nVidia Shield TV Pro (2019 version), still relevant in 2025! A listen to Auro-3D & Auro-Matic Upsampler.

Hey guys, I thought it would be fun to talk about something that's been around quite awhile already but which I still bought in 2025. As per the image above, it's the nVidia Shield TV Pro (US$200, CAD$260). For years, I've been using the Apple TV 4K (2nd Gen, 2021) which is a fine unit with all the bells and UI whistles of the Apple ecosystem. But it is missing something that "serious" movie audio lovers - and even audiophile music lovers - might want; lossless audio bit-streaming for Dolby TrueHD/Atmos and DTS/HDMA/X.

That's right, sadly, after all these years, Apple doesn't care to update the AppleTV to support basic bit-streamed audio. 😢

Note that I don't necessarily blame them as a company, they make no money off local libraries of UHD/BluRay-ripped content. So if I were running the business, I'd also think twice about getting developers to support a feature that at this time in history they will make no streaming subscription revenue from. Streaming services - Apple TV, Apple Music, Netflix, Prime Video - all do not send lossless multichannel audio content, opting typically for lossy Dolby EAC3 with or without Atmos. Not supporting much beyond the basic feature set is nothing new with Apple as part of their KISS closed ecosystem mentality. (The only lossless multichannel I've come across are the few albums on Qobuz.)

Since 2021, without lossless bit-streaming to the receiver, I've been using Infuse PRO on the Apple TV which will decode Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio to multichannel PCM. Doing this removes the embedded Atmos or DTS:X height effects (can turn on Dolby Surround Upmixer or DTS Neural X to extract some content back). At least lossy EAC3-Atmos is sent directly to the receiver.

Therefore in 2025, the only other mainstream choice is still the Shield TV, a device that seems to be catered more to the home-theater enthusiast with lossless audio - thanks nVidia.

Apple TV 4K, 2nd Generation (2021, A12 Bionic SoC, 6th Gen Apple TV): A look and listen (to "Spatial Audio" on Apple Music)...

So guys and gals, let's jump from the lo-tech "audiophile boutique" passive AudioQuest JitterBug FMJ last week to talk about something hi-tech this time.

As I mentioned a few weeks back, I've been listening to some of the "Spatial Audio" music streaming off Apple Music these days. Easy to give it a shot with the 1-3 month trial period they're offering.

As I mentioned before, while I enjoy the content on headphones and can experience the difference Atmos streaming makes, as one who enjoys excellent high fidelity sound quality (ie. "audiophile"), the best, most natural way of listening to multichannel content is in the sound room where I have my multiple speakers set up. I have a modest surround system with the ELAC Debut 2.0 A4.2 Atmos speakers (previously measured) adding a bit of that height effect with Paradigm Signature S8 v.3 fronts, matching C3 center channel, full tower Studio 80 v.3 for rears and dual subs to make basically a 5.1.2 arrangement.

The trick with getting the multichannel content out to the room has to do with whether Apple Music allows the bitstream to pass through the playback device into the AV receiver that can handle Atmos. As I mentioned in that previous article, I can get the "bed" channels out (ie. 5.1, 4.0, etc...) using my wife's M1 MacBook Air running the recent macOS Big Sur release, but this is with the machine decoding the DD+ (E-AC3) + Atmos stream into 24/48 5.1 PCM sent to the receiver over HDMI.

For bitstream passthrough including the full Atmos encoding, at least at this point in time, the Apple TV works and let's talk about this box today for audio/home theater usage... As you can see above, I have the Apple TV 4K, Gen 2, 64GB here - this was released just recently April/May 2021 with the "A12 Bionic" 7nm SoC which actually was first used in the iPhone XS series back in late 2018. Certainly energy-efficient and plenty fast for non-multitasking media playback. If you don't need the storage, the 32GB model saves you US$20 - as usual, Apple has no SD card expansion for their devices. Internally, the machine has 3GB RAM.