ATTENTION Current Mac mini/A+ users: Boot Mavericks from an SD card, load a RAMdisk, dismount your internal SATA drives, and pour a drink for the musicians walking out of your speakers!

[Freann]

Idea: use an external usb wireless network card (D-Link DWA-160). Access music library without galvanic contact or wifi inside the computer enclosure.

 

[Freann]

The reason is you are disconnecting external noice generators (HDD circuits, power supplies etc).

 

Using SD-cards for my music is too extreme for my taste. Booting from one is doable. But I’d like to use a HDD via ethernet. I’m thinking NAS with analogue power supply + Acoustic Revive LAN-filter.

[Freann]

Test 1: music on CF card via usb-driven card reader (using a USB dac). Ok, I get it. Clearly better.

 

 

Test 2: Copy music to internal drive, unmount USB HD. Ok, that also better.

 

 

Can I fit a 2TB drive (15mm) in my 2008 Mac Mini Server? Probably not.

Better buy an external firewire port driven 2.5” drive (Western Digital My Passport Studio V4 2TB)?

[Freann]

Confused.

Putting A+ on a RAM disc makes no sense. The application is read into (regular) RAM once, and that’s it. If it writes temp files, they would be stores on the OS partition. What Im I missing?

 

Music files on the other hand is fine. Regular file access without HD etc involved.

[Freann]

Each of those zillions of interactions is mediated through the CPU. CPU-RAM interactions are the fastest and most optimized in the entire computer, far more than disk I/O, even with an SSD. So there is always a processing advantage to use of a RAMdisk. Whether there is a sonic advantage is up to you.

 

No, there are only one interaction – when the app (A+) is loaded into memory. When the app talks to the OS, it does so from (ordinary) RAM, just like any other app. The code being executed in RAM has nothing to do with were the the app was loadad from (disc X or Y).

 

If there is a sonic advantage, it is not because A+ resides on a RAM disc per se. There is something else going on.

[Freann]

Using an app called RAM Disk Creator. Works well.

 

http://bogner.sh/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/RAMDiskCreator.app_.zip

 

[Freann]

@Jud: way over my head now...

But timing aside – when does an app talk to a disc other than the one controlled by the OS? A+ uses a scratch disc like Photoshop?

[Freann]

Ah, the mysteries of software development!

 

Now running OS from SD card and music files from RAM disk. Need to compare against previous setup using a 2008/brick power supply mac mini.

 

Awaiting delivery of a Acoustic Revive Lan filter & a 2.5" FW800 powered 2TD drive.

[Freann]

Last nights setup

2010 Mac Mini unibody/Mavericks on a SD card/Music on a RAM disk

 

Todays setup

2008 Mac Mini/Mavericks on HD/Music on a RAM disk

 

I prefer the 2008 mac. Simply because I hear hardness and grit from the built in power supply in the 2010 Mac Mini. If I modify it with an external analogue power supply the reverse would probably be true. Smaller sound stage and less quick bass with the 2008 setup.

 

Has any one else compared old vs. new Mac Mini?

[Freann]

@Superdad: interesting shootout. Mine is a server model with a 2.53 Core 2 Duo with 8GB ram.

Which linear PS are you getting for your 2010?

[Freann]

Well I just had to... Disconnect the ethernet cable brings another step of clarity and calmness. Not very usable though! Awaiting delivery a Acoustic Revive Lan filter.

[Freann]

Having done the above, I can add three thinks to Pols list:

 

 

1. Headless with monitor emulation

2. LAN filter

3. “External Wifi”

 

 

1. This but on a standard Display port-to-vga adapter:

The 30 Second Dummy Plug

 

 

2. The LAN filter is an Acoustic Revive RLI-1. In my opinion an absolute must. In my setup a much bigger difference than a new USB cable (NordOst Blue Heaven –> Wireworld Platinum Starlight)

 

 

3. The “external wifi” is an older Airport Extreme powered by my JS-2 power supply and configured to be an extension to the existing wifi network. I still use the LAN filter between the mini and the AE.

 

 

With these three tricks my mini has no galvanic connection to anything except the JS-2. Music is stored on a HD connected to the regular Airport Extreme. With HQPLayer my setup now sounds like a million bucks. Unbelievable.

[Freann]

The Acoustic Revive RLI-1 has one drawback: it’s only 100Mbit. The gain in SQ makes up the for loss of speed.

[Freann]

@jcpom I see this too. I suspect it is the internal card reader not correctly reading the card. There are lots of videos on Youtube about this. I applied some tape over the lock switch. Seems to help.

[Freann]

It seems to be a major issue, especially on portables. I suspect there is a lot of dust in there... Cleaning time.

[Freann]

Start with the LAN filter. Whatever you do you will (probably) need it.

 

Headless with monitor emulation: if you run a mac mini completely headless, the CPU will do the GPU’s (video card) job. You will tax the processor and get low framerates. This is a way of tricking the hardware into thinking its connected to a VGA monitor. There are solutions for HDMI, but those little boxes are darn expensive (>$100). The only side effect is resolution maxes out at 1600x1200.

And yes, you can hear the effect of removing yet another connection to a device with a power supply.

[Freann]

A m3u file is actually a text file containing paths to the original file. A+ is playing the file from your external HDD. Placing the m3u on ram disk makes absolute no difference in the way A+ operates.

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M3U