HQPlayer Linux Desktop and HQplayer embedded

[stosoorok]

I'm testing HQPe to convert all formats to DSD x128. All files seem to play fine but not dsf x64. What am I missing here?

 

I'm using synology audio station dlna server, mconnect as a control point, HQPe busybox 1.24.1 image in virtualbox, Sparky with Dietpi as NAA to Mytek Brooklyn DAC.

[Miska]

1 hour ago, stosoorok said:

I'm testing HQPe to convert all formats to DSD x128. All files seem to play fine but not dsf x64. What am I missing here?

 

I'm using synology audio station dlna server, mconnect as a control point, HQPe busybox 1.24.1 image in virtualbox, Sparky with Dietpi as NAA to Mytek Brooklyn DAC.

 

I don't immediately see anything wrong in the settings. Could be that the UPnP Media Server in Synology is doing something funny with DSD files. DLNA certainly doesn't cover DSD at all. Log file could tell more...

 

Have you tried same files with MinimServer as media server and Bubble UPnP app as control point?

 

[stosoorok]

15 hours ago, Miska said:

Have you tried same files with MinimServer as media server and Bubble UPnP app as control point?

 

Yes, I installed minimserver and bubble upnp and the result is exactly the same. All files except dsd are playing fine.

 

Is there any web based playback control for hqp to skip upnp (upnp apps tend to lag, even with ac wifi and gigabit network) control app? I personally like moode player UI.

 

And here is the log from HQPe.

[Miska]

6 hours ago, stosoorok said:

 

Yes, I installed minimserver and bubble upnp and the result is exactly the same. All files except dsd are playing fine.

 

Is there any web based playback control for hqp to skip upnp (upnp apps tend to lag, even with ac wifi and gigabit network) control app? I personally like moode player UI.

 

And here is the log from HQPe.

 

OK, I see, this is a metadata problem where the image doesn't have needed character set conversion data for this particular metadata. Some other DSD files with different metadata character set likely play just fine...

 

I need to check if I have similar DSD files to test with. I'll look into this...

 

By the way, is your host OS Windows or macOS?

[stosoorok]

21 minutes ago, Miska said:

By the way, is your host OS Windows or macOS?

 

You mean for the virtualbox? It's Windows 10 Enterprise v.1709.

[Miska]

10 minutes ago, stosoorok said:

You mean for the virtualbox? It's Windows 10 Enterprise v.1709.

 

You may get better performance by utilizing WSL instead. Ubuntu 16.04 has been available for it for quite a while.

 

Anyway, I just recreated the 4.0.6 release image which should now include needed character set conversions... Hopefully it fixes the issue you've been experiencing.

 

[stosoorok]

1 hour ago, Miska said:

You may get better performance by utilizing WSL instead. Ubuntu 16.04 has been available for it for quite a while.

 

Anyway, I just recreated the 4.0.6 release image which should now include needed character set conversions... Hopefully it fixes the issue you've been experiencing.

 

Great thanks! It seems to work now from bubble to hqpe (status page shows the playing file name) but not from hqpe to dietpi NAA anymore.  I had your NAA rPi image somewhere but can't find it, I'll try it tomorrow again.

 

Performance is quite okay I think. I'm currently testing it in virtualbox with 2 core 1GB virtual machine, upsampled pcm to dsd 128 with 40-50% cpu utilization!

 

BTW, why is the HQPe licence double the price compared to desktop?

[Miska]

21 minutes ago, stosoorok said:

Great thanks! It seems to work now from bubble to hqpe (status page shows the playing file name) but not from hqpe to dietpi NAA anymore.  I had your NAA rPi image somewhere but can't find it, I'll try it tomorrow again.

 

There was  no change at all in HQPlayer code, only some missing files added to the image...

 

You can download NAA images any time from my website.

 

[agillis]

I have HQPlayer Embedded fully working on the sonicTransporter i7 if anybody is looking for a plug-and-play ROON / HQPlayer solution. 

[arglebargle]

Didn’t see any notice on social media but hope it’s ok to post about the latest release...Some nice changes in 4.1! Access to logs through the web interface is much appreciated. The 1x vs Nx upsampling is I’m sure is a real boon for  those who will use it. 

 

 

[arglebargle]

Hey @Miska, quick report on my experience with 1x / Nx oversampling. Setting oversampling / oversamplingx in the config works as expected, but if I try to switch filters from the web UI , both cells switch to the selected 1x oversampling value. Not a display issue as it causes actual filter  to change. 

 

This is starting with a fresh install, where the config is generated via web interface. Chrome Linux, Chrome iOS and  Safari iOS are the browsers I've tried. 

 

[arglebargle]

Just installed 4.1.1 and this is indeed fixed. I assume the 1x/Nx feature will make it to Desktop? Just looking forward to seeing what filter choices people prefer. You singled out poly-sinc-mqa as one option for high res,  any other slow roll-off filter that would be a good candidate? Cheers 

[Miska]

17 hours ago, arglebargle said:

Just installed 4.1.1 and this is indeed fixed. I assume the 1x/Nx feature will make it to Desktop? Just looking forward to seeing what filter choices people prefer. You singled out poly-sinc-mqa as one option for high res,  any other slow roll-off filter that would be a good candidate? Cheers 

 

At some point yes. Another slow roll-off option is minringFIR which is not apodizing, unlike the poly-sinc-mqa. Then there's a "middle ground" option of poly-sinc-short.

 

Now that the feature is there, I will design more filters with this feature in mind, optimized for 96/192k source sampling rates.

 

[gvl]

Folks, I want to experiment with the HQPE but sadly none of my PCs I use for media duties support SSE4.2 so I'm in the market for some new hardware, I like the idea of a mini-PC for space savings. What is the minimum level of performance I should be looking at? Is GPU offload available in the Linux version? I have no immediate need for PCM to DSD transcoding but it's likely in my future,.

[shadowlight]

@gvl, 

Do you have any recent laptop/desktop that you can use?  You can install the image (https://www.signalyst.eu/bins/hqplayerd/images/) that Miska provided on to a USB flash drive and boot from it to test it out.  Doing that you can test it with out blowing your default setup away.  You will be limited to the 30 minutes per session/startup for HQPlayer Embedded.

 

The image does not have support for GPU offload but you can install either Debian/Ubuntu/Fedora on USB flash and install the support.   I have not personally tested GPU offload under embedded.  If you do get it working let us know, especially the steps.

 

I have it running on a Lenovo ThinkCentre with i3 and I can do DSD upto 128 and PCM 384.  I do not have a DAC that supports anything higher under Linux.

[Miska]

Note, CUDA support (Nvidia GPU) is only built into the hqplayerd Ubuntu package. This is because it requires matching Nvidia GPU driver and they only support limited set of distributions and kernel versions.

 

[gvl]

I have an i5-based laptop I can take for a spin, good idea. Is it true the image only supports a wired network connection?

 

GPU offload isn't a priority for me at the moment but might be useful if I ever get into DSD conversion. I haven't tried all the filters but even my ancient T43 Thinkpad with W7 can do to 384kHz out to ASIO backend using HQPD w/no major issues, WASAPI stutters though.

 

I'm a bit unclear on the installation. The images are all-inclusive and preconfigured, but I can also install my own OS from scratch and then add the hqplayerd package, is that right? Is there any benefit  of doing it one way vs. the other?

[Miska]

11 hours ago, gvl said:

I have an i5-based laptop I can take for a spin, good idea. Is it true the image only supports a wired network connection?

 

Yes, wired only at the moment, because it comes up on it's own automatically. Wireless needs to setup SSID and password. I can add necessary tools to configure those if needed, but so far people have usually preferred wired connections.

 

11 hours ago, gvl said:

GPU offload isn't a priority for me at the moment but might be useful if I ever get into DSD conversion. I haven't tried all the filters but even my ancient T43 Thinkpad with W7 can do to 384kHz out to ASIO backend using HQPD w/no major issues, WASAPI stutters though.

 

With WASAPI you likely need to select something like 100 ms as buffer time in HQPlayer settings. ASIO is usually fine with "Default" and for ASIO it is anyway better to adjust buffer sizes from the driver's control panel.

 

11 hours ago, gvl said:

I'm a bit unclear on the installation. The images are all-inclusive and preconfigured, but I can also install my own OS from scratch and then add the hqplayerd package, is that right? Is there any benefit  of doing it one way vs. the other?

 

Yes, you can also install one of the supported distributions (preferably minimal headless, so without any graphical UI) and then the hqplayerd package on it.

 

Reason for using pre-built images is that it is much easier to get up and running. And the OS in images is very minimal and built for this purpose.

 

[trs]

@Miska: Is there a way to use the control api to switch inputs for HQPlayer Embedded?

[Miska]

4 hours ago, trs said:

@Miska: Is there a way to use the control api to switch inputs for HQPlayer Embedded?

 

Yes, through SetTransport; there's a transport type TRANSPORT_AUDIO and the argument is name of the input.

 

[trs]

5 hours ago, Miska said:

 

Yes, through SetTransport; there's a transport type TRANSPORT_AUDIO and the argument is name of the input.

 

 

Thanks, I'm currently using the web UI to switch to a USB FM radio receiver with great results.

[Kilauea50]

How do you set playback in HQPe for 44.1khz/DSD 256?  I am now running embedded on a SonicTransporter and the settings are a bit different than desktop version.  Thank you

[Miska]

3 hours ago, Kilauea50 said:

How do you set playback in HQPe for 44.1khz/DSD 256?  I am now running embedded on a SonicTransporter and the settings are a bit different than desktop version.  Thank you

 

Most of the settings are the same, you set SDM output mode and wanted output rate...

 

[Kilauea50]

I have bit rate set to Auto and Rate Limit is 11289600.  I don’t know how to tell what is 44.1khz. 

[Miska]

3 minutes ago, Kilauea50 said:

I have bit rate set to Auto and Rate Limit is 11289600.  I don’t know how to tell what is 44.1khz. 

 

44100 x 256 = 11289600

 

Or what do you mean?