Posted By Paul Kafasis on January 9th, 2014

It’s a new year, and a good time for a rundown on where things stand with our major applications. Back at the end of October, Apple officially released Mac OS X 10.9 (Mavericks). However, as readers of this blog know, it took us some time to get updates with compatibility for this new OS.

We had several public betas available throughout October and November, and at the end of November, we released official updates for Airfoil and Piezo. Finally, after several more betas, we released Mavericks-compatible updates to Audio Hijack Pro and Nicecast just before Christmas.

If you haven’t updated our apps recently, you should do so immediately. You can always download the latest version from our site, or by selecting “Check for Update” inside the application. If you’re using Fission or Piezo from the Mac App Store, just open the App Store app to update to the latest version.

New Underpinnings

We’re certainly pleased to have Mavericks support, but it took longer than we’d have liked. One major reason is that these updates feature an overhaul to our audio capture engine. This overhaul brought compatibility with Mavericks, along with the possibility for many future improvements. For now, the biggest difference most users will see is that updates to the Instant On component no longer require a restart. This will no doubt be a welcome change!

We’re still ironing out various wrinkles, but overall, this is a big and positive step forward. However, if you experience issues, we want to know about it. If audio capture no longer works as expected, Audio Hijack Pro and Nicecast users should first check the “Advanced” settings. If you still can’t get the audio you’re after, or you’re using Airfoil or Piezo, you should definitely contact us for assistance.

Airfoil Video Player

At this time, the biggest incompatibility with Mavericks is with Airfoil’s companion app, Airfoil Video Player. Airfoil Video Player was built to make it possible to play video locally on your Mac, with remote audio played out via Airfoil in sync. Unfortunately, Airfoil Video Player is not currently compatible with Mavericks. We’re still assessing this situation to determine what we can do for the future.

Safari Audio Capture

This particular issue occurs on all versions of Mac OS X, and impacts Piezo users most. Unfortunately, due to changes made by Apple, it’s no longer possible for Piezo to capture audio from Safari. We recommend that Piezo users capture web-based audio with another web browser, such as Google Chrome or Firefox.

Airfoil, Audio Hijack Pro, and Nicecast are also impacted. However, these apps are capable of capturing from Safari, when the Instant On component is installed. If you try to capture audio from Safari without Instant On installed, the app should prompt you to install. You can also install Instant On from the “Install Extras” window in the application’s menu. Once you’ve got that installed, you’ll be able to pull audio from Safari without an issue.

Unfortunately, Apple’s Mac App Store restrictions preclude us from including Instant On with Piezo. If you must capture from Safari (and can’t use another browser instead), we recommend our more powerful Audio Hijack Pro.

More to Come

That’s the current news on smaller updates. We’ll likely have further improvements over time, so always be sure you’ve got the latest version of your app. We’ll also have news on bigger updates and new products soon, so be sure to watch this blog.