I have problems with airplay. I hear quite cracks when streaming audio over airplay.
I have this problem on RPi with HiFiBerry via i2s and on CuBox with an USB DAC. Streaming from USB or network works fine.
I noticed this problem with test sounds streaming from my ipad. But it happens with other files, too and while streamin via iTunes from my PC.
It must be a problem with shairport. The cracks and plobs are rather quite but disturbing. It seems to happen only with higher frequencies above 500-800 Hz.
Does anyone have similar problems? It is absolutely reproducible and clearly an airplay problem. The best way to check it is to use a 1000 Hz test file and play it via airplay. It happens on all devices with all DACs and from all airplay clients.
I have similar problem, when I stream music from spotify via AirPlay i hear some irregular crackles.
Is there any solution for this?
Have you tried to increase the audio buffer size and buffer before play?
This can be edited in “Menu --> Playback --> General music daemon options”
This works wonders on slower or unstable connections, Volumio gets more time to do the transfer before and during playing.
As I understand, audio buffer size and buffer before play are related to mpd and have no influence on airplay.
I tried to update airplay but had no chance to do it on CuBox-I. Waiting for the new Volumio release …
Same problem with V 1.5
All platforms, all sound cards!
@volumio-team: btw, great job with the new version!
Still no solution in sight.
Seems nobody here has a good enough DAC to hear the strange distortions 
Try to play a 1000 Hz sinus file via airplay. The problem occurs with ANY DAC (HiFiberry, RPI-DAC, DragonFly) from ANY airplay source (iTunes, iPad,…) on ANY hardware (raspberry, Cubox) with old and new volumio version.
Hi!
I sent a 1kHz signal to my Volumio + Audiophonics ess9023 i2c dac via my android device with Allstream and it works, well…
Hi,
thank you balbuze.
I sent it with airplay (iTunes from my PC and from my iPad) to different devices. I also used different test signals.
I know a few people using iTunes and they are very interested in volumio and Cubox. But they don’t like the pops and the noise.