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On 5/24/2018 at 10:19 AM, tboooe said:

I personally feel using a Windows based NAA with drivers sound better based on my limited testing.  I've only compared the Allo Sparky to my i3 Server 2012 R2 NAA.  I believe some other folks have reported the same results.  I need to next put the image on the same i3 machine and compare.

Thanks @tboooe Please keep us posted on this.

 

Can someone confirm this? I get the SQ improvement of Windows over Linux and Direct Connection to DAC vs network renderer only (or I should say mostly) applies to owners of Holo Spring (and/or SU-1) combinations for which Windows Drivers (as @tboooe has mentioned before) may be better. Possibly other DAC's may not shown such difference in SQ when using Win vs Linux or DirectUSB vs NAA. Also we cannot rule out the synergy between SU-1 -- I2S -- Holo Dac

 

My trial version of Roon is expiring and need to decide which way to go, I believe HQP is one of them being fed by MinimServer - BubbleUPNP+HQP and Rygel, all running over Ubuntu (I believe that's what Jussi recommends) I'm just afraid of losing SQ with my Pro-ject S2 or my future (yet to purchase DAC) which I believe may be a Brooklyn+ or Denafrip Ares or else.

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...
17 minutes ago, HardrockInMiniMac said:

 

 

Well, I do not know why, but I can switch on the same song in just seconds and it is absolutely significant. The combination of Roon+HQP ist better than Roon alone but worse than HQP alone by far. However, to me it only matters for serious listening, for all other requirements I run Roon + HQP. 

How dare you? we only do serious listening around here .... all other requirements are a distraction ....  :) 

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  • 1 month later...
1 hour ago, LoryWiv said:

I also listen mostly to classical instrumental music (solo keyboard and chamber music) as well as vocal jazz and small ensembles. I use XTR filter with the -2s to output DSD256 and really enjoy the results. My CPU load stays < 20% and NVidia CUDA offload shows GPU usage of around 10-15% as well on my mid-tier Windows PC. 

 

PCM w/FIR does add a bit of immediacy / presence but occasional stridency as well. My best results of all are with 24 bit FLAC or DSD64-DSF files upconverted to DSD256 --> very transparent, musically engaging sound but doesn't sound "processed" even though obviously conversions are at work.

 

Truly, setting up HQPlayer does not require very advanced computer skills. It is no harder than Foobar but the quality of output and versatility is far superior. it is well-worth downloading the trial and experimenting. I purchased it before my trial expired and am very glad I did.

Yeah I agree too, that's the closest you can get to a custom DAC on software with the convenience of switching the filters at your disposal, room correction etc. Very good software

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posted about this before, I have an Amanero Combo 384 and when playing from HQPe (Desktop and Embedded should be the same engine per previous Miska confirmation) there is loud and irritating white noise most of the time, sometimes is the actual music with noise included, if I change the filters to any other filter then the noise stops and I can play music for extended periods of time, as long as I don't disconnect HQP from Amanero. When disconnected and re connected the first time it plays white noise, changing filters then restores normal sound and you can switch filters back and forth with no issues. Running currently Amanero 1099c. 

 

I know it has been reported before the quirks with Amanero, I was just wondering if someone with the same issues found a workaround to it.

 

Thank you all

 

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1 hour ago, Le Concombre Masqué said:

❤️poly sinc mqa mp

 

Drifting on the web in an armchair in the shade (it's hot...) I read it's Lampizator's recommended settings.

 

Tried it with regular NON MQA files and found it very nice with redbook (does not work with TEAC 501/Windows/n48k). If I was to bitch it I'd say it's tubey round simplified but I enjoyed it as clean smooth articulate & simply pleasant.

 

My base setting (and I've been true to it for months so maybe I'm just welcoming a change for the sake of novelty) is poly sinc xtr mp

 

What do you think what are your findings ?

 

And, @Miska, is it an heresy since that filter is designed to get rid of noise generated by the mqa process not to better other filters, or is there ground to this liking? 

Pcm or dsd? 

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  • 4 months later...

I would not recommend you to go down the virtualized route for HQPE, hypervisors are not very fond of high cpu tasks and you will lose performance but if you still want to try it out then install Ubuntu from scratch and HQPE, I can post the entire commands chain if you want 

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On 12/24/2018 at 9:49 AM, Hammer said:

Yes, I recognize the downsides of running in vm, but wanted to try and see the results.  I’m currently running HQPlayer desktop in a Windows VM, but it’s a bit clunky, so I think running the image will be better.  Thanks!

Well I can tell you that once you go HQPE there is no turning back to windows, the clunkiness you may notice is a windows thing. I will post my install commands (with updated versions) when I get to my computer, I will include the wireless config etc just in case you are interested to go full physical non vm as I stream wireless and access my HQPE and NAA wireless for updates. 

Merry Christmas everybody 

 

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  • 1 month later...
35 minutes ago, Miska said:

 

No, I have the same massive Noctua NH-D15 (newer NH-D15S may be easier to fit) as in the i7-6950X machine. BIOS is too aggressive on the second "OPT" fan controller, but with just one fan in the middle and using just the regular "CPU" fan controller, it should be pretty quiet on this board too. At least on the other Gigabyte board where the 6950X is, it is practically totally silent when CPU fan profile is set to "Silent".

 

The board model is quite old already, I've had it for couple of years. Probably there are even better Z270/Z370 boards around...

 

I have a Noctua NH-D14 on a gaming rig, 6.5 years already still going, great cooling, I was looking more into a mini ITX board, as of today with USB 3.1, Intel and Ultra Durable (which has better components ergo better shielding) they have only 7th gen not 8th yet, guess around March they will release a new board or something.... will see

Shielding in SQ is a big part of it, I do among other things RF assessments and installs on buildings and high-rise towers for a living and it is extremely but extremely hard to block leaking of EMI/RFI in components that's why these boards are so attractive.

Thanks, I may stick to air cooling 

 

 

 

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9 hours ago, tboooe said:

Alright guys, I am finally going to build an actively cooled server PC so I can try CUDA.  I am hoping that using some of the more computational heavy filters in HQP will result in better sound to me.  My intent is to buy some mini-itx Asus mobo and the Streacom DA-2 case (https://www.thermofisher.com/us/en/home/clinical/precision-medicine.html).  

 

Anyway, I would really appreciate some advice on what GPU to consider.  I have never bought a GPU before so I have no idea what to look for or consider.  Thank you in advance!

Check gigabyte as well, for gaming Asus is great for audio I believe gigabyte surpasses it in shielding, not gen8 Intel support yet on gigabyte though 

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On 3/8/2017 at 1:39 AM, bogi said:

Xenial for sure, according to OS.

 

I tried that, but no change for IPv4 only. HQPlayer Desktop sees no device when NetworkAudioAdapter backend is selected.

 

Did you ever try direct cable config?

Old and off topic for this thread but @bogi I have the exact same issue, did you ever found out why the NAA could not get out of the loop?

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5 minutes ago, bogi said:

Hi @luisma , to the topic of Linux NAA discovery on Windows HQPlayer computer in the case of direct ethernet cable connection (without network switch):

I desribed my solution is here

Thank you so much for detailing the solution in such a way with the references.

Miska mentioned the dual stack (4 and 6) needs for the connection so I enabled the DHCP on Ubuntu and Miska's image comes standard with DHCP so that fixed the issue with the direct connection. Miska's also mentioned the switch in the middle will improve isolation and you are confirming it although from other posts I recall seeing the switch (if not properly powered) as another noise device which could introduce EMI. So far I am directly connected, Miska's image sounds better on my NAA than my former NAA and also my Allo USB Bridge.

 

Now my design is (damn I don't have Visio installed just reinstalled my laptop) basically this

 

RuckusWIFI AP --> WIFI ---> Fanless Ubuntu i7 HQPE

|                                                                     |

|                                                                     | This is the ethernet from HQPE to NAA 

|                                                                     |

--------------------------->  WIFI ---> Fanless Ubuntu Celeron ---- USB --> Denafrips DAC

 

Basically both fanless computers connect via wireless to the router for management only and the music flows through the directly connected ethernet cable

I actually removed the WIFI from the NAA thinking that would improve SQ, still to test.

 

I am building a core i3 fanless with Windows Server 2019 Core let's see how it goes

 

thanks again, appreciate it

 

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  • 3 months later...

Hi Jussi don't know if this have been covered, just yesterday upgraded to the latest HQPe version, been doing only sdm for the last 8 months or so, tried the 48k dsd very nice, I decided after a long time to switch over to pcm, almost blow a Twitter, high pitched pink type noise with high spl, removed the 48 option and it is pcm fine now. What you think? Amanero tricks? The 48 k option doesn't seems to affect, man I thought these amanero glitches were passed behind me, getting a new dsp board in 3 weeks let's see 

 

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18 hours ago, AnotherSpin said:

 

As I told, I am not sure which setting I tried and changed when pink noise happened. Most probably it happened for the first time when I changed SDM conversion from wide to narrow. But it happened one or two times more in different circumstances. Never with 3x.

On my specific case it wasn't related to the 48k option, just happened to enable it and for a moment thought it could be related. 

 

The issue is related to the Pcm switching which oddly enough was fixed with my current amanero firmware some time ago. But now when changing tracks switching from one Pcm rate to another (384 to 352 based on source content which HQP does automatically adjusting the rate) the dB settings increased dramatically on the new track too. 

 

So I went back to sdm only and all good in my case. 

 

Jussi I am using closed form for the N1 and closed fast for the Nx, when HQP switches from 384 to 352 at the track change roon reports 352 closed fast only, is it possible the N1 is not happening or just roon's reporting might not be accurate? 

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2 hours ago, Superdad said:

) NAA discovery is currently broken in 4.10 (and you are right, I can’t get off Config screen in 4.10)

Hi Alex, I just upgraded HQPE to 4.10 on Friday, running a separate NAA with Jussi's custom image and also and extra NAA which I swap sometimes running Audiolinux headless 1.3.0, both NAA s are working properly that means the discovery is happening right? Even more the Audiolinux NAA is multi homed with one wireless interface and one network wired interface working just fine. 

 

Let me know if I can help in any way as well 

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1 hour ago, Miska said:

 

There is almost no clock difference between 3900x and 3800x. I'm pretty sure I will try to get 3900x as soon as possible, it looks promising part with it's notably large caches compared to smaller models. Large caches can help HQPlayer.

 

And 3700x seems to be very potential for passive cooled configurations!

 

that 3700x on a Streacom DB4 might work very well

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1 hour ago, Miska said:

 

I'm thinking more about the equipment rack friendly FC10 which is rated for 65W TDP. Now I'm using it with Intel T-series 35W TDP CPU's and it gets barely warm when doing DSD512.

 

Yeah but the db4 no fans some people have been able to make it work, I will look into the fc10 regardless since you mentioned it, when you start adding more taps the tdp should increase 

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1 hour ago, Miska said:

 

That article just gets technical things so wrong that I'm not sure where I should start correcting it...

 

 

Not even cheapest DAC chips use that until they hit 8x (352.8/384k rate). Only NOS DACs running at source rate do something like it, but even those don't do straight line interpolation - they just omit the interpolation step altogether.

 

 

P.S. And for number games, with HQPlayer one can do 16 million taps to 45.1584 MHz for example.

 

Thanks, very valuable, the no interpolation part I understand and the amount of taps also I understand of course the software flexibility IMO is superior 

 

Thanks I was just reconfirming things 

 

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  • 4 weeks later...
10 hours ago, JTS said:

+1 on this. I am curious. I have been bouncing between poly-sinc-ext2, close-form-16m and polysinc-xtr-mp. My playback chain in my work suite where I do most of my listening:

 

Tidal -> Roon -> HQPlayer -> [filter] -> [modulator] -> DSD256 -> USB -> Intona-> RME ADI-2 DAC fs (in DSD direct mode)-> Schiit Freya -> Neumann KH120As

 

I listen principally to studio recorded music. Looking at my testing playlist and pulling a few tracks out: Songs: Ohia, Lioness; Mattew E. White, One of These Days; The Books, Group Autogenics I; Bjork, Crystalline; Sparklehorse, Shade and Honey; Gorillaz, Revolving Doors; James Blake, Limit to Your Love; T. Rex, Spaceball Ricochet etc.

 

I have not done any scientific testing here, but I find:

 

closed-form-16M - exciting to listen to, sharp, great separation and stereo imaging. A bit tiring with janglier stuff (non-apo?)

polysinc-xrt-mp - sharp but more mellow than closed form, again great stereo imaging and depth.

polysinc-ext2 - hard one for me to describe. I would say it's very clean and beautiful sounding. I somehow go to it less than 16M or XTR, though. I perhaps just need to give it more time.

 

This all changes around with the modulator. I am going in between DSD5V2, ADSM7, ADSM7 256+fs. All of them sound different though I mostly just stick to ADSM7.

 

I think I could probably do up a matrix and some notes when I have some time.

 

I would be super curious to hear other people's preferences and thoughts on the different filters/modulators and what type of music they might be listening to with them and on what type of system.

 

Any suggestions of things to try and why?

 

Funs!

I like closed-form as one of my favs, lately (last month or so) I have been using minringFIR-mp for 1x and Nx and it is very good too.

 

There is some compromising on the filter and the CPU stressing, many have noticed that increasing the filter complexity will drive the CPU cores to max and this will increase noise generated within your PC's and could be potentially transmitted to your DAC, every system is different.

 

 

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