Ultimate NAA/Roon endpoint/AirPlay receiver etc

[Blizzard]

So it's the ultimate renderer with this BOM price tag, and if USB regen was installed?

 

 

I know of no better ASIO compatible media player/renderer for anywhere near the price. In fact for any price. Based on the rave reviews on the REGEN, it should definitely take it to another level.

 

But if anyone can chime in with a better alternative, I would love nothing more than to hear about it.

 

Like Alex said, share and learn. I am sharing, now it's time to learn.

[lkong]

I know of no better ASIO compatible media player/renderer for anywhere near the price. In fact for any price. Based on the rave reviews on the REGEN, it should definitely take it to another level.

 

But if anyone can chime in with a better alternative, I would love nothing more than to hear about it.

 

Like Alex said, share and learn. I am sharing, now it time to learn.

Ok I'm confused.

Did you try the build with REGEN in or not?

[Blizzard]

Ok I'm confused.

Did you try the build with REGEN in or not?

 

 

 

 

No I haven't built it with a REGEN yet. I'm just saying that it could be. And using this technique would avoid the need for any USB cables. Based on the reports of others on the REGEN thread, taking USB cables out of the picture offers large benefits. Not only that it would be all in a single clean box.

[Blizzard]

Here's a picture of the beautiful little SBC without heatsink installed.

 

It's a UCFF form factor board with the dimensions of 4X4"

 

[bibo01]

I know of no better ASIO compatible media player/renderer for anywhere near the price. In fact for any price. Based on the rave reviews on the REGEN, it should definitely take it to another level.

 

But if anyone can chime in with a better alternative, I would love nothing more than to hear about it.

 

Like Alex said, share and learn. I am sharing, now it's time to learn.

I believe that a Fitlet is a pretty good and cheaper alternative, which I have already tested with both Linux and WinServer on a microSD card. It has a 8-layers, industrial quality pcb.

[Blizzard]

I believe that a Fitlet is a pretty good and cheaper alternative, which I have already tested with both Linux and WinServer on a microSD card. It has a 8-layers, industrial quality pcb.

 

 

 

Yes I never seen those before but look pretty good. I added to cart and $310 with shipping for the Fitlet-I

 

One drawback of ready built system is no way to build a REGEN into it.

 

It's also nice when you can have a LPS in the exact same matching case such as the Teddy Pardo.

 

A large part of the cost in my system is the premium power button and connectors. You can shave $50 off the BOM cheaping out on them. The ability to power the SSD from it's own low noise power supply is also a bonus. You can also power the USB bus from the dedicated low noise power supply as well. And lastly, it doesn't look like a computer, it looks like something that belongs on a hifi shelf.

 

But they do look very nice. I would love to get info on ordering the raw motherboards.

[Jud]

Here's a picture of the beautiful little SBC without heatsink installed.

 

It's a UCFF form factor board with the dimensions of 4X4"

 

[ATTACH]20129[/ATTACH]

 

The E210882 pictured here is a rather old design that may not be readily available currently.

[Blizzard]

The E210882 pictured here is a rather old design that may not be readily available currently.

 

 

 

 

Sorry Jud but that's not the board. Your looking up the wrong number. it's definitely not an ATX form factor motherboard from circa 2008. That setup would look a little more like this and be 8X the size.

[Blizzard]

Here's another picture. See if you can figure it out

 

[seeteeyou]

Here we go

 

http://www.mouser.com/new/intel/intel-atom-nuc-e3815/

 

http://ark.intel.com/products/78576/Intel-NUC-Board-DE3815TYBE

 

http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/nuc/nuc-board-de3815tybe.html

[Blizzard]

Here we go

 

http://www.mouser.com/new/intel/intel-atom-nuc-e3815/

 

http://ark.intel.com/products/78576/Intel-NUC-Board-DE3815TYBE

 

http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/nuc/nuc-board-de3815tybe.html

 

Bingo!

 

Nice little board for this application. Not a powerhouse, but that may possibly be why it sounds so good.

[bibo01]

Yes I never seen those before but look pretty good. I added to cart and $310 with shipping for the Fitlet-I

 

One drawback of ready built system is no way to build a REGEN into it.

 

It's also nice when you can have a LPS in the exact same matching case such as the Teddy Pardo.

 

A large part of the cost in my system is the premium power button and connectors. You can shave $50 off the BOM cheaping out on them. The ability to power the SSD from it's own low noise power supply is also a bonus. You can also power the USB bus from the dedicated low noise power supply as well. And lastly, it doesn't look like a computer, it looks like something that belongs on a hifi shelf.

 

But they do look very nice. I would love to get info on ordering the raw motherboards.

 

A Fitlet-B barebone, which is all you need although out of stock at the moment, is $149 with shipping in the US. No SSD needed, just add a 16GB microSD. Totally headless and fanless.

An external LPS can be used to power Fitlet and, eventually, Regen.

It did DSD256 effortlessly.

 

If you are interested in alternative x86 single industrial boards, have a look at Compulab offer:

ARM and x86 Single Board Computers |CompuLab

[Blizzard]

A Fitlet-B barebone, which is all you need although out of stock at the moment, is $149 with shipping in the US. No SSD needed, just add a 16GB microSD. Totally headless and fanless.

An external LPS can be used to power Fitlet and, eventually, Regen.

It did DSD256 effortlessly.

 

If you are interested in alternative x86 single industrial boards, have a look at Compulab offer:

ARM and x86 Single Board Computers |CompuLab

 

 

That is pretty cool. I like it. Thanks for the links. I would love to be able to order just the motherboard with micro SD card reader out of the Fitlet-B. The Intel board I'm using has an onboard 4gb flash chip to install Linux on, but I like the microSD method better.

 

Did you try playing any music off of the SD card?

 

I'm going to order one and try my version of embedded 8 on it when they are available again.

[Blizzard]

Their not expecting stock on the Fitlet-B until Sept 30th. Too bad. The SD card reader is pretty slow though at 25mb/s. I would probably load embedded 8 on a 32gb M.2 SSD. I love how it has the full sized mSATA slot as well. You need to get the I3 NUC in the latest lineup of intel NUC boards to get the full sized M.2 slot. However they are PCI-E M.2 which is nice.

[bibo01]

Too bad about ordering. I ordered it immediately as it became available. It is very much in demand because quality is far superior to consumer products.

 

You are right that mSD card reader is rather slow. However, once OS is loaded, usage of Fitlet as NAA is smooth.

Under Linux I tried also in terminal mode, no GUI.

 

I am not sure that the available single boards correspond to the one onboard Fitlet.

[Blizzard]

Too bad about ordering. I ordered it immediately as it became available. It is very much in demand because quality is far superior to consumer products.

 

You are right that mSD card reader is rather slow. However, once OS is loaded, usage of Fitlet as NAA is smooth.

Under Linux I tried also in terminal mode, no GUI.

 

I am not sure that the available single boards correspond to the one onboard Fitlet.

 

 

 

It's small and cheap enough. You can always throw the whole thing enclosure and all into a bigger fancy box. Then you could put the Regen in with it along with an optical transceiver module for isolation like the one in the picture.

 

Then it would look like a fancy piece of audio gear.

 

Something like this would probably do the trick for isolation:

 

http://www.mpl.ch/t2ba0.html

[firedog]

Yes I never seen those before but look pretty good. I added to cart and $310 with shipping for the Fitlet-I

 

 

Blizzard, this is another example of why it's been suggested to you to think about reducing the tone of your posts where everything is "ultimate". You are passionate and have good ideas, but maybe - just maybe - you don't know more about every aspect of computer audio than professionals with success in the marketplace - people who have actually build products and sold them, not just drawn them up on a piece of paper and possibly built one DIY unit.

[Blizzard]

Blizzard, this is another example of why it's been suggested to you to think about reducing the tone of your posts where everything is "ultimate". You are passionate and have good ideas, but maybe - just maybe - you don't know more about every aspect of computer audio than professionals with success in the marketplace - people who have actually build products and sold them, not just drawn them up on a piece of paper and possibly built one DIY unit.

 

 

 

Sorry if the word "ultimate" offends you. I never claimed to know better than anyone else how to build computer audio based components. This is why I asked a few posts ago:

 

"But if anyone can chime in with a better alternative, I would love nothing more than to hear about it"

 

So far bibo01 chimed in with an awesome alternative. Hopefully more people will contribute helpful information as well rather than contribute time wasting criticism. If so this may turn into an educational thread for everyone.

[Blizzard]

I'd just like to say that since interest in this project so far has been more than I was expecting, perhaps I should make a tutorial with photos of all the steps. I can also include different options such as the REGEN, optical isolation etc.

 

If you haven't ever built a computer or DIY project before, it might be best to wait for the tutorial, or buy a ready to go mini computer such as the Fitlet-B bibo01 mentioned, or the turn key NUC kit based on this same SBC.

 

http://www.amazon.com/Intel-Thin-Canyon-NUC-DE3815TYKHE/dp/B00LPLQD04

 

 

Powered by LPS, sound should be just as good as the basic version of my design.

 

 

Others may offer more options on this thread later as well that may be suitable.

 

 

Another note is I didn't include the 4 small screws for the standoffs, wire to go from the push button header pins to the switch, and small piece of wire from the DC input to the motherboard. Those are all things that are only available in larger quantities from Mouser. It's all stuff I have lots of already so never had it on the BOM.

 

Amazon probably has the best deal on SSD's. 32gb should be good enough. Ram is 4 GB of SODIMM DDR3 1600.

 

What I like about the Fitlet-B is it can be just used on its own, or built into a case like I mentioned in the previous post. So this may be a better option once they become available again.

[Jud]

Here's another picture. See if you can figure it out

 

[ATTACH]20133[/ATTACH]

 

Yup. Found it but seeteeyou beat me to it. Also found that "E210882" listed in a group of numbers printed on Intel boards that "are not indicative of board model." Guess so.

[Blizzard]

I suppose I shouldn't be recommending the REGEN to be installed as part of this system before testing as well. I might end up sharing the same view point on the unit as one of the other well respected professionals that is a member of this forum. His thoughts can be located on post 264 of this thread.

 

 

 

 

http://www.computeraudiophile.com/showthread.php?t=25177

[Blizzard]

Anybody who's following this thread might be interested to know that I asked AudioPhil (the man behind Audiophile Optimizer) the pro/cons of windows 2012 server vs windows 8 embedded for audio purposes.

 

I'm expecting he will chime in with a very good explanation on his reasons for making this choice.

 

You can follow this on his thread:

 

http://www.computeraudiophile.com/showthread.php?t=17897

[Blizzard]

Hi guys,

 

I decided that it's probably best to stick with the K.I.S.S principal with this project for now.

 

Anyone who wishes to evaluate my version of Windows Embedded 8, I now recommend just using the ready to go kit version with the same internal SBC.

 

 

http://www.amazon.com/Intel-Thin-Canyon-NUC-DE3815TYKHE/dp/B00LPLQD04

 

 

In the future the motherboard can always be pulled out and put in a fancy enclosure with upgrades. By then I'll have experimented with more tweaks and I'll be able to provide detailed tutorials. Hopefully there will also be input from others and their ideas as well.

 

The way Windows embedded 8 works is the operating system is actually built specific to the hardware it's being used on. If my image is installed on any other computer it won't work. The 3815 SBC is the only system it will work on. But I do encourage others who are perhaps more knowledgeable than me to try their own tweaking of Embedded 8 on the hardware they currently own.

 

I'm also going to experiment with the Fitlet, and will share my experiences with it.

 

I'd also like to say that from now forward if all discussion related to this project be discussed openly rather than PM. This way all readers can benefit from the discussion.

 

Thanks,

Blizzard.

[Blizzard]

Yup. Found it but seeteeyou beat me to it. Also found that "E210882" listed in a group of numbers printed on Intel boards that "are not indicative of board model." Guess so.

 

If you have $133 to spare, pickup one of these cheap units and try for yourself. It can alway used as a dedicated Linux based NAA if you decide you don't like the Windows embedded.

[Miska]

Anyone who wishes to evaluate my version of Windows Embedded 8, I now recommend just using the ready to go kit version with the same internal SBC.

 

http://www.amazon.com/Intel-Thin-Canyon-NUC-DE3815TYKHE/dp/B00LPLQD04

 

That's a nice passive cooled device for NAA use also with Linux.

 

Another board level alternative is:

Meet MinnowBoard MAX | minnowboard.org