A commenter known only as "David" on my post about the new MiniStore in iTunes noticed a great new
feature that I'm surprised wasn't somehow worked into yesterday's keynote: multiple speaker streaming. iTunes can now
stream music to multiple AirPort Expresses, and even keep playing the music on the originating computer. Users have been clamoring for this ability since the day the AirPort Express hit store shelves, it finally shows up in a .0.2 iTunes update - and not a single peep about it? I guess not every new feature, option and button can claim a coveted keynote mention, but it's good to see you TUAW readers are on your toes when we're neck-deep in news ourselves.













Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
1-11-2006 @ 8:18AM
Greg said...
So what's that typo there? "Speekers" ?! wtf?
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 8:29AM
SuperDan said...
I find this ez, yet hard to miss... Apple did not hide it, they just let it speak for its' self.
http://www.apple.com/itunes/share/
Look Near the bottom....
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 8:36AM
David said...
You can also tag your own movies as TV Shows finally!
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 8:56AM
Andrew said...
You need to have the latest firmware update (6.3) installed on each Airport Express for multiple speakers to work.
http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/airportexpressfirmwareupdate63formacosx.html
a
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 9:00AM
James said...
And a commenter known only as "James" mentioned it a whole 15 hours earlier in the original iTunes 6.0.2 post...
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 9:15AM
DrWho said...
Speekers? You can name the airport expresses whatever you want, no spell checking required!
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 9:19AM
Zeno said...
Nice!
(I believe AirFoil 2.0 could already do that...)
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 9:21AM
Ted said...
Whaaaaaa! That is fantastic, long overdue Steve.
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 9:24AM
K said...
Did anyone try this out yet? Was wondering if there was a delay as in experienced with AirFoil...
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 9:26AM
Jacob Varghese said...
Any clue on why Pixar shorts are no longer available for sale on iTunes? They have been unavailable since yesterday morning.
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 9:38AM
Kevin R said...
I'm suprised that no-one has picked up on another major feature: convert your movies to an ipod-compatible format *within itunes*. Add any quicktime compatible format to itunes, right click and select "covert for ipod". iTunes will now convert to it an .m4v file, and add it to the library. It looks like it keeps both files in the libary. Thus you can now have a playlist with your higher-res video content for viewing on-screen, and another for synching to the ipod. Combine with the new tagging options to keep organized by content type. Not bad...
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 9:44AM
Mark said...
THANK YOU #4 for finally explaining WHY this didn't show up in iTunes for me.
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 10:30AM
B said...
Pretty sure this is new-automatic bookmarking of podcasts.
I noticed that I could listen to a pod cast, hit stop, go listen to some songs, and next time I double-clicked the pod-cast, it started where I left off...nifty.
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 10:32AM
Ted said...
I have tried it, it works great with no delay. The only problem is that the volume control in iTunes controls only the volume on your PC and not on your Airport. Am I missing something or are others having this same issue?
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 10:39AM
olivier said...
well, i experienced yesterday the MULTIPLE SPEAKER feature. but i couldn't figure how to adjust the volume level on the Airport-connected speakers.
anyone?
oh and by the way, the airport patch downloaded last week didn't solve the dropping problems at all... thanks apple for making my internet connection and speakers useless.
olivier
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 10:50AM
David Chartier said...
Hey. Speekers was an intentional name. No making fun of my choice in AirPort Express names!
:)
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 11:36AM
Rick said...
This is Keynote material!! The only thing I don't like is that I can adjust the volume while its set to multiple spkrs.
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 11:43AM
n8dawg87 said...
I've had nothing but problems with 6.0.2...it hangs my powermac dual 2.3 everytime i try to transfer content to my ipod :(
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 12:01PM
Stephen Jonke said...
I don't have an Airport Express, but can see in the preferences that there is an option to ignore the iPod volume for Airport Express "speakers". Presumably you just need to uncheck that setting in order to have the iTunes volume affect the remote speakers
Reply
1-11-2006 @ 1:20PM
Sal said...
Can anyone explain exactly how i can now stream music to my stereo while contemporaneously listening to music on my laptop? I only have one base station, so the multiple stream function is useless to me unless I can also listen on my laptop.
--sib
Reply