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AudioLinux and NUC Troubleshooting and Tuning


rickca
Message added by austinpop

Summary of useful findings and recommendations

 

This section will be a living repository of useful info from this thread. It's very similar to a wiki and will be maintained by a small group of thread moderators.

 

Before you get started please refer to the Audio-Linux website to ensure you have the latest info and the proper versions of the OS. Audio-Linux.com  

 

**** Updated for AL 1.30 menu 118 or later.

 

  "First Run" setup for headless.  

 

Setup your NUC with a keyboard, mouse, and monitor to the NUC BIOS settings.  From the menu note the IP address of the machine to SSH into.  From a MAC the macOS terminal program supports SSH:

324537708_ScreenShot2019-01-28at3_02_19PM.thumb.png.739dc7f9cdb05e04da806c7c66877332.png

 

Then it is simpler to cut and paste into the terminal session. After entering the password for the audiolinuxuser you will be presented with the AL headless menu:

 

1518375894_ScreenShot2019-01-28at3_04_18PM.thumb.png.a7b2867a163f8f014e56e52ff69f94b4.png

 

Option 8 takes you to the command line for the following basic setup.  You will need to be the Root user for this setup and the su command first:

 

su

 

Fix the time zone:  (this is my timezone - look in directory /usr/share/zoneinfo)

 

timedatectl set-timezone America/Chicago
 

Setup and Start NTP daemon (to keep the system time in sync)

 

*** the config file is now properly filled in.

 

Now Start the daemon

 

timedatectl set-ntp true

 

 

NOTE: Sometimes the system takes a little while to get synced up.
 

Set hostname  (this provides a unique name for the machine on your network.  Replace <NAME> with your chosen name)

 

hostnamectl set-hostname <NAME> 
 

Once the above items are set up your machine is ready to be configured for say a Roon bridge/endpoint. That is done using the AL menu.  To return to the menu do the following commands.

 

exit

menu

 

----------------------------------

 

For most of us, the following basic settings are key.

From the configuration menu:

6. START and enable Roonbridge

15. SET Realtime Priority to extreme

16. ENABLE ramroot (reboot after)

 

Return to the main menu and reboot the NUC using 

 

11 Reboot

 

------------------

Roon Server setup is a bit more complex and we will cover it completely a bit later.  The key is where you are booting from and where the Roon database is stored.  In general; say a 32gb OPTANE "SSD".

 

  • You have to partition the SSD into a boot drive and a storage drive.  
  • The transfer the USB stick install to the boot partition.  
  • Reboot from the boot partition.  
  • Do the basic setup. Timezone and name
  • Transfer the Roon Database to the storage drive
  • Start the Roon Server
  • .....

 

----------------- 

The machine will reboot and from the display attached to the NUC you can watch it boot up and load into RAM.  Once the AudioLinux menu is showing the endpoint should be available in Roon.    This completes the basic startup sequence.  The system is ready to start testing.    

 

 

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Some settings should be universally applicable for many distros, though there are others hardware-specific ones and obviously we've gotta get the matching motherboard / server etc. in order to apply those corresponding settings

 

Low Latency Performance Tuning for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7
https://access.redhat.com/sites/default/files/attachments/201501-perf-brief-low-latency-tuning-rhel7-v1.1.pdf

 

Linux on Power – low latency tuning
https://developer.ibm.com/linuxonpower/docs/linux-on-power-low-latency-tuning/

 

Configuring and tuning HPE ProLiant Servers for  low-latency applications
https://support.hpe.com/hpsc/doc/public/display?docId=emr_na-c01804533

 

How to Enable Dell Processor Acceleration Technology
https://www.dell.com/support/article/us/en/mvbsdt1/sln156702/how-to-enable-dell-processor-acceleration-technology

https://vinfrastructure.it/2017/09/dell-processor-acceleration-technology-pat/

 

Analysis: Inside Supermicro's Hyper-Speed HFT Server
https://intelligenttradingtechnology.com/blog/analysis-inside-supermicros-hyper-speed-hft-server

 

New Generation Servers Optimized for Extreme Low-Latency Trading
https://www.supermicro.com/white_paper/white_paper_Low_Latency_Server.pdf

 

Low Latency/Jitter Optimization  User’s Guide
https://www.supermicro.com/products/nfo/files/Hyper-Speed/low_lat_jitter_opt_guide.pdf

 

Basically they're optimizing each system to suit the requirements of high-frequency trading, therefore it's a just matter minimizing the number of active cores while maximizing the the clock speed of CPU. Of course we've gotta find out if that kinda settings would also work for Roon / LMS / HQP or otherwise.

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  • austinpop changed the title to AudioLinux and NUC Troubleshooting and Tuning

I still recall what this Texan was all about

 

https://books.google.com/books/about/Direct_From_Dell.html?id=XCMjisWZFYcC

Quote

You'll meet the young Dell who, at the tender age of eight, had already begun looking "to eliminate unnecessary steps" and who, as a numbers-loving adolescent, was inspired by a newfound fascination with computers to save his money to buy a coveted Apple II--only to promptly take it apart.

 

Let's remember that we're indeed utilizing "plain vanilla" Ethernet at this point, therefore we don't really have the "luxury" to eliminate the unnecessary steps

 

https://searchstorage.techtarget.com/definition/Remote-Direct-Memory-Access

Quote

Remote Direct Memory Access (RDMA) is a technology that allows computers in a network to exchange data in main memory without involving the processor, cache or operating system of either computer. Like locally based Direct Memory Access (DMA), RDMA improves throughput and performance because it frees up resources. RDMA also facilitates a faster data transfer rate and low-latency networking. It can be implemented for networking and storage applications.

 

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/InfiniBand

Quote

IB's latency is incredibly small: SDR (5us); DDR (2.5us); QDR (1.3us); FDR (0.7us); EDR (0.5us); and HDR (< 0.5us). For comparison 10Gb Ethernet is more like 7.22us, ten times more than FDR's latency.

 

BTW, maybe it's about finding the sweet spot?

 

https://help.ableton.com/hc/en-us/articles/209072289-How-to-reduce-latency

Quote

The smaller the buffer size, the lower the latency. Bear in mind that very small buffer sizes may cause dropouts or glitches due to the increased CPU load. Find the sweet spot where the buffer is as small as possible without impairing the audio quality.

 

Question for @hifi25nl, do you have any experiences with enabling RDMA on both server side and client side?

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