I don't find Apple Stuff easy

So, I've never been an Apple fan and I don't find most things to be very intuitive about Apple. I've never been a fan of iTunes either....but my wife had it installed on her computer for when she had her iPhone.

Anyway, I got a new home theater receiver and it supports Apple Airplay. So I thought tonight, why not try to fire it up and see how it works. It's Apple, it's supposed to be easy. Yeah, not so much.

I get into iTunes 10 on her PC, I click AirPlay it shows my receiver as a capable device, but clicking on it does absolutely nothing. I search the web for help, but most are on Mac's, using Apple TV, using an airport wireless network, etc. I have none of this stuff.

I assumed after a while that my old trusty Linksys WRT54G probably doesn't support something needed by Airplay. So, i connect the laptop via a network cable directly to the switch where my receiver is. While it still sees the receiver, I cannot pick it.

Oh well, this was just a bonus feature...not something that I specifically bought the receiver for.

Edit: At present, I'm trying to upgrade iTunes to 11.01 to see if that changes anything. Plus, it rebooted the computer.

Maybe the update might work.

Yep, sure enough the upgrade from 10 to 11.01 and a reboot of the PC fixed the issue. Even works without a problem over my wireless network.

This is not a bad feature at all. Although not a fan of iTunes...I'm going to keep an iTunes machine around for playing back my digital music collection as this is pretty sweet. It will turn on my receiver if it was off, and I can control the volume from my computer. Nice.

Apple guy here. I don't know how to help you. See this help read; maybe it will provide insights. I eventually had to give up on the router you mention, but because I wanted 5 GHz band too. I know I didn't try AirPlay from iTunes on a PC through Apple TV, but using a PC shouldn't be an issue in general. And, I never tried to use AirPlay through a receiver.

I'll keep my eyes open on your problem. I really like the AirPort Extreme base station, but I don't know if it would solve your problem; I sort of doubt it. As I recall, I was using the WRT54G(S), iTunes, my MacBook Pro, and Apple TV when I was using AirPlay from iTunes.

itunes 11 is such a metro design butchering if you ask me...

Coke Robot said:

itunes 11 is such a metro design butchering if you ask me...

Click to expand...

Oh well, it streams music directly to my home theater receiver and plays back flawlessly without stuttering or any other issues. Sounds good too. I'm not sitting at the computer looking at the UI, just selecting a playlist or album and hitting play.

I love this new receiver. It does Internet radio too, supports Sirius, Pandora, Spotify, etc.

pparks1 said:

Coke Robot said:

itunes 11 is such a metro design butchering if you ask me...

Click to expand...

Oh well, it streams music directly to my home theater receiver and plays back flawlessly without stuttering or any other issues. Sounds good too. I'm not sitting at the computer looking at the UI, just selecting a playlist or album and hitting play.

I love this new receiver. It does Internet radio too, supports Sirius, Pandora, Spotify, etc.

Click to expand...

I set up my home system differently, I center it around my desktop PC. It's connected to the sound system, and I play it from there. Internet radio? Xbox Music. Local library? Music Info. I never really got into internet radio....

But no, I was so upset when my iphone using/slightly regretting it friend showed me the update and she remarked how much it was ripped off from Windows 8, along with parts of ios 6. She is not a very clever woman.

My desktop PC and such is in my basement and is usually not turned on. My home theater is in my living room. I do have a DNLA media server setup on my server and can stream music and such from it, but then I have to control most of it from the receiver. It's pretty nice being able to control everything from within iTunes, including being able to turn on my receiver.

The receiver even has a web server on it and I can connect via a web page on my browser and setup the receiver, control the inputs as well as save the configuration. There is also an app for tablets and smartphones that lets me control my receiver as well.

Internet radio is nice as it's fast and easy to find genres or types of music from all over the world; So, if I want a German hard rock station, can quickly and easily find it. If my wife wants a contemporary Christian station, she can quickly grab it.

And when my computer is down and out and being rebuilt, rebooted, etc...I can continue to listen to all of my stuff since nothing is reliant on the PC

pparks1 said:

My desktop PC and such is in my basement and is usually not turned on. My home theater is in my living room. I do have a DNLA media server setup on my server and can stream music and such from it, but then I have to control most of it from the receiver. It's pretty nice being able to control everything from within iTunes, including being able to turn on my receiver.

The receiver even has a web server on it and I can connect via a web page on my browser and setup the receiver, control the inputs as well as save the configuration. There is also an app for tablets and smartphones that lets me control my receiver as well.

Internet radio is nice as it's fast and easy to find genres or types of music from all over the world; So, if I want a German hard rock station, can quickly and easily find it. If my wife wants a contemporary Christian station, she can quickly grab it.

And when my computer is down and out and being rebuilt, rebooted, etc...I can continue to listen to all of my stuff since nothing is reliant on the PC

Click to expand...

My PC is in the other room from the living room, as well as the stereo. I have two speakers on my desk from the stereo, and two more on a splitter to the living room. I also have it hooked up to my flatmates's TV, although I want to get a 100 inch pull down screen and projector. That, and a new receiver with HDMI inputs and outputs to make setup and switching easier. My PC is on literally 24/7, but I've recently set a task to sleep at night and wake up at 9 in the morning, of which my stereo's alarm goes off and my music starts playing. I need to keep my current fleet of hard drives from dying on me like my last one...

See, I was thinking last week that every since the iphone came out along with the app store, it seems EVERYTHING with a touch has apps or internet connections. And it made me wonder if home theater receivers will have app stores and internet connecting, I guess they do!

Oh my gosh, I had a couple of internet radio apps installed on my Windows Phone and PC and went to a German rock radio station and it some of the VERY same music I have, except they weren't German. Mildly disappointed! They listen to the same music as we do!!

pparks1 said:

Yep, sure enough the upgrade from 10 to 11.01 and a reboot of the PC fixed the issue.

Click to expand...

i'll be darned! Wouldn't have thought it.

I would love to have a projector setup, but my house is fairly small and I don't have the room to handle it. My 50" plasma is as big as my room can honestly support without sitting too close and having video quality suffer.

I'm just not an "Apple person" I guess. I had an iPhone for almost 4 years and hated every minute of it. I hate iTunes and the way it's so counterintuitive. I've just been a PC guy too long to change. I don't like the way Apple hides everything behind the scenes but I understand why people may like that approach. I love my Nokia Lumia 920 and the way it interfaces with Win7/Win8. I enjoy using M$ OS's and I've spent a lot of time and effort to learn M$ stuff, so switching to Apple is not an option for me.

I'm glad the M$ has competition because if they didn't prices would be crazy, not that they're low now!

Yeah, I'm obviously not an Apple person either. But using AirPlay is the simplest way to stream music from my PC to my receiver without having anything else involved. And since my wife had an iPhone previously, she already had iTunes installed so I used it.

Personally, I buy my music from Amazon.com and I use MediaMonkey as my actual laptop music player.