HQ Player

[SunYang]

If HQ Player is stopped playing music track, even my sensitive full range OB speakers are deathly quiet. Digital output of Amanero card is 010101010101...

But if player is only paused or is quiet passage in the track, I can hear some noise from distance about 0.5 m from speaker. If I checked DSD data in this time by scope, signal is more chaotic then only continuous changings 0 1. Different modulators change style of this strange noise. What is reason for this behaviour?

[SunYang]

My DAC is discrete DSD DAC (principally similar your DSC1) and muting circuit is not installed yet. Transformer symmetrical output reduces potential DC offset.
Also without DAC on the Amanero digital output STOP produce 010101010101010101010... but PAUSE something like 01011010010101001100. Near zero but with little chaotic fluctuances. Different modulators change little bit pattern of this digital noise. I am using Windows HQ Player Desktop.

[SunYang]

Thanks for explanation. If I need some control computer/phone + power computing PC + NAA how many licences of HQPlayer I should buy? Desktop or Embedded?

[SunYang]

I am currently very satisfied with HQPlayer which is sending DSD data through Amanero USB card to 2 discrete DSD DACs. If I want to add 2 channels more for low pass filtered L and low pass filtered R, I can compute it by convolution, but need something like 4 channels Amanero USB card (output with 1 clock signal and 4 DSD data signals). Can somebody recommend me suitable hardware?

[SunYang]

I use evaluated Win version of HQPlayer Desktop. If I connect my workstation directly with Chinese clone of Amanero card, Backed set as “ASIO” and Device I can choose from “Combo 384 ASIO 1.03” and “Amanero ASIO Combo 384”. First of them works very well, second don’t work. If I connect Intel NUC as NAA, set Backed: “NetvorkAudioAdapter” I can select Device: “naa:Combo384Amanero:USBAudio”, but it doesn’t work. If I want to play some track, only blue indicator is repeatedly going from left to right and back. Do you know anybody some solution?

[SunYang]

Did anybody compare good UTP cable with fiber one?

[SunYang]

@Miskalet me ask you:
1.       For some HW testing purpose I need to booth output channels send the same digital signal. Is it possible do it directely by HQP settings?

2.       How can I set HQP for 4 channels setup? For first testing approach for example can be channel L sending to booth channels 1 and 3 and channel R to booth channels 2 and 4.

(NNA is running on BBB with botic driver.)

[SunYang]

22 hours ago, Miska said:

You can set number of output channels to 4 and use matrix pipeline setup to route channels.

Thanks, Miska. I am asking because if I try setup like this, HQP don’t start to play any track.  2 Channels setup works OK. Do you have some idea how can I solve it?

[SunYang]

@Miska

Send HQP to DAC some information about Muting? Thanks 

[SunYang]

1 hour ago, Miska said:

 

How?

 

BBB with Botic driver on connector P9 can on 1 of 4 serializers emulate Mute pin. Because I use 4 channels DSD, all serializers are occupied by DSD signals. So, I don’t understand from where information about muting originates. Is it from HQP or if Botic driver has no valid data then generates Mute signal? Is muting important if I use DSD256 only?

[SunYang]

Miska:

Installation of new version was smooth. If I play 44.1 based PCM to DSM (DSD256/512) all is ok. But 48 based files are sending as DSD128 (6.144 MHz - I checked it by scope) even if I set DSD256 or DSD512. In previous version no problem.

[SunYang]

24 minutes ago, Miska said:

 

How's the rate table from NAA looking like? You can find it from the log file.

 

It has nothing with NAA. ASIO and 2 channels has the same behavior.

[SunYang]

47 minutes ago, Miska said:

 

Well, if you have some audio output, you will certainly have supported output formats listed in the log file?

 

I don’t know which log file you mean. In my computer SW and HW has no changes only install new version of HQP. Before upgrade was all ok, so there is no problem, that my HW don’t support these frequencies.

[SunYang]

19 minutes ago, Miska said:

 

HQPlayer log file, please see manual section "Troubleshooting".

 

Here's my Windows laptop playing to a NAA connected to Holo Spring 3 DAC:

 

This is log file for ASIO output

HQPlayer4Desktop.log

[SunYang]

32 minutes ago, Miska said:

 

HQPlayer log file, please see manual section "Troubleshooting".

 

If output is 48k x 512 or 48k x 256:

48/24/2 -> 12.288/1/2

96/24/2 -> 3.072/1/2

192/24/2 -> 6.144/1/2

 

[SunYang]

43 minutes ago, Miska said:

 

OK, mysterious...

 

After restart Windows:

If output is 48k x 256:

48/24/2 -> 12.288/1/2 ok

96/24/2 -> 3.072/1/2

192/24/2 -> 6.144/1/2

and 48k x 512:

48/24/2 -> 24.576/1/2 ok

96/24/2 -> 24.576/1/2 ok

192/24/2 -> 6.144/1/2

Strange

[SunYang]

2 minutes ago, Miska said:

 

DId you uninstall old version of HQPlayer before installing the new one?

 

Is this stock Windows 10 without any additional tools like AO or Fidelizer?

 

Stock Windows 10. Morning I used 4.13.1 with no problem. Without another HW or SW changes I only upgraded HQP. New version has the same problem with ASIO and NAA and with different DACs.

[SunYang]

Hello, on my new music dedicatet computer (7950X, RTX3090 Ti) I have already instaled Ubuntu 22.04.1 LTS. But I am not familiar with Linux at all. Can anybody help me how to install HQP low latency kernel, drivers for RTX3090 Ti with CUDA support, and HQP Desktop (AMD AVX2 version)? Thanks a lot

[SunYang]

In my new music dedicated PC:

AMD Ryzen 9 7950X + ARCTIC Liquid Freezer II 420

ASUS ProArt X670E-CREATOR WIFI + Corsair HX1500i

MSI GeForce RTX 3090 Ti GAMING TRIO 24G

G.SKILL 32GB KIT DDR5 6000MHz CL30 Trident Z5 NEO AMD EXPO

Seagate Firecuda 530 500GB M.2 SSD for OS and HQP

Seagate FireCuda 530 2TB for music files

Dual boot:      Windows 11 (NVIDIA drivers 520)

            Ubuntu 22.04 Desktop (NVIDIA drivers 520, original kernel)
              Miska's custom kernel 5.15.71-jl+_5.15.71-jl+-10_amd64 collided with GPU drivers

HQPlayer 4 Desktop 4.19.3 and now new 4.20

Output: 4 channels DSD 512 (44.1), ASDM7ECv2 and my preferable AMSDM7EC 512+fs

Poly-sinc- gauss-long / Poly-sinc- gauss-hires-lp

Multicore DSP: grey   /  CUDA offload: x

From PCM sources all is smooth. From DSD256 sources on Windows ok, but on Ubuntu heavy scattered.

(Windows also scatters if Multicore DSP is x) 

Can anybody help?

[SunYang]

3 hours ago, CJH said:

SunYang--what DAC are you using? I am not aware of any DAC that will output 4 channels of DSD512.

CJH

This is my custom made DSD only discrete DAC (4 mono DACs capable 4 x DSD1024, but with current computing HW max. 4 x DSD 512)

[SunYang]

2 hours ago, Miska said:

 

Given your CPU, I assume you are using the AVX2 build? Not the generic one, since it would have bad performance on your CPU.

 

My kernel works fine with the official Nvidia drivers. I have "515.65.01-0ubuntu1" version of the drivers at the moment with my latest kernel.

 

 

What multicore setting works for you? Grayed? I would sort of expect checked to work at least as well on your CPU.

 

In Windows 11 greyed multicore is fine for everything PCM or DSD to DSD512. Checked scattered only for DSD256 to DSD512 (ASDM7ECv2 / AMSDM7EC 512+fs)

In Ubuntu with AVX2 build looks that current performance is weaker than in Windows. DSD256 to DSD512 is scattering either for greyer or checked multicore switch. 

Installing Ubuntu 22.04 for me was nightmare. First problem was Safe boot in BIOS. After it long time I can’t install Nvidia drivers. Problem was that pciids was not up to date. After sudo update-pciids, lspci starts show RTX3090 Ti card correctly and was possible to install drivers. During instalation of kernel:

sudo dpkg -i linux-headers-5.15……11_amd64.deb

sudo dpkg -i linux-image-5.15……11_amd64.deb

installation stopped (something like „Your version of kernel not compatible with instaled GPU drivers”).

[SunYang]

1 hour ago, Miska said:

 

You need to keep secure boot enabled in BIOS, but you need to disable secure boot process at Linux side:

sudo mokutil --disable-validation

 

If you use stock Ubuntu kernel, make sure you use lowlatency variant available from the official repositories.

 

But it is also possible that you will need some newer kernel for the new AMD CPU.

 

After reading this article (https://www.phoronix.com/review/7950x-windows-linux), maybe this processor is still not supported enough in Linux, and will be better to wait for a new kernel. Never mind, I'll stay with Windows 11 Pro 22H2 for now. But I had a different problem in Windows. When I play the whole album continuously, everything is ok. But if I start switching individual tracks, suddenly HQplayer disappears. In log in not anything interesting:

……  2022/11/19 19:05:00 Offload: resampler=enabled convolution=disabled

& 2022/11/19 19:05:09 GoTo 2

  2022/11/19 19:05:09 Offload: resampler=enabled convolution=disabled

& 2022/11/19 19:05:14 GoTo 3

  2022/11/19 19:05:14 Offload: resampler=enabled convolution=disabled

& 2022/11/19 19:05:20 GoTo 4

  2022/11/19 19:05:20 Offload: resampler=enabled convolution=disabled

& 2022/11/19 19:05:23 GoTo 5

  2022/11/19 19:05:23 Offload: resampler=enabled convolution=disabled

& 2022/11/19 19:05:25 GoTo 9

[SunYang]

Luca72c: Through Beagle Bone Black as NAA. This brinks one limitation. BBB has only 100 Mbit ethernet. For 44.1 based 4 ch. DSD512 is just OK, but 48 based DSD512 works good for about 10 second and then starts to crack regularly. Maybe some network optimalization can help.

[SunYang]

Luca72c: BBB has only 4 serializers, so only can be usesed for 4 ch. DSD or 8 ch. PCM

[SunYang]

Any idea why HQP Desktop 4.20 on Win 11 Pro 22H2 (without any optimalization) during manual swithing tracks suddenly disappears with no eror info in log? Continual playing is OK, 4.19.3 has also no problem.