Apple Music Does Sound Check work over Airplay?

[GLTirebiter]

For a few years now it feels like local music files streamed over Airplay 2 do not use Sound Check to even out the volume levels. I switched to Airfoil a while back, which seems to totally resolve the issue, but just tried Airplay again and volume levels are all over the place. Sound Check over Bluetooth seems to work fine. I’m streaming from my Mac to Airport Express around the home.

Has anyone else experienced this?

 

[arw]

It may be too much effort for most, but I leave it here anyway as this way, I never experienced unusual loudness level fluctuations anymore (Airplay, Bluetooth, ...).

I always save the ReplayGain info into the file so when adding it to iTunes / Music, it already has everything calculated:
- I use the loudness analyzer of foobar2000 (Windows)
- For iTunes / Music to see the ReplayGain info, the appropriate tag has to be set (I batch convert the ReplayGain tag with Mp3tag):
For m4a: ITUNNORM:
$if($eql(%_extension%,m4a),[$rg2sc($if2(%REPLAYGAIN_ALBUM_GAIN%,%REPLAYGAIN_TRACK_GAIN%))],)
For mp3: COMMENT ITUNNORM:
$if($eql(%_extension%,mp3),[$rg2sc($if2(%REPLAYGAIN_ALBUM_GAIN%,%REPLAYGAIN_TRACK_GAIN%))],)

 

[GLTirebiter]

Thank you for sharing that! I’ve been using iVolume to set MP3 gain. I’m not sure I want to alter the original audio files, but that’s a foolproof way to get the result.

 

[arw]

The audio stream itself stays untouched. The gain info is additionally stored as a tag and can be removed should there be any reason to do so. (unless I misunderstood and you mean altering the file in general)

 

[GLTirebiter]

Ah…I misunderstood that you were adjusting the audio portion of the signal. Yes, the solution I use just changed the tag.