Connecting iPhone to old amp

[Randolph]

I have a rather lovely Cyrus 7 amp and want to play some music that I now only have in my iPhone. I’m happy with a wired connection but being technically stupid am stumped as to how to proceed. I assume I need some type of portable DAC with connection for lightning wire (to connect from the iPhone) and 2x rca for the amp?

Don’t need anything expensive as will probably bite the bullet on a proper streamer at some point.

[OlonMusky]

Google dragonfly red or dragonfly cobalt. These are a good starting point.

[Miserablegit]

You have a number options:

1. Lightning to 3.5mm adaptor (one came with the phone I would think) then get a 3.5mm to rca adaptor or

2. Simple 3.5mm to rca adaptor and use the headphone socket if your iPhone has one or

3. Get a Bluetooth receiver to plug into the amp via the rca connections or

4. Get one of the lightning DACs as mentioned by another poster.


3.5mm to rca cable looks like this - they range from about £5 to quite a bit. I’d think anything about £15 would be ok.

Edited by Miserablegit on Sunday 12th January 13:27

[Randolph]

Thanks all, by sheer luck I found the right cable in a drawer. The sound is very poor though with very little depth. I assume this is because iPhone dac is not really designed for that type of function. Would a dragon fly make lots of difference?

[alorotom]

There’s all sorts of 3rd party applications that can transfer music back to a pc or Mac

[OlonMusky]

Randolph said:

Thanks all, by sheer luck I found the right cable in a drawer. The sound is very poor though with very little depth. I assume this is because iPhone dac is not really designed for that type of function. Would a dragon fly make lots of difference?

Dragon Fly would make it sound much better.

[mikef]

If you want to stream by wireless to a cherished stereo amp, I can def recommend a Yamaha WXAD-10

As well as Airplay streaming from your iPhone, laptop, etc, it has built-in clients for several streaming services

[Miserablegit]

Randolph said:

Thanks all, by sheer luck I found the right cable in a drawer. The sound is very poor though with very little depth. I assume this is because iPhone dac is not really designed for that type of function. Would a dragon fly make lots of difference?

It might also be as a result of the quality of the audio files on the iPhone - I don’t use iTunes these days but might it be that they are compressed and so even a good DAC will struggle.
I’d vote for the Yamaha dac/streamer referenced above as well because it can stream hi res music. I use a few Yamaha bits of kit to replace Sonos in parts of my house and they are good.

[Randolph]

thanks for all the replies - very helpful. The Yamaha box looks perfect

[blueg33]

I use this to connect to my old NAD amp. It works brilliantly

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B016NUTG5K/ref=sspa_dk...

I use the Logitech version, its the same thing.

[megaphone]

Randolph said:

Thanks all, by sheer luck I found the right cable in a drawer. The sound is very poor though with very little depth. I assume this is because iPhone dac is not really designed for that type of function. Would a dragon fly make lots of difference?

Make sure you have the iPhone volume cranked up to full, often it defaults to half volume when you plug in, means you need to whined the amp up higher and it sounds naff. Also make sure the audio settings in the iPhone are set flat.

[stevoknevo]

The Google Chromecast audio is another solution - sadly Google have stopped manufacturing them so prices have went up by around 50% minimum but they are available on ebay for under half of the Yamaha device above.
Connect to your Cyrus 7 via 3.5mm to 2 x RCA, supply power to the Chromecast audio and connect it to your WiFi and then stream from your iPhone - WiFi streaming is more battery friendly to your iPhone than Bluetooth streaming.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/p/Google-Chromecast-Audio-2...