Jump to content
IGNORED

Offline Upsampling


Jud

Recommended Posts

Yes, I'm hoping more of the DAC makers will program ASIO for Mac: I have an iFi Micro iDSD on the way, which will go to DSD512 . . . if they'll write a driver for it ;)

 

John,

+1

 

Matt

"I want to know why the musicians are on stage, not where". (John Farlowe)

 

Link to comment

[*]Can you use the same license for more than one computer? I have both a MacBook Pro and a Mac Mini I'd like to license.

 

By license terms, licenses are per computer. But most important is that you don't have more than one copy of the same license running simultaneously.

 

[*]Can the Mac client also function as an NAA? I'd love to be able to do the "heavy lifting" on my MacBook Pro and send the output to my Mac Mini.

 

NAA is always a Linux machine running a special server process, it is recommended not to have GUI or any other server processes (apart from DHCP client) running. You can install minimal Debian Wheezy and necessary "networkaudiod" on a USB stick and boot it on Mac Mini for NAA functionality.

 

Point of NAA is to get rid of things like graphical desktop and such on the machine where DAC is connected, so OS X or Windows are not really useful for the purpose. 400 MHz ARM9 CPU and 64/128 MB RAM is well enough for NAA functionality, so Mac Mini is pretty much overkill for the purpose.

Signalyst - Developer of HQPlayer

Pulse & Fidelity - Software Defined Amplifiers

Link to comment
By license terms, licenses are per computer. But most important is that you don't have more than one copy of the same license running simultaneously.

 

 

 

NAA is always a Linux machine running a special server process, it is recommended not to have GUI or any other server processes (apart from DHCP client) running. You can install minimal Debian Wheezy and necessary "networkaudiod" on a USB stick and boot it on Mac Mini for NAA functionality.

 

Point of NAA is to get rid of things like graphical desktop and such on the machine where DAC is connected, so OS X or Windows are not really useful for the purpose. 400 MHz ARM9 CPU and 64/128 MB RAM is well enough for NAA functionality, so Mac Mini is pretty much overkill for the purpose.

 

So the answer to both questions is "no" ;)

 

No, I can't have HQPlayer running on both my MacBook Pro and my Mac Mini at the same time (I always leave my music players running, so they'd both be running at the same time), and I can't use the Mac Mini as an NAA - I'd either have to have a separate Linux box or dedicate the Mini for this purpose (in effect, the same thing).

 

Thanks for the info!

John Walker - IT Executive

Headphone - SonicTransporter i9 running Roon Server > Netgear Orbi > Blue Jeans Cable Ethernet > mRendu Roon endpoint > Topping D90 > Topping A90d > Dan Clark Expanse / HiFiMan H6SE v2 / HiFiman Arya Stealth

Home Theater / Music -SonicTransporter i9 running Roon Server > Netgear Orbi > Blue Jeans Cable HDMI > Denon X3700h > Anthem Amp for front channels > Revel F208-based 5.2.4 Atmos speaker system

Link to comment
Now we're more on the same page. I can answer these questions. 1/ Yes you can. 2/ Yes it can.

 

NAA is always a Linux machine running a special server process, it is recommended not to have GUI or any other server processes (apart from DHCP client) running. You can install minimal Debian Wheezy and necessary "networkaudiod" on a USB stick and boot it on Mac Mini for NAA functionality.

 

 

Okay Geoffrey and Jussi: Have either of been truly successful in creating a bootable build of NAA/Wheezy on a USB stick for Intel Macs? Don't you remember the week we spent Miska with you sending me various disk images to do this? At the time we both had to give up.

 

Maybe now that you have spent more time with a Mac (producing the NAA-not-required version of HQPlayer), perhaps you have a successful NAA image for me?

Both my desktop and headless music Mac minis (direct connected via dedicated Ethernet cable) are now 2012 2.3GHz i7 with 16GB RAM. So I could run HQPlayer well on the music player, but I'd love to do so and also compare SQ to it as split Player/NAA.

 

Hoping for good news,

 

Alex C.

Link to comment

So I have run into the fact that both WAV and AIFF have a 2GB limit on file size. (A 20 minute classical piece converted to 24/384 ran to 2.7GB. Conversion completed successfully but wasn't recognized by the player.) Other formats not subject to this limitation?

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

Link to comment

It is a matter of organization in the header of the file. But like .WAV should not contain Tag data, it just can. Next though all sorts of players will choke on it.

 

Anecdotally :

 

*Because* so much abuse is made already or headers are wrong for other reasons, a software player like ours consists of all sorts of angles to let the file play anyway when something is wrong;

When recently I made the offline upsampling work for 705600 (768000) I never thought of the 2GB limit. Regularly though the music would turn into hiss (not static) and I thought it was some sort of synchronization problem. Until I started to notice it only happened with the somewhat longer tracks (~8 minutes). Yaya.

So header officially wrong (just does not contain the address space for more than 2GB), player sees the inconsistency, is able to work out the length by other means, plays, but fails after all after 2GB has been played (I don't even know why LOL).

 

BTW, I'm sure an official format exists for this, but I forgot which. Isn't much useful either because hardly players will exist that support it.

Lush^3-e      Lush^2      Blaxius^2.5      Ethernet^3     HDMI^2     XLR^2

XXHighEnd (developer)

Phasure NOS1 24/768 Async USB DAC (manufacturer)

Phasure Mach III Audio PC with Linear PSU (manufacturer)

Orelino & Orelo MKII Speakers (designer/supplier)

Link to comment

The problem is a little bit different. One bit actually ...

 

So header officially wrong (just does not contain the address space for more than 2GB)

 

When I was writing this I already thought uh-oh, because this can't be correct. Should be 4GB. And so it is ...

 

Sorry that it's a bit technical, but somewhere deep down the 32 bit (4 bytes) of data denoting the length of the file is defined as "signed integer". This is wrong ... How ? The length of a file can not be negative. And the sign consumes one bit. This means that the space to address is 4GB / 2 (1 bit less) = 2GB.

But it is only a matter of not defining that "field" in your program as "unsigned" integer ...

 

So I do. And this will be the reason no error is thrown and the file just plays. Still though somewhere something goes wrong because probably I myself use some intermediate field which is signed again. Can't guess where and it still feels odd.

But also : Hardly any player will exist supporting the 4GB (which thus just should be able to exist/work) because of the internal Windows (Mac ?) routines that treat it wrongly. It is only that I don't use those ...

Hmm.

 

I recalled the "a format will exist" from the time I started all this, when a new RF64 (RIFF64) header indicator was proposed (this normally is RIFF) for 64 bit address space. Well, although this happened, still no official format (extension) exists that will let it work. BWF (Broadcast Wave Format) should be the one, but that one does not contain the RF64 tag if I see it correctly. So here :

RF64 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

and this refers to this :

Broadcast Wave Format - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

Conclusion ? nothing. Why ?

Well, the RF64 can just be used (first link) but no file extension exists for it. What the smart *sses seem to have done is make BWF "WAV player" compatible which means that no RF64 is to be in there.

 

Side note :

The DoP solution is as stupid but at least was implemented (no different extension but header denotes reality).

 

Lastly, if we'd talk about 705600 not even 4GB would be enough (allows for ~16 minutes).

 

Peter

Lush^3-e      Lush^2      Blaxius^2.5      Ethernet^3     HDMI^2     XLR^2

XXHighEnd (developer)

Phasure NOS1 24/768 Async USB DAC (manufacturer)

Phasure Mach III Audio PC with Linear PSU (manufacturer)

Orelino & Orelo MKII Speakers (designer/supplier)

Link to comment

AuI can convert to this format and has knobs to tweak RF64 info in the file; wonder if any player will play it?

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

Link to comment
Thanks, Geoffrey! Yes, I'm hoping more of the DAC makers will program ASIO for Mac: I have an iFi Micro iDSD on the way, which will go to DSD512 . . . if they'll write a driver for it ;)

 

That should work out well for you John. I have a nano which I recently updated with the latest firmware and asio drivers. Sounds very good up to DSD128. I'm interested in trying a Micro. Please post your opinions when you've had a chance to listen to it.

Owner of: Sound Galleries, High-End Audio Dealer, Monaco

Link to comment

Quite unimportant :

 

But it is only a matter of not defining that "field" in your program as "unsigned" integer ...

So I do. And this will be the reason no error is thrown and the file just plays.

 

Not, do, minus, signed ...

What I should have said is :

 

But it is only a matter of defining that "field" in your program as "unsigned" integer ...

So I do. And this will be the reason no error is thrown and the file just plays.

 

 

Lush^3-e      Lush^2      Blaxius^2.5      Ethernet^3     HDMI^2     XLR^2

XXHighEnd (developer)

Phasure NOS1 24/768 Async USB DAC (manufacturer)

Phasure Mach III Audio PC with Linear PSU (manufacturer)

Orelino & Orelo MKII Speakers (designer/supplier)

Link to comment
AuI can convert to this format and has knobs to tweak RF64 info in the file; wonder if any player will play it?

 

I think need test player with RF64. The format has structure like to wav, aiff, dsf as example. But header structure is non full compatible with standard wav and I don't sure what any player capable play it.

AuI ConverteR 48x44 - HD audio converter/optimizer for DAC of high resolution files

ISO, DSF, DFF (1-bit/D64/128/256/512/1024), wav, flac, aiff, alac,  safe CD ripper to PCM/DSF,

Seamless Album Conversion, AIFF, WAV, FLAC, DSF metadata editor, Mac & Windows
Offline conversion save energy and nature

Link to comment
I think need test player with RF64. The format has structure like to wav, aiff, dsf as example. But header structure is non full compatible with standard wav and I don't sure what any player capable play it.

 

I ran into this problem when auto-recording concerts from the Radio using Audio Hijack pro on the Mac. I wanted to record at 192khz 24bit; but obviously a 2 hour concert would take us over the 4gb limit. The solution for me was to have Audio Hijack automatically create a new file every 1gb. If you can load these into a player which supports Gapless playback, hopefully you would not hear any gap between the files.

 

Perhaps a similar solution could work here Yuri. If you could have an option to auto-split a large file into smaller segments it might work to create standard split WAVs.

 

Otherwise, Jud or anyone else facing this problem would need to split the file manually. You can probably do this with the free Audacity or Quicktime.

 

Apple introduced the caf (core audio format) to get over this limit and there is broadcast WAV as well. Again though, the trouble is the players that support these is very limited. Quicktime can probably play .caf files.

Owner of: Sound Galleries, High-End Audio Dealer, Monaco

Link to comment
If you can load these into a player which supports Gapless playback, hopefully you would not hear any gap between the files.

 

Of course you won't hear any gaps. But the player of concerned needs to support gapless (don't they all ?).

Lush^3-e      Lush^2      Blaxius^2.5      Ethernet^3     HDMI^2     XLR^2

XXHighEnd (developer)

Phasure NOS1 24/768 Async USB DAC (manufacturer)

Phasure Mach III Audio PC with Linear PSU (manufacturer)

Orelino & Orelo MKII Speakers (designer/supplier)

Link to comment
Okay Geoffrey and Jussi: Have either of been truly successful in creating a bootable build of NAA/Wheezy on a USB stick for Intel Macs? Don't you remember the week we spent Miska with you sending me various disk images to do this? At the time we both had to give up.

 

Maybe now that you have spent more time with a Mac (producing the NAA-not-required version of HQPlayer), perhaps you have a successful NAA image for me?

Both my desktop and headless music Mac minis (direct connected via dedicated Ethernet cable) are now 2012 2.3GHz i7 with 16GB RAM. So I could run HQPlayer well on the music player, but I'd love to do so and also compare SQ to it as split Player/NAA.

 

Hoping for good news,

 

Alex C.

 

I have never attempted to do this. I did buy an SOTM SMS-100 naa. The only DACs I have actually been able to get it to work with are the Oppo 105D and the Grimm LS1s. I believe I hear an advantage with the Oppo; but the Grimm's are already well isolated. They come with a USB interface box connected at one end to the computer and the other to the speaker/dac via ethernet, sort of like an NAA in reverse :)

 

The other DACs I have here would probably require custom drivers installed on the NAA to work. There is no provision to do this within the Web interface for the NAA, so I guess it would have to be via a command line interface, if/when the necessary drivers get written.

 

The situation may be different for other NAA's which I haven't tried.

Owner of: Sound Galleries, High-End Audio Dealer, Monaco

Link to comment
I think need test player with RF64. The format has structure like to wav, aiff, dsf as example. But header structure is non full compatible with standard wav and I don't sure what any player capable play it.

 

Hi Yuri,

 

I can't tell what "player" you talk about (not yours I presume ?) but anyway if I were you I would not go that direction.

Just an example for my own situation :

 

I will easily be able to create the RF64 tag and further structure (which is totally different from normal WAV).

But I don't think I will ever be able to change everything and all (so much) to support the playback of it. It is just too deep in everything. Thus example what I could do :

 

RIFF -> Offline Upsample -> Write to disk in RF64 -> Playback ... NOTHING.

 

This will count for everybody (every player), unless the RF64 is already supported.

 

Peter

Lush^3-e      Lush^2      Blaxius^2.5      Ethernet^3     HDMI^2     XLR^2

XXHighEnd (developer)

Phasure NOS1 24/768 Async USB DAC (manufacturer)

Phasure Mach III Audio PC with Linear PSU (manufacturer)

Orelino & Orelo MKII Speakers (designer/supplier)

Link to comment
I ran into this problem when auto-recording concerts from the Radio using Audio Hijack pro on the Mac. I wanted to record at 192khz 24bit

 

Do you mean that you're capturing an internet radio stream, or you're using an A/D to convert an analog signal from an FM radio? Either way, it seems doubtful that the audio is high enough quality to benefit from recording at such a high sample rate.

HQPlayer (on 3.8 GHz 8-core i7 iMac 2020) > NAA (on 2012 Mac Mini i7) > RME ADI-2 v2 > Benchmark AHB-2 > Thiel 3.7

Link to comment
Do you mean that you're capturing an internet radio stream, or you're using an A/D to convert an analog signal from an FM radio? Either way, it seems doubtful that the audio is high enough quality to benefit from recording at such a high sample rate.

 

I'm using an A/D to convert an analog signal from an FM tuner. …and yes it is high enough quality to my ears when live converts are recorded by France Musique.

 

It's a method of time shifting because Audio Hijack pro can be used to schedule recordings when I'm not there. If I like the concert enough, I'll keep it. Otherwise I trash it.

Owner of: Sound Galleries, High-End Audio Dealer, Monaco

Link to comment
Of course you won't hear any gaps. But the player of concerned needs to support gapless (don't they all ?).

 

No they don't all apparently Peter, because I've read numerous complaints about lack of Gapless. Off the top of my head I think Amarra was one culprit; but maybe it's fixed by now.

 

BTW J River seems to support all those formats.

Owner of: Sound Galleries, High-End Audio Dealer, Monaco

Link to comment
Perhaps a similar solution could work here Yuri. If you could have an option to auto-split a large file into smaller segments it might work to create standard split WAVs.

 

It will be very very tough to present this as a transparent solution. An example of my own (XXHighEnd) again :

 

Base file -> Upsample/Filter -> Split file into two logical names -> Treat as one logical file.

 

Transparent solution : That you don't notice anything about the process except for the waiting for it.

 

It is about this "Treat as one logical file". This really is a super pain. So, I do (did !) similar for some of the offline preprocesses but at some stage I had to cut it out because of too many anomalies and too complex to deal with. This is about the (earlier mentioned) caches, the running time in the player, the one track in the playlist which better be two to avoid complexities by now that in itself is a complexity and quite some more which made me abandon the whole means of splitting (which was for another reason but effects would be the same).

 

Of course, when nothing needs to be transparent and e.g. people split the files themselves then it is another matter, but mind you, now *nothing* is going to work any more for "control by the player". Thus this will not work :

 

Base file -> Press Play -> External (AuI) process creates upsampled file -> Player plays the file all automatically.

 

When the people need to split the files themselves, all what is left will be :

 

Base file -> External (AuI) process explicitly initiated by user creates upsampled files -> Load in player by user -> Press Play.

 

Of course I realize that I speak for myself, but with the notice that XXHighEnd at least can do it automatically and I thus know what's about with it all, and since I don't see it working with split files automatically, of course I think the same about others. :)

 

One more notice : This all is not about XXHighEnd to do it (for you Mac guys). It is only that I can implement it very easily so things can be tested easily as well.

Lush^3-e      Lush^2      Blaxius^2.5      Ethernet^3     HDMI^2     XLR^2

XXHighEnd (developer)

Phasure NOS1 24/768 Async USB DAC (manufacturer)

Phasure Mach III Audio PC with Linear PSU (manufacturer)

Orelino & Orelo MKII Speakers (designer/supplier)

Link to comment

Something else (not really) for Geoff and Jud :

 

If you use the beta-beta 1.186-i (not -a or even earlier !) version and use the AI filtering you see happening what I am talking about for 100%.

With the proper settings concerned playback starts right away but is not the best of course because further conversions are still going on (behavior is then like Audirvana) and otherwise you can wait a mile. The filter used here is not the best and also relatively slow. But always to keep in mind : if an album contains 10 tracks of 6 minutes and that would result in 2GB per track then 20GB has to be written. Or, if you want to play from RAMDisk then you'd need the memory for it.

 

Might you really try then you can see that the number of processor cores against the number of tracks to be loaded (for Unattended !) is crucial. So, one track more than cores available and it will take twice as long.

Lush^3-e      Lush^2      Blaxius^2.5      Ethernet^3     HDMI^2     XLR^2

XXHighEnd (developer)

Phasure NOS1 24/768 Async USB DAC (manufacturer)

Phasure Mach III Audio PC with Linear PSU (manufacturer)

Orelino & Orelo MKII Speakers (designer/supplier)

Link to comment

Question for Yuri :

 

A few posts back you gave the command line options (a link to it - and I did not look at it yet). Now outside of new developments for DSD filtering etc., what happens when I hook that into XXHighEnd ? I mean :

 

I myself don't have a license (no problem to obtain that) but how will this work for others ? Is this all automatically protected from your side ?

 

Am I even allowed to do this / try this / let people try it ?

So, "today" I mean without further adjustments on your side ...

 

Peter

Lush^3-e      Lush^2      Blaxius^2.5      Ethernet^3     HDMI^2     XLR^2

XXHighEnd (developer)

Phasure NOS1 24/768 Async USB DAC (manufacturer)

Phasure Mach III Audio PC with Linear PSU (manufacturer)

Orelino & Orelo MKII Speakers (designer/supplier)

Link to comment
I think need test player with RF64. The format has structure like to wav, aiff, dsf as example. But header structure is non full compatible with standard wav and I don't sure what any player capable play it.
Amazing, I clicked the checkbox in AuI to enable BWF, converted to a 24/384 WAV file, and the file played perfectly with Audirvana Plus. I could see from the track loading UI that A+ was treating this single track as two files (one of 16 minutes length, the other the rest of the track) and doing gapless playback between them.

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

Link to comment

Perhaps a similar solution could work here Yuri. If you could have an option to auto-split a large file into smaller segments it might work to create standard split WAVs.

 

Geoffrey,

 

I add the feature to list for improving .

 

Hi Yuri,

 

I can't tell what "player" you talk about (not yours I presume ?) but anyway if I were you I would not go that direction.

Just an example for my own situation :

 

I will easily be able to create the RF64 tag and further structure (which is totally different from normal WAV).

But I don't think I will ever be able to change everything and all (so much) to support the playback of it. It is just too deep in everything. Thus example what I could do :

 

RIFF -> Offline Upsample -> Write to disk in RF64 -> Playback ... NOTHING.

 

This will count for everybody (every player), unless the RF64 is already supported.

 

Peter

 

Peter,

I assume dividing big files to 1 GB fragments solve trouble recognizing of RF64.

 

 

Question for Yuri :

 

A few posts back you gave the command line options (a link to it - and I did not look at it yet). Now outside of new developments for DSD filtering etc., what happens when I hook that into XXHighEnd ? I mean :

 

I myself don't have a license (no problem to obtain that) but how will this work for others ? Is this all automatically protected from your side ?

 

Am I even allowed to do this / try this / let people try it ?

So, "today" I mean without further adjustments on your side ...

 

Peter

 

Command line don’t supported in free and Lite version due avoiding using batch processing via script or via third party software. In free version almost full audio performance - it important for demonstration of audio quality, but functionality (include command line) is restricted. If licensed AuI Audiophil-E or PROduce-R is installed - no problem.

 

Amazing, I clicked the checkbox in AuI to enable BWF, converted to a 24/384 WAV file, and the file played perfectly with Audirvana Plus. I could see from the track loading UI that A+ was treating this single track as two files (one of 16 minutes length, the other the rest of the track) and doing gapless playback between them.

 

Jud,

Interesting info about A+. So as I assume it consider the file as two due internal software structure or really divide to 2 file "on fly». As I right understand, you turn on «Enable BWF» checkbox?

AuI ConverteR 48x44 - HD audio converter/optimizer for DAC of high resolution files

ISO, DSF, DFF (1-bit/D64/128/256/512/1024), wav, flac, aiff, alac,  safe CD ripper to PCM/DSF,

Seamless Album Conversion, AIFF, WAV, FLAC, DSF metadata editor, Mac & Windows
Offline conversion save energy and nature

Link to comment
Amazing, I clicked the checkbox in AuI to enable BWF, converted to a 24/384 WAV file, and the file played perfectly with Audirvana Plus. I could see from the track loading UI that A+ was treating this single track as two files (one of 16 minutes length, the other the rest of the track) and doing gapless playback between them.

 

That is amazing. I wonder which other players can do the same?

Owner of: Sound Galleries, High-End Audio Dealer, Monaco

Link to comment

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now



×
×
  • Create New...