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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!


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The results of my experiment this afternoon compel me to start another thread.

 

This builds on what we have been discussing since Saturday over at: http://www.computeraudiophile.com/f8-general-forum/my-deep-dive-media-storage-interfaces-musical-differences-heard-between-chipsets-firewire-400-800-usb-sata-flash-drives-sd-cards-and-network-shares-warning-may-cause-seizures-dbt-crowd-and-flat-earth-naysayers-18108/

 

It is about just what the new thread title says. After finding that the slowest/quietest/simplest storage/transport methods sounded best--due to reduced activity we think--and not having a SSD drive internal (on my 2010 Mac mini), which would still be running the SATA bus, I did the following:

a) Cloned my Mavericks boot partition to a 32GB SDHC card (format to Mac OS Extended/Journaled w/GUID partition table);

b) Assigned that card as the boot drive in System Prefs>Startup Disk; Booted back up from the SD card;

c) In Disk Utility I unmounted both of my internal hard drive partitions (I have a Mavericks and a ML partition);

d) Made a 1GB RAM disk (my machine has just 8GB RAM at present); Copied favorite test tracks to it;

e) Ejected external FW drive that holds my big music library; Unplugged FW cable from computer and unplugged drive PS from wall;

f) Lauched A+ in Playlist mode (cloned SD card of course nicely retains all prior settings from HD); Deleted current tracks from playlist; Dragged test tracks in from RAMdisk Finder window;

g) Quit Finder (just one of my usual tweaks, doesn't do much;

h) Played tracks;

i) Soiled my pants.

 

The best sound I have EVER gotten. Alive with real energy, but so much quiet and detail that I can hear things going on on old tapes that have never been revealed before. And this in in comparison (several times booting back and forth in astonishment) to what already was the very best method I had: Playing from RAM disk but booted normally from 2.5 inch internal SATA drive (also with externals disconnected).

 

Be advised that only the 2010 and onward Mac minis (i.e. all the thin ones) are certain to have their SD card slot (actually an SDXC slot) on their own bus (actually shared with the Ethernet port on a Broadcom chip). The SD card slot on many (most? all?) of the Macbook Pros are on the USB bus, so results for such users might not be as dramatic.

(Check by going to About This Mac>System Report>USB; expand all the triangles for the USB bus branches to see if the SD Card Reader shows; Just looking at System Report>Card Reader won't tell you if it is/is-not on the USB bus.)

 

The next time I do surgery on my Mac mini (to yank out the switching power supply), I will probably pull the SATA HD entirely, and also plug in 16GB of RAM so can load longer playlists.

 

I know a number of you recently bought SD cards based on my other report. Now install the OS on them and enjoy!

 

Regards,

ALEX C.

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While you are inside the Mini, install a SSD. Get a fast one 500MB/sec R/W and low power draw. Some are 2w active and others are around 0.1 watt active.

The SD card may still be better sounding. But a fast, low power draw SSD should narrow the gap in performance.

I used a better supply with a 2009 model. Not gutsy enough to pull the switcher out of the 2011 currently used.

 

Well, I probably should try an SSD, just so I know. But since:

a) for the music tracks RAM disk already beat SD card, and the SD card beat the internal SATA;

AND

b) the OS on the SD card allowed the SATA bus to sleep almost completely (at least as much as unmounting the internal HD allows);

AND

c) I could never afford to put my whole library on an internal SSD;

AND

d) Mavericks, A+, and my utilities are only taking up 14GB of the 32GB SD card;

AND

e) I've spent too much already this year and the holidays with the kids is coming…

 

So it's kind of cool to be booted from the SD and play from RAM disk.

Moving over to a linear supply (the very elegant 2-rail, 12V/5A choke-filtered one with remote voltage sense line that John Swenson designed and which I will commercially produce) will be the next big leap for my system. We have come up with a slick PCB for inside the mini which does not require any wire cutting or goofiness; just plug the existing motherboard power cable connector into it and stick nuts on the two PCB-mounted jacks (DC barrel and SMA for Kelvin-sense) that will stick out through the old power-cord oval hole.

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Alex, when you get the 16gb ram upgrade, what size do you expect that your RAMdisk will go to ...?

 

That's a tough question. Mavericks and A+ run great with just the 8GB (well 7 if you take out for the RAM disk I am playing with), and with the OS on the SD card I am obviously not getting speed from it (the Class 10 32GB is 22MB/sec; 2x what my camera's 2GB card was but still a slug). I know that it is good to leave extra space on any drive, though I'm not sure if this applies to ones being used just to read tunes from. And of course the OS and A+ might enjoy more room.

 

I currently give A+ 6.4GB allocation for track preload. Which brings up a question I e-mailed Damien about a few days ago but have yet to receive an answer. Maybe someone here knows. To quote from part of my e-mail:

 

"In playlist mode, when the grey bar finishes loading into memory the track that is playing, does A+ continue to load more tracks into memory--namely the next up track on the playlist? It certainly behaves like does preload the next track since if I stop a first track halfway through playing and select the next in-order track to play, it starts immediately and the is no grey bar moving to indicate memory loading activity. Am I correct? How many tracks get preloaded? Up to whatever RAM allocation is set in A+ preferences? Is this part of supporting gapless playback?

 

I ask this because some other user has insisted to me that A+ sounds better if you let it load the whole track before playback, or that while playing, once the grey bar finishes loading the track then the music gets better. To preload, I start the track, pause, and then start playing after the grey bar gets to the end. I can't really say I have heard that much difference doing this. And if A+ is actually continuing to load more tracks even after the grey bar finishes, then that would explain why I don't hear a difference (unless none is to be heard anyway).

Certainly I have watched Activity Monitor before and see that A+ uses lots of processor time during the loading, then settles down to almost nothing. I did it just now and see that it settles down right away after the grey bar is filled. Maybe the grey bar is indicating loading of more than just the track that is playing.

 

This would seem the only logical explanation, but I just did a test: I timed the grey bar filling first for a track in a long playlist, and then deleted all other tracks in the playlist and reloaded and timed the same track. Both times it took 16 seconds for the grey bar to fill. So now I am confused."

 

Anyone?

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Great, something new for me to try... I appreciate the creativity it took to come up with this idea and the time you spent doing it. I have a question though, how did you make a RAMDisk?

 

There are lots of easy GUI front end for making a RAM disk (its just one command line in Terminal, but that's not usually my bag). Here is a link to the one I'm using: OS X: How to create a RAM disk – the easy way » bogner.sh

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Try putting A+ on RAMdisk once you've got the 16GB?

 

XXHE sounds best to me with both app and music on RAMdisk. (One each for app & music.)

 

Oh man Jud! I just tried it, and while I don't have time right now for a proper A/B (got to hit the BBQ), just the first track I played with A+ launched from the RAM disk sound like MORE of the same kind of improvement. I'll know (and report) tomorrow if it is a little or a lot. I am suspecting the latter. Thanks!

 

Can't believe this week. Such huge leaps for my system for next to zero $. I've been grinning all day.

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

 

Nice idea, but then I'd have to put an active data interface on the USB bus with my DAC. And I know what that sounds like. Even a USB flash drive did not sound as good as SD card or a shared network drive on wired ethernet.

 

Now I suppose I could directly attach a standard wireless router to the computer (with ethernet cable) and have it wirelessly retrieve music from elsewhere (either bridged to another wifi router or to a computer talking to the music machine's wifi point). Seems a stretch just to eliminate galvanic connection between the ethernet port and my Cisco switch. The Mac has some sort of LAN filter chip in it already. But I might give it a try for fun.

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I am very eager to try SuperDad’s suggestion of a SD card with Mavericks (although my Mini is still running Mountain Lion) and booting from the SD card with Audirvana +, music, and the OS all on the same card (or with the music on a RAM disk). I have a question:

 

After doing some internet research on making a bootable copy of Mavericks on an SC card, I could not find a clear step by step walkthrough on the process. I understand Mavericks to be an upgrade, not a complete new OS and the apple page says that OS 10.6.8 is a requirement. Will I need that version of the OS on the SD card first? Lastly it would be appreciated if someone could point to a trusted step by step walkthrough on installing a bootable OS on an SD card from the web it would be appreciated. I want to get it right the first time without too much of an issue. Many thanks!

 

Booster, so glad you are enjoying it. Yes, having the OS on an SD, dismounting the internal SATA drive (you will have to do that in Disk Utility--run from the SD after you boot from the SD), creating a RAM disk for some music AND putting Audirvana on the RAM disk (thanks Jud!) will indeed take you to another amazing level.

 

Once you get a 32GB SDHC card (I bought this one for $21: Amazon.com: Transcend 32 GB Class 10 SDHC Flash Memory Card (TS32GSDHC10E): Electronics ; it's Class 10 so about 22MB/sec in the mini), download a trial version of Carbon Copy Cloner. You must first format the SD card with Disk Utility to be a Mac OS Extended Journaled drive (GUID should be the default partition table which is also required). Then use CCC to clone your Mountain Lion boot drive to the SD card (it should easily fit unless you use your machine for other things and have a bunch of apps on it; be sure that it will fit with about 8-10GB to spare). Once you clone is done and mounted, you can set it as the Startup Disk and reboot.

 

If you want to do a clean Mavericks install (and yes, I greatly prefer the "sound" of Mavericks over ML, but some others feel otherwise), then you first need to read: How to make your own bootable OS X 10.9 Mavericks USB install drive | Ars Technica

 

Apple changed how the installer works with Mavericks. With ML you actually could follow some of the widely published steps and use just Disk Utility to make a USB OS X installer. That does not work with Mavericks but that's okay since the free "DiskMaker X" utility does now work with Mavericks--I used it last month. Get it at: DiskMaker X.

 

So yes, you will need/want an 8GB thumb drive that you can dedicate to being a Mavericks installer (a good thing to have around). And you will download Mavericks (from the app store on any machine) as if you were going to upgrade. But then DON'T upgrade, don't launch the Mavericks installer; copy it out of your Applications folder and follow the instructions in the article I linked.

 

After all that, then you can do a clean install of Mavericks whenever and wherever you want; in your case, to an SD card. But don't forget to do all the usual optimizations after you boot into Mavericks (all those command lines to permanently turn off Spotlight, Mission Control, Notifications, etc., etc.). I should clean up my text file list of all those that I do so I can share them around. Most are pretty well known.

 

Have fun!

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The "sweet spot" currently in terms of $ per GB at class 10 or greater speeds seems to be 128GB. You can find cards going for 50 cents a GB or less at that size.

 

Jud, why buy a big SD card at all? If one is playing from RAM disk the SD card just needs to be big enough for a clean install of the OS (and a copy of A+ to drag over to the RAM disk too). I cloned my Mavericks internal partition to the SD, and even with all my little sound utilities and the 20 .dmgs of older A+ versions, I still have more than half of the 32GB SD card free.

 

I intend to spend my money on more RAM. Too bad I can't get a mini to accept 32GB of RAM. That would make for a roomy RAM disk!

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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.

 

That should word out nicely.

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Forgive my ignorance, but why would an EHD connected to my MBP via ethernet sound better than my EHD connected via FW?

 

I think because the FW interface somehow allows in noise on the power supply ground plane and also requires the computer to run more on the FW interface chip and divert attention as well. This is my layman (me) conjecture based of what I am hearing and what my engineering partner is tell me. His ideas are more complicated and he has isolated a lot of this to the pollution of the ground plane caused by all the CMOS switching that goes on throughout the chain.

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I attribute the benefits to removing the usb cable which carries noise from the SMPS powering the drive.

 

Well, if he is in fact using a USB-connected external drive than that alone is cause of "confusion" in the sound when using a USB DAC. As I have said before, any time I use a USB source for the music files--even a thumb drive--I hear the same "jumbling" as the computer is using the USB to talk to both the DAC and file source at the same time.

 

I hear most of the benefit playing from SD card or RAM disk even if the hard drive (in my case a FW400) is still attached and powered on. Disconnecting it and unplugging its power supply from the wall helps a little too, but not nearly as much as simple not using it as the source.

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Hi Alex,

 

There are another matters tan could affect the SQ of the same sound track from where it’s stored.

 

Following is the possible storage three. The album is “Five Songbirds”, and from my Mac Mini late 2012, Audirvana Plus memory player (in order to avoid confusions I didn't linked to RAM Memory all the threes).

 

 

Album stored in iTunes in an external FireWire Hard Disk:

 

Main Bus/FireWire Bus/External HD/Users/Music/iTunes/iTunes Music/Compilations/“Five Songbirds”

 

 

Album stored in an SDXC Card in the SDXC Card Reader:

 

Main Bus/Sd Card Reader/64GB HDXC Card/“Five Songbirds”

 

 

Album stored in the internal Sata 3 SS Hard Disk:

 

Main Bust/Sata Bus/128GB SSHD/“Five Songbirds”

 

 

Album stored in an RAM Disc in the RAM Memory Banks:

 

Main Bus/8gB Memory Bank 1 + 8gB Memory Bank 2/RAMDisk/“Five Songbirds”

 

 

Mac HFS+ is the Hard Disk file structure used by Apple. Less prone to fragmentation than other file structures, but possible, mainly if Hard Disk is close to full.

 

SDXC Cards, RAM Memory & RAM Disks could get fragmentation also. In the case of RAM Memory you have to 'restart' the PC in order to get it unfragmented. SDXC Cards & RAM Disks it's better to format it gain. Regarding external Hard Drives or, the internal SSD one, the only way is to achieve only 50% of their capacity (in Macs), I don't know in Windows. There are defragment apps. but use it at you own risk, it's not recommended to unfragment and SSD.

 

Kind regards,

 

Roch

 

Hi Roch:

 

I am interested and trying to follow what you are saying. Are you implying that the reason RAM disk sounds so good is that the files are not stored a few folder layers down? Based on what I have heard in my system I am skeptical of that since in my tests between storage locations I have--for ease of access with A+ playlists--been in every case putting my 6 test tracks in the root directory of the "test medium." And my results are still clear. I am convinced it has to do with processing and noise.

 

As far as defragmenting RAM disks, why would one need to restart the computer? Just ejecting (dismounting) a RAM disk makes it disappear; and I can create a brand new one. No rebooting required.

 

There is one are I am a little worried about: Since I now boot and run the OS only from my 32GB SD card, and since I know that OS X and all UNIX-based OSs do a lot of constant background maintenance reading/writing even if the machine is not used for anything other that music playback (with music data stored elsewhere), will tyne SD card have a limited life-span? I don't think that these simplistic devices (SD cards) are maintained by the sort of methods which are now part of SSD drive-life preservation.

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Hi everyone:

 

The other day Jud mentioned running A+ itself from a RAM disk, and I thought cool, this should be a logical extension of what I have been hearing as I moved to ever "quieter"/"simpler" music transport interfaces. So I did that the same night, gave it a quick listen with a couple of my test suite tracks, and indeed it sounded great. But I did not go back to running A+ from the SD card (that's my boot OS, all internal SATA and externals dismounted) until this morning. What prompted me do so was that last night I was cursing through my music library for pleasure, dragging in a few tracks at a time to the RAM disk and playing them from that.

 

What happened was that a lot of beloved music--including some tunes that used to sound great--the sound seemed shrill and rather bass-light. Most of it I attributed to the greater accuracy that the RAM or SD playback has been bringing. The main positive attribute of that seems to be a much more unified wave front where the harmonics of the note are better integrated with the initial attack. This allows the instruments to sound more explicitly like what they are (instantaneous transient attack; inner tones of brass, piano, drums; and acoustics that are more natural).

 

Admittedly, the tunes where I was experiencing disappointment were older recordings. Some newer, independent recordings (Ardrew Bird comes to mind from last night) were fine and there was plenty of bass--when it is there in the recording. But some formerly VERY dynamic-sounding tracks (like the crazy King Crimson "Easy Money" from Larks' Tongues in Aspic) just did not have the impact, excitement, and room filling presence that I was used to.

 

So I figured I'd chalk it up to the usual greater accuracy revealing the limitations of recordings. After all, the best tracks sounded amazing, there was lots in between, and each recording has a different character--always a benchmark for it the system is moving forward or backward. And playing the tracks from the hard disk (instead of from RAM) would probably bring back some "fullness" and "lushness"--along with being more convenient. (Maybe I'd use the RAM disk just for the best/reference tracks). I tried the hard drive layback, and while it helped, it lost the elements of RAM disk playback I had been getting spoiled with.

 

What could it be? Well, I had not done a proper A/B between running A+ from the SD card versus running it from the (admittedly small 500MB) RAM disk. Of course it is VERY quick to quit and relaunch A+ from the SD card or RAM disk. Bingo!! For me, the sound is decidedly more lush and "organic" with A+ running from the SD card than from the RAM disk. Notes and space fills in much more richly, and I don't feel nearly as edgy while listening to the great middle of my large library. Again, the tracks themselves are still loaded into and played from the RAM disk; it's just A+ that is running from the SD card (along with the OS).

 

Is it more accurate? Probably not for the very best tracks. But it is more listenable. I am wondering if the problem might be that running A+ from a small (500MB) RAM disk partition is somehow too restrictive. I know that apps need "scratch disk" space as they operate, and while I always assumed that the boot drive is where they "scratch", I have never before run app from other than the boot drive. Of course A+ probably becomes 100% RAM resident when running… So I just don't know. Clearly I am grasping at straws to explain what I have no trouble hearing.

 

I am probably operating at the limits, not just of my knowledge (duh!), but of what flexibility and customization is offered by Audrivana Plus and OS X. I understand that folks that play with the advance functions and settings of PeterSt.'s XXHighEnd--on well endowed and tweaked Windows machines--are able to adjust a lot of parameters relating to memory play and RAM disks.

 

Maybe a few of you will experiment with A+ from RAM disk versus SD card (assuming you are booting from the SD card) and let me know your results. Be sure to check out some less than perfect tracks as well.

 

Thanks for reading. Regards,

Alex C.

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Some words from Gordon Rankin about SD cards and the slowness of them.

 

That's nice, but in my experiments, the noise and crap from SATA, FW, or USB are far more of sonic issue. Besides, my "slowpoke" SD card is stall transferring at 22MB/sec. That's faster than a lot of external USB attached drives. Plus if you look at the spec and interface, SD card slots (of course just those built onto motherboards) have an extremely simple, quiet, almost RAM-like interface. And I am convinced that is the root of the matter.

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Hi Alex (Superdad),

 

There is something interesting with XXHighEnd: PeterSt added a parameter where one can specify the ramdisk drive letter. When one press "Play", the songs in the playlist are copied from where they physically reside in the ramdrive. So all is done automatically.

 

BTW, I really enjoy this thread (and the other where you mention your experience with different interfaces). Thanks for all the trouble you went through :)

 

Regards,

 

Alain

 

Hi Alain. That sounds like a great feature. Something to wish for in a future version of A+? Really essential if you are like me and enjoy instant access to your whole music library, not just what you hand picked out and copied to a RAM disk--and then to and A+ playlist. We know Damien has lots of big plans for the player/list experience for 2.0.

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Yes! Superdad you are spot on in your analysis. I echo that an sd boot w audirvana on the sd card is superior and provides an immediacy to the music that is unique. I do agree that performance does suffer. For those that walk this path expect your performance to be slow but it is absolutely worth it to experiment and try this. I understand the value of a RAM disk but I question if it's worth it. The most significant value here seems to be from dropping the USB interface and unmounting the main drive in the mini. There is more noise than I anticipated caused by these interfaces.

 

It is awesome that you hear the very same thing!

Just think about it.

This change we are making--between A+ running off a RAM disk versus an SD card--is about as far into the thin edge of what would seem an infinitesimally small factor, yet:

 

a) it sonically quite striking--unmistakable even;

b) you, and others hear it the same way;

 

Sure the naysayers would dismiss any statistics of forum posts. But you know what you heard, and I know what I heard, so?…

 

----

Booster, is your music library on the USB interface you unplugged? Also, did you listed to it dismounted only, still plugged in/on, versus unplugged, off at the wall? Even for FW400--the least offensive external interface for us Mac w/USB DAC folk--it helps a bit to have it all unhooked. I have not hooked up a drive via USB since getting into the SD card scene, but I can imagine that the difference in your case would be even more significant.

 

I just looked at your profile to see if you are using a USB DAC. No offense to you or Arcam meant, but now I am more blown away that you are hearing what we have been discussing--on a $500 DAC!

 

Amazing confirmation that not all this tweaking is restricted to mega-performance systems. I honestly am shocked. That's great.

 

 

I didn't quite understand what you meant by "For those that walk this path expect your performance to be slow…" What would be slow? (people?, sound?)

 

Goodnight, AJC

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I do think there is value to be found in that configuration. As I now notice how slow the Apple OS seems on an SD card i imagine that it would be a very slow boot process. I have yet to reboot my Mini pointing to the SD card.

 

Hi Booster: I don't think that's what Jud meant. I'm the one booting (Mavericks) from an SD card--and I don't find the slowness to be a problem.

Jud is suggesting a number of tests to try with combinations of SSD, SD, RAM disk, and where the OS, A+ app, and music tracks are run from.

I do not yet own an SSD, so I can't try out his suggestions. I think part of the question comes down to if I can tolerate the internal SATA interface running at all. So while maybe SATA running an internal SSD might be more acceptable, I can't afford a big enough one for my music library and running the OS and A+ from the SD sounds very good.

 

While without an SSD on hand I am limited in what I can test, I should compare:

OS booted on SD (music on RAM disk) with internal SATA HD dismounted (my current set up)

versus

The same but leaving the internal SATA mounted.

Perhaps that would in some way simulate keeping the SATA interface talking--enough to gauge its effect.

Lots of permutations possible, yet getting an SSD is the only way to answer some for sure.

 

I am certain that much more will be sonically obvious (or maybe even lessened, though I doubt it) when I finally get to yank the switching PS out of my mini and run with a great linear. So I may cool it on too many more comparisons until then.

 

BTW Jud, in my test above where I said I was not completly happy with A+ running from RAM disk and find it running from the booted OS SD to be fuller and richer, I was indeed running A+ from its own 500GB RAM disk--separate from the 1GB one for the music files.

Actually, the first time you mentioned running A+ from RAM disk I did so with it on the same 1GB RD as the music tracks--but I did not do a comparison of that when I then gave it its own RD. Guess I should. Just tired of burning out my ears and days with the same test music!

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Possibly a bit late to the discussion: An applescript alternative to the various GUIs for making RAMDisks, for anyone who wants to run with it...

 

Thanks Souptin! It will be great for me to use your script as a starting point. When I get more RAM I can adjusted to create larger disks. This sort of thing might even make it into the a future big upgrade of A+--along with hopefully major improvements to Playlist features/functions...

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Can't test any of it right now. My server is a G4 tower. It doesn't have any SD slots and can only run OSX 10.5, which means no A+, among other limitations. I will finally be ordering a Mac Mini this week, a late 2009 for the separate PSU, optical drive and price. It will take a bit for me to get memory upgraded, software setup, etc. before I can attempt anything along the lines of this thread. None-the-less I am following the developments with great interest :)

 

Daudio: For a host of reasons, I really recommend that you consider a mid-2010 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo instead of the late-2009. I own both (along with a pile of G4 minis, an i5, and an i7), and in a carefully controlled 3-way between the 2009, 2010, and 2011 (i5), the 2010 won--even when I gave the 2009 the advantage of the big outboard 10 amp linear I had been running with it. (Sorry, but Nugent at Empirical is misplacing his love with the 2009.) Additionally, the 2009 does not have an SD slot, and I personally find it harder to work on than the thin minis.

The 2010 and newer ones run cooler and quieter, and require just 12V. Extracting the power supply from them is not hard (I can send you videos), and very soon I will be producing a board to make adding a DC barrel jack quite simple (the board has at one end the SPOX connector for the existing internal PS cable to attached to, and jacks that fit into the empty oval hole left by the removal of the stock PS at the other end).

There are other reasons for my preference (sonics), but also I have had a lot of problems over the years with the optical drive of the 2008-2009 minis. My 2010 has been ripping quickly and quietly for some time now.

 

I know you said price is a factor, but I bet you could find a 2010 for pretty close to the price of the late-2009.

 

Anyway, just my 2 cents…

 

Too bad we can't get squat in $ for our G4 machines. Aside from the little pile of G4 minis, I too have a tower gathering a lot of dust out in the garage--along with a couple of originally very expensive, very heavy, NEC CRT monitors. Can't give this stuff away--I've tried! But it has always been this way with computers, no?

 

Best of luck.

--Alex

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Good to know it! I'm moving to Thunderbolt external drives I guess next week.

Roch

 

Hi Roch. I've been meaning to ask you a few questions regarding your Thunderbolt plans:

1) What brand of enclosures are you getting?

2) Will they be bus powered or have their own power supplies?

3) Will the enclosures have ports besides the Thunderbolt and/or did you find any that are exclusively Thunderbolt?

4) Are you putting spinning HDs in them or SSD? (What brand/model of either?)

 

I am somewhat interested in Thunderbolt, not because of their speed (which my personal experience leads me to believe is not that relevant to SQ), but because Thundebolt-equiped Macs have a dedicated controller for it which:

a) allows one to avoid use of the FW, USB, and SATA buses--each of which demonstrably do have a negative effect;

b) might offer some isolation/blockage of nasties that the disk or SSDs in the enclosures might generate on their SATA interfaces and chips.

 

While my 2010 Mac mini music server does not have a Thunderbolt port, my desktop 2012 i7 does. I have been thinking that with the evolution of A+ this year, Mavericks, the SD card and RAM disk things, plus a better USB cable and further improvements inside my DAC, it might be time to revisit my preference for the 2010 mini (which was based on a 3-way shootout I did last year versus late-2009 and an i5 2011 mini). Certainly will be easy to do now with my whole tweaked boot OS being on an SD card.

 

If Thunderbolt proves to be a really good sounding alternative for external high capacity music storage (versus FireWire400--the best sounding large thing I have now), then I would prefer to know this before I permanently pull the PS (and maybe some other junk) out of my 2010. So I could order a TBolt drive to try with my i7. If it does not beat my FW400 sonically, then no harm, I'll use it on my desk. If it does, then I might give the 2010 unit to my wife (and do another round of musical computer upgrades with the kids), and get a newer (2011 or 2012) unit with Thunderbolt for the music system. (Have to first be sure that i5/i7 units sound as good as my 2010 Core2 Duo--see above.) Would miss the optical of the 2010 for ripping, but could plug an external in somewhere. Wish they made Thunderbolt optical drives to add to the chain with the HD.

 

Thanks and regards,

ALEX C.

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Just strikes me that putting somewhat artificial resource limitations on the OS by running it from a relatively slow SD card interface might be counterproductive sonically vs. running it from the much faster SATA interface. (Thinking of speed of communication between player app and OS also.)

 

A spinning drive might give back some of this advantage in electrical noise and vibration; perhaps an SSD would do better in this respect.

 

Good points for sure! I just have to get my business moving better (too much time on testing and CA forum!), and also get through the holidays with kids without breaking the bank! So for now I look to others to test and report what they hear with internal SSD boot versus SD card.

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I would agree that from what I know at this point that running from an SSD on the Mini should sound superior to a SATA interface and also give you back the performance, features and speed that you would expect from a CA system.

 

Hi George: Of course we each should run with whatever works and is not too inconvenient. I too wrestle with the dilemma of a large music library and the hassles of copying to RAM disk, etc.

 

Much of what is being discussed in this thread is about experimenting and sorting out the limits of what configurations yield the ultimate sound--and then examining those factors to learn and find a workable approach.

 

Just to be clear, SSD units are all (to my knowledge) sold with SATA interfaces. That interface is fast and plugs right into where internal (and external) hard drives have been. So if you add an SSD in a mini, you are still running the SATA interface. Hence my reply earlier--and my admission about lacking an SSD myself--that this remains to be compared.

 

This also ties into my interest and questions to Roch (elcorso) about Thunderbolt. If the Thunderbolt interface of current Macs is electrically/processor interrupt quieter than the internal SATA bus, then an external Thunderbolt drive would certainly be fast enough for booting--and sizable enough for music storage. Yes, the drives themselves (SSD or HD) which get installed in a Thunderbolt enclosure will still be SATA drives, but going back to my other research thread I think the issue is also about the interface to the computer--and maybe Thunderbolt will isolate whatever effects from the SATA drive.

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Thunderbolt drive powered through the Mini (thunderbolt bus), and Mini powered through external linear PSU.

 

But galvanic isolation of all outputs is may be also a reason...

 

 

Hello Yucca:

 

I looked at the DB System web site. Fascinating things they are into. I only get a sense from the pictures and some phrases, since I do not read French. It looks from the page showing the Mac mini modification (MacMini modifications db) that they bring out the left/right analog from the computer's own DAC chip, and also make an S/PDIF signal (from before the Toslink optical encoder perhaps?). Is this correct and is the S/PDIF what you attach to your Mytek DAC?

 

Also from on the DB System web site: Please explain what is Zardoz? (Besides being the title of a weird 1974 Sean Connery sci-fi movie.)

 

Merci.

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