Sometimes, things just work

My laptop threw another wobbly about 10 days ago. Black screen, everything else working fine. And just after I’d got my internet access at home sorted out too. Turned out to be the same problem as before (cue old Doctor Doctor joke), fixed under warranty again and returned last night good as new.

So I thought I’d see whether I could get the Airport Express up and running. And I could, just by following the instructions in the Assistant. Which was nice.

And then I tested iTunes over the hi-fi. And that worked too. But it is not that useful, effectively just a long lead between the Mac and the speakers. And alas, iTunes radio stations just don’t have that much of interest in good quality. Unlike, say, BBC radio. Still, a good evening’s effort.

And then, this morning, on my VersionTracker RSS feed¹, was news of a program called Airfoil², from the people who make Audio Hijack. It is simply astonishing. Takes any audio stream and feeds it direct to the Airport Express. OK, the free trial version adds white noise to the output after 10 minutes. That takes two clicks to fix. Two clicks, every ten minutes; small price to pay. Astonishing. And no reason not to register.

It’s enough to restore one's faith in technology.