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In the Forum: Didital Things
In the Thread: High Quality Music Server / CD player
Post Subject: An audiophile grade server: The Linux SolutionPosted by nycparamedic on: 12/9/2008
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 scooter wrote:
Gentlemen:

...*Regarding playback, I misspoke in my original post of an "Audiophile music server." Upon further reflection, this is an oxymoron, if not a moronic phrase. I think it is highly unlikely that a dedicated audiophile CD player will be beat by a home-brewed or commercially available music server:


I think you were on the right track, and I think that a *properly* implemented music server can beat the pants off of a "audiophile" quality music CD transport.

 scooter wrote:


- The microcomputer used for a music server is unable to perform specialized application roles at top-tier levels. The microcomputer's operating system and hardware are too generalist, too buggy, too noisy and have too much stuff going on in the background


And therein lies the problem. People using the wrong hardware, i.e., common desktop machines or laptops. Others try to build machines with common PC parts posing as *music servers*, and they are almost no different than you standard OEM machine. Then they saddle them with bloated --and most importantly *proprietary*-- operating systems.

 scooter wrote:

- The apparently simple task of moving 1s and 0s from a hard drive to a DAC is still a challenge in 2008 (interference, jitter, data loss, etc.). Part of this is due to the limitations of a generalist computer system being utilized in a specialized application

- The specialized knowledge, engineering, parts selection, testing and assembly of a dedicated audiophile CD player guarantees a streamlined and efficient integration of hardware and software.


I awkwardly stumbled into the whole mess that is USB audio and music servers not too long ago. I only wanted an ugly hack of a solution so that I could play songs while cooking, without having to constantly run to CD transport and keep switching discs. I was actually very happy with my Theta Digital Basic transport when I was *really* listening to music. And to make a long story brief...

I threw together a USB to S/PDIF converter feeding my trusty Adcom GDA-700 HDCD DAC from a old Dell running Linux. And one day, when I actually sat in the sweet spot, I realized that it sounded fabulous! And after doing some more research about the audiophile music server scene I realized that Linux lets you listen to the music without getting in the way. It lets you configure a small server with minimal services, and it lets you do that one thing  simply: play music.

I got rid of the Dell soon thereafter. It was noisy. It was power hungry. It had VGA, parallel ports, CD-ROM, and a host of other things not necessary for playing music. It was aslo a very ugly beige. I needed something like you said: "dedicated...  guarantees a streamlined and efficient integration of hardware and software." I also wanted something that afforded me freedom.

After living with my current custom Linux music server does not leave me wanting anything much when it comes to playing music:

A PC Engines ALIX single board computer in a small aluminum enclosure and running Voyage Linux. The music playing software, MPD, is based on the client/server model. The ALIX board runs the server daemon, and any other device in the house controls and displays a GUI.

The ALIX board is a completely silent and fanless single board computer that only consumes 4 watts of power. The CPU is an x86 compatible AMD Geode running at 500Mhz; no need to compile special software. 256mb of RAM allows me to buffer FLAC files %100 to RAM before playing. The device has 2 USB ports, one of which is used to feed a USB DAC. There is no VGA, mouse, keyboard, or onboard video.

Voyage Linux is a stripped down version of Debian Linux desinged to run on embedded or low power devices, such as the ALIX. It can run off of a compact flash card as small as 128MB and runs entirely in RAM. Most importantly, it keps Debian's APT package manager; installing software such as MPD and ALSA is only one apt-get command away. On the server it is configured with no audio software mixers, and MPD is given a direct hardware address of the USB DAC thus affording bit-perfect output.

The MPD server daemon allows the ALIX server to do one thing very well: play music. MPD fetches FLAC files via NFS from my bedroom computer, buffering one song at a time completeely to RAM. I can control the MPD server from multiple clients, which can all be connected at the same time. MMPC on a Nokia N800 tablet, and GMPC on the bedroom computer. There are a multitude of MD clients to chose from. from bluetooth phones to the iPod Touch.

I am *truly* enjoying music this way, especially since I recently picked up a Wavelength Audio Brick DAC. This is a killer combo, and I'm not going to look back to spinning transports any time soon. Anybody having any doubts about music servers should really investigate a properly configured, streamlined Linux device before reching any conclusions.

Cheers.

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