WiiMer SJ
Senior Member
Given the fraught history of Alphabet and Apple it's a wonder they're interoperable at all. Where they do, it's due to motivated self interest or government mandate.
Wiim amp bluetooth vs chromecast sound quality?
- Thread starter Sumit
- Start date
One hack I want to share you. Its not a hack actually. Its the way I play music to get better sound quality. Cast you apple music via google home app. Its will sound better than apple own casting via chromecast. I thing parametric eq improve the quality of sound then normal eq. Used that.
hgo58
Major Contributor
There is a big difference in the way the casting work then. Using bluetooth or casting via Google Home involves sending the audio digital signal via the phone and its EQ, while using Chromecast from the app sends it directly to the WiiM device and only using the phone as controller.
So why ther is a difference in sound quality. In my case for apple music via google home sounds grt. While from its own app it sounds thin, bluetooth sounds good, spotify from wiim amp sounds good. Gaana app casting via own app. Sounds ok.
You said Chromecast from the app, which app its wiim amp or streaming apps, plz clear that. I think wiim amp doesn't have direct casting option.
I'm using Google home app.
hgo58
Major Contributor
You do probably have some EQ enabled on the phone? If streaming via phone sounds better it may be modified for your liking, while the direct casting from the provider to WiiM is the unaltered audio without the "coloring" you like.
Sound quality is a subjective thing. Sometimes it sounds better when not perfect.
Use the EQ on WiiM to modify it to your liking.
No eq set on phone.
hgo58
Major Contributor
Technically the direct Chromecast should be better, so if the other options sounds better then there's probably an issue with the Chromecast settings somewhere or you just prefer the lower bitrate of Bluetooth.
Amen.
Technically Chromecast is better than Bluetooth AAC in any thinkable way. If it doesn't sound better, something is wrong. If the reason is not different EQ settings of the WiiM device for Wi-Fi and for Bluetooth then the reason is completely out of WiiM's realm.
Where Apple Music is involved, I understand that Chromecast also defaults to 256kbps AAC like it does with AirPlay 2 as the former doesn’t support lossless ALAC. And Bluetooth on WiiM is similarly SBC/AAC. So by and large they surely should all sound similar unless other factors are in play?
hgo58
Major Contributor
The OP is on Android with Apple Music, so there may be a technical explanation? As Chromecast doesn't support ALAC, which is what Apple Music streams at to the phone, direct Chromecast is probably downgrading to AAC that is on the level of MP3.
Bluetooth and casting from the phone uses the full audio quality available from ALAC although then compressed for Bluetooth.
Bluetooth and casting from the phone uses the full audio quality available from ALAC although then compressed for Bluetooth.
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But Bluetooth itself imposes the same AAC 256 kbps limit here, since WiiM don't support audio codecs other than SBC and AAC.
Yes, I should have said "potentially technically better", but in the case of Apple Music it should be "just as good" due to lacking ALAC support in Chromecast. Unless Apple is playing tricks here and the AAC data they provide for Chromecast is already of lesser quality than technically possible.
While ALAC is free software since 2011, the public master branch on github has not been updated in 9 years. According to the German Wikipedia article on ALAC, this did rise security concerns. This info is not contained in the English Wikipedia, so here is an automated translation:
(https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Lossless#Geschichte
Footnote 3: https://blog.checkpoint.com/2022/04...-users-privacy-around-the-world-were-at-risk/)
Apple obviously want their music service to be as closely tied to their ecosystem as possible.
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