HQ Player

[Geoffrey Armstrong]

That's a very nice little guide Chris. The only thing I question is your first point. I don't believe it should be necessary to activate the network button in HQP for Roon to talk to it.

 

In fact I know one person who believes having it active when using Roon -> HQP is detrimental to sound quality.

 

Having said that, I have encountered situations in the past with SGM customers where they had to activate the button initially to get Roon and HQP to talk to each other. Once they got talking the button could be de-activated again and all ran fine. That was in older versions of Roon though.

[The Computer Audiophile]

47 minutes ago, Geoffrey Armstrong said:

That's a very nice little guide Chris. The only thing I question is your first point. I don't believe it should be necessary to activate the network button in HQP for Roon to talk to it.

 

In fact I know one person who believes having it active when using Roon -> HQP is detrimental to sound quality.

 

Having said that, I have encountered situations in the past with SGM customers where they had to activate the button initially to get Roon and HQP to talk to each other. Once they got talking the button could be de-activated again and all ran fine. That was in older versions of Roon though.

Hi Geoffrey, that one was an oversight. I use Roon / HQP integration over the network and need that button checked for it to work. If the user has Roon in the local machine perhaps they don’t need that enabled. 

[Miska]

51 minutes ago, Geoffrey Armstrong said:

Having said that, I have encountered situations in the past with SGM customers where they had to activate the button initially to get Roon and HQP to talk to each other. Once they got talking the button could be de-activated again and all ran fine. That was in older versions of Roon though.

 

That button changes rules HQPlayer uses to check whether incoming connection is allowed or not.

 

[Miska]

5 hours ago, luisma said:

This could be a simple question for someone to answer, HQP volume should be limited at -3 to avoid possible clipping, what about if you would like to get some more volume because your preamp is not enough? can this be done avoiding clipping and possibly noise? convolution maybe? let's say  I would like to increase max volume (without clipping +8db)?

 

Output cannot exceed 0 dBFS. If the recording has enough headroom (IOW, loudest peaks don't reach 0 dBFS), you can use also positive gains to get closer to 0 dBFS. If HQPlayer noticed 0 dBFS is encountered it enforces volume limiting and increments the "Limited" counter you can see. So always make sure the counter stays at 0.

 

[Zauurx]

22 minutes ago, Miska said:

 

Output cannot exceed 0 dBFS. If the recording has enough headroom (IOW, loudest peaks don't reach 0 dBFS), you can use also positive gains to get closer to 0 dBFS. If HQPlayer noticed 0 dBFS is encountered it enforces volume limiting and increments the "Limited" counter you can see. So always make sure the counter stays at 0.

 

And if you have Roon as a remote control ... does that secure clipping, or not ? according to roon settings ?
And, HQP remote (to change filters, on fly) has not impact of quality...

[Geoffrey Armstrong]

46 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Hi Geoffrey, that one was an oversight. I use Roon / HQP integration over the network and need that button checked for it to work. If the user has Roon in the local machine perhaps they don’t need that enabled. 

Hi Chris, Ok thanks.

[luisma]

3 hours ago, Zauurx said:

And if you have Roon as a remote control ... does that secure clipping, or not ? according to roon settings ?

If you are referring to the headroom DSP in Roon to avoid clipping I believe it is the same as setting HQP max volume at -3, I personally don't use the feature in Roon.

[Le Concombre Masqué]

At last, me and my system reunited after a 3 months split. Was a bit afraid that complexity would turn into troubles that I would not know how to resolve anymore.

Turns out it was turn key : switched on the NAA, launched the 15" MBP on Embedded image, launched Audirvana on the 13" MBP, et voilà. Audirvana is a cheap and convenient library management solution.

Just had to remember to restart my Time Capsule (router) after I updated Embedded and NAA to the latest images, in order to get binding.

BTW I was stuck to 4.14.1 since a bit newer versions would not work but everything is fine with 4.18.01 : thank you @Miska. Will later explore novelties

[Miska]

12 hours ago, Zauurx said:

And if you have Roon as a remote control ... does that secure clipping, or not ? according to roon settings ?
And, HQP remote (to change filters, on fly) has not impact of quality...

 

Roon should just send original data to HQPlayer without further processing and then everything else is up to HQPlayer.

 

[rikirk]

On 6/17/2020 at 5:22 PM, Miska said:

 

With the LHLabs driver removed?

 

Thanks! Yes, even when the driver is fully uninstalled and running WASAPI in PCM. I always have to match the rate in the Windows driver to avoid the DAC dropping the USB path because not in sync. 

[CheapSplurge]

On 6/17/2020 at 10:03 PM, The Computer Audiophile said:

A step by step will probably be needed because it isn't that intuitive. 

 

Here are some screenshots for now.

 

Make sure this is clicked in HQP. It enables Roon to talk to it. 

 

 

 

If HQP is installed on your Roon machine, then select ASIO or WASAPI in the HQP settings and select your DAC.

 

 

 

 

 

 

In Roon go to this screen and select Add HQPlayer

 

 

 

 

 

Then leave localhost if Roon and HQP are on the same machine. Otherwise enter the IP address of the HQP machine. 

 

I have done all this and got it working through roon

Im using Tidal hifi in roon. 

But I fail to detect any change in sound when using the hqplayer? 

I have a very resolving system that would show change immediately. 

As I toggle from basic roon to dac and from roon to hqp to dac, I see no change in sound. 

 

Surely I'm not doing all I could? What do I need to do? 

[The Computer Audiophile]

11 minutes ago, CheapSplurge said:

I have done all this and got it working through roon

Im using Tidal hifi in roon. 

But I fail to detect any change in sound when using the hqplayer? 

I have a very resolving system that would show change immediately. 

As I toggle from basic roon to dac and from roon to hqp to dac, I see no change in sound. 

 

Surely I'm not doing all I could? What do I need to do? 

Did you try the different settings for filters and modulators? Perhaps your DAC converts everything no matter the input?

[CheapSplurge]

The Hugo tt2 shows that it's getting up sampled to 300something 

Here is an image of my settings screen, should I make it up sample to the max? Just want to see what this player can do before I buy. 

If I get 5% more quality out of my tt2 I'll definitely do it

[The Computer Audiophile]

29 minutes ago, CheapSplurge said:

The Hugo tt2 shows that it's getting up sampled to 300something 

Here is an image of my settings screen, should I make it up sample to the max? Just want to see what this player can do before I buy. 

If I get 5% more quality out of my tt2 I'll definitely do it

I don’t remember how the Chord handles incoming high rate PCM. 
 

Perhaps @austinpop can chime in, as he knows these DACs pretty well. 

[austinpop]

33 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I don’t remember how the Chord handles incoming high rate PCM. 
 

Perhaps @austinpop can chime in, as he knows these DACs pretty well. 

 

@CheapSplurge

 

The TT2 can accept a max PCM rate of 768kHz or DSD512 native when using the Chord ASIO driver on Windows.

 

As for HQPlayer settings, I can't help you, as I use am not an HQPlayer user — I use a Chord M-Scaler — but I know people like @ray-dude are getting excellent results with HQPlayer. As I recall, they are using PCM-to-PCM upsampling to 705.6/768 using the 1M taps Sinc-M filter and 15th order noise shaper (LNS15). You can look at Ray's recent article on the SGM Extreme to get his HQPlayer settings. See https://audiophilestyle.com/ca/reviews/reality-quest-going-to-extremes-with-the-taiko-audio-sgm-extreme-part-3-of-5-r909/

 

[AnotherSpin]

7 hours ago, CheapSplurge said:

The Hugo tt2 shows that it's getting up sampled to 300something 

Here is an image of my settings screen, should I make it up sample to the max? Just want to see what this player can do before I buy. 

If I get 5% more quality out of my tt2 I'll definitely do it

 

You may want to try other values for DAC bits (for example, 20), other dither, and filter (sinc-L)

[Le Concombre Masqué]

@Miska Sinc S is another remarkable achievement. Provides more cues than ever to suspend disbelief and mimic the real thing, would it be piano notes seamed so they obviously share the same soundboard, attacks on the strings of an electric guitar or enhanced cohesiveness of soundstage. Sure digs deep, dirt (existing digitalis distortion ?) as well sometimes.

 

Unfortunately, I can't enjoy it over # 3 minutes with EC modulators ; same goes for the welcome Save engine in Matrix.

 

Haven't decided yet which computer upgrade route I'll take. Have you now found a way to EFI boot your Embedded image from a USB stick on your i9 9900 iMac ? (my MBPr is ageing and I'll need to keep a powerful Mac at hand for photo processing)

 

BTW, I incidentally booted 4.18.01 from the right hand USB port of my 2012 MBPr and that's most probably why it launched fine. When I tried from the left hand it would not complete boot any better than 4.15. 4.14 is the last version that boots fine from the left port.

[rickca]

@Miska Cooper Lake (3rd gen Xeon Scalable) introduces AVX512-based BF16 (bfloat16) instructions.  Is this something that HQPlayer can exploit for improved performance?

[Miska]

1 hour ago, rickca said:

@Miska Cooper Lake (3rd gen Xeon Scalable) introduces AVX512-based BF16 (bfloat16) instructions.  Is this something that HQPlayer can exploit for improved performance?

 

No, those are mostly useful for AI tasks, but not for HQPlayer.

 

[Miska]

10 hours ago, CheapSplurge said:

The Hugo tt2 shows that it's getting up sampled to 300something 

Here is an image of my settings screen, should I make it up sample to the max? Just want to see what this player can do before I buy. 

If I get 5% more quality out of my tt2 I'll definitely do it

 

You have PCM rate limit set to 384k. For Chord you'd want to set it to 768k. Also for Chord, select "PCM" as Default Output Mode.

 

[CheapSplurge]

14 hours ago, AnotherSpin said:

 

You may want to try other values for DAC bits (for example, 20), other dither, and filter (sinc-L)

I found where I can change dac bits. 

But other dither? And filter sinc-l? Where? 

[AnotherSpin]

6 hours ago, CheapSplurge said:

I found where I can change dac bits. 

But other dither? And filter sinc-l? Where? 

In PCM Defaults. 

[Solstice380]

11 hours ago, CheapSplurge said:

I found where I can change dac bits. 

But other dither? And filter sinc-l? Where? 

They are in drop-down menus in the PCM Defaults section of Settings that @AnotherSpin indicated.  If you use the HQP Client after starting HQP there are the same menus so you can quickly change them.  Scan your library from HQP using File/Library menu once before starting Client.  Then you can select your music from cover flow or album list in Client.  

[Account Closed]

16 hours ago, CheapSplurge said:

I found where I can change dac bits. 

But other dither? And filter sinc-l? Where? 

I do not mean to sound trite or condescending but it would be much easier to help you if you would read the manual for HQPlayer first. I know that it is not organized really well but at least you would know some of the basics. Getting the best out of this amazing program does take some time and effort so please don't give up.

[AnotherSpin]

1 hour ago, bobflood said:

I do not mean to sound trite or condescending but it would be much easier to help you if you would read the manual for HQPlayer first. I know that it is not organized really well but at least you would know some of the basics. Getting the best out of this amazing program does take some time and effort so please don't give up.

 

Agree, it take some time to discover HQPlayer. However, I was never able to dig much from the manual, most probably because of my own failure to comprehend specialist's lingo.