a problem.

My pleasure. I'd just been thinking about this, as my parents wanted this setup (a Mac Mini connected to their stereo, that could be controlled via any laptop) and I couldn't remember what OS X used for remote access that was akin to Remote Desktop.<br /> <br /> Another option that would be fun to try, if it were available and cheaper than a full laptop, would be a wireless touch-screen monitor, like the Sony LF-X1. Unfortunately that or any of the other designs for remotes are a little too boutique compared to a simple laptop (and require most of the same components).<br /> <br /> If anyone is looking to buy a laptop just to run their music server with, something like the Eee PC might be a good option. The cheapest version (which would be sufficient) is $300, comes loaded with a VNC client and it's very portable. It's not quite as stylish as a Macbook, but it makes a good attempt. My concern with any setup using a laptop as the controller is battery life. However with good standby settings (meaning auto-standby after 5 minutes) it should last all day.

One thing you don't touch on is for those with mixed OS environments.<br /> <br /> If you have a Windows music server that you want to control with an Apple Laptop, Microsoft provides a Mac version of Remote Desktop Connection:<br /> http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/networking_security/remotedesktopconnectionclient.html<br /> It works just like Windows Remote Desktop Connection.<br /> <br /> If you have a Mac music server that you want to control with a Windows Laptop, you setup the Mac server as noted in the original post, and can use any Windows VNC client to connect to it. TightVNC (http://www.tightvnc.com/) is one option, but I haven't used any client in awhile, so I don't really know the alternatives.

Does anyone have any experience with this device? According to their forums they support FLAC as well, even though it's not listed. I've been considering what to do for my own media setup, and all I really need is a hard drive that can output audio and video over HDMI (so it needs to be able to handle a few codecs). Backup I'll handle by syncing the drive against a backup drive whenever I update it (this has one advantage versus raid, the backup drive won't undergo regular wear). I suspect the jitter-correction is subpar compared to a lot of solutions used by this site's readers, but I'd probably be satisfied with it. Disadvantages: no built-in wireless, and quality in general seems to be lacking.

This may be a simple software setting that can be changed on the Apple TV, provided you're willing to use some of the hacks to gain access to it's file system. The 16-bit / 44.1 KHz was a problem also exhibited in iTunes, and it was caused by Apple's Core Audio library having a setting to output all audio with those settings. The solution for iTunes (and Quicktime in general) was to use /Applications/Utilities/Audio MIDI Setup to modify the output sample and bit rates. The Apple TV is based on a reduced version of Mac OS X, so it should use the Core Audio library as well. The application Audio MIDI Setup modifies settings contained within: ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.audio.AudioMIDISetup.plist That's a binary file, so editing it directly would probably be difficult. However, default settings seem to exist in /Library/Preferences/com.apple.audio.DeviceSettings.plist; it should be possible to edit them directly to use a sample rate of 96000 and bit rate of 24-bits. I don't have an Apple TV, but I plan on getting one in the next few days. I can try this out once I get it. I have no idea how to determine what the actual output from one of the digital ports is however. Edit: My attempts to modify the sample rate by modifying plists have been thwarted, but another discussion (http://groups.google.com/group/perian-discuss/browse_thread/thread/5ebbb3c184f8945) demonstrates that there is a way to modify the sample rate on the Apple TV. I don't yet know how to run Audio MIDI Setup on the Apple TV however. This is getting into some tricky ground though. Perhaps someone can suggest to Apple that they allow users to change this setting in configuration.