HQPlayer's Network Audio Adapter

[Holzohr]

On 9/17/2019 at 5:47 AM, Jerry said:

I'm shocked to find out with HQPlayer 4.1.1 (on win10) and X64 NAA on Minnowboard, when I check 48k DSD and Auto Rate, my iFi iDSD Pro would not play any 48k DSD, I recall @Miska pointed out as long as the NAA is running linux, 48k DSD should work for iFi product. Could @Miska please advice a procedure to troubleshoot if this is iDSD Pro's problem or if it's the NAA's (hqplayer-embedded-4.11.2-x64.7z )driver issue? Thanks!

 

From my memory the iFi Pro iDSD was able to play 48k DSD with its first firmware and lost this ability with the MQA-ready firmware. 

[kohmelo]

I can confirm that 48k rates work with my Pro iDSD and Linux NAA.

1.60 firmware is required for that so you lose MQA capability.

 

Pro iDSD will also output some "crackles and pops" when switching from audio format to another, so there's that and few other minor bugs related to 1.60 firmware that are not there with latest MQA capable FW versions >2.XX.

 

As far as I know 1.60 is the last FW that handles 48k rates and it's available via iFi support.

[Jerry]

On 9/28/2019 at 8:51 PM, Holzohr said:

 

From my memory the iFi Pro iDSD was able to play 48k DSD with its first firmware and lost this ability with the MQA-ready firmware. 

 

15 hours ago, kohmelo said:

I can confirm that 48k rates work with my Pro iDSD and Linux NAA.

1.60 firmware is required for that so you lose MQA capability.

 

Pro iDSD will also output some "crackles and pops" when switching from audio format to another, so there's that and few other minor bugs related to 1.60 firmware that are not there with latest MQA capable FW versions >2.XX.

 

As far as I know 1.60 is the last FW that handles 48k rates and it's available via iFi support.

 

Thank you! I think both of you are right on about the issue. To test iDSD Pro itself is capable of 48k DSD, I send it a 48k pcm file, and it remastered to 1024 DSD (shown as 49MHz) without any issue! I have sent PM to @AMR/iFi audio along with gain setting question (gain and volume settings for 80 Ohm Utopia headphone to keep the Amp section working in Class A) and waiting for their reply.

[tieuphi2006]

On 9/29/2019 at 4:48 PM, kohmelo said:

 

How to install NAA into jetson nano developer kit? 

Help me please, thank!

[randytsuch]

1 hour ago, tieuphi2006 said:

How to install NAA into jetson nano developer kit? 

Help me please, thank!

On a Pi 3b+, I did this.  The stuff in italics should be entered on the console port, other lines are comments.  Not sure if you would need to do the first command, or if they will even work on your board.

Also not sure if armhf.deb is the right file for you, its the one for a pi.

 

Install necessary dependencies (alsa-utils is optional, but the utilities are helpful sometimes)

sudo apt-get install libasound2 alsa-utils

 

Download the latest networkaudiod deb package for armhf architecture using “wget”

wget  https://www.signalyst.eu/bins/naa/linux/stretch/networkaudiod_3.5.6-41_armhf.deb

 

Install the package (correct the version number to what ever is latest at the time)

sudo dpkg -i networkaudiod_3.5.6-41_armhf.deb

[tieuphi2006]

On 10/4/2019 at 9:58 PM, randytsuch said:

On a Pi 3b+, I did this.  The stuff in italics should be entered on the console port, other lines are comments.  Not sure if you would need to do the first command, or if they will even work on your board.

Also not sure if armhf.deb is the right file for you, its the one for a pi.

 

Install necessary dependencies (alsa-utils is optional, but the utilities are helpful sometimes)

sudo apt-get install libasound2 alsa-utils

 

Download the latest networkaudiod deb package for armhf architecture using “wget”

wget  https://www.signalyst.eu/bins/naa/linux/stretch/networkaudiod_3.5.6-41_armhf.deb

 

Install the package (correct the version number to what ever is latest at the time)

sudo dpkg -i networkaudiod_3.5.6-41_armhf.deb

Thank randytsuch.

[Outlaw]

Would there be any advantge to running a wired router.Thinking of running a wired router to my hqplayer pc,roon rock pc and the intel nuc naa.Then connecting my wireless router to wired router for wireless.?????

[ericuco]

1 hour ago, Outlaw said:

Would there be any advantge to running a wired router.Thinking of running a wired router to my hqplayer pc,roon rock pc and the intel nuc naa.Then connecting my wireless router to wired router for wireless.?????

I hope you mean switches and not routers. Typically you only have one router in a home network. Multiple routers would probably cause issues. 
 

In my system, I have a switch which connects my music server (HQP Desktop & Roon Server), NAS and HQP NAA (opticalRendu). The switch is also connected to a wireless access point which in turn provides WiFi connection to the rest of my network and Internet.

[Outlaw]

4 minutes ago, ericuco said:

I hope you mean switches and not routers. Typically you only have one router in a home network. Multiple routers would probably cause issues. 
 

In my system, I have a switch which connects my music server (HQP Desktop & Roon Server), NAS and HQP NAA (opticalRendu). The switch is also connected to a wireless endpoint which in turn provides WiFi connection to the rest of my network and Internet.

No i mean two routers.Main router would be wired then second router hooked to wired router as a access point only for wi-fi

[acatala]

Yesterday, I installed the NAA 3.6.0 image on my Up Gateway's eMMC drive. The install process is simple ( https://audiophilestyle.com/forums/topic/13649-hqplayers-network-audio-adapter/?do=findComment&comment=964209 ).

 

So far, I have not found any issues. I can still play native DSD and it seems it fixed the annoying problem with the shutdown process of the networkaudiod that went into a blocked state for a couple of minutes before closing. Now the shutdown process (after pushing the reset button) is a matter of seconds.

 

The "double play click" is still present. Perhaps this is a specific issue between networkaudiod and the chipset of my DAC, I don't know. But after clicking the play control for thr fist time after powering on the system the music doesn't start, but it does after a second click. After that, it works fine.

 

In either case, NAA is better now.

 

[Miska]

5 hours ago, acatala said:

The "double play click" is still present. Perhaps this is a specific issue between networkaudiod and the chipset of my DAC, I don't know. But after clicking the play control for thr fist time after powering on the system the music doesn't start, but it does after a second click. After that, it works fine.

 

If the DAC disappears from USB when powered down (not all DACs do this, since many power the USB interface itself from the USB bus power), ALSA driver doesn't report this to the networkaudiod immediately, it only fails in obscure ways when next time accessed. This is not a problem if HQPlayer is not connected to a NAA, because networkaudiod is hooked to the DAC only as long as HQPlayer is using it.

 

However, if the last item from the chain gets pulled out while in use (HQPlayer connected), all the device capabilities and established state needs to be reset, also back in the HQPlayer. For this reason the first playback attempt fails in such case, HQPlayer stops and updates the GUI (technically for available formats and sampling rate could change).

 

Some DACs even disappear from USB when input is switched to S/PDIF or similar. So HQPlayer doesn't attempt to start again blindly by itself, to avoid going into annoying attempt & failure loop, for example if the DAC is still not fully available or the failure is due to something else. Instead strategy is to just stop on failure and let you attempt again. Roon has similar strategy towards HQPlayer; when it notices something has changed at HQPlayer side, it drops the control connection and says that it has lost control of HQPlayer. This is to avoid fighting against you when you are trying to do something with HQPlayer directly, or through some other control application. Roon does go into retry loop sometimes when you initiate action from Roon, and it can be annoying at times, while sometimes it helps around this kind of problem.

 

So the initial failure is combination of different things. If you shut down NAA too, HQPlayer v4 will auto-reconnect to this when available again. If you leave NAA running, but want to shut down DAC, closing HQPlayer too also helps around this. So this generally happens only when everything else is left running, except the DAC.

 

[Outlaw]

Miska  looking for your opinion .I was thinking of using a wired router from my modem and connect my HQPlayer PC, My Roon Rock PC,and and my naa nuc to it .Then run cable to my wireless router for wifi and remaining connections.Thanks

[Miska]

5 hours ago, Outlaw said:

Miska  looking for your opinion .I was thinking of using a wired router from my modem and connect my HQPlayer PC, My Roon Rock PC,and and my naa nuc to it .Then run cable to my wireless router for wifi and remaining connections.Thanks

 

Best is to have a good switch, and connect your modem and everything else to it. And get a plain wifi access point for wireless. For example HPE and Cisco make good switches and wifi access points.

 

[Outlaw]

13 hours ago, Miska said:

 

Best is to have a good switch, and connect your modem and everything else to it. And get a plain wifi access point for wireless. For example HPE and Cisco make good switches and wifi access points.

 

Okay didn't know you could hook a switch to modem before router or wifi access point.

[ericuco]

25 minutes ago, Outlaw said:

Okay didn't know you could hook a switch to modem before router or wifi access point.

 

For most home networks the order should be:

 

coax cable from ISP > modem > router > other equipment (switch, wifi access point, NAS, music server, NAA, etc.)

 

Note that modem, router & wifi might all be contained in one box from your ISP. You can use separate boxes for each, really up to you and what the ISP allows you to do.

 

The combinations of the "other equipment" is almost endless where you can have numerous branches stemming out from your router leading out to one or more switches that could branch to even more switches and equipment. Or out to wifi access points that again branch out further.

 

You probably want all of your audio equipment connected to a single (high quality as Miska mentioned) switch so that the music related data is only traveling in & out of the one switch (branch). This is not a requirement though as you might have say a NAS unit located elsewhere on another branch of your network. It really all depends on how your equipment is laid out throughout your house. Lots of games you can play.

 

[Miska]

48 minutes ago, Outlaw said:

Okay didn't know you could hook a switch to modem before router or wifi access point.

 

Usually modem + router is combined. If you have a separate, then switch and all the rest is after the router.

 

[Outlaw]

Just now, Miska said:

 

Usually modem + router is combined. If you have a separate, then switch and all the rest is after the router.

 

I  get it now.My modem was set to bridge mode so just using as modem.I could change back to default and do what you recommend.Thanks

[Miska]

27 minutes ago, ericuco said:

You probably want all of your audio equipment connected to a single (high quality as Miska mentioned) switch so that the music related data is only traveling in & out of the one switch (branch). This is not a requirement though as you might have say a NAS unit located elsewhere on another branch of your network. It really all depends on how your equipment is laid out throughout your house. Lots of games you can play.

 

...or through multiple switches... But the switches built into modem-routers are usually not so great.

 

I have modem-routers and firewalls in storage room, where I also have two central switches (one is a PoE switch to feed power to wifi access points and such). Then each room has it's own room-specific switch to distribute the network further. So overall the network structure is like a star. I can play audio from any room to any other room through the network, or from the wifi (multiple access points to cover the entire house as one wireless network).

 

[Miska]

6 minutes ago, Outlaw said:

I  get it now.My modem was set to bridge mode so just using as modem.I could change back to default and do what you recommend.Thanks

 

I have the modem/routers set up in a similar way, although a full blown router, but not doing NAT or anything like that. Then I have separate firewalls between the internet and local network.

 

[clang]

Is there an image for RaspberryPi4 now?

 

[acatala]

On 10/8/2019 at 2:24 PM, Miska said:

 

If the DAC disappears from USB when powered down (not all DACs do this, since many power the USB interface itself from the USB bus power), ALSA driver doesn't report this to the networkaudiod immediately, it only fails in obscure ways when next time accessed. This is not a problem if HQPlayer is not connected to a NAA, because networkaudiod is hooked to the DAC only as long as HQPlayer is using it.

 

Thanks for your extended answer, @Miska.

 

The scenario is this: Roon and HQPlayer Embedded run 24x7 on a Intel NUC Debian 9 box, NAA runs on a UP Gateway with your NAA image and is attached to the USB port of the embedded DAC in the preamp.

 

The power on cycle is:

Roon and HQPlayer ar 24x7, so no need of power them on most of the time.

Power on DAC (actually preamp + amp)

Power on NAA

 

The power of cycle is:

Stop playing Roon (+ HQPlayer Embedded)

Shutdown NAA (Reset button pressing) + Power off it

Power off DAC (Preamp + amp)

 

The NAA is powered off before the DAC and yet the next time I play from Roon + HQPlayer Embedded I have to do the double play. Even, some times, the NAA remains running 24x7 a couple of days and I power off the DAC (preamp + amp) in the mean time and the behaviour is the same: I need the double play. In this case, the NAA doesn't fail even the DAC is powered on after him, I only have the double play issue. Weird, isn't it?

 

On the other hand, the rest of the system seems solid rock and I have no further issues. Nice sound quality, easy to update, a bunch of configuration options... in short: happy with the duet Roon + HQPlayer Embedded.

 

 

[Miska]

33 minutes ago, acatala said:

The NAA is powered off before the DAC and yet the next time I play from Roon + HQPlayer Embedded I have to do the double play. Even, some times, the NAA remains running 24x7 a couple of days and I power off the DAC (preamp + amp) in the mean time and the behaviour is the same: I need the double play. In this case, the NAA doesn't fail even the DAC is powered on after him, I only have the double play issue.

 

Usually the problematic case is where everything else remains on, but DAC disappears and comes back. If NAA also goes out and comes back, it shouldn't be a problem with latest versions.

 

Could be also that Roon thinks that something has changed at HQPlayer side and disconnects, that's sort of separate thing.

 

[Sevenfeet]

On 8/22/2019 at 6:35 PM, Miska said:

 

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.

 

 

I'm going to try to do this for you.  I have two Oppo DACs....the Oppo 205 and the HA-2 portable model.  The 205 seems to work across all DSD modes with the NAA just fine.  But the HA-2 doesn't seem to recognize it's capability to do DSD256 via native mode.  I've tried everything and the best it can do is DSD128.

[Sevenfeet]

41 minutes ago, Sevenfeet said:

 

I'm going to try to do this for you.  I have two Oppo DACs....the Oppo 205 and the HA-2 portable model.  The 205 seems to work across all DSD modes with the NAA just fine.  But the HA-2 doesn't seem to recognize it's capability to do DSD256 via native mode.  I've tried everything and the best it can do is DSD128.

 

Never mind.  I figured out what I was doing wrong.  DSD256 works on the HA-2 via the NAA.

[ASRMichael]

Jussi, question?

 

Does HQ player use more CPU processing when upscaling from wave 96khz 24bit to DSD128, compared to upscaling wave 44.1khz to DSD 128?

 

Both are upscaling to DSD128. Just the original source format is different?

 

Why am I asking this? All my wave 44.1khz work on setting I like, but when I go to 96khz 24bit with same settings it skips. So I thought HQplayer has more processing to do on 96khz files?