Anyone using Apple’s take on the Primephonic experience?
I never used Primephonic so can’t compare, but in its own right it seems pretty good!
A few orchestral albums in my regular library did not migrate into my Classical library for some reason, but easy to find and re-add…
I would have liked an iPad-version. But I suspect it will show up.
There is much intro-help for people new to classical.
It is nice, not far off the old primephonic. And the spatial mixes is fun when you have headphones/pods.
I’m happy to get it, especially for the learning / familiarization aspects.
I was surprised that the iPhone app doesn’t allow downloading for offline listening, but found that if I added a playlist (the Introduction to Classical series) to my Favourites, it showed up in the main Music app and could be downloaded from there. A weird wrinkle but an easy workaround.
We have the family subscription to Apple everything, so the Music and Classical services are a nice bonus for us. If Naim and / or Roon are ever able to integrate at full resolution, I’d switch from Tidal to just this. My wife likes using Airplay from native apps (especially Radio Paradise, which has a “skip this track” feature not available on the Naim internet radio integration), and this already works pretty well - but will be better when (if?!?) they enable CD quality directly.
For me, it feels like a free bonus upgrade, just like when Naim have introduced new services and features via firmware that weren’t in place at time of purchase. Nice one.
So far seems really nice. Being able to browse by composer, period, and so on is great.
I like Qobuz, but if Apple Music & Classical were available natively in Naim I would probably ditch it. For now it’s Qobuz on hi-fi and Apple on mobile and car.
Missed the launch.
Fortunately did not need to update iOS to download it on iPhone.
Odd there’s no iPad or Desktop version. I’d imagine many people might want to play classical in a home office while using their computer.
I would expect them to launch an iPad version soon.
It simply seems strange it’s only on iPhone whose owners I would least expect to be to fall into the classical music demographic.
It would have been a nice addition only if they could have provided proper lossless transmission. I have subscription to Apple Music yet I do not know why I continue to pay as I mostly do not use their service. Maybe it is time that I cancel it until (if, ever…) they come up with a solution with regard to AirPlay2 mess. (Tidal and Qobuz are not available in the the country I am currently stationed at)
Apologies if this has been asked before - search not my friend hence question.
In the absence of Apple integration how are people connecting their Naim systems to Apple Classical to get best sound quality, access to full hi-res playback, and still relatively easy to setup/use.
I’m currently using Qobuz but do have a NAS (Synology) with both Asset and Minim loaded. Tend to use wired as opposed to wireless for connectivity.
Just a bump to see if there are any responses.
My current understanding is that Airplay etc limit max throughput so in order to get full HiRes I will need to use my phone to provide the output (via Apples lightning connector (not the simple headphone one but the larger camera one to get full data link) and potentially use a UPnP server app on the phone to act as control point. Or am I overthinking this and there is a simpler way.
That won’t work. The phone or tablet needs to be hooked up to a DAC over USB. The ToppingD10 USB DAC has a USB input and a SPDIF output, so you can hook up the SPDIF out of the Topping to the SPDIF input of the Naim streamer.
The alternative would be using any DAC with USB input and use the analogue RCA out to the amplifier, bypassing the Naim streamer.
You use the Apple app on the phone to select and play music.
Hi @jmtennapel Many thanks for the update. I therefore assume that the USB input of my NSC222 will not connect directly to the iPhone. Is it possible to use a UPnP server app on the phone (does one exist?) and connect that to the NSC222 via WiFi. In effect using the iPhone as controller and server.
The USB input of the NCS is to hook up usb drives or usb hard drives with music files on them.
A UPnP app on your phone won’t be able to play from Apple Music. You are confusing a UPnP controller app (the Naim App itself is a UPnP controller app to play music from a UPnP server) and apps like MConnect and BubbleUPnP that can play music from Tidal and Qobuz over UPnP. But not Apple Music.
Many thanks for that additional info. So looks like until Apple allow more third party access to their walled music garden we’re stuck with Airplay2 or buying another DAC (but I already have one in my NSC222) such as the Topping.
Or just carry on with Qobuz.
I think that choice is not so hard. Carry on with Qobuz and if you want to play music from the Apple Classical app, just use Airplay. It probably will deliver the most joy in listening to music without too much fuss.