Apple lossless music digital to analog conversion

iphones don't have internal dacs as they don't have any analogue output (i.e. a headphone jack) and ipads can't spit analogue signals out of a digital connector (like lightning or usb-c). hdmi is a digital connector too, so your iphone or ipad would send the digital signal out the lightning or usb-c port, through the hdmi cable, then your receiver would convert the digital signal from digital to analogue.

so the answer is, yes, you can use the lightning to hdmi av adapter to let your av receiver perform the digital to analog conversion.

You don’t need a DAC with the Denon, it’s built-in. Connect direct to its USB port using a lightning to USB cable.

“Play them from memory devices via the front panel USB, or over network sources” https://assets.denon.com/DocumentMaster/AU/Denon_AVR-X3500H.pdf

Thats marketing English for “USB Streaming? Fuhgetit!”

That said, this otherwise versatile puppy will do the job just fine with an Apple TV 4K and ARC-compatible TV. Having a display is part of the lossless listening fun, lyrics scroll beautifully, that too in sync. Worth considering.

Well, yes, the Digital AV adaptor does allow PCM output from the iPhone to HDMI, however I have just bought this to use with a iPhone 12 Pro Max and a Denon receiver that supports up to 24-bit/192Khz.

However having put the Apple Music/iPhone settings to ALAC lossless and also tried a FLAC & DSD file in the Teac HiRes player app, my receiver is telling me it is receiving a 48KHz PCM stream. Needles to say the Teac app also told me the source resolution was much higher than the 48KHz it was telling me it was outputting, so it seems it was being forced to down-convert.

So it seems to be the adaptor is either limiting the output or the iPhone is. As they say if you use an external DAC you will get HiRes, but presumably this would have to be a direct Lightning to USB cable, which unfortunately my receiver does not allow me to do.

I did look at a device on Amazon that converts USB to optical digital, but ended up going with the Digital AV adaptor. Unfortunately Apple have published very little technical documentation or specifications for the adaptor.

incidentally I previously had Amazon Music playing it’s ‘Ultra Hi-Def’ via the Denon native HEOS solution (embedded in the receiver), this reported the correct high bitrate, so it’s not a limitation of the receiver.

Interesting, here we go:

• Denons: actually it’s the newer models that’ve stopped supporting Apple to USB streaming. My older Denon works fine but successor models specifically state no support for Apple streaming. I believe it’s because of licensing issues that Apple started enforcing very strictly
• Limitation of PCM is imposed when the Apple device doesn’t recognize the external AVR which seems to be the case when using an adapter

So, the short answer to your original question is no, unfortunately, this is how it works by design. To solve, you’ll need to (a) ditch the HDMI adapter method entirely and (b) replace your AVR with a new receiver that explicitly states support for Apple streaming over USB. Good luck!

I know I don’t need a DAC thanks, that’s the reason I went for using the lightning to HDMI adaptor, to just get the digital stream out the iPhone.

My point was that the HDMI *should* be capable of receiving steams at greater than 48KHz, but the HDMI adaptor only seems to output PCM at that rate (PCM is a digital stream, so the Denon is still doing the digital to analog conversion). L

I can’t use a simple lightning to usb cable, as you suggest, as the USB port on my Denon (AVR-X3600H) is only for attaching mass storage devices like a USB memory stick or HDD.

If I just plug the iPhone in and play music, it comes out the speakers and the Denon can’t browse the music on the phone as iPhone doesn’t expose the files. Maybe newer Denon’s support direct streaming via USB, but mine doesn’t.

Yep, pretty much figured that out!

At the end of the day 48KHz PCM isn’t exactly the end of the world (I mean it could be 192kbps MP3!), but it would be nice if Apple thought a bit more about listening to lossless/higher-res audio before launching the service. It would also be nice if they detailed the specs for the adaptor, so I didn’t have to buy it to find that out!

For what it’s worth, the only references to iPhone audio streaming in my Denon’s manual is with respect to Airplay, so it doesn’t actually state you can or can’t do digital out via USB.

Hi Jerome93,

Thank you for using the Apple Support Communities. We understand that you want to know about using an adapter to listen to lossless audio and we'd be happy to help! We also see that you already checked out the Apple Support article About lossless audio in Apple Music which can be helpful with these questions. To hear the best audio quality Apple recommends that you use an external digital-to-analog converter (DAC). 

Have a good day.

Take care. 

What model is it? I’ve seen Denon manuals that shooed me away from USB streaming pretty quick.

To feedback, use this link https://www.apple.com/feedback/

It’s the AVR-X3500H (I wrote 3600 by mistake earlier, which was the following years model)