Airport Express (square) skips unbearably with Airplay

Another piece of information: In a different location, I have a single DAC with a AE. Here, I ran into the problem that led me to read these posts. I get bothersome stutter when I stream music from my Mac to the AE. Interestingly, however, when I use my iPhone (rather than my Mac), to send the music (both from Spotify and iTunes) to the AE, there is no stutter. Hence the PUZZLE: using the same identical setup ... if the music comes from a OS X system, there is stutter, if it comes from an iOS operating device, there is no stutter. Any explanation for this?

I have had to give up streaming with square A-Ex’s all together. They neither work to my Aqua Audio La Voce (twin 32 bit Wolfson DAC’s) in France or my Audiolab M-DAC (32bit ESS Sabre) in the UK. I have tried all the fiddling about with channels to no avail and done all the FW updates. I have now bought a 2012 old stock but new Mac Mini, which I will take backwards and forwards from the UK to France and use that as a media player and streamer. The advantage is that I can control it remotely either with the Remote App on an iPad for iTunes or via Jump Desktop for all other streaming/purposes. The Mac Mini is supposedly very low jitter on the optical audio output and I can play my 96K/24 bit studio master recordings properly. Now I just use my A-Ex’s as wifi boosters round my French house, which with 75cm thick walls is really line of sight wifi only.

Wilson

I have had an idea. Has anyone got one of the latest generation DAC’s, which in addition to using a 32 bit DAC chip (often a pair of them in differential mode), also forces a reclock on the incoming signal. The idea is that no matter how bad the jitter on the incoming signal, if you force a reclock, the DAC will lock on and be able to decode the bits as they arrive, without degradation/errors. An example of this type of DAC would be the Schiit Audio Gungnir, which uses something called Adapticlock with a voltage controlled crystal oscillator (VCXO). For those cases which will not permit VCXO, like satellite receivers, it shifts over to VCO which will reclock the entire network.

If this worked with the new type square A-Ex’s, then it would prove that the drop outs were a jitter issue and we could write formal letters to Apple, demanding replacements which worked to spec. I might give Schiit Audio a call and ask if they have any experience streaming from square A-Ex’s.

Wilson

I have had a response from Schiit Audio. The A-Ex works with their cheaper DAC’s Loki and Bifrost but on the Gungnir with re-clocking, it lights up the warning light for poor quality equipment connected. I guess this means that the jitter is extreme on the A-Ex.

Wilson

Very interesting thread, just worked my way through it all. I currently run two original (1st gen, 802.11g, 2004 era) Airport Express using their onboard DAC to an amplifier. They are connected via ethernet with wifi switched off. I wanted to upgrade and start using an external DAC, and figured I might want to upgrade to the current AE. But reading this thread has warned me off that.

To summarise, would those of you who've experimented a lot with the different models agree that:

a) I am better off sticking with my original 802.11g AE models, if used solely for Airplay over ethernet?

b) There are no disadvantages of the original 1st-gen models compared to current models (wi-fi aside, as I will be using wired)?

b) There is currently no better alternative to these particular models for this purpose?

Thanks!

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DougTipton has posted in the AirPort community.

Airport Express (square) skips unbearably with Airplay

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problem solved for optical airport express output by dropping my firmware to 7.6.0. I didn't try any other firmware since this solved the issue.

On a side note, AppleTV will not necessarily solve this problem for folks since I am having this issue on the AppleTV also. Not sure if that firmware is also affecting the toslink output, but I suspect it is the same problem.

Hey KeyshoreY

I experienced constant dropouts while my new DAC (Augio-gd NFB-11) was connected to my Airport Express (firmware 7.6.4) via Toslink.

I thought it had to be the cables because not long ago my Fiio-D07 (just sold) did not have any problems while connected via Toslink. I had a short Toslink cable without Jack/optical. While this was connected between my TV and DAC via toslink I had no dropouts. So I ruled out the DAC as the culprit. It had to be the cables!!

When my new cables arrived the problem was still not resolved. Than I tough maybe in the meantime there had been a firmware upgrade to my AEX and the AEX was maybe to blame. So I downgraded first to 7.6.3, than to 7.6.2 and finally to 7.6.1. To my surprise the downgrade to 7.6.1 fixed the problem!!!

And than by chance I almost simultaneously crossed your reply. A pitty I did not found it earlier. Now 30 USD poorer on a set of unnecessary cables.

A downgrade to firmware 7.6.1 did in my case solve the problem of the constant signal drops of the AEX connected via Toslink to my DAC.

I hope this will help other AEX-users.

Hi all.

I just registered on purpose after reading this, to claim the same.

I have an Airport Express latest Gen and i can't use the optical out. It is not the network environment, as i am working connect by ethernet.

Through Analog i have ZERO issues, through optical, it skips. I've seen a lot of users with this problem and apple doesn't seem very comited to fix it.I've read elsewhere that it may be even a hardware issue that it's impossible to solve and thus the silence...

Pitty i spent my money on this. I bought it from apple on purpose to have a higher quality product to connect to my B&W and now i'm stuck with something I can't use...

Is the new version of Airport Express compatible with the 7.6.1 Firmware?

Thanks!

Ricardo.

Hi Ricardo,

IIRC, yes, Airport Express square shipped with 7.6.1 or 7.6.2. Mine is currently at 7.6.4. A lot of weird things happened starting with 7.6.3. For example, I had to fix the 2.4 and 5 GHz channels at 1 and 153, respectively, in order to get my older generation airport expresses to connect to the 5 GHz network. If I set the 5 GHz channel to auto, then the older AEs cannot connect.

Indeed, it was with the square that my optical connection also went to pot. With a lot of jiggling, I could get the connection to work reliably, but it's still not as robust as it is with the older generation AEs. I finally broke down and got an AppleTV like the others. I like that investment because I like watching the programming on the AppleTV, and the hdmi connection is more robust than the optical connection, if you have the option of one or the other.

Thanks for your answer!

You say you got it to work, how exactly? I still couldn't... 😟

Also is there any chance i can downgrade mine to 7.6.1? It came factory installed with 7.6.4 and according to what i read, it's not possible... Is that correct? Or is there any way we can for the install?

Thanks!

Hi

I have an Airport Express first generation second edition (A1264, IEEE 802.11a/b/g and concept 802.11n2).

I can downgrade this model as far as to 7.6.0.

I can downgrade with the help of an App on my Iphone called "AirPort" or a program called "AirPort Utility" on my PC.

I do not know whether the second (latest) generation of the Airport Express is downgradable. It should be possible IMO.

Good luck.

Dear friends,

After careful reading of this thread (and many others) I have remarks that might be of use to you all.

1. About DACs.

I have been streaming through the Airport Express (I and II) to a V-DAC (first generation) connected to a NAD-amplifyer (C355 BEE). I've never experienced any problems. After 'upgrading' to the Arcam irDac, I have experienced the same problems you have all extensibly described in this thread.

2. About the AE-out and 'jitter'

When I stream Qobuz to the AE with an iPhone or iPad, the signal is interrupted incessantly, making it impossible to listen. When I stream from my Macbook Pro however, interruptions are much less frequent. This makes me wonder if the optic out of the AE is indeed the issue, or whether there are more factors at work here.

3. Work-around.

The (excellent) irDAC has an special usb-input for 'iPods', which also worked well with iPhones and other devices. I have not used Airfoil much since Apple extended Airplay beyond iTunes. I have now found Airfoil Speakers to be particularly useful howeverl. I connect my Macbook to the irDac and am able to stream from my iPhone and iPad to my DAC through Airplay. Or I can use my iPhone as a receiver, and stream from my laptop. Or any i-Device, for that matter.

This is exactly my issue. After years of my AEX working fine through an optical cable into a Rotel pre processor, it now won't behave at all with either my newer Arcam receiver nor a Tube DAC. Very weird for it to work flawlessly with one receiver and not at all with two others. I'll likely migrate over to an Apple TV, but I hear the AEX is better for music reproduction