Giving it a try. Doing the annual switch from Qobuz to Apple Music for a month and seeing if it will take this time (with added classical organization). 

On 3/29/2023 at 5:48 AM, blessingx said:

Giving it a try. Doing the annual switch from Qobuz to Apple Music for a month and seeing if it will take this time (with added classical organization). 

How is it going? Can it be used on the Mac? I received some publicity saying the App can be installed on iPhone. Searched the App Store not finding the App for OSX, so I'm guessing you use it with the web browser.

I think the Apple Music Classical app is only available on the iPhone right now.

Not sure why, but it really limits their chance at success (I think more people would listen to Classical on a computer).

Yep, no Mac app. Not sure if there are plans for it. Strangely I tend to listen to classical over speakers and when using speakers I tend to use Airplay with phone. When listening to headphones I tend to use laptop. 
Generally I’m adapting better to Apple Music this round, though do prefer the more album focus of Qobuz (though even they are changing). 

Edited April 7, 20233 yr by blessingx

It's possible they're thinking of merging the functionality into the existing macOS Music app (and not separating like on the phone)... then we could expect to see it once they merge the new metadata (composer, etc.) into the interface.

Edited April 7, 20233 yr by HiWire

6 hours ago, HiWire said:

It's possible they're thinking of merging the functionality into the existing macOS Music app (and not separating like on the phone)... then we could expect to see it once they merge the new metadata (composer, etc.) into the interface.

It makes sense. Since I'm in a very old version of OSX, I still have iTunes but not Music, I can't check.

You should still be seeing classical music in iTunes. I notice that Apple just updated iTunes for Windows.

The Apple Music app was first launched on macOS Catalina (10.15) in 2019, so you'd have to update to at least that to subscribe to Apple Music (which is required to get Apple Music Classical)... if Apple updates the app. Otherwise, you can still purchase classical music through iTunes, but you can't get the other features...

Other than being able to find music more accurately (using their metadata), the benefits of the Classical app seem to be lossless, hi-res music and spatial audio.

There are also some limitations: you need minimum iOS 15 on your phone and it excludes users in China, Japan, Korea, Russia, Taiwan and Turkey.

 

Also, there was a news item recently claiming that Apple is planning to remove services from older devices and operating systems: https://www.macworld.com/article/1684118/apple-services-stop-working-older-devices.html

– iOS 11-11.2.6
– macOS 10.13-10.13.3
– watchOS 4-4.2.3
– tvOS 11-11.2.6

Edited April 7, 20233 yr by HiWire

According to that schedule about killing older devices, this MBP should be kept alive for a while, but it's old enough not to admit the update to Catalina. No worries, I'm happy with Qobuz so far  My iPad has suffered a cynical death (as opposed to clinical) for a couple of years. It's still good to read the newspaper, some web browsing and other "easy" tasks. I'm not upgrading it just for how pissed I am at Apple. I'm pretty sure it could still do a lot more things.

There are ways of doing that. Can't remember the exact one I used, but put Catalina on my mid-2012 Mac Mini doing this, and it worked fine.

 

Yes, I used dosdude1's installer to install macOS 10.15 Catalina on a 2008 MacBook and several other Macs.

There are a few gotchas, but it mostly just works. Newer versions of the patchers (supporting macOS 11, 12, and 13) require OpenCore Legacy Patcher, which is slightly more complicated to do.

Catalina Patcher: http://dosdude1.com/catalina/

Discussion thread: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/macos-10-15-catalina-on-unsupported-macs.2183772/

I'm not sure of going that route, I'm very afraid of losing support of the Firewire DAC I'm using, which is the main reason why I haven't purchased a new computer in all this time. I might consider that if the lack of support to this computer becomes a serious problem, but I'm afraid it's more likely that I get another one. 13 years is quite some time even for this indestructible device. 

8 minutes ago, Torpedo said:

I'm not sure of going that route, I'm very afraid of losing support of the Firewire DAC I'm using, which is the main reason why I haven't purchased a new computer in all this time. I might consider that if the lack of support to this computer becomes a serious problem, but I'm afraid it's more likely that I get another one. 13 years is quite some time even for this indestructible device. 

Seems like your fear may be founded, but if you want to experiment (with work/friends newer laptop). Mostly obvious stuff, but worth a look. 

 M

Yes, Apple discontinued FireWire support in Monterey, so you should keep it below that.

I have a friend who maintains a kWh sucking late 00s Mac Pro in spite of the fact that his iPad Pro has more CPU power at this point solely because of legacy FireWire hardware.  He has an old high end FW audio interface (it's an RME FireFace 800 IIRC) and also an analogue video interface which he uses to digitize legacy media (a task I've taken on recently in the world of Windows Hell, more on that later.)

6 hours ago, blessingx said:

Seems like your fear may be founded, but if you want to experiment (with work/friends newer laptop). Mostly obvious stuff, but worth a look. 

 M

Thanks, but on a current production Mac this DAC won't work unless I used it on a legacy OSX, which is not the clever thing to do on a new computer. it would work on Windows thru USB, though. The manufacturer didn't deliver USB drivers for OSX newer than Sierra or so.

I like it because it sounds good, has simultaneously working balanced XLR and SE RCA outputs, and has a Sabre chip that plays DSD natively. Replacing it with a similar quality device would add >1.5K to the bill. But I'm not sure I love it as much as to go back to have a Windows computer  The day this poor trustful Mac dies I'll make my mind up and spend the dough, I guess. I might ditch fancy DACs to get a proper audio interface thus probably giving up on playing DSD natively. I haven't been able to find an equivalent to the discontinued TASCAM DA-3000

Edited April 7, 20233 yr by Torpedo

Apple sells a Thunderbolt to FireWire adapter that might do the trick. It's not too expensive.

On 2/26/2023 at 6:24 PM, Kattefjaes said:

I'd probably not dive straight in with Swift development for the iPhone, the learning curve will be somewhat steep, if you've never programmed before. Better to explore the fundamental concepts somewhere more friendly first, an introductory Python book/course might be good, it's a popular teaching language. We are not born with an intuitive grasp of things like object polymorphism and inheritance after all

 

 

Dammit. I thought I was gonna make it big...

 

 

Dinny, you have not aged well.

https://www.theverge.com/2023/6/5/23726900/apple-wwdc-live-blog-vr-virtual-reality-headset-macbook-ios-ipad

#WWDC

M2 Max and M2 Ultra on the Mac Studio.

My eyes are watering.  WANTT!

Oh, and on the Mac Pro, too.

(cries)

When did Apple execs get the force? 

3 minutes ago, blessingx said:

When did Apple execs get the force? 

When they embraced the dark side?

Mac Pro as in a 20K computer with an awesome 32" 8K screen?

What the hell am I watching?

Who and what is this thing for? Why would I want one?

I'll give them credit though, they really went for it. No Oculus ripoff here.