Listening to music with a DAC
Apple Music finally offers high-quality audio – but you’ll need a converter
Many DACs also include an amplifier to give your music extra volume and power
YOU WILL LEARN How to use a DAC and wired headphones for high-quality music
When Apple added new highquality ‘lossless’ and ‘high-res’ audio formats to the Apple Music service last summer, it was forced to admit that its own AirPods range of headphones are unable to actually play these new audio formats – and, yes, that even includes the madly expensive AirPods Max.
That’s because the AirPods all use Bluetooth – rather than conventional audio cables – to stream wireless music. The convenience of wireless headphones is great, of course, but Bluetooth – which was originally developed way back in the 1980s – was never designed to handle these modern, high-quality audio formats.
Playing lossless or high-res audio therefore requires either a conventional set of wired headphones, or Bluetooth headphones that also include a 3.5mm audio connector so that you can switch to a wired connection when you want to. That’s a really good option, as it gives you the convenience of Bluetooth when you’re travelling, but lets you switch to a wired connection when you get back home and want to enjoy your favourite tunes with the best possible sound quality. And, of course, you can play lossless and high-res music on external speakers that have a wired connection too.
That’s not the whole story, though. Even with a good set of wired headphones or speakers, the cheap and cheerful sound chips that Apple uses in Macs, iPhone and iPads aren’t really good enough to handle high-quality audio. So, in order to get the best sound quality from Apple Music or any other streaming service, or even sources such as an old CD collection, which is still stored in iTunes on your Mac, Apple now recommends you use an additional device known as a DAC – a digital-to-analogue-converter.
Macs and DACs
Modern DACs come in all shapes and sizes – some larger DACs are designed to sit on a desk alongside your Mac or PC, but there are lots of smaller DACs that are easy to carry around with a laptop, smartphone or tablet. However, all DACs have some basic features in common. On one end of the DAC you’ll find a USB port that can accept a digital audio signal – known as USB-Audio – from your Mac or iOS devices (as well as PCs and Android devices too). The other end of the DAC will have a 3.5mm audio connector, which can be used to connect wired headphones or an external set of speakers. More expensive DACs may also have additional connectors for use with high-end audio equipment. That can be useful for recording your own music, or for video-editing work that requires really good sound quality, but most
of us will get by with a more basic DAC that just has USB and 3.5mm audio connectors.
The reason it’s worth buying a DAC is that the analogue audio output that you get from a headphone connector on a Mac or iPad simply isn’t very good quality because of those cheap-as-chips sound chips that Apple uses. That’s why Apple’s technical notes for Apple Music now recommend using a DAC with wired headphones in order to play lossless or high-res music on Apple Music. You can also use a DAC to listen to lossless and high-res music from other streaming services, such as Tidal or Qobuz, and ‘offline’ sources such as your old CDs.
Using a DAC enables you to bypass the headphone connector on your Apple devices, and instead take a ‘pure’ digital audio signal from a USB or Lightning port on your Mac, iPhone or iPad. The DAC has a more specialised audio chip of its own that converts the digital audio into high-quality analogue sound - that’s the ‘digital-toanalogue’ bit - and you can then connect your wired headphones or speakers to the DAC in order to enjoy your music in the highest quality lossless and high-res formats.
Many DACs also include an amplifier as well, to give your music some extra volume and power, and that combination of improved quality and power can make a real difference when listening to your favourite music on your Apple devices.
Making a connection
Setting up a DAC can be a little tricky, though, because Apple uses a variety of different connectors on its products. MacBooks and some iPads now only have USB-C – and the new iPad mini only has USB-C with no headphone socket at all, so a DAC is essential if you want to use wired headphones or speakers. And, of course, the iPhone and many iPad models are still using the totally non-standard Lightning connector. Some DACs really don’t get on with Lightning connectors, so it’s important to check what cables and adaptors are supplied with any DAC before buying, so that you know it’s compatible with all your Apple devices.
But, thankfully, once you’ve connected your DAC to your Mac, iPhone or iPad, it will work automatically. The DAC will simply appear as an output option in the Sound Preferences panel on a Mac, while iPhones and iPads will show the DAC in the Audio section of Control Centre. So all you have to do now is sit back and enjoy your favourite music in all its high-quality glory.
Cliff Joseph