Possible AirPlay bug with iOS 9. Not 9.0.1?

[Keyboard Magic]

Sorry this is a bit long winded, but wanted to fill in some background info along the way. 

So at the Church dinner gig last night I was using the DL1608 wirelessly with the AP Express, iPod Touch 5th Gen with AirPlay, and one iPad 2 docked in the DL. Using an Air 2 for remote. I was playing keyboards for dinner music and in between playing keys, I played audio tracks for break music.

Every time I switched from keys to AirPlay I would have to reconnect the iPod Touch AirPlay function to the AP Express. The weirder thing was that when I was playing audio trax, AirPlay never disconnected. The iPod was practically sitting on top of the AirPort express! I never moved it all evening.

Wireless with the DL was perfectly flawless, no loss of sync the whole gig. I had not updated to the latest iterations of MF and iOS 9 prior to the gig on Sat night.

I am running on the 5 GHz band exclusively. Shouldn’t have been interference in a small Church Hall with about 50 people and the hall does not have any wireless access points or repeaters anywhere. Hall is old, no ground on AC outlets anywhere. Ugh!

Now everything is updated to iOS 9.0.1, and MF 3.2.2. I should probably test the same setup with the new updates to see if I can recreate the problem. Unfortunately only at home.

Has anyone run into this little bug when using AirPlay with the new iOS 9?

[WK154]

" The iPod was practically sitting on top of the AirPort express! I never moved it all evening. "
That could be your problem, too close. Check it out I don't have a iPod 5.

[Keyboard Magic]

" The iPod was practically sitting on top of the AirPort express! I never moved it all evening. "
That could be your problem, too close. Check it out I don't have a iPod 5.

You'd think that being that close together, nothing could interrupt the signal? Or maybe too strong a signal? I will play around at home varying the distances. I know I never had to reconnect AirPlay at the school 50 feet away from the AP, even with 100 people and all their active phones.

Gotta be bad Karma maybe? 

It's actually not a big deal since it's solid while working and it's only a minor annoyance at most though. 

[Weogo]

Hi KM,

I agree with WK154.

Years ago I had an AKG wireless system that specified the transmitter be at least 16' from the receiver.
Distance probably varies with wireless strength, frequency, etc.

Thanks and good health,  Weogo

[Keyboard Magic]

Hi KM,

I agree with WK154.

Years ago I had an AKG wireless system that specified the transmitter be at least 16' from the receiver.
Distance probably varies with wireless strength, frequency, etc.

Thanks and good health,  Weogo

Thank you to you and WK.  I will certainly give that a try. 

[Wynnd]

I'm not sure of the exact reasons, but my guess would be the ghost broadcast frequencies.  If you live right beside a radio antenna, you will get that channel in about 5 different frequencies.  (Radio version of overtones.)

[Keyboard Magic]

An update to my OP about this topic, if you're interested of course.

Still having a lot of trouble with Airplay dropping sync when playing tracks with any iDevice. It’s rock steady while playing tunes to the express, but when you leave it idle for up to 5 minutes (devices not allowed to go to sleep, always on) and come back to use airplay, you have to force the iDevice to reconnect.

Using Airplay with the windows laptop and iTunes, Airplay never drops even when left idle. Was on the phone to Apple Support about this issue, spoke to Apple networking tech and even an iOS tech. They couldn’t figure out what was going on.

It was suggested that I do a complete recovery on my iPod Touch 5th gen using iTunes. This wipes everything off the device and does a complete re-install of, in this case, iOS 9.1. I did this and when everything was restored, I tried Airplay once again and low and behold, it dropped Airplay sync with the express router regular as clock work when left to idle. I even reset my express router back to factory specs as well, to no avail.

I tried both the iPad 2 and Air 2 with the same results. Ugh!

Funny that there are no issues with a laptop running Windows 10, iTunes and Airplay with the AirPort Express whatsoever.

Starting to think that there is a bug with iOS 9.X causing AirPlay connectivity to drop like that. Not good when playing backing tracks for choirs at major (okay small) school concerts. Actually even the iOS tech hinted that this might, kinda like, even possibly be an iOS 9.X issue and that iOS 9.2 might, sort of fix it.

Here’s hoping for a fairly quick release of iOS 9.2, cause once you’ve run your shows completely wireless (okay dozens of times!) you never go back. (if you don't have to, of course as a last resort, hence the backup analog mixer)

Thank you for reading this. 

PS: Wireless connectivity with the Airport Express, DL1608 and MF is rock solid all the time. Not ever one drop out, that I noticed. Hmm!

[dpdan]

loosing connectivity is never fun, so I feel sad for you.
If I were supplying sound for an event such as yours, I would never use Airplay for the tracks, especially if it is in front of an audience.
I would connect an MP3 player of your choice to the Mackie mixer's line inputs.

As professional engineers, (professional = profession, only meaning that we are paid),...
we should expect anything that is wireless can fail far more likely than a physically connected device.
So, if you are in a position where using a wired device for something like this is possible, that is always going to be the most reliable way to go.

.02

[ToH2002]

As professional engineers, (professional = profession, only meaning that we are paid),...
we should expect anything that is wireless can fail far more likely than a physically connected device.
So, if you are in a position where using a wired device for something like this is possible, that is always going to be the most reliable way to go.

100% agree - even though I hardly ever get paid for my engineering ;-)

The beauty of the Mackie wireless mixing is that even when the wireless connection fails, there is no loss of audio signal (just loss of my ability to change anything    ). Using AirPlay for part of the performance takes away this safety net.

To avoid this, I am using a HifiBerry (www.hifiberry.com - essentially a Raspberry Pi with an improved audio interface) running Volumio as my audio player for break music, backing tracks etc. instead of a classic MP3 player. Advantage: I can control it just like the DL32R - via WiFi with my iPad (it's attached to the same Wifi access point as my DL32R). And it's super-easy to put tracks on it - no fiddling with iTunes or an unwieldy file system as in the DL32R - simply put the mp3 files on a USB stick (in whatever directory structure) and attach it to the HifiBerry - done!

And the whole package (Raspberry, audio interface board, case, power supply, memory card, cables) is less than 100 Euros - not too bad...

Cheers,

Torsten

[Keyboard Magic]

Thanks to both of you; dpdan and ToH2002 for your input on my issue. I truly appreciate it! 

Since I run the sound from the back of the venue, using AirPlay was the most logical and cost effective thing to use. Having the audio player at FOH connected to the DL is more secure, but I’d have to assign a reliable person to cue up the tracks for me. But as you mentioned dpdan, it is a wiser solution.

Having said that, I’ve come across an app that may just be the ticket for my iOS woes. It’s called Tango Remote with Up Next Queue. $5.79 CDN at the app store.

http://blueatlastechnology.com/tangoremote/

It might be just the right thing for my particular situation. I can leave the iPod Touch direct connected to the DL and run it with Tango Remote from my second iPad, thus removing AirPlay from the equation, even though I’m still using my wireless network. And keep my fingers crossed that iOS 9.2 cures this particular ailment affecting AirPlay. When it's released soon, that is. 
 
ToH2002;

Your solution looks very interesting too. I will certainly consider it, if all else fails.

Thank you both once again!

[ToH2002]

Having said that, I’ve come across an app that may just be the ticket for my iOS woes. It’s called Tango Remote with Up Next Queue. $5.79 CDN at the app store.

http://blueatlastechnology.com/tangoremote/

It might be just the right thing for my particular situation. I can leave the iPod Touch direct connected to the DL and run it with Tango Remote from my second iPad, thus removing AirPlay from the equation, even though I’m still using my wireless network.

This looks pretty much the same as my solution: attach the player directly to the DL and remote control it from wherever you are, eliminating the need for a Minion sitting by the DL to cue up the next song. Minor advantage of my Solution: the HifiBerry is a pretty unspectacular black box, mounted within my mixer rack, and thus not as likely to spontaneously evaporate as a shiny nice iPod Touch sitting unwatched on a busy stage ;-)

[Keyboard Magic]

"Minor advantage of my Solution: the HifiBerry is a pretty unspectacular black box, mounted within my mixer rack, and thus not as likely to spontaneously evaporate as a shiny nice iPod Touch sitting unwatched on a busy stage ;-)"


Especially at an Elementary School too! 

[WK154]

KM I can't remember if you tried Bluetooth in the past but since you have a docked iPod Touch and iPad then Bluetooth is available and I would use it with Tango. It's a lot more robust than WiFi and I've had no issues using both together. Interference is a myth and once paired reconnect is automatic. Distance would be the only issue with Apple devices, a class 2 which limits you to 33 ft or less.

[Keyboard Magic]

KM I can't remember if you tried Bluetooth in the past but since you have a docked iPod Touch and iPad then Bluetooth is available and I would use it with Tango. It's a lot more robust than WiFi and I've had no issues using both together. Interference is a myth and once paired reconnect is automatic. Distance would be the only issue with Apple devices, a class 2 which limits you to 33 ft or less.

I thought about Bluetooth, but what about all the smart devices in the room, 50 -70 phones that could connect with Bluetooth and possible disruption of my BT streaming?

Or what about one of these connected audio out to the DL and stream BT from my iPod Touch?

http://www.bestbuy.ca/en-CA/product/amped-wireless-amped-wireless-bluetooth-speaker-adapter-btsa1-ca-btsa1-ca/10299766.aspx

Here's the products home page too:

http://www.ampedwireless.com/products/btsa1.html

I guess I have to remember that I'm sweating the logistics and it is volunteer work. I guess I wouldn't have it any other way though. Gotta do your best at all times. 

[WK154]

I think you are confused about how it works. The Bluetooth in this case (Tango control)  Ipad to Ipod is not streaming audio. The iPod is presenting audio to the DL wired. The control is via Bluetooth from the iPad. It takes a pair state for the devices to connect so no phone can hook up unless both are in that state. Would you let anyone go thru that process knowingly?