HQ Player

[Jud]

1 hour ago, pkane2001 said:

 

I use poly-sinc-xtr-mp-2s with AMSDM7 512+fs

 

 

I like the AMSDM7 modulator too.  I don't know exactly what is adaptive (the "A" in AMSDM) about it, but I like the results. 

[Jud]

On 2/18/2018 at 8:28 AM, rickca said:

Thanks for trying it.  The only information I can find is this:

Windows 10 preview build 17101 and Skip Ahead build 17640 introduce a new Ultimate Performance power profile that allows users to get the most out of their premium PC components.

This new policy builds on the current High-Performance policy, and it goes a step further to eliminate micro-latencies associated with fine grained power management techniques.

The new Ultimate Performance option can be customized and is found under the Hardware and Sound category in the Windows control panel.

 

Skip Ahead build 17640 is what I'm running.  I don't have an Ultimate Performance option, possibly because my hardware is 2010 vintage. 

[Jud]

Curiosity got the best of me again, couldn’t leave well enough alone.  I upgraded Lubuntu to 18.10, and HQPlayer doesn’t work correctly.  It starts, but (1) When I try to play something, it crashes; and (2) Dragging and dropping a folder no longer shows the tracks in the folder, it shows the folder name as the “track” to be played.

 

I’m thinking perhaps files I allowed the upgrade to get rid of were necessary for HQP’s proper operation.  I’ve tried simply reinstalling, but no change.

 

So - suggestions for getting HQP working correctly with 18.10?  Or simpler to just reinstall 18.04?  (And my apologies for bothering folks when Miska’s repeatedly talked about the .04 builds being those he supports.)

[Jud]

On 11/17/2018 at 6:05 PM, Jud said:

Curiosity got the best of me again, couldn’t leave well enough alone.  I upgraded Lubuntu to 18.10, and HQPlayer doesn’t work correctly.  It starts, but (1) When I try to play something, it crashes; and (2) Dragging and dropping a folder no longer shows the tracks in the folder, it shows the folder name as the “track” to be played.

 

I’m thinking perhaps files I allowed the upgrade to get rid of were necessary for HQP’s proper operation.  I’ve tried simply reinstalling, but no change.

 

So - suggestions for getting HQP working correctly with 18.10?  Or simpler to just reinstall 18.04?  (And my apologies for bothering folks when Miska’s repeatedly talked about the .04 builds being those he supports.)

 

Dead simple just to reinstall 18.04.  Back in business....

[Jud]

57 minutes ago, rikirk said:

Thank you. I am looking for even better specs compared to those two without the typical add-ons of a fully loaded music server.

My guess Linux is a more efficient OS for a NAA and would like to consider a viable alternative within that option, but ready to use like the Sotm and Sonore.

 

Apologies that I haven't looked at your prior posts to know if you've already talked about this, but if you have the ability to install Linux, there are any number of inexpensive mini-computers that will run NAA (networkaudiod) very nicely.

[Jud]

On 11/20/2018 at 5:46 PM, rikirk said:

 

Thank you Jud

 

I do not have any knowledge and will to play with Linux. I believe both Sotm and Sonore worked hard in implementing their devices well beyond any standard Raspberry. 

 

So my question is why there is no further implementation for an end point. If, if, if a Bricasti M5 (just as an example) performs better that the two renders I mentioned, why I cannot have it as an end point instead of a music server not compatible with HQ Player.

 

Am I crazy thinking that optimization on the server side (MoBo, SSD, RAM, PSU, Win or Mac)  is not as much important as the one you can get out from the device (power/circuitry/components/Linux) that is actually connected to the DAC after the cleansing via ethernet?

 

I am happy with the Ultrarendu, Isoregen, LPS1, Sotm 1000 endless caterpillar, but I am surprised there is no product out in the market that combine them all and maybe add a GUI and a AES or I2s or RJ45 output in the mix...

 

 

A problem with streamers/endpoints is that many tend to use different streaming protocols, or varying implementations of the same supposedly standard streaming protocol (e.g., UPnP/DLNA).  Miska has his own solution that works very well (NAA/networkaudiod), but others haven't adopted it, with the exception of Sonore.  So if you want a readymade solution for HQPlayer/NAA there's Sonore, or if you can work with Linux there are a number of other devices you can use (many nicer than Raspberry in terms of performance, though one can't minimize Sonore's good work on optimization).  But the other companies like Bricasti have so far tended to stick with their own solutions.

[Jud]

19 hours ago, Confused said:

So this got me wondering, is the "Bootable NAA image" something the likes of SOtM or Sonore could utilise in their products?  Of course, it is up to them what they choose to support and how they implement their software, I was just wondering if it would be possible?

 

The image runs networkaudiod exclusively, so SOtM's, Sonore's, or anyone else's current ability to use their products with a variety of streaming solutions other than NAA would be eliminated.

 

Edit: Of course they could use Miska's image as a base and modify it if they wanted to go through that, but why bother when they already have a product easily configurable via a web GUI?

[Jud]

10 minutes ago, Outlaw said:

on Linux how do you remove hqplayer to install updated version ?

 

 

Pretty much the same way you installed it.  How did you do that?

[Jud]

3 hours ago, DancingSea said:

 

While very well stated, it nonetheless is a very technical explanation that does not use  common audio description language.  It would be great to hear the HQPlayer filters etc explained in Stereophile or The Absolute Sound type audio language.  

 

Maybe an easier way to do what you want than speaking generally about Stereophile or TAS language is to ask specific questions, if you can come up with them.

[Jud]

5 hours ago, Miska said:

 

Fifth order modulators have less aggressive noise slope, so either one is good. With seventh order modulators noise slope is more aggressive, so 50 kHz filter begins to cut into it earlier.

 

Any particular reason for odd-order modulators?

[Jud]

5 hours ago, Yviena said:

Does anyone know what better frequency domain in filters actually do, I know that better time domain performance results in better soundstage/room ambience.in my case, but unsure exactly what the other does, is it timbre/tonality of instruments?

If it is then it confirms my finding that poly-sinc-shrt has somewhat better soundstage, but things like drums sounds more like drums using poly-sinc or poly-sinc-shrt.

 

Better frequency domain performance means less aliasing and imaging, which in turn means less harmonic and intermodulation distortion.

 

But I doubt that any of Miska's filters have bad performance in those respects.

[Jud]

14 hours ago, DancingSea said:

 

Goodness, what an odd response!  I’m far from the only one who feels the price hike is extreme.  And of course, there are plenty who find it fair.  There is room for a variety of opinions.   If you think HQP is worth $2500, then a level of delusion has crept into the frozen tundra!

 

In my opinion, and you are welcome to disagree, in this consumer market we have, for instance,  Audirvana at $74 with $40 upgrades - sounds good and has a functional library with Tidal & Quboz.  HQP at $240 with 200% major upgrade fees has an excellent sound engine, but is otherwise undeveloped.  The GUI and library system is antiquated at best.  You’ve been receiving feedback on this for years yet totally ignore it.  For me, its difficult to reconcile your pricing given the undeveloped state of your entire package. 

 

I’m not sure the pricing is a wise business move for you.  You are clearly very talented. If you were either willing or able to create a modern interface and a well thought through and functional library management system, including Tidal and Quboz, and price it at $100 or so, you’d possibly dominate this entire market rather than be a niche product.   

 

It can be short sighted to think that raising your price is going to make you more money. The exact opposite could be true. 

 

I could have predicted the "odd" response. 🙂

 

I'm sure Miska did not make this decision without considerable thought.  He is aware of factors going into the decision that we are not: What his time is worth to him, how much of it he wants to spare on HQP, the amount of hassle the separate licenses created for him, what the decision regarding the new architecture allows him to do in future development, and a host of others, I'm sure.

 

Against this you have the arguments that this seems like too much money to you, and others may feel the same.  But if you are arguing with the developer, you know whose decision counts in the end. So it is probably not a good use of time.

 

And for anyone who likes HQP and doesn't have the upgrade in their current budget, there is 3.x that still works just fine and AFAIK uses the same filters and modulators.

[Jud]

6 hours ago, Miska said:

8 hours/day * 21 work days per month

 

I have no questions or argument about your pricing. But I thought this was not your "day job." Perhaps I was incorrect, or perhaps you work at another full time job as well as treating HQPlayer like one.  Just curious, I guess.

[Jud]

1 hour ago, Superdad said:

No direct support for ripping CDs.  Guess I would need to switch to a standalone CD ripper utility that also gathers disc metadata from web.

 

XLD.

[Jud]

On 5/24/2020 at 11:56 PM, Allan F said:

 

Oops. Mea culpa. I didn't look at the date of the post to which I replied as above. I doubt that anything regarding the state of digital filters four years ago would have much, if any, relevance today.

Ayre’s published filtering wasn’t its DSD modulator but its interpolation filters. The one it noted as probably preferable for listening would not be as accurate as HQP’s, but some people may have preferred the sound.

[Jud]

4 hours ago, sgb said:

There are some of us (or am I the only one) HQPlayer users that don't use Twitter or Facebook. I am certinly not going to get a Twitter or Facebook account just to know when there is a new version of HQPlayer. 

Don’t know about your OS/distribution, but when I update the Linux distributions on which I run HQP, they tell me if there’s a new version of any installed program, including HQP, available. I look for any OS/app updates as a matter of routine anyway, so HQP updates come along for the ride.

[Jud]

8 hours ago, Luca72c said:

Ok, ok, you're right: i surely went too far. Sorry about that.

I apologize with everyone in this thread for my insistence and with Jussi above all. I hope he understands that my posts weren't meant as an attack against his work, but to stimulate him to meet a wider audience with its products, so achieving the diffusion they deserve.

Sorry for having understated his difficulties, too.

 

Enthusiasm is understandable. But Miska does get to decide how he wants to live his life (as we should all be able to), and he doesn't seem to particularly want to spend it as a businessman supervising a development team at HQPlayer Incorporated. 🙂

[Jud]

Bootcamp (or other bootloaders) can be used with either Windows or Linux, I believe.

 

I see no reason to suppose MacOS with M1 is bad for audio, though I do wish Apple would enable native DSD, allowing the CPU to work half as hard.

[Jud]

2 hours ago, Miska said:

 

What do you mean by CPU to work half as hard? I don't think it makes notable difference from CPU point of view.

 

 

Not overall across all its tasks, but specifically in oversampling to a given rate, say DSD256, isn't a CPU on MacOS going to be doing the equivalent work on that task of a CPU on Linux or Windows oversampling to DSD512?

[Jud]

1 hour ago, bobflood said:

When you are ready, update your UEFI/BIOS first. ASUS has a new one especially for Windows 11. There are a bunch of things at that level that have to happen before the upgrade.

 

All I did was enable TPM 2.0, though I'm not positive MS is holding fast to that requirement, and the ASUS BIOS update (from 8/11) says no further changes are needed beyond installing it to be able to run Win 11.

 

I've been running the developer versions pretty much since they came out.  There've been a couple of hiccups, but overall not bad.  Things seem pretty settled down now, though of course the particular things I use the system for may not tickle whatever bugs might be left.

 

All this said, I tend to run HQP mostly on Linux, though it's been working fine on Windows.

[Jud]

Running HQP on Xubuntu 21.04. The HQPlayer Client shows up briefly as a small white square (perhaps an inch on a side), then disappears.

 

I'm supposing this is because I have the wrong version of a library. If so, any notion which one is lacking or how to find out (enable logging?)?

[Jud]

9 minutes ago, AudioDoctor said:

So I have a question... What are the optimal settings for HQP to downsample a DSD256 download to DSD128 for playback? I bought this in DSD256 because that's the original format and though my DAC can play it back, my NAA can only do DSD128.

 

 

 

Apologies for not answering your question, but I'm wondering if Channel does the conversion to DSD128 with HQP Pro. If so, the conversion is quite likely to have been done with optimal settings.

[Jud]

3 hours ago, Luca72c said:

 

But how that conversion of bits to analog is performed and "supported" from input to output can produce a bigger change in sound than a well thought modulator. In reality there is no perfect dac nor a perfect way to perform that conversion: bit perfect not necessarily means "output sound perfect". The process of digital music conversion to analog, from input to output, always leaves its trace, modulators are just one piece of the puzzle

I wonder if Miska is referring to simply using the DAC’s analog filter stage, without any digital filtering or sigma-delta modulation.

[Jud]

5 minutes ago, ted_b said:

I'd love to try Quboz (again I guess) but Quboz says I am associated with the UK (not, I'm in the US) and can't change my country.  My trial Visa did not go through, and when I told my cc company it was ok Quboz still won't let me input payment.  When I follow the FAQ it is an endless do-loop.  So I asked Quboz to delete my account and now that it is deleted I can't do anything, even my other email account tries say I'm already a user.  Argh!!!!!!

 

Sorry this is off topic, but anyone else have this?

 

Sorry I can't help, Ted, for me a change of email address worked.

 

Edit: @dmackta, can you get our friend the help he needs?

[Jud]

1 hour ago, Miska said:

 

If you look at spectrum analysis of a piano, it all fits well below 20 kHz bandwidth. Meaning that it doesn't have any fast transients. Unlike things like claves, castanets, cymbals etc. that can reach 100 kHz.

 

Generally I know piano quite well, spent 7 years of piano lessons.

 

Miska, does this include the piano’s inharmonic attack, not just the overtones/harmonics of the notes?