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02-19-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
xandcg


Rio de Janeiro, BR.
Posts 218
Joined on 09-07-2014

Post #: 126
Post ID: 22985
Reply to: 22984
What is the problem with N10?
Armir,

I did not heard the N10, what you did not like in it? It is terrible or something more specific?



Think for yourself, do not be sheep.
02-19-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
xandcg


Rio de Janeiro, BR.
Posts 218
Joined on 09-07-2014

Post #: 127
Post ID: 22986
Reply to: 22985
Musica Pristina 2.
A bit more about the Music Pristina: http://6moons.com/audioreviews2/musicapristina/1.html



Think for yourself, do not be sheep.
02-19-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Amir
Iran Tehran
Posts 299
Joined on 02-11-2009

Post #: 128
Post ID: 22987
Reply to: 22985
N10
I dont judge audio products by it's spec or magazine reviews.
i guess it's sound is not my cup of tea.
02-20-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
xandcg


Rio de Janeiro, BR.
Posts 218
Joined on 09-07-2014

Post #: 129
Post ID: 22988
Reply to: 22987
Please, elaborate.
There is a difference between something that sound bad (faulty) and something I do not like (taste) - what "it is not my cup of tea" means.

Since you previously said it is not good I assumed you found out it is a faulty product, but apparently you think it is not, it more like a taste thing.

So, may you elaborate a bit more about what characteristics you did not like on Aurender sound?



Think for yourself, do not be sheep.
02-20-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Amir
Iran Tehran
Posts 299
Joined on 02-11-2009

Post #: 130
Post ID: 22990
Reply to: 22988
N10 Review
 xandcg wrote:
There is a difference between something that sound bad (faulty) and something I do not like (taste) - what "it is not my cup of tea" means.

Since you previously said it is not good I assumed you found out it is a faulty product, but apparently you think it is not, it more like a taste thing.

So, may you elaborate a bit more about what characteristics you did not like on Aurender sound?


http://www.hifi-advice.com/blog/review/digital-reviews/music-server-reviews/aurender-n10/

when a reviewer say the component sounds precise i guess it means the sound is compress.
03-02-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Amir
Iran Tehran
Posts 299
Joined on 02-11-2009

Post #: 131
Post ID: 23045
Reply to: 22990
Linux ALSA
http://insanecoding.blogspot.com/2009/06/state-of-sound-in-linux-not-so-sorry.html

https://hifiduino.wordpress.com/2014/03/27/beaglebone-black-navigating-the-audio-maze/

about Linux sound API history
03-02-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
xandcg


Rio de Janeiro, BR.
Posts 218
Joined on 09-07-2014

Post #: 132
Post ID: 23046
Reply to: 23045
OSS.
OSS over ALSA everyday, specially the FreeBSD implementation. The only issue with OSS is the lack of drivers, there are very little drivers when compared to ALSA.

Pulse Audio is purely crap and almost useless, or complete useless if you compare it with OSS what offer alone all features ALSA + PulseAudio.

Jack only stream on fixed bitrate.



Think for yourself, do not be sheep.
03-06-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Amir
Iran Tehran
Posts 299
Joined on 02-11-2009

Post #: 133
Post ID: 23054
Reply to: 23046
Alix2d2
I am trying to setup Voyage MPD on my Alix2d2 . i am not so hopeful about the result but i do that.

https://lacocina.nl/bitperfect-audio

03-06-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
xandcg


Rio de Janeiro, BR.
Posts 218
Joined on 09-07-2014

Post #: 134
Post ID: 23055
Reply to: 23054
Audiophile Linux.
You can try: https://www.ap-linux.com/ instead. I think there is not anything special on Voyager, it is just tweaked to use very little space what is not a problem on that board. You can easily find a CompactFlash card with 64GB, what is a lot more more than you need.

If you have some patience, you can make www.runeaudio.com work on X86 too.

EDIT: if you wanna run mpd exclusively, you may be better with NetBSD. I think you should not have driver problems with those boards nor with the SOtM card.

EDIT: to make mpd work bit perfect you just need to configure it to grab the hardware directly (for instance hw:0,0) and not the software mixer: dmix or pulseaudio. When mpd (or anything) grab the hardware nothing more can play sounds while mpd is playing - unless you are using pro audio cards with several channels.

To find the hardware, using Alsa (i.e):

% aplay -l

**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: SB [HDA ATI SB], device 0: Generic Analog [Generic Analog]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: SB [HDA ATI SB], device 1: Generic Digital [Generic Digital]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: HDMI [HDA ATI HDMI], device 3: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0


If you want to use (i.e) "Generic Analog", Card 0 Device 0, you should configure mpd to use: hw:0,0.



Think for yourself, do not be sheep.
03-06-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Amir
Iran Tehran
Posts 299
Joined on 02-11-2009

Post #: 135
Post ID: 23056
Reply to: 23055
Runeaudio
Ap-linux needs more memory than voyage and alix memory size is just 256mb.I am not pro linux user , my friend install and config linux on my board. i am not sure but i guess Runeaudio just works on arm processors like BBB and installing it on x86 is not easy .I never heard any bad news about voyage and i think linux is not important if we config player/alsa to work in bit-perfect mode. I use mpd 0.17 with asynchronous usb to spdif berkeley alpha.
Thanks a million
03-06-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
xandcg


Rio de Janeiro, BR.
Posts 218
Joined on 09-07-2014

Post #: 136
Post ID: 23057
Reply to: 23056
Rune Audio are just tweaks.
You can run RuneAudio on anything Linux. You would just basically need to get the config files and put it on the right place. To run the nice Rune interface, what basically is a php website, you would just need to install some very light  webserver like httpd + php, and put the files on the right place. Easy but one would need to have some patience... I will eventually do it, maybe.

NetBSD is not Linux, it is a FreeBSD fork aiming embedded devices specifically. It does not have only minor tweaks, like the usual Linux distros, it is a proper OS redesign for that objective, however still compatible with FreeBSD. You should use OSS for audio in there.

EDIT: you can use that board with the SOtM card in a thin chassis if you prefer. You would just need to grab a chassis which support riser cards, like this one, and a riser card.



Think for yourself, do not be sheep.
03-06-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Amir
Iran Tehran
Posts 299
Joined on 02-11-2009

Post #: 137
Post ID: 23058
Reply to: 23057
Runeaudio
 xandcg wrote:
You can run RuneAudio on anything Linux. You would just basically need to get the config files and put it on the right place. To run the nice Rune interface, what basically is a php website, you would just need to install some very light  webserver like httpd + php, and put the files on the right place. Easy but one would need to have some patience... I will eventually do it, maybe.

NetBSD is not Linux, it is a FreeBSD fork aiming embedded devices specifically. It does not have only minor tweaks, like the usual Linux distros, it is a proper OS redesign for that objective, however still compatible with FreeBSD. You should use OSS for audio in there.


it seems i should learn more about linux for running runeaudio on x86 Alix board. volumio is also works for x86 platforms but i have no idea about it.
if runeaudio works bitperfect then why i should install NetBSD?

 xandcg wrote:

EDIT: you can use that board with the SOtM card in a thin chassis if you prefer. You would just need to grab a chassis which support riser cards, like this one, and a riser card.


OK
03-07-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
xandcg


Rio de Janeiro, BR.
Posts 218
Joined on 09-07-2014

Post #: 138
Post ID: 23059
Reply to: 23058
Optimizations
NetBSD have a lot of specific optimizations for embedded systems, including several ones to reduce the wear flash cards, for instance.  It is also more stable and have a more sane update/upgrade schedule, and it uses OSS by default.

You can also have several cards, each one with a different installation and so you can test everything without bother the other ones. :-D

EDIT: Yes, Volumio have a x86 image already, should end up the same of Rune Audio in practice. I wasn't aware of it.

You can also install everything thing in a VM, like VirtualBox, to feel how they work.



Think for yourself, do not be sheep.
03-07-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Amir
Iran Tehran
Posts 299
Joined on 02-11-2009

Post #: 139
Post ID: 23060
Reply to: 23059
NetBSD
thank you.
I will try them 
03-08-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
decoud
United Kingdom
Posts 247
Joined on 03-01-2008

Post #: 140
Post ID: 23061
Reply to: 23060
The locus of intervention
Guys, it is worth thinking about where the computer attributable noise is best intercepted. Since the signal is digital all the way to the DAC, it is sufficient to optoisolate the USB connection. If your DAC runs the USB traffic asynchronously all the jitter will come from the DAC alone. So it will not matter at all what you run on the computer side.
03-08-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
xandcg


Rio de Janeiro, BR.
Posts 218
Joined on 09-07-2014

Post #: 141
Post ID: 23062
Reply to: 23061
There are other reasons.
I do not use USB audio and so I cannot comment on its quality properly.

There are also others objectives going on this thread about the Amir Alix project aside of audio quality, like the usability provided by Rune Audio and/or Volumio, and the maintenance predicability of NetBSD.

Also, Amir said he is not savvy on Linux/BSD OSs and then he should find something will fit better for his comfort as OS user.



Think for yourself, do not be sheep.
03-10-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Amir
Iran Tehran
Posts 299
Joined on 02-11-2009

Post #: 142
Post ID: 23063
Reply to: 23062
Flac is not bit-perfect
designer of spectral audio and inventor of HDCD claims:
"Keith Johnson, inventor of HDCD, claims that only WAV files guarantee perfect sound reproduction which can’t be achieved with any compression, even lossless compression. He says that any file processing even in the digital domain alters it and that executing FLAC decoding affects the sound."

It seems just .Aiff , .Wav and .raw are linear PCM and no other format is bit-perfect .
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_Interchange_File_Format

Wav and aiff are the same but with minor difference in saving structure. Pcm data is the same in both aiff and wave.
http://www.hifi-advice.com/blog/audiophile-insights/digital-info/lossless-audio-flac/
03-11-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
xandcg


Rio de Janeiro, BR.
Posts 218
Joined on 09-07-2014

Post #: 143
Post ID: 23065
Reply to: 23063
Flac is just a contender.
I am not surprised this kind of bizarre affirmation coming from a guy whom aim to live of royalties from copyrighted material.

WAV or WAVE (aka Audio for Windows) is owned by Microsoft and IBM, and AIFF is owned by Apple Inc.

I do not know the current legal state of WAV, but if you want to commercialize AIFF audio files you shall pay royalties for Apple. And you probably will only really know how it works (if it do modify or not the data) if you do some agreement with Apple.

Flac is open source (GNU GPL) a kind of license called copyleft. What basically means you pay nothing to distribute Flac material, and depending on what you (he) do code-wise with it this code also became GNU GPL automatically...

Flac is not indeed a "file format", it is just a contender. If you use compression (yes, you can do it without using compression), a md5 hash will be taken from the original data -> it will be inserted into the Flac contender. When you play it, it will be uncompressed -> a md5 hash will be taken again, but now from the uncompressed data -> the md5 hashes (of original file and the uncompressed one) will be compared -> if everything match the file will play, otherwise it is marked as corrupt.

There is no difference between the original PCM data and the uncompressed one (not even a single bit) unless it was made by some weird custom software/algorithm instead of the Flac one. It is indeed more easily to have the file damaged during a download from the internet (or while you copy it from one storage device to another) than on the Flac compress/decompress activity, because most internet downloads (and copy tools) do not hash the data and compare them later.

If you really want to make a test, get any raw PCM data (or any other data) -> create a md5/sha256/sha512 hash of it (store/write the result) -> compress to Flac (or even 7z, what is the most aggressive compression algorithm commonly available) -> decompress -> do the hash again, but now against the uncompressed data -> compare the result of both hashes.

Cheers!



Think for yourself, do not be sheep.
04-13-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Amir
Iran Tehran
Posts 299
Joined on 02-11-2009

Post #: 144
Post ID: 23138
Reply to: 23065
Flac is bit-perfect
 xandcg wrote:
I am not surprised this kind of bizarre affirmation coming from a guy whom aim to live of royalties from copyrighted material.

WAV or WAVE (aka Audio for Windows) is owned by Microsoft and IBM, and AIFF is owned by Apple Inc.

I do not know the current legal state of WAV, but if you want to commercialize AIFF audio files you shall pay royalties for Apple. And you probably will only really know how it works (if it do modify or not the data) if you do some agreement with Apple.

Flac is open source (GNU GPL) a kind of license called copyleft. What basically means you pay nothing to distribute Flac material, and depending on what you (he) do code-wise with it this code also became GNU GPL automatically...

Flac is not indeed a "file format", it is just a contender. If you use compression (yes, you can do it without using compression), a md5 hash will be taken from the original data -> it will be inserted into the Flac contender. When you play it, it will be uncompressed -> a md5 hash will be taken again, but now from the uncompressed data -> the md5 hashes (of original file and the uncompressed one) will be compared -> if everything match the file will play, otherwise it is marked as corrupt.

There is no difference between the original PCM data and the uncompressed one (not even a single bit) unless it was made by some weird custom software/algorithm instead of the Flac one. It is indeed more easily to have the file damaged during a download from the internet (or while you copy it from one storage device to another) than on the Flac compress/decompress activity, because most internet downloads (and copy tools) do not hash the data and compare them later.

If you really want to make a test, get any raw PCM data (or any other data) -> create a md5/sha256/sha512 hash of it (store/write the result) -> compress to Flac (or even 7z, what is the most aggressive compression algorithm commonly available) -> decompress -> do the hash again, but now against the uncompressed data -> compare the result of both hashes.

Cheers!


Ronald van Engelen is a linux guy who wrote a bit-perfect script file for mpd music player.

https://lacocina.nl/bitperfect-audio

Ronald van Engelen wrote:

"While flac is a bit perfect encoder/decoder for digital audio, the extra decompression that takes place when playing back the audio within a flac file, adds to the total load of the playback computer, which is something we’re trying to avoid. Therefore flac should not be considered suitable for usage in a bit perfect audio playback chain, although it is a great tool for efficient and accurate archiving and transport."


04-13-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
xandcg


Rio de Janeiro, BR.
Posts 218
Joined on 09-07-2014

Post #: 145
Post ID: 23139
Reply to: 23138
Anything add something to the total load of the processor.
Amir,

Anything running in a computer add something to the total load of the computer. The flac decompression is negligible, unless you are using something über low powered - better read quite old. It should not add much more than 1% load to just one of the cores of my computer when playing some 192/24 files I have - what is imperceptible computer-wise.

The maximum real thing the decompression will add is very little latency. However, on the contrary of recording practice where latency is a real thing, it is irrelevant to playback (unless you have serious latency problem, what is indeed a consequence of another serious problem). Does not matter if your play back will start 3ms or 8ms after you hit the play button, what is what it means in this case.

If the script you told about is this one, it does exactly what you should never do (personal opinion) with digital audio files, what is re-sample it. If you, for some reason, want to play all given files in a specific sample rate and bit depth, and you are using Alsa, you are doing it wrong from the very beginning.

There is Jack what is a professional Unix/Linux audio backend, what play only in user selected sample rate and bit depth - and do not modify (read destroy) the source file. And I am not ever talking about the fact Jack is a proper software written in C/C++ (fast), and not a fancy bash/sh script <- Linux folks have fantasies with bash scripts.

If you take a deep look on any Linux distro you will find tons of very complex bash scripts what does things you can do with just a few lines directly calling the commands.

Basically, those scripts try to cover all imaginable scenarios before running something to make it simple to the user. However, 99% of the covered cases are just useful for advanced users what in 99% of cases will change/customize everything anyway. But the real hidden objective is to create bash scripts everywhere, just for the sake of show off their bash skills.

You do not need anything extra to play bit-perfect when using mpd, because it already do it very properly. Mpd is that kind of software: set it up and forget. It rarely breaks, and rarely change anything that needs user intervention.

Cheers!

EDIT: Just for the sake of the transparency, those are two screenshots of my desktop while running top (a small software to monitoring resource usage¹). There are also several other unrelated services running around since it is not something purpose built.

On the top left you can see the *total* CPU usage. The first one is "idle", and the second one is playing a 44/16 flac file. Those number are not static, they change at every minute, but very little if you do not do anything more.

Idle.

Playing.

¹ On the idle file is also possible to see the same but per core at he right side, on Conky behind the terminal emulator.

Before you ask about the righ RAM usage, it is FreeBSD what basically does not flush the memory until the point it need the space for anything - the real usage should be around 700MB. If you have memory you should use it, doesn't you? :-D



Think for yourself, do not be sheep.
04-13-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Amir
Iran Tehran
Posts 299
Joined on 02-11-2009

Post #: 146
Post ID: 23140
Reply to: 23139
Mpd config
I do not use flac , i just use AIFF.

My friend configured voyage mpd 0.9.5 with ronalde (http://lacocina.nl/) bit-perfect script.Alix 2d2 with voyage mpd sounds not bad before break-in and after break-in i will report about the sound.I guess even good pc with good linux could not beat CEC TL0
04-13-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
xandcg


Rio de Janeiro, BR.
Posts 218
Joined on 09-07-2014

Post #: 147
Post ID: 23141
Reply to: 23140
The current mpd version is 0.20.6!
Amir, I did an update in the previous post.

Why using so old mpd? The current mpd version is 0.20.6!



Think for yourself, do not be sheep.
04-13-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Amir
Iran Tehran
Posts 299
Joined on 02-11-2009

Post #: 148
Post ID: 23142
Reply to: 23141
New MPD is written by C++
 xandcg wrote:
Amir, I did an update in the previous post.

Why using so old mpd? The current mpd version is 0.20.6!

New MPD is different from older versions.Some reported 0.9.5 is better sounding
04-13-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
xandcg


Rio de Janeiro, BR.
Posts 218
Joined on 09-07-2014

Post #: 149
Post ID: 23143
Reply to: 23142
Load.
Are you running that script on the fly? If you are concerned with added load that script add in a lot more load than the flac decompression.



Think for yourself, do not be sheep.
04-13-2017 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Amir
Iran Tehran
Posts 299
Joined on 02-11-2009

Post #: 150
Post ID: 23144
Reply to: 23143
Mpd config script
 xandcg wrote:
Are you running that script on the fly? If you are concerned with added load that script add in a lot more load than the flac decompression.

I never used it's flac upsampling script. I just used ronalde mpd config file.
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   Target    Threads for related reading   Most recent post in related threads   Forum  Replies   Views   Started 
  »  New  The commercial music servers...  Touch screen remote...  Didital Things  Forum     37  335050  01-10-2008
  »  New  About the DAW playback software...  Best hardware with best software...  Didital Things  Forum     11  102418  03-22-2008
  »  New  Recording/Playback software..  Free stuff...  Didital Things  Forum     14  100807  08-24-2008
  »  New  To Rip or not to Rip...  Ripping with better playback...  Didital Things  Forum     2  33082  03-18-2009
  »  New  The contra-ridicules solution for a good DAW?..  Happy to see this thread...  Didital Things  Forum     1  32028  06-18-2009
  »  New  DAW drives configuration and backup strategies...  Not expensive to recover DATA, avoid Corporate Recovery...  Didital Things  Forum     3  38608  10-05-2009
  »  New  Weiss Engineering DAC202..  Attenuation...  Didital Things  Forum     5  51277  06-21-2010
  »  New  Pacific Microsonics Model Two: What Platform, Software ..  XLR to RCA adaptor. Watch out...  Didital Things  Forum     1  27083  03-17-2011
  »  New  Windows Based Transport: A quiet and capable Source?..  DAE Firmware quality...  Didital Things  Forum     47  287988  11-01-2011
  »  New  Memory Player Box?..  Maybe I will not order the Pure Teflon capacitors after...  Didital Things  Forum     2  46306  11-03-2011
  »  New  Why I hate computer playback...  Higher power cpu...  Didital Things  Forum     17  125010  04-16-2012
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