TuneBlade

TuneBlade

TuneBlade is a small tray utility from Breakfree Audio that streams system-wide audio from a Windows PC to AirPlay receivers. It captures whatever the computer plays and sends it over the local network to AirPort Express, Apple TV, AirPlay-enabled speakers and hi-fi receivers, or to AirPlay receiving software such as ShairPort, Kodi (XBMC) and TuneAero.

TuneBlade allows users to wirelessly stream all audio from their PC to one or several AirPlay-enabled devices at the same time.

Features

1. System-wide streaming: TuneBlade streams audio from any application, including Spotify, web browsers and media players. You simply select the AirPlay speakers in the small TuneBlade window, and everything the PC plays is sent to them, with no changes needed in the source application.

2. Multi-room audio: TuneBlade can stream to several receivers at the same time and keeps them in sync, so the same music can play in different rooms. Each receiver can be connected or disconnected separately.

3. Streaming modes: In the preferences you can choose real-time streaming with minimal delay, normal streaming, buffered streaming for congested wireless networks, or a custom buffer size. Audio is sent in uncompressed CD quality.

4. Video synchronization: TuneBlade can open a video file or a YouTube URL in VLC media player and play it with the sound synchronized to the AirPlay audio. The system latency can be fine-tuned with a slider.

5. Remote control: Volume and connection state can be controlled from an iOS app called Remote for TuneBlade. Remote access can be protected with a password, and the port can be selected automatically or set manually.

6. Sound equalizer: A 3-band equalizer lets you adjust lows, mids and highs. Other settings include automatic connection to discovered receivers, start at login and automatic update checks.

7. Licensing: TuneBlade is free for streaming to open source receivers such as Kodi, ShairPort on Linux or Raspberry Pi and Shairport4w. With other AirPlay devices the free version stops streaming every 10 minutes; the full version removes this limit for a one-time fee.

Conclusion

TuneBlade is a simple way to send all PC sound to AirPlay speakers and receivers, including multi-room setups. It runs only on Windows (Vista to 10), newer Sonos speakers with AirPlay 2 are supported, and the program has not been updated since version 1.8.0.0 released in December 2018.