For the past 10 years my video/audio setup was comprised of a Denton amplifier, a DAC, an old gen Apple TV, a turntable, a CD player that got broken in the meantime and two hi-fi speakers of good quality. The Apple TV was used to connect my iPhone or MacBook to the amplifier via an optical to coaxial converter plugged onto the DAC. Likewise the sound from my TV was redirected via an optical cable to the DAC. I also add a direct connection via a coaxial from the CD player to the DAC but to be honest built in DAC in the CD player was already good enough so that it makes little difference if any.

Today I’m left with a 4K Apple TV and an HomePod which means a lot less of cables lying around here and there. To be honest I don’t really care about the video setup since I barely watch TV shows these days. I know I can still get a decent audio output from my amplifier, but maybe a second HomePod which I could pair with the present one would do the job as well. As for streaming my music via Airplay, the combo Apple TV + HomePod means instant feedback. While I had to wait for 4-5 seconds before the old Apple TV wake up and start playing, it’s now instant: Just press the play button and listen to the music. As when you open your laptop and get prompted with your login screen. That’s what Steve Job wanted from the beginning:, after all: that the system get ready instant.

And in case you wonder, this is a very old 2 To Time Capsule, and an even older MacBook Pro (PPC).

Of course, in case the network is down nothing’s working anymore in the house. That’s the 21st century, right? Thankfully I will still be able to play my old records on the turntable! Or listen to some of the 20k songs I keep archived on my HD using headphones or AirPods.

Even if haven’t tested at the time the old Apple TV was still connected to my home network I’m pretty sure it would have been possible to stream Apple Music to both Apple TVs so that I could get the audio playback redirected to my DAC from the old Apple TV while the newest one would have been using the HomePod.