updating a old setup

[clarityinlife]

hello thanks for reading,
first time post

i have a old hifi seperate system and want to move to purely streaming music from a iphone to my current speakers, i am looking at the best
way in terms of no loss of sound quality before it hits my ears.

I currently have a old Cambridge seprate system, azur 640a amp, and jamo d590 speakers floor speakers bi wired, and i think they are 200w.

I'd like introduce my apple iPhone as the primary and only source of music Streaming wirelessly.

I'm currently trying to understand the nature of the beast to make a informed decision as to which way forward.
I'm torn between scrapping the current amp for a amp with airplay and trying use what I have.

Ok so my issues 3 fold:
Questions

1. My Concerns is there loss of quality of music when sending over from a iPhone via wifi? Or Bluetooth?
As compared to direct from a CD player plugged direct into a amp. I read Bluetooth is worse. I would probably choose airplay,
i'm always going to stay with apple and itunes.
I read this is lossless!? is this true?

2. I read mp3 bit rate from iTunes is 256kps. And deezer my main music source 320.
I'm guessing this is not hd quality in terms of sound? Will a decent dac attached to my amp be overkill as the feed its given is not the best?

3. I have Apple TV. Which has digital audio optical out. i could look into going through Apple TV via airplay which could feed a new amp.
will I experience generation loss of apple tvs dacs ability or does it simply push the complete original digital signal on to the amp
that'll do the converting?

Any suggestions for decent buys to convert a old system into a streaming digital powerhouse would be appreciated.
Again would be using airplay and iphone as source of music and jamo speakers will definatly be staying as the output.
The middle part is undecided!

Many thanks

 

[Alec]

Ok so my issues 3 fold:
Questions

1. My Concerns is there loss of quality of music when sending over from a iPhone via wifi? Or Bluetooth?
As compared to direct from a CD player plugged direct into a amp

I don't think it makes a difference.

i'm always going to stay with apple and itunes.
I read this is lossless!? is this true?

No, a media player cannot be lossless, that's down to the bit rate of the music you play through it, which brings us to...

I read mp3 bit rate from iTunes is 256kps. And deezer my main music source 320. I'm guessing this is not hd quality in terms of sound? Will a decent dac attached to my amp be overkill as the feed its given is not the best?

Neither 256 or 320 is lossless. If this matters to you, it would make sense for you to rip anything you play in iTunes to Apple Lossless (ALAC).

I can't speak about deezer, or HD music, really, so I'll leave that to others.

 

[jjbomber]

i am looking at the best way in terms of no loss of sound quality before it hits my ears.

I'd like introduce my apple iPhone as the primary and only source of music

Well, you can't do both! If you are buying all your music via itunes, then that is what you are stuck with. Not sure how you will manage capacity wise. However it is your choice.

Moving on and trying to make the best sound, I would certainly look at an amp with a built in DAC, something like the Rotel RA-11. You can experiment between a bluetooth commection to this and also an airplay connection to ATV and a digital connection to the Rotel. You have to do what is best for you, as everyone's ears are different, as are musical tastes.

 

[Alec]

i am looking at the best way in terms of no loss of sound quality before it hits my ears.

I'd like introduce my apple iPhone as the primary and only source of music

Well, you can't do both! If you are buying all your music via itunes, then that is what you are stuck with. Not sure how you will manage capacity wise.

Good point, that. It sounds like the OP may be downloading all his music and not ripping...? In which case, of course, lossless is out. I don't particularly have a problem with that, myself, though some will point to the usefulness of lossless rips as a backup and for transcoding purposes. But that approach would appear to entirely preclude downloading from anywhere that doesn't offer lossless downloads. I also know some who won't download from the likes of Amazon and iTunes, but I've no problem with downloading. I'm not usre I'd ever want to transcode those downloads anyway...

 

[clarityinlife]

thanks for your comments...

i think i found some other answers in avforums as far as apple tv and streamin goes, this is pasted from something i read there:

"When you use Apple TV using digital ins and outs there is no quality loss. Here is why:
If you are within digital domain, there is no such thing as audio quality as all is done with bits and bytes. Sound quality comes to play when the A/D and D/A converters come to play, like when audio is converted by your receiver to analog to be played by your speakers (D/A). As long as you are in digital, there is absolutely no sound quality loss simply because it is not the audio that is being transferred back and forth but it's digital data ABOUT the audio that is then later interpreted by your final D/A converter. You loose quality when the audio is converted to a different lossy format, like MP3 for example that actually discards certain data about the audio information, or when you are using analog ins/outs because this is when A/D and D/A are converting things to analog and back to digital. Since you are not converting anything here but simply passing it through from one device to another as-is through their digital connections, no data is being discarded, and therefore no data loss is there that would cause to distort the audio bits in any way. So using Apple TV for feeding the digital data to the receiver is the way to go.

Now, the real question is if AirPlay converts your sound data to a compressed lossy format in order to make it smaller to pass it from your source to Apple TV receiver. This is where you could loose data if any lossy (as opposed to lossless) conversion is performed. I have a feeling it is a lossless compression so no quality is sacrificed"

given this is the case, i'm either looking for any amp with a digital optical in and will use apple tv to feed it.

or a amp with airplay built in... the one the second personsuggested was nice but at £500. is a little more than what i wanted to pay....

been looking at a "sony strdn 1040" from richer sounds .. big ugly looking thing but will do the job???

 

[Overdose]

I would recomend an Airport Express and connect that directly to your existing amp via the analogue output on the AEX.

With a suitable 3.5mm jack to twin RCA/phono cable, the total cost should come in at well under £100.

There is little or nothing else that will come close for the money, particularly in terms of integration with other Apple products.