Image: Belkin
Belkin’s new SoundForm Connect Audio is a $99 dongle that lets you turn any pair of speakers with either a 3.5mm or optical port into an AirPlay 2-compatible setup. In other words, it’s effectively an Apple version of the (now-defunct) Chromecast Audio.
As someone who actually likes AirPlay 2, it’s a very interesting concept, especially if you have older speakers or an audio setup that you’d like to get wired into the rest of an AirPlay system.
Setup is simple: just plug in the SoundForm Connect Audio to power (over USB-C, thankfully), and then plug in a 3.5mm headphone jack or optical cable from your speaker system’s input port.
Image: Belkin
Unfortunately, the SoundForm Connect Audio does come with a pretty…