Posted By Paul Kafasis on January 28th, 2013

Using our popular Airfoil app, you can stream audio from your Mac or PC out to hundreds of compatible devices around your house. That list includes Android devices, thanks to our free Airfoil Speakers for Android, released last month in the Google Play store.

If you’ve got a Kindle Fire, or simply prefer the Amazon Appstore on any other Android device, you’ll now be able to find Airfoil Speakers in Amazon’s store. Though we submitted the app at the same time we released it in the Google Play store (seven weeks ago), Airfoil Speakers for Android has only just now been approved — quite the delay. Nevertheless, the wait is over. Read more about Airfoil Speakers for Android or just head over to the Amazon Appstore directly to download and getting sending audio to your Android device.

Posted By Paul Kafasis on January 25th, 2013

Earlier this month, Macworld’s Dan Frakes posted his Mac Gems of the Year for 2012, and we were honored to see our streamlined audio editor Fission included in that list! You can read about it with the link above, or listen to Dan and Chris Breen chat about all the winners on the Macworld podcast. Of course, we already knew Fission 2 was a hit, lauded by critics and users alike. We’ve been both thrilled with the reception and busy making it even better.

Since its initial release in September, we’ve put out a decent-size update in the form of version 2.1, which offered full Retina compatibility, support for the AAC-HE audio format and MP3 CBR (in addition to VBR), as well many other improvements. We’re now working on squashing various bugs. We’ve already released a bug fix version 2.1.1, and have lots of great updates and improvements to come.

If you haven’t tried Fission yet, you can learn more right here.

Posted By Paul Kafasis on December 11th, 2012

After two months in beta testing, we’re delighted to unveil the first public release of Airfoil Speakers for Android. It’s now available in the Google Play store, so if you’ve got an Android device running 2.3 (Gingerbread) or higher, get it now. You can also click here for more information.

By running Airfoil Speakers on your Android device and coupling it with Airfoil, you can play audio from any Mac or Windows machine, all around the house. Now anything playing on your computer can be heard on your Android phone or tablet too.

Airfoil Speakers receiving audio on Android

A Few Notes

Here’s a few items worth noting while you use the app.

• Due to issues with the operating system itself, Airfoil Speakers for Android will not always play in sync with other AirPlay receivers. We’re still working on this, but at this time you can manually adjust the delay using the slider in Settings. If you tweak this and find a stable value, please report in with your device type and Android version, along with that ideal latency value.

• Airfoil Speakers for Android currently receives audio solely from Airfoil for Mac or Airfoil for Windows. In the future, we’ll see about making it possible to receive audio directly from iOS and iTunes.

• Airfoil Speakers for Android does not currently offer reverse connect or remote control, two features found in some other versions of Airfoil Speakers. We’ll see what happens there.

• We have no current plans for Airfoil for Android (that is, an application which would send audio from Android out to AirPlay receivers). Android does not currently provide the level of access needed to create this. We’ll see what happens in the future, however.

Stay Tuned

As you can see by the version number, this is just the initial public release. We have plans for updates and more features, so keep an eye out. For now, just grab Airfoil Speakers for Android 1.0, and enjoy!

Posted By Paul Kafasis on November 2nd, 2012

As you may know, we released version 2 of our audio editor Fission recently, and it’s been very well-received. We’re never content though, so we’ve been spending the past weeks fixing problems and adding features.

Now, we’re pleased to release Fission 2.1. This is a major update, with a lot of useful changes and improvements our users have asked for, and we’re eager to get it in your hands.

New and Improved

So, what’s new? The first thing some of our users will notice is that Fission 2.1 is now fully Retina-ready. So, if you’ve got a 15″ Retina MacBook Pro or the new 13″ model, Fission will look gorgeous on your display.¹

We’ve also got some new features and functionality. For audiophiles, Fission now offers both VBR and CBR MP3 exporting, in its Custom settings, and also features support for high-efficiency AAC (HE-AAC) exporting. Fission can now open and import audio from more formats, open files dragged directly from iTunes, write iTunes-style AIFF tags, export to many more sample rates, and much more.

MP3 CBR and HE-AAC are now available in Fission’s Custom settings.

And of course, we’ve squashed a slew of bugs. Most importantly, an alert which could appear when trying to save a file has been fixed. Support for slightly malformed FLAC files has been improved as well, along with other improvements to the Batch Converter. We’re also properly handling extensions in Save panels, correctly handling album artwork in file icons, avoiding overwriting files imported via QuickTime, and fixed many other small issues.

This update fixes and improves myriad items on our list, and should improve the experience of using Fission for all of our users. Get it today!

Updating to Fission 2.1

If you purchased directly through our store, Fission is immediately available for download. You can head over to the Fission page or just open your copy of Fission 2 and choose Check for Update from the Fission menu. This is a free update for all users of Fission 2, so get it now.

If you purchased Fission via the Mac App Store, you’ll need to wait for Apple to approve the update we’ve submitted. We’ve strived to have simultaneous releases in the past, and hope to continue to do so in the future. However, recent extended waits for approval by Apple’s review team have convinced us it’s in the best interest of our direct purchasers to provide Fission 2.1 to them as quickly as possible, despite the fact the Mac App Store version is not yet available for download.

We’ll have the Mac App Store version updated as soon as Apple allows, and we’ll update this post when it’s available.

Update (November 20th, 2012): Apple has finally approved Fission 2.1, and it’s now available on the Mac App Store. Click here to get it.

Upgrading

If you’re still using Fission 1, now’s a great time to upgrade! You can do so at a greatly-discounted price, right here.

Footnotes:

1. We’re slowly working on Retina updates for all of our software. Next up is likely to be Piezo, hopefully by the end of the year, then others to follow. Stay tuned!   ↩

Posted By Paul Kafasis on October 4th, 2012

We obviously think Fission 2 is great, and we’ve heard much the same from many of our users. But if you’re unconvinced, you don’t need to take our word for it. Check out these reviews:

Over at Macworld, Kirk McElhearn took Fission through its paces, and he was very impressed. We’re thrilled to have earned a rating of 4.5 mice. While that would be a very poor score for a restaurant kitchen, it’s a near-perfect score for Mac software.

Speaking of near-perfect scores, we managed to earn another, from IT-Inquirer. Erik Vlietinck gave Fission a 9.5 out of 10, stating “I expected Fission to be much like Apple’s Soundtrack Pro, but it’s simpler, more elegant, and it has brilliant support for editing podcasts”. Thanks for the kind words!

We also had a rave review from Glenn Fleishman, writing for TidBITS. Glenn was impressed with Fission’s “crisp” new interface, saying “it abounds with nice new touches”. He also found many of version 2’s new features to be quite useful. We think you’ll agree.

If you haven’t taken Fission for a test drive yet, head over to the Fission page to learn more and download the free trial. If you’re already using Fission 2, don’t think we’re resting on our laurels. We’re currently squashing bugs for Fission 2.0.1, and planning future updates as well, so watch for updates!