Who's used the Audiophile Optimizer for Windows 2012 Server or Windows 8?

[ALRAINBOW]

Hifi thanks. I have found that the board as well as the chip make a difference. My revenge setup is all batteries. Three sets. One of the main board and two for drives while one is shared for ppa usb card. I have the card about 60 days or so. Before it wasn't on his website. It's big and very nice to use but its sound is just to forward and on Brite of neutral. And this is with a lampi b7. Imagine a lesser dac. Now this was worth my ref setup. It's fanless and xion I7 3.5 MSI main board and ppa memory chips . Three SS drives. Two on one baboon and one on the so and ppa usb . I have tried other sanerios and all about the same with hits setup. I am in no way saying it's bad it's not but for headphones a bit much. As I build some for some friends I am going with the ver2 boards for them. They both have lampi,s.

Sp what tubes do you roll ?? Or how many red tubes do you have ??

al

[Hifidelit]

Al, personal preference cannot be argued, I like the v2 as well and it is the best value I think, there are so many variables that come into it, the key is finding something you like and enjoying the music. The comments on Phil's versions in this thread shows there is no one size fits all.

[ALRAINBOW]

Absolutely . Preference rules. We all want something different and in some cases it can make no sense to some . But hey there is so many varibles. But it was nice to read about the pairings. The new ver 3 gets pretty hot and I wondered if it was using too much power . But it appears to be fine . Computer audio is the most complex form of audio reproduction. And most never give it a second thought. How many reviews that we cherish use a laptop as a source. Now as we may feel it's absurd not to have a top source for a review but it's just not what happens. The people of this forum I feel have a better view then some reviewers who have notoriety in the hobby. Now I am not saying I know all but I do know what I hear and it's very varied with the source in same music .

a while back I read a review from a man that I honesetly like his reviews. He used a then little know device to clean up the sound so to speak . It was a ap1 no SE or pp was around at the time. He clearly was ahead of his time. Having listened to my new ap1se / pp. it greatly improved anything I used it with. This prompted me to buy my offramp 5 with the Paul Hines psu. Another great. choice for digital audio. Now of course the servers we build are far better still. But the point that some people are just way ahead of the curve in this didgital audio reproduction hobby. And it's not a dac maker except for Steve Nugent . It just makes me wonder just how much the makers of our sacred devices really know about the sound that can be had.

Al

[EuroDriver]

I just start it manually from the desktop dir. You can use something like total commander for easier navigation. You can have playlists already set while in GUI mode and access them or drag folders or files into the player window using total commander.

 

I am slowly getting there, I am using [Minimal-Server] mode and I am able to start HQ Player with a batch file that sits in the user directory

 

In Minimal-Server mode, is it possible to get explorer.exe to run properly and drag and drop files into HQ Player, or I need a file manager like Total Commander ?

 

I have not done any sound tests yet !

 

It sure takes a long time to switch between modes ! Writing batch files and constant rebooting recalls my days with the Radio Shack Trash 80, except the TRS-80 was so much faster to reboot

[EuroDriver]

HQ Player sounds amazing in GUI mode already, more realistic more live than a slimmed down Win 8. I was unable to get any sound out of my Exasound DAC so far in Minimal Server mode. I think it might be a problem with the USB driver not being woken up.

 

 

The SQ difference was a real surprise, over the last 2 days I convinced my self that the SQ difference would be small, boy was I wrong !

[AudioPhil]

Very nice... SOtM-Audio uses AudiophileOptimizer on one of their demo Systems at CES 2015!

 

SOtM - English | Upcoming Event : 2015 CES

 

PDF: http://www.sotm-audio.com/sotmwp/english/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2014/12/Press-playlist-SOtM.pdf

[dtb300]

I just start it manually from the desktop dir. You can use something like total commander for easier navigation. You can have playlists already set while in GUI mode and access them or drag folders or files into the player window using total commander.

 

HQ Player sounds amazing in GUI mode already, more realistic more live than a slimmed down Win 8. I was unable to get any sound out of my Exasound DAC so far in Minimal Server mode. I think it might be a problem with the USB driver not being woken up. The SQ difference was a real surprise, over the last 2 days I convinced my self that the SQ difference would be small, boy was I wrong !

 

So far I have been able to get HQ Player up and ready to run and I am now in GUI mode with no AO optimizations run. I was missing a DLL but found that and compied to HQ Player directory.

 

Right now when I go to play either PCM or DSD I get no sound and the counters do not even move, they all stay at 0:00. I have Min and Max sound set to 0, so my Pre and/or DAC take care of the volume.

 

I have a Wadia Di122 DAC with their 1.0.57 driver in place. I can go into Control Panel, Sounds, and have the Wadia as Default. I can go into properties for the Wadia and choose anywhere from 44 to 192 and run TEST and hear sounds from my speakers.

 

Not sure what I may be missing here to get the player to play a song. I only have 2 albums in my library at this time, a PCM and a DSD album for testing.

 

I am thinking it is the Wadia driver, but wanted to make sure I was not missing something else.

[dtb300]

When I changed from the Wadia ASIO driver to the Wadia WASAPI driver, I got sound, both from PCM and DSD. Sent off an email to Wadia trying to find out why the USB ASIO Driver would have an issue. BTW, same issue with JRiver where I have to use the Kernel Stream ASIO driver. The USB ASIO driver does not work, so something with that driver.

[EuroDriver]

HQ Player sounds amazing in GUI mode already, more realistic more live than a slimmed down Win 8. I was unable to get any sound out of my Exasound DAC so far in Minimal Server mode. I think it might be a problem with the USB driver not being woken up.

 

The SQ difference was a real surprise, over the last 2 days I convinced my self that the SQ difference would be small, boy was I wrong !

 

Today I got HQ Player running in Minimal Server mode. I had to manually launch the exaSound.N1.exe before starting HQP and then everything worked fine.

 

The sound quality takes a big leap in Minimal Server mode for both DSD to DSD and PCM > DSD. However the SQ gap between DSD>DSD and PCM > DSD narrows, they both sound fantastic. I may sound like a broken record, but HQP on WS 2012 + AO is definitely worth trying. Your time and effort will be rewarded big time

[AudioPhil]

As far i could test this on my setup HQPlayer works great in minimal-server mode, even in a JPLAY Dual-PC setup. Making it working in core mode is on my list for AO 1.3?

[EuroDriver]

Phil and others

 

Would it be possible to install WS 2012 on to a bootable SD card for a MAC mini ?

 

The reason for asking is that the SD card is a lot electrically quieter than a SSD or HDD

 

Some one has installed OSX on a bootable SD card and had great results with HQ Players's NAA running in that environment.

 

I suspect that Minimal Server WS 2012 will be much quieter than OSX

 

Are there any mobo's with built in SD card slot ? I don't think one would want to use a USB SD card reader ;-)

[Hifidelit]

EuroDriver, you might have seen it already but if not you may be interested in this RAMDISK using a virtual hard drive:

Jump start your SSD | Computer Audio | Forum | JPLAY - hi-end audio player for Windows

 

English translation of the guide on aktives-hoeren.de by Horst and Modmix here:

http://www.acourate.com/RamWin/WinRAM%20Installation%20Guide%20V1.3_engl.pdf

[AudioPhil]

Hi

 

should be possible in theory. You should apply same technique like for CF cards.

 

just for having you all up to date, AO 1.31 will bring some new things. Support for HQPlayer in core mode, Fidelizer in core mode, and some other interesting things! :-)

[Hifidelit]

If following the Ram disk guide make sure you read 2.11 and note 10:

Of course, the Audiophile Optimizer can be installed into System 3 (VHD disk), but not earlier.

Be sure to have a copy of the .vhd file serving as backup of System 3 (VHD disk)

In some cases, „Disable driver and services?“ has to be answered with “no”.

[Bloodwound]

A self contained SD card with Server2012r2 is possible. But you need to install Server 2012 in UEFI mode to a hard drive first. It might be possible to circumvent this with refit/refind, but I guess the whole point would to be disconnect the internal drive altogether, anyways EFI-booting would be the most elegant way. That way you can either press and hold option/alt at boot time, or you could bless the actual efi boot file on the SD media to make it automatic.

 

There is a software named WinToUSB that claims to be able to do this for you, but I would probably just clone my installation manually. Of course Windows would need to load all the storage drivers before anything else, but I think (modern) Windows already does this. (Back in XP days it didn't, you'd need to hack XP to force the drivers to load before the actual OS)

 

Anyways, this is a stupid idea. (if somewhat cool) But I am absolutely certain that it can be done, but it might not be as straightforward for everyone. Unfortunately I can not verify this 100% since I have absolutely no interest in either Server2012R2 or AO.

[AudioPhil]

....just made Kernel-Streaming working in core mode on Windows Server Technical Preview (Server vNext).

[Solid-State]

....just made Kernel-Streaming working in core mode on Windows Server Technical Preview (Server vNext).

How is the sound in comparison with 2012R2 do you think

[EuroDriver]

From Jussi post in another thread, two mobo's with either micro SD or CF monory that one can boot from

 

PC Engines alix3d2 product file

Meet MinnowBoard MAX | minnowboard.org

[Miska]

From Jussi post in another thread, two mobo's with either micro SD or CF monory that one can boot from

 

PC Engines alix3d2 product file

Meet MinnowBoard MAX | minnowboard.org

 

I was thinking more about Linux... Alix probably doesn't have enough resources for running Windows (500 MHz Geode + 256 MB RAM), and doesn't have any display output (you'd install OS using serial console cable).

 

But MinnowMax is officially supported on Windows Embedded 8.1 (Industry Pro):

MinnowBoard MAX hardware development board (Windows Drivers)

 

And the fitlet also runs Windows:

fitlet

[wisnon]

Is Fitlet available for sale? Where?

[Octagon]

....just made Kernel-Streaming working in core mode on Windows Server Technical Preview (Server vNext).

Well done!

Thomas

[EuroDriver]

I was thinking more about Linux... Alix probably doesn't have enough resources for running Windows (500 MHz Geode + 256 MB RAM), and doesn't have any display output (you'd install OS using serial console cable).

 

But MinnowMax is officially supported on Windows Embedded 8.1 (Industry Pro):

MinnowBoard MAX hardware development board (Windows Drivers)

 

And the fitlet also runs Windows:

fitlet

 

 

Arrgh, I missed further down on the fitlet spec page that it also has a SD slot, so that makes the Fitlet very interesting too

 

Fitlet resellers list here

Resellers

[Bloodwound]

From Jussi post in another thread, two mobo's with either micro SD or CF monory that one can boot from

 

PC Engines alix3d2 product file

Meet MinnowBoard MAX | minnowboard.org

 

I believe all these (I cant say for certain though) machines do not have a "pure SD cardreader". (not just talking about the above computers, but generally) The SD card reader emulate a normal harddrive, within the context of ATA/SATA or something similar. for all intents and purposes the OS is booting from a hard drive. The SD card reader on Apple computers are not an emulated hard drive, so they are more tricky to work with, espescially since Apples EFI firmware will only EFI-boot from an SD card.

 

The CF interface on the other hand is always standard IDE. (Technically it's just a normal ATA hard drive in miniature)

The Minnowboard seems to only support booting from USB.

The Fitlet only seems to boot from it's internal Msata port.

 

One of my old laptops will boot from SD, but only because it's connected to the USB bus, so technically the same as booting from an USB stick.

[EuroDriver]

I believe all these (I cant say for certain though) machines do not have a "pure SD cardreader". (not just talking about the above computers, but generally) The SD card reader emulate a normal harddrive, within the context of ATA/SATA or something similar. for all intents and purposes the OS is booting from a hard drive. The SD card reader on Apple computers are not an emulated hard drive, so they are more tricky to work with, espescially since Apples EFI firmware will only EFI-boot from an SD card.

 

The CF interface on the other hand is always standard IDE. (Technically it's just a normal ATA hard drive in miniature)

The Minnowboard seems to only support booting from USB.

The Fitlet only seems to boot from it's internal Msata port.

 

One of my old laptops will boot from SD, but only because it's connected to the USB bus, so technically the same as booting from an USB stick.

 

which board / device do you think has the best chance to instal WS2012 and boot from it ?

 

one thought about using these mini devices is the time Service a Tool would take switching between modes. One may well fall asleep waiting zzzzzz

[Bloodwound]

The Fitlet with its msata port should be able to run WS2012 no problem.

Well technically also the Minnowboard Max, but it seems you're supposed to boot off an USB drive. Might need tweaking and hacking to install WS2012. Anyways it's a development board with the power button on the board itself. + Lots of other obvious cons.

 

You're much better off with a cheap Fitlet that is plug and play.