[larsfloe]

Hello, I wrote this, and thought other could benefit from my experiences: Upcycle old hardware to modern Airplay devices by software

[XavierItzmann]

An excellent post, Lars, for keeping a Beoplay A3 alive together with an iPad 1 or iPad 2. Here I offer an alternative.

I’ve posted before here on this forum how I wanted to run my A3 with an iPad with the current iPad OS (currently 17.4.1), and how I installed an iPad 6 (the final iPad that fits on the A3 cavity, short of an iPad Mini, which will be too small but will be the alternative after the iPad 6 becomes obsolete), so I have a post on the minimal work required to do this.

I do not use the A3 proper on a day to day: it is merely a stand for the iPad to be on at all times (screen on, unlocked), displaying the B&O App 24 x 7. It is therefore a display to see what is playing on my system, and, on occasion, touched and used as a remote. So I do not use the speaker abilities of the A3 except rarely, when we take it to the patio and play a little bit of music directly from it.

But your post made me think: what if someone wanted to use the A3 as an actual receiver, and use its speakers? Your post is an excellent alternative, but here is another one:

1) On a Mac that is left on at all times (such as my Mac Mini, for example), run Airfoil by Amoeba Software. Run Apple Music (iTunes).

2) On the iPad 6 inside the A3, run Airfoil Satellite, which is a free app available on the Apple Store.

3) OPTIONAL: on an iPhone, run iTunes Remote, which is a free app made by Apple.

Given this setup, at any point from your iPhone you can control your entire library of downloaded music. The audio from videos on the Mac library can be controlled from the iPhone and their sound plays seamlessly on the A3 (but not the video images).

Since Apple lets you download any music you can also stream, you can download unlimited music to your Mac (as much as the disk will fit!) and play it from the iPhone.

You cannot, however, control “streaming” Apple Music from the iPhone: if you wish to do that, you have to access the Mac, either directly, or from another Mac, or from a VNC session on the iPhone, which is suboptimal. The same principle applies if you want to use Deezer.

Anyway, here is the A3, the iPad 6 running Airfoil Satellite, and an iPhone running iTunes Remote.

And here is the Mac running Airfoil (the transmitter) and Apple Music. Airfoil does not have to show its display: you can click it away. Also, it does not have to be on the foreground.

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