#Apple airport express airplay 2 how to#
#Apple airport express airplay 2 for mac#

Enter whatever information you wish into AirPort Utility as you’ll be creating a wireless network for all of five minutes before it’s disabled. If you’re configuring an AirPort Express from scratch, select the first option to Create a new network. Unfortunately, this is the fault of AirPort Utility as one of these options must be chosen before we can get into the more advanced options and configure it more appropriately. If You’re Setting up a New AirPort Expressįrom these examples, you’d be forgiven for thinking that an AirPort Express must use some sort of wireless connectivity, whether it’s creating a new network or joining one. It will still attempt to create a new wireless network. Replace an existing deviceĬopy the settings off a current Apple base station that you might be upgrading or a non-Apple one. If you were going to use an AirPort Express as an AirPlay receiver for a Hi-Fi that isn’t within reach of an Ethernet cable, this would be the option you choose. Add to an existing networkĮither extend an existing wireless network or have the AirPort base station join an existing one.

Set up the Airport base station to create a new wireless network.

#Apple airport express airplay 2 for mac#

Instead of offering the complete setup to begin with, AirPort Utility provides three basic scenarios of using the AirPort base station.ĪirPort Utility for Mac and iOS are near-identical and both can be used. This is due to the initial setup it runs through when configuring a new (or recently restored) AirPort base station for the first time. AirPort UtilityĪpple’s current incarnation of AirPort Utility is a shadow of its former self and, whilst it doesn’t necessarily remove any functionality, it has made it much harder to configure. This is to ensure that if lose any wireless connectivity, you can easily restore it by connecting directly to your network rather than restoring anything to factory settings. I’d recommend having an ethernet cable and, if necessary, a USB or Thunderbolt Ethernet adapter.

It’s assumed that you have an existing network router and Ethernet available in any of the locations you’re wanting to set up an AirPort Express, whether it’s via Ethernet outlets or Powerline network adapters which provide a cheap and efficient way of putting in Ethernet anywhere at home without needing to run any cabling. This isn’t the case and by delving into the AirPort Utility app we can configure an AirPort Express to suit our needs. Unfortunately, the terribly counterintuitive AirPort Utility app doesn’t make this obvious and, if you bought one with the sole purpose of adding AirPlay functionality to a Hi-Fi via Ethernet, it gives the impression that it isn’t possible as it must do something related to Wi-Fi. Many people (myself included) have taken to using a few of these devices solely as AirPlay receivers that have their wireless functions disabled and connect to an existing network over Ethernet - effectively they’re dumb AirPlay receivers. You can connect it to an existing Hi-Fi or set of speakers and stream audio from any Apple device on your network without having to buy a whole new sound system.

#Apple airport express airplay 2 how to#

Need to figure out how to put this into a table or something.The AirPort Express is Apple’s pocket-sized 802.11n wireless router that features AirPlay connectivity via its 3.5mm Analog / Digital audio jack. There is different metadata/information available depending on the receiving device type (aTV vs AE vs other). From what I’ve seen here and in other threads, there is different control behavior depending on which device is streaming the music (iOS vs tvOS vs HomePod…OS?), and which device(s) are receiving the music. I think I might start an AirPlay function matrix document to try and lay all this out, and put it on GitHub or something. It’s hard to know what’s maybe a bug in an integration and what’s an “AirPlay” limitation.

Also very disappointing because I was hoping to make an all-AirPlay setup, but if other people can’t control zone volumes if they didn’t start the music, that’s a major You clearly know a lot about the underlying protocols because you’ve helped implement integrations, but to most people it’s just “Airplay”, and I can speak from experience when I say that it’s really confusing what AirPlay does and doesn’t support in different combinations. I never knew that either, but that explains some other behavior I was struggling with about a month ago. You cannot change volume for someone else that is streaming).