If this works as expected (and i plan on trying it out this weekend) it would lead the way to being able to add Spotify Connect devices to existing Stereo systems cheaply (a Raspberry Pi and possibly an external sound card)... Do the Pis still have crappy Stereo Audio? i remember the first (and possible second) gen ones being bad... not sure about the newer ones...
It's still buggy, but it mostly works as intended. I've been using it together with https://github.com/badaix/snapcast/ for whole-house multi-room audio.
The analogue audio is still pretty subpar. It's just (12bit?) pwm into a simple RC filter. the hdmi output is fine though, and there's a whole aftermarket of boards providing better audio (typically using their own dac on the i2s bus)
Spotify Connect lets any spotify client act as a remote, and lets you hand-off from one sink to another.
The primary benefit for me is that a Connect client is actually connecting to spotify itself - it's less output sink and more headless client. So if I start spotify playing, and then close my laptop, it can sleep properly without interrupting my Connect device.
I don't want to use a custom firmware image. I like the firmware provided by Google, and the monthly security updates. If I were to switch to a custom build of AOSP, I'd need to sideload Google Play Services (by downloading it from a source I trust less than I trust Google) and would also no longer get security updates.
I think I think this is pretty cool, but I'm not sure if the reasons I think it's cool are valid. For example, I can imagine a jukebox app for parties or bars accessible via SMS, but I can't tell if Spotifyd actually enables such an app. Furthermore, if Spotifyd does enable such an app, would that app be impossible without Spotifyd?
I glanced at the readme, but it looks like it's written for someone who already knows why they wanted an open source Spotify client.
Seems like sp[0] (from the README) could be a pretty decent basis for what you want.
That said, AFAIK it's not technically legal to use regular Spotify in a public space. Spotify Business[1] seems to use a separate client, no idea whether that's instead of or in addition to the consumer ones.
