Everything Apple (the Mac heads thread)

I use an Apple Airport Express and it works flawlessly. Sound is excellent.

Setting it up was a pain in the arse as I recall.
Apple claim that it will work with WEP WIFI encryption. It just fucking won't. You need to use WPA.
(But then you shouldn't be using WEP anyway, unless you really like connecting to the net with a Nintendo DS.)

Out of the box I think it wants to be the master, assuming that you have no WiFi already, and you need to configure it to work as a slave node on your existing network. The utility is a free download.

The audio port is clever. It's both a normal stereo mini-jack and an optical digital output.
(I bloody wish the modern Apple TV had this feature. I want one but I won't buy one without an analogue audio out.)

You can also connect a USB printer to it and print wirelessly from any device.

There are a number of software applications that work with Airplay and allow you to send all your sound to it. see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AirTunes for a list of some.
iTunes supports it natively of course, but so do many applications on iPads and iPhones - Youtube, Garageband, etc.

the combination of iTunes on a computer stuffed with MP3s, an Airport Express hooked up to the stereo and the Apple remote app on your iPhone and iPad is fucking killer.

so, the AE + the software you highlighted would have solved the 'all sound' issues? have they been around long?

(thanks, btw)