Design a PC/Server for ROON and HQ Player

[kravi4ka]

Is the Mellanox card a MHQH29C-XTR? And why do the prices range from 30USD up to 1k for seemingly the same card???!

[ted_b]

Mine is an MNPA19-XTR

[kravi4ka]

That was lightning fast Thanks, will look for one. And what is in the other end, if you are not fed up with me asking questions that are probably answered already( I did try to find, honestly)?

[ted_b]

That was lightning fast Thanks, will look for one. And what is in the other end, if you are not fed up with me asking questions that are probably answered already( I did try to find, honestly)?

 

The Mellanox uses a Cisco SFP, and then fibertronics cabling to a Diablo fiber switch. Its all detailed in this thread:

http://www.computeraudiophile.com/f22-networking-networked-audio-and-streaming/optical-network-configurations-24641/index4.html#post437616

[ericuco]

That was lightning fast Thanks, will look for one. And what is in the other end, if you are not fed up with me asking questions that are probably answered already( I did try to find, honestly)?

 

I have a Mellanox card that I was using in my music server but am no longer using. Switched to an Intel card because the drivers are included standard in Linux OS. PM if interested in Mellanox card. I bought off eBay for not much $$. It has the 1/2 height bracket.

[sig8]

I am trying to build 2-pc's with Gigabyte GA-Z170X motherboards. I ordered one Intel 65 W i7 6700, and one 95W i7 6700K. I will use an HDPlex H5 fan less case for 6700, and a Fractal Design R5 for 6700K.

 

The 65W 6700 I received came with a fan, and the 95W 6700K I received did not come with a fan (I must not have ordered them correctly, I think both can come with or without fan). The one which came with fan will go in a fan less box, and the one that did not come with a fan will go in a conventional box with fans.

 

Do I need to install the fan on 95W 6700K (I can use the one that came with 65W 6700), or I do not need that because it is going in a conventional box with fans.

 

I will test the SQ from both pc's; one low(er) powered fan less, and one higher powered with conventional build. Thanks.

[Letuchkin]

My build is up, operational, and sounds incredible. Redbook to DSD512 averages 27% cpu and about 40% GPU (assuming I'm reading right). I moved the Fractal stock fan on the back (exhaust) to the front panel bottom position, and added a Phanteks 140mm for the exhaust, as it is more powerful and I was concerned about the addtl heat produced by my Mellanox fiber card. The dual front fans decision was aided by the fact that they are slightly reduced in their CFM due to pulling air in through dust filters. The filtering in this case is exceptional and I am very pleased.

 

Here is the complete build list:

Intel Core i7-6700K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor

Noctua NH-L9x65 33.8 CFM CPU Cooler

Gigabyte GA-Z170X-UD5 ATX LGA1151 Motherboard

Kingston HyperX Fury Black 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR4-2133 Memory

Asus GeForce GTX 960 Overclocked 4GB GDDR5 PCI-E Video Card

SeaSonic 520W 80+ Platinum Certified Fully-Modular Fanless ATX Power Supply

Microsoft Windows 10 Pro OEM (64-bit)

Phanteks 140mm Cooling Fan (PH-F140SP_BK)

Mellanox Connectx-2 Optical (Fiber) Network PCI-E card

SanDisk SSD PLUS 2.5" 120GB SATA III Internal Solid State Drive (SSD), OS only, no music

Fractal Design Define R5 case

iFi iUSB 5V power supply for SSD

Roon server

Audiophile Optimizer 2.0 beta 15 (using "strip down Windows 10" service tool option)

HQplayer (sends to NAA)

 

Thanks to Jussi for 90% of this build idea.

 

Have you carried on any experiments with RAM-disk?

Based on my experience I should note that SQ in configuration with NAA is better than even in direct DSD mode while music files are loading from RAM-disk on HQplayer PC.

 

What is the platform of your NAA machine? Does it have USB 3.0 ports?

My new NAA nettop (ZOTAC ZBOX CI320 nano) demonstrates quite a sufficient SQ difference between via USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 ports. USB 3.0 port using makes sound so smooth (analog like) and almost eliminates SQ difference between DSD128 (max for my DAC) and DSD64.

[ted_b]

I have not done any ramdisk. I tried it (probably incorrectly) a year ago this time, with WS2012R2 and a much smaller machine and it flopped flat, boring and a PITA) I am open to what the Win 10 Pro and HQPlayer ramdisk best practices are these days; heck I have 32GB of RAM.

 

My NAA is a WS2012R1 running AO. It is a CAPS Carbon (Atom processor) with a wonderful JCAT USB card (so mobo USB ports, regardless of type, are irrelevant). It is connected via a FMC and fiber to my Diablo fiber switch.

[Dev]

Most of the build I see here needs quiet a few fans for cooling. Was anyone able to build a HQP/Roon PC, passive/active cooling or not, which has silent operation and can be kept inside the music room ? Or is this not a viable solution at the moment for DSD512 up-sampling ?

[EuroDriver]

Most of the build I see here needs quiet a few fans for cooling. Was anyone able to build a HQP/Roon PC, passive/active cooling or not, which has silent operation and can be kept inside the music room ? Or is this not a viable solution at the moment for DSD512 up-sampling ?

 

The SGM 2015 does Roon 1.2 > HQ Player > DSD 512 all passively cooled :-)

 

It's also important to note that to get really good Sound Quality with a Windows ASIO DAC such as the T+A DAC 8 DSD running Roon to HQP, one needs a reduced an optimized OS. Roon is a very busy app, and getting Windows to be minimally active is very much a necessary condition for good SQ

[sig8]

Most of the build I see here needs quiet a few fans for cooling. Was anyone able to build a HQP/Roon PC, passive/active cooling or not, which has silent operation and can be kept inside the music room ? Or is this not a viable solution at the moment for DSD512 up-sampling ?

 

I have built with HDplex H5 case; passively cooled. i7 6700 at 65 TDP. That case can handle 95 TDP (6700K).

[jabbr]

So I'm trying to get to DSD512 with the poly-sinc-mp filters and my current system does -2s well but hiccups at poly-sinc-mp. Not sure that its a pure CPU issue because my system loads to 32% (6x 3.4Ghz 4930k processor). The GTX 760 doesn't seem to help.

 

So:

i7-6700k (4.0) vs.

E3-1275 V5 (3.6)

vs.???

 

adding a GTX 1080 I'm assuming this will do DSD512 poly-sinc-mp fine ...

any idea about DSD1024? ...just because ...

[Dev]

The SGM 2015 does Roon 1.2 > HQ Player > DSD 512 all passively cooled :-)

 

yeah, I know that but honestly its beyond my budget at this point :-)

 

It's also important to note that to get really good Sound Quality with a Windows ASIO DAC such as the T+A DAC 8 DSD running Roon to HQP, one needs a reduced an optimized OS. Roon is a very busy app, and getting Windows to be minimally active is very much a necessary condition for good SQ

 

I agree. My experience has been that AO/Fidelizer Pro/PL has been a tremendous help in this area, along with tweaking some of the bios parameters.

[Dev]

I have built with HDplex H5 case; passively cooled. i7 6700 at 65 TDP. That case can handle 95 TDP (6700K).

 

How are you powering it ? Are you sure its able to do DSD512 up-sampling without any issues ? Miska suggests using a cuda graphic card to offload some of the computations and if I were to use one, the whole pc would at least need about 400watts.

[Miska]

So I'm trying to get to DSD512 with the poly-sinc-mp filters and my current system does -2s well but hiccups at poly-sinc-mp. Not sure that its a pure CPU issue because my system loads to 32% (6x 3.4Ghz 4930k processor). The GTX 760 doesn't seem to help.

 

Please check out the per-core load graphs in Resource Monitor. If any one of the cores is maxed out, then hiccups are likely to occur. Also note that for CPUs with HyperThreading, the CPU is practically fully loaded at 50% total load, because the virtual second CPU's from HT don't really help much with HQPlayer type of work loads.

 

adding a GTX 1080 I'm assuming this will do DSD512 poly-sinc-mp fine ...

any idea about DSD1024? ...just because ...

 

If the GTX 1080 performance is going to be anything like they promise, that won't be a bottleneck for DSD1024... Bottleneck is more likely to be the parts that still run on the main CPU. Let's see how much faster I can still make those ones.

 

 

Generally, if you go for CUDA, you can use CPU with higher base clock speed and less cores.

[sig8]

Most of the build I see here needs quiet a few fans for cooling. Was anyone able to build a HQP/Roon PC, passive/active cooling or not, which has silent operation and can be kept inside the music room ? Or is this not a viable solution at the moment for DSD512 up-sampling ?

 

Dev: I do not have a DAC that does DSD512. I was just suggesting a fan less box. I have not tried graphic card off-loading yet. So far for my 2-ch HQP or IB I am using an HDPlex 300W LPS (it sees about 70W total load with i7 6700, 3.4 GHz, and I will try down clocking once things settle down).

[sydlow]

Dev: I do not have a DAC that does DSD512. I was just suggesting a fan less box...

 

Can HQP dummy-upsample to DSD512 without being connected to a DAC just to see what load it generates?

[sig8]

Can HQP dummy-upsample to DSD512 without being connected to a DAC just to see what load it generates?

 

Don't know. Maybe Miska can answer. Dev asked if there is any option to go fanless, and I suggested HDPlex H5. You can have all the processor power you need (or available today) is an i7 6700K at 4.0 GHz, and based on others experiences it can up sample to DSD512. As of power supplies; I think there is HDPlex 300W LPS, and then there are few Teradaks LPS's going up to 600W. So everything remains fanless, and you have the required processing power.

[sydlow]

Don't know. Maybe Miska can answer. Dev asked if there is any option to go fanless, and I suggested HDPlex H5. You can have all the processor power you need (or available today) is an i7 6700K at 4.0 GHz, and based on others experiences it can up sample to DSD512. As of power supplies; I think there is HDPlex 300W LPS, and then there are few Teradaks LPS's going up to 600W. So everything remains fanless, and you have the required processing power.

 

Oh - I thought you had built a server with those specs.

[sig8]

Oh - I thought you had built a server with those specs.

 

Yes, I have a server built with;

 

Intel Core i7-6700 3.4 GHz Quad-Core Processor

Gigabyte GA-Z170X-UD5 TD ATX LGA1151 Motherboard

HDPlex H5 case

and HDPlex 300 W LPS.

[sydlow]

Yes, I have a server built with;

 

Intel Core i7-6700 3.4 GHz Quad-Core Processor

Gigabyte GA-Z170X-UD5 TD ATX LGA1151 Motherboard

HDPlex H5 case

and HDPlex 300 W LPS.

 

So if you have HQPlayer on it can you just set it to see if it will upsample to DSD512 and advise the CPU load?

[Forehaven]

Please check out the per-core load graphs in Resource Monitor. If any one of the cores is maxed out, then hiccups are likely to occur. Also note that for CPUs with HyperThreading, the CPU is practically fully loaded at 50% total load, because the virtual second CPU's from HT don't really help much with HQPlayer type of work loads.

 

 

 

If the GTX 1080 performance is going to be anything like they promise, that won't be a bottleneck for DSD1024... Bottleneck is more likely to be the parts that still run on the main CPU. Let's see how much faster I can still make those ones.

 

 

Generally, if you go for CUDA, you can use CPU with higher base clock speed and less cores.

 

Good post. I know I keep reading an i7 is min. for DSD512, but here's a screenshot of my cores while upsampling DSD64 to 256. So do you think for sure that my Mini wont do DSD512 on a Windows bootcamped?

[lmitche]

Over here I'm running an I7-6700k with a Scythe low profile fan. When up sampling to DSD512 the fan is audible only at the start when HQplayer renders the filter. Once done, the fan drops to 800 rpm during playback and is inaudible.

[Miska]

Good post. I know I keep reading an i7 is min. for DSD512, but here's a screenshot of my cores while upsampling DSD64 to 256. So do you think for sure that my Mini wont do DSD512 on a Windows bootcamped?

 

I'm pretty sure it won't. Going DSD256 -> DSD512 at least doubles the load, and you have two cores already at around 75%. Based on your load figures, you are now at optimal max of your machine. There's some margin left for the Roon GUI.

[MikeJazz]

I'm pretty sure it won't. Going DSD256 -> DSD512 at least doubles the load, and you have two cores already at around 75%. Based on your load figures, you are now at optimal max of your machine. There's some margin left for the Roon GUI.

 

So it's hard to find a mac with appropriate capacity for going to DSD512.

I am looking and not finding an imac with i7...

 

Should we assume that only the mac-pro will do?