[Reason077]

> "Apple should hire a couple hackers to create “end-of-life” firmware for their obsolete devices; give them new life as super-specialized devices."

They've actually done this in a few cases! There's a whole generation of obsolete Airport Express Wifi base stations that got a final firmware update which gave them AirPlay 2 functionality. Now they're still quite sought after as a device to make old stereos/speakers wirelessly compatible with the latest Apple devices. Especially if you have stereo eqipment that can take optical (TOSLINK) audio input.

[thejazzman]

I was so confused when I noticed people could still use those devices recently.

I think my AirPort Extreme got a pretty late update a few years ago too, I assume security related

[xattt]

> They’ve actually done this in a few cases!

Besides the AirPort Express, were there other devices that were issued EOL updates?

[dml2135]

Oh nice. I didn’t know about the Airplay 2 update, but I’ve been using an old Airport Express to airplay for this old audio receiver I have for ages. And I’ve got a spare I hold onto in case this one ever shits the bed.

And while we’re on the topic — its amazing how many hifi audio receivers I see being thrown away, stuff that is still top-of-the-line for sound quality, but is now considered “obsolete” purely based on connectivity options — ie not having a direct bluetooth/wifi ability, when one could easily buy a separate device for that and hook it up.

[lloeki]

Exactly what I do!

I build quite a bunch of Pi e.g for multiroom setups:

- some output directly via the jack (which is okay quality wise as long as you don't push the gain/stay at line level, the device downstream being the one doing amp)

- others have an iqaudio hat (either DAC for when the internal jack doesn't cut it or people want 24/192 or Amp+ to drive passive speakers)

And I didn't notice til recently but the Amp+ has onboard headers for balanced output, so with a bit of soldering one can add, say, XLR to the thing.

Then throw in some room eq via an impulse response and you get a device that rivals off the shelf stuff that cost one to two orders of magnitude more, plus you get to not throw away perfectly good hardware.

Similarly I've smartified a crapton of dumb+ devices with a bunch of Shelly stuff (notably Plug S are dead easy): washing machine, water heater, mechanical ventilation, light switches, thermostatic valves...

+ And in a few cases smart ones too, except I compared what I can do with the first party offering and my hackjob, and it's nuts that not only the first party shit is never local when technically it could totally be, but that my hacked-together BS is more useful than the first party option, on top of being 100% local.

[j45]

Handy, I hope I have mine still!