shairport-sync VS raspotify

It's worth noting that shairport-sync exists. Perhaps it could be made easy by knitting some functions together?

You want SnapCast. You'd run snapserver on your Linux box and snapclient on your Pi's. Snapserver has support for Airplay (via shairport-sync) and Spotify (via librespot). I recommend using MPD for your music library, as I don't think PlexAmp can output audio in a way that's useful for snapserver.

I use shairport-sync for airplay (https://github.com/mikebrady/shairport-sync), complete instructions via: https://blog.adena.dev/blog/apple-airplay-on-raspberry-pi-in-7-easy-steps

If you’re interested, you might be able to get Airplay 1 & 2 support by running shairport-sync on your pi.

The plan is to run shairport-sync on the Omega 2 and have audio output to a 2x50w class d amplifier board.

To replace it, I've purchased in-ceiling speakers and a Control 4 Amp (C4-16AMP3-B) which I can control via the network. I plan on using shareport-sync for AirPlay and librespot for spotify as the sources to play music. 90% of the use for my whole home audio is for music.

ShairPort-Sync allows my Mac to listen for a AirPlay with multiple instances available, each pointing to different settings as per this GitHub Issue, which would allow me in theory to run multiple AirPort plugs and output each to an Alexa. Rarely would I ever need to have them playing all at once, and at this point I don't really care about maintaining pure audio quality or latency. I just need to be able to get out of my office and move to the kitchen, then back to my office without needing to spend a ridiculous amount of time trying to move what I was listening to on my iPad into my Echo Show

The benefit of the Pi is the open source software, in particular I use https://github.com/mikebrady/shairport-sync in order to turn it into an AirPlay 2 receiver, which I can stream to using my phone or laptop. It's my main way of sending audio to my hifi setup.

The only option I know of would be to use multiple raspberry pi’s running Shairport-Sync. I’ve been using the airplay 2 version for about a year and it works great. You might be able to build a server and run multiple instances of shairport with multiple audio cards. https://github.com/mikebrady/shairport-sync

So, after looking around, I realised that just like the Nest Hub 2nd gen, the Nest Audio also has a (sort of) exposed debug USB port. And these devices are (originally) running Linux. Since the Nest Hub 2nd gen has been jailbroken, I'm hoping that I can do the same on the Nest Audio, with a singular purpose: to inject a ShairPlay service, which would run parallel to the Chromecast services, which would allow me to use them as native AirPlay2 speakers.

Basically Raspotify but for windows.

If you have a raspberry pi, Raspotify works pretty great as a Connect receiver with a little tinkering.

Raspotify installed on a raspberry pi would be my recommendation. Config allows you to normalise volume controls - have a read here: https://github.com/dtcooper/raspotify/wiki/Configuration

The last.fm site will work independently from airplay, so it will display whatever is playing, even if you are not using airplay to stream to your pi. Because it is just a standard Raspberry Pi OS running, you could also set it up as a MPD client https://linuxhint.com/raspberry-pi-music-station-mpd/ or https://github.com/dtcooper/raspotify. As long as you are submitting music to last.fm the song will display.

I have previously used raspotify on my 3B+, is there any way to achieve something similar on a pico?

For Spotify Connect on a Pi I can recommend Raspotify:

https://github.com/dtcooper/raspotify

https://github.com/dtcooper/raspotify allows you to use Spotify connect on Raspberry Pi's, so you can manually move your music using the Spotify app.