HQPlayer's Network Audio Adapter

[Le Concombre Masqué]

On 8/2/2019 at 7:40 AM, fas42 said:

 

This is an interesting aspect of audio playback ... human hearing is very sensitive to undesirable anomalies, and if they are present that can make a major difference to the ability to enjoy the experience - although the actual change in some property in the sound may be very slight, almost unmeasurable by normal standards, there can be a huge step in the perceived SQ. Unfortunately, this can be both directions, - I have had major battles with rigs slipping in and out of the "good zone"; and usually the hardest thing is to identify what's going on ...

 

The takeaway is that one should never seriously evaluate the potential of a system by a short exposure to the sound - an almost minimal adjustment may cause a major transformation in the presentation; and, yes, for better and for worse, .

Let's say something had to break in, it happened a few hours after inception and was brisk, in the middle of a track, not a subtle slow improvement over ages.

 

I now can back the recommendation for the UP + MeanWell medical grade PSU

[bodiebill]

I used naa-3561-x64.7z to make a bootable usb stick.

It seems to boot OK, but HQPlayer can find no NAA.

I can ping the NAA machine.

'systemctl status networkaudiod' indicates that the service is Inactive (dead).

When I tried 'systemctl start networkaudiod' it said (after a long wait):

'A dependency job for networkaudiod.service failed.'

 

Any advise?

[asdf1000]

On 7/11/2019 at 9:03 PM, AudioXP said:

 

It looks like the news is good 🙂: Broadcom Media Access Controller for gigabit ethernet, USB-3.0 controller connected to the CPU via PCIe 2.0. Fully independent.

Looking forward to an RPi4B NAA passing out DSD512 to the DAC - with no clicks!

 

Are BOTH USB 2.0 and 3.0 independent from ethernet?

 

[Miska]

On 8/9/2019 at 10:29 PM, bodiebill said:

I used naa-3561-x64.7z to make a bootable usb stick.

It seems to boot OK, but HQPlayer can find no NAA.

I can ping the NAA machine.

'systemctl status networkaudiod' indicates that the service is Inactive (dead).

When I tried 'systemctl start networkaudiod' it said (after a long wait):

'A dependency job for networkaudiod.service failed.'

 

That likely means you have more than one network interface and DHCP has not completed on all.

 

networkaudiod has dependency for completely set up network. If some part doesn't come up successfully, the service doesn't get started.

 

[bodiebill]

8 minutes ago, Miska said:

 

That likely means you have more than one network interface and DHCP has not completed on all.

 

networkaudiod has dependency for completely set up network. If some part doesn't come up successfully, the service doesn't get started.

 

 

Indeed, I am using an Intel X520-D1 fiber card but there are also two unused ethernet NIC's. Is there a way to deactivate the unused network interfaces?

[Miska]

18 minutes ago, bodiebill said:

Indeed, I am using an Intel X520-D1 fiber card but there are also two unused ethernet NIC's. Is there a way to deactivate the unused network interfaces?

 

For this case, easiest is to switch using the HQPlayer OS (HQPlayer Embedded image) instead. That runs all ethernet interfaces bridged, so if some port doesn't come up, it doesn't matter as longs DHCP on the combo succeeds.

 

Since the NAA image (due to requests) boots in RAM mode, the configuration cannot be easily modified. But since the HQPlayer OS boots in a normal way, you can also edit the configuration to your liking.

 

If you want, you can disable HQPlayer Embedded on the image with "systemctl disable hqplayerd" and thus it becomes a plain NAA image with just some extra storage space spent for unused HQPlayer Embedded.

 

The two images are built based on different assumptions. NAA hardware is expected to have only needed things and very simple single interface network configuration (lighter for the CPU). While HQPlayer OS image is built to support multiple network interfaces and more complex setup. The OS itself is largely the same for both, but HQPlayer OS is usually more frequently released and thus gets more frequent updates.

 

 

[bodiebill]

Thanks Miska, I started the HQPlayer OS, but that does not recognize the 10GB Intel X520-D1 fiber card.

(I remember we exchanged some similar posts earlier regarding the NAA image, after which you added the Intel X520 drivers to that.)

[Miska]

21 hours ago, bodiebill said:

Thanks Miska, I started the HQPlayer OS, but that does not recognize the 10GB Intel X520-D1 fiber card.

(I remember we exchanged some similar posts earlier regarding the NAA image, after which you added the Intel X520 drivers to that.)

 

I think I added that in the latest release. But I have to check if I did that change before or after the release.

 

[baconbrain]

On 8/11/2019 at 10:43 PM, Miska said:

 

For this case, easiest is to switch using the HQPlayer OS (HQPlayer Embedded image) instead. That runs all ethernet interfaces bridged, so if some port doesn't come up, it doesn't matter as longs DHCP on the combo succeeds.

 

Since the NAA image (due to requests) boots in RAM mode, the configuration cannot be easily modified. But since the HQPlayer OS boots in a normal way, you can also edit the configuration to your liking.

 

If you want, you can disable HQPlayer Embedded on the image with "systemctl disable hqplayerd" and thus it becomes a plain NAA image with just some extra storage space spent for unused HQPlayer Embedded.

 

The two images are built based on different assumptions. NAA hardware is expected to have only needed things and very simple single interface network configuration (lighter for the CPU). While HQPlayer OS image is built to support multiple network interfaces and more complex setup. The OS itself is largely the same for both, but HQPlayer OS is usually more frequently released and thus gets more frequent updates.

 

 

 

Could you provide me with the link for the NAA image? Thx.

[ericuco]

7 hours ago, baconbrain said:

 

Could you provide me with the link for the NAA image? Thx.

 

The various NAA images can be downloaded from https://www.signalyst.eu/bins/naa/

[baconbrain]

2 hours ago, ericuco said:

 

The various NAA images can be downloaded from https://www.signalyst.eu/bins/naa/

 

Thanks, not sure why I struggle to find the right downloads on the Signalyst Site ... ☺️

[ericuco]

2 minutes ago, baconbrain said:

 

Thanks, not sure why I struggle to find the right downloads on the Signalyst Site ... ☺️

 

The link is provided at the very bottom of the page under the section Network Audio Daemon: 3.5.6

 

https://www.signalyst.com/consumer.html

[baconbrain]

So I created the image on a usb and powered up the device. When watching the boot up process everything seems to be ok. (ifconfig is also showing an ip address). Unfortunately HQPlayer Desktop is not finding the NAA, regardless if one try’s  IP v4 or v6. Ideas?

[ericuco]

23 minutes ago, baconbrain said:

So I created the image on a usb and powered up the device. When watching the boot up process everything seems to be ok. (ifconfig is also showing an ip address). Unfortunately HQPlayer Desktop is not finding the NAA, regardless if one try’s  IP v4 or v6. Ideas?

Maybe a silly question but do you have "the device" connected to your DAC? If the NAA is not connected to the DAC then HQP does not see the NAA, at least that is what I have found. Sometimes my mRendu has problems connecting to my DAC and when that happens HQP does not recognize the NAA.

 

Also, have you changed the HQP settings to look for a NAA?

[baconbrain]

1 minute ago, ericuco said:

Maybe a silly question but do you have "the device" connected to your DAC? If the NAA is not connected to the DAC then HQP does not see the NAA, at least that is what I have found. Sometimes my mRendu has problems connecting to my DAC and when that happens HQP does not recognize the NAA.

 

Also, have you changed the HQP settings to look for a NAA?

Yes, it‘s connected via USB and I am using a Mutec MC-3+ as a „DAC“. Another yes on checking the HQP setting to look for an NAA.

 

Didn‘t see the Mutec on the Signalyst recommended HW list, could that be the problem? 

[ericuco]

6 hours ago, baconbrain said:

 

Didn‘t see the Mutec on the Signalyst recommended HW list, could that be the problem? 

 

From what I can tell that Mutec is a reclocker, not a DAC, at least in the conventional sense. So my guess is that is your issue.

 

Do you have a more conventional DAC that you can try?

[baconbrain]

5 hours ago, ericuco said:

 

From what I can tell that Mutec is a reclocker, not a DAC, at least in the conventional sense. So my guess is that is your issue.

 

Do you have a more conventional DAC that you can try?

The desktop version of HQPlayer recognizes the Mutec with it directly connected via USB to the windows PC which is hosting the HQP SW.

 

I was hoping that the NAA version would be able to do the same but perhaps my understanding of how HQP NAA functions is not correct?  

 

Appreciate the help.

[firedog]

Can the NAA be loaded onto a device running Volumio? Is there a plugin?

[baconbrain]

11 hours ago, baconbrain said:

The desktop version of HQPlayer recognizes the Mutec with it directly connected via USB to the windows PC which is hosting the HQP SW.

 

I was hoping that the NAA version would be able to do the same but perhaps my understanding of how HQP NAA functions is not correct?  

 

Appreciate the help.

 

So I have gotten a step further and entered the cmd syntax in this reply:

 

Same result for me. My intended NAA device also has multiple network ports, so I will give the hqplayerd version a try.

 

More soon.

[baconbrain]

Success!

 

The HQPlayerd image worked and the Mutec is now recognized correctly through the NAA device.

[Norton]

I’m using image 3562-x64 19th August with an Oppo205.

 

Works fine with DoP but not native DSD and thus not 256/512.

 

Is this as expected?  According to Github, Linux native  DSD support for the  Oppo 205 was added back in 2017.

[Miska]

On 8/20/2019 at 8:44 PM, Norton said:

I’m using image 3562-x64 19th August with an Oppo205.

 

Works fine with DoP but not native DSD and thus not 256/512.

 

Is this as expected?  According to Github, Linux native  DSD support for the  Oppo 205 was added back in 2017.

 

I think they changed something in a firmware update that made it not work anymore. The old style ugly explicit whitelistings are bad in that way. The new autodetection method I added works much better. But Oppo is still on the old list because I cannot test if it works with the autodetection (I don't have any Oppo devices).

 

[Norton]

Thanks, just wanted to check the NAA image was working as expected. I can in fact get 256 via DoP with it and of course  native up to 512 works fine for NAA under Win10, but your image sounds better to me.

 

Bearing in mind the Oppo205 must be one of the more common 512 capable DACs, it’s a pity not to be able to use its full capabilities via a NAA image.  If it’s just a simple yes/no matter, I’d be happy to give feedback if you were prepared to make a test image available using autodetection 

[Miska]

7 hours ago, Norton said:

Thanks, just wanted to check the NAA image was working as expected. I can in fact get 256 via DoP with it and of course  native up to 512 works fine for NAA under Win10, but your image sounds better to me.

 

Bearing in mind the Oppo205 must be one of the more common 512 capable DACs, it’s a pity not to be able to use its full capabilities via a NAA image.  If it’s just a simple yes/no matter, I’d be happy to give feedback if you were prepared to make a test image available using autodetection 

 

I would need someone with that Oppo and latest firmware run "lsusb -vvv" on Linux and provide the Oppo specific part of the output to me (not as a forum post though, because it's pretty long!).

 

Something like Ubuntu or Fedora live image would do for that purpose.

 

You can redirect the output to a text file like "lsusb -vvv >something.txt" and then send me that something.txt too, I can dig out the relevant part.

 

[Norton]

Great, I should be able to do that sometime in the next week.  Thanks.