New Apple TV 4K and hi-res lossless
Will the new Apple TV 4K 3rd generation support hi-res lossless audio?
Apple TV 4K, tvOS 16
That’s been answered already for Apple Music, see About lossless audio in Apple Music - Apple Support
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Interesting discussion - because I have the same question.
Lots of confusion in the discussion as well.
First, ALAC vs. FLAC:
Both are mathematical compressions, which means: They are reversible. When you decode the compressed file, you get the exact same bit sequence you had before. This means: Neither one is better than the other - because you’ll get the exact same file back from both, you won’t lose anything.
This is why both are called “lossless compression”.
MP3 or AAC are different: They remove ‘inaudible’ components of the music (e.g. a triangle being played while the guy next to the percussionist blasts his trumpet). Therefore, MP3 or AAC compression (and all the TV formats like Dolby Digital, Atmos etc.) are considered “lossy”.
The format of the music inside the ALAC or FLAC file
The “payload” of an ALAC or FLAC file does not matter - the compression algorithm of both does not even look at it. So, it will never change the bit rate or the sampling rate when you compress a file with FLAC or ALAC.
In theory, you could be compressing a picture or a Word document with FLAC: it’s purely mathematics.
What makes an ALAC or FLAC file a music file is the fact that all meta data (tags like title, artist, album, or cover art etc.) are kept outside of the music payload - which means that you can see these things, e.g. in Apple Music without decompressing the file.
And when you start decompressing, you will get your bit-perfect music payload back.
(One of the key differences between ALAC and FLAC is the storage of metadata: ALAC uses the same format as the lossy AAC/M4A files. FLAC has a different metadata format which Apple does not support, it does not mandatorily follow any standards.)
High-Resolution Music:
The generally accepted definition is: Everything better than a CD is considered Hi-Res. A bit rate higher than 16 bit, and/or a sampling rate greater than 44 KHz makes the file Hi-Res. 24-bit/44 KHz can be considered Hi-Res, and 16-bit/96 KHz is also considered Hi-Res. So technically, Apple's "24 bit, 48 KHz" limits can be considered Hi-Res.
Common Hi-Res files (like Apple’s) typically have both high bit rates and high sampling rates (e.g. 24bit/96 Khz or 24 bit/192 KHz).
That said…:
A FLAC or ALAC file is always lossless - but only as lossless as your original file.
If you re-encode an MP3 file to FLAC, you won’t get the information back that the MP3 encoder removed. You only will get the original music information from the MP3 file back.
If you encode a CD (which technically is a 16 bit/44 KHz WAV file), your FLAC or ALAC will get the exact original CD quality.
Apple:
Apple is offering “Hi-Res” lossless music in their store: It’s encoded in 24 bit/192 KHz. For delivery, it is losslessly compressed using the ALAC algorithm.
Apple apparently does not offer any device that makes use of these Hi-Res files: AirPlay2 maxes out at 24 bit/48 KHz. So does the DAC in the lightning-to-3.5mm cable. Not even the expensive Apple AirPod Max headphones can go beyond 24 bit/48 KHz. The AppleTV would have been the perfect device to allow passing on high-resolution music: In many cases, it is connected to an AV receiver over an HDMI cable. HDMI can handle the high bitrates and frequencies - and pretty much any AV receiver has a potent Digital-to-Analog converter inside. You could keep everything Hi-Res until you are converting back to analog.
Opportunity missed:
From what I read here, Apple latest ATV 4k still does not allow the output of Hi-Res files in Hi-Res over the HDMI output.
The passage about ATV digital audio maxing out at 24 bit/48 KHz was in Apple's documentation for the previous generation of ATV 4k - that’s why many were hoping that Apple would improve on this with the new device and its higher processing power.
The bottom line, I guess: We have to keep waiting. And I will not subscribe to Apple Music - because the biggest advantage it has - the Hi-Res files - evaporates the moment it reaches an Apple device.
131 replies
it is a big disappointment. May I ask what other options you are considering? So far all I am aware of is using a modern Mac mini via HDMI. or buying a USB DAC which is frustrating if you already have a good receiver Amp with DAC in it.
If your speakers and amplification are up to the task, there is a noticeable difference between 24/48 and 24/192 and I agree it seems strange that the one device Apple sells that would probably already be connected to a device like a receiver capable of decoding Apple Music's s HI-res offerings is the one device that can't do it. If you are interested in higher resolution, DSD and even higher PCM bit rates are even more noticeably different.
Except... HiFi Rose themselves say - as of October 18 - that Apple Music doesn't do hi-res yet, and that their implementation of Apple Music is limited to 256kbps AAC... see Information about Apple Music service - ROSE NOTICE / Notice - HiFi ROSE (roseaudio.kr). But at least they seem to be trying to persuade Apple to give access to ALAC/ high resolution.
Nope, no one answered the question I intended to ask. Here are images from Apple Music of what I’m talking about:
See how the first one says “Lossless?” It’s a 48kHz ALAC file. All Apple devices play it. The second one says “Hi-Res Lossless.” It’s an ALAC file greater than 48kHz. The image is from my iPad Pro. My 2nd generation Apply TV 4K displays it as simply “Lossless,” and Apple’s own literature says Apple TV does not support their own Hi-Res Lossless format. I was hoping the new Apple TV 4K 3rd generation would support Apple Hi-Res Lossless, but the specs don’t make that clear.
I agree 100% with this. If they can’t fix this I will start shopping for a solution that can access Tidal with convenient smart phone control that can be fed into my receiver.
what is the point of only offering high res lossless if the only way (most) people can listen to it is through expensive headphones and portable dac. Surely the vision would be to enjoy music in a lounge room setting as it was recorded! 24 bit 96khz.
I have a bunch of albums in 24bit and they sound amazing. The fact that we can now steam using apple is brilliant. There is surprisingly a huge catalogue of hi-res already available.
common apple tweak the last bit we are 98% there.
just as a clarification for anyone interested if you do play a hi res track through Apple TV it will play it at 24bit 44khz.
@1RS - don’t buy a Mac Mini for this purpose, unless you have a TON of your own downloaded music. Even then there have to be better options. I hooked mine up to my TV and AV Processor. I got Roon going and have the Apple TV still hooked up for TV. It’s harder and more frustrating to get HiRes from the Mac Mini M1. Apparently the older ones supported HiRes, but this does not, and requires a bunch of obnoxious workarounds, and even those cause frequent issues. I think the takeaway is: Apple hates HiRes, and having Apple in the mix at all makes it nearly impossible. Stream natively through other hardware. Use AppleTV for TV only.
It’s there in the spec - Apple TV 4K supports FLAC, AIFF, and WAV = High resolution lossless.
Yes, it will play ATMOS music. No, I will not play hi-res.
See the following from Apple TV 4K - Technical Specifications - Apple
Audio Formats
HE-AAC (V1), AAC (up to 320 Kbps), protected AAC (from iTunes Store), MP3 (up to 320 Kbps), MP3 VBR, Apple Lossless, FLAC, AIFF, and WAV; AC-3 (Dolby Digital 5.1), E-AC-3 (Dolby Digital Plus 7.1 surround sound), and Dolby Atmos
I assume you’re referring to the Apple Music? It comes with limitations as already noted. Try playing a non-Music, non-ALAC high resolution file (FLAC/Wav) using a 3rd party player like File Explorer.
- It’s technically accurate - if a 24 bit AIFF or WAV file is converted to ALAC and then back to AIFF/WAV, it gets truncated to 16 bits by the Apple CoreAudio engine. Apparently it’s by design. Hence my statement “Apple High Resolution as defined by Apple for its Music App is another animal entirely”
- In that same post I state “high resolution music as the rest of the world knows it - uncompressed FLAC or WAV or AIFF files, accessed and played outside of the Music App (using a third party player App)”. FLAC files can be uncompressed, look it up.
- I was referring to the spec which contains no qualifiers or settings for the formats supported. Apple only limits its comments to what the Music App outputs. Additionally, there is also no way of measuring/verifying bit-speed output other than by listening, which is subjective and depends on not just the external gear, not just the headphones involved, but also the content i.e. that particular file.
A Mac Mini is IMHO the only remote controllable suitable solution for living rooms so far. I use it to play high res up to 24k/192kHz via USB into a Cambridge Audio DAC (but HDMI will also be possible). Using the tool "Lossless Switcher" Music is played with original sample rate of the file regardless the settings in "Audio Midi Setup".
https://github.com/vincentneo/LosslessSwitcher
It's also better to disable loading "Dolby Atmos" in Music preferences. A high res file is not loading if it's enabled and the music has Dolby Atmos concurrently, then the DA file would be saved.
Qobuz and Tidal represent about 10% of the number of subscribers Apple Music has. Considering Apple Music revenues are almost $10billion this year, that not an insignificant number of user or revenue.
You can play Amazon Music, Tidal, or Qobuz (all Hi-Res) from a Wiim Pro for $150. It reportedly works extremely well.
@gmeardi, @BitzgiSF
The "Dune HD Max Vision 4K" mediaplayer can play multichannel DSD files from an attached storage or from streaming servers over HDMI to your receiver. Even the cheaper "Dune HD Pro 4K II" can do it, if you find one on Ebay. Maybe there are also other hardware manufactures.
New Apple TV 4K and hi-res lossless