AudioLinux and NUC Troubleshooting and Tuning

[tapatrick]

5 hours ago, darkfrank said:

 

 

Thanks, I installed ethtool and managed to change those configs. If need to apply these configs permanently, the only way is to add a customized service to systemd to run a script on boot? 

You probably saw it but here is a section "making ethanol settings permanent" in that link.

Did you add all the configs listed there?

 

Interesting resource

However I noticed this warning on the intro page: https://cromwell-intl.com/open-source/performance-tuning/

Be careful: The network tuning suggestions are for a data center with at least 1 Gbps bandwidth and very low round-trip latency. If you apply them to your home computer, they are likely to make your Internet connection worse instead of better. See the BufferBloat discussion on the Ethernet page for why this is the case.

[seeteeyou]

40 minutes ago, tapatrick said:

You probably saw it but here is a section "making ethanol settings permanent" in that link.

 

Was AutoCorrect getting drunk or what?

[tapatrick]

7 minutes ago, seeteeyou said:

 

Was AutoCorrect getting drunk or what?

yep, all part of a (budget) Christmas spirit...

 

[darkfrank]

57 minutes ago, tapatrick said:

You probably saw it but here is a section "making ethanol settings permanent" in that link.

Did you add all the configs listed there?

 

Interesting resource

However I noticed this warning on the intro page: https://cromwell-intl.com/open-source/performance-tuning/

Be careful: The network tuning suggestions are for a data center with at least 1 Gbps bandwidth and very low round-trip latency. If you apply them to your home computer, they are likely to make your Internet connection worse instead of better. See the BufferBloat discussion on the Ethernet page for why this is the case.

 

Yea but there is no /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-enxxx in archlinux, no /etc/rc.d/rc.local as well.

The configure file of the network interface is located at /etc/systemd/network/en.network, I doubt adding those ethtool commands into it would works.

[hifi25nl]

New menu version 0.8! 

If you have installed audiolinux 0.7 or updated manually to the new menu you can update it from Update menu.

Now you can mount easier a local or network drive with a script .

Mount scripts are in a beta stage, please use with care.

For network mount you must install first nmap

pacman -S nmap

 

 

[Monge]

22 hours ago, lmitche said:

Unless I missed something, there is no reason to check the audio box with a usb DAC or DDC.

My mistake. Sorry. 

I just tried to leave the Onboard Audio unchecked In BIOS and running AL 0.7 it works like a charm.

It tried it a couple of times In earlier Al versions and I could not get it to work.

Thanks for correcting me and have a Merry Christmas.

[lmitche]

18 minutes ago, Monge said:

My mistake. Sorry. 

I just tried to leave the Onboard Audio unchecked In BIOS and running AL 0.7 it works like a charm.

It tried it a couple of times In earlier Al versions and I could not get it to work.

Thanks for correcting me and have a Merry Christmas.

Hi Monge. Glad to see it worked, Merry Christmas to you and yours. Larry

[tapatrick]

7 hours ago, darkfrank said:

 

Yea but there is no /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-enxxx in archlinux, no /etc/rc.d/rc.local as well.

The configure file of the network interface is located at /etc/systemd/network/en.network, I doubt adding those ethtool commands into it would works.

Okay, I see. Maybe Piero can help...

[davide256]

On 12/23/2018 at 6:13 AM, hifi25nl said:

New menu version 0.8! 

If you have installed audiolinux 0.7 or updated manually to the new menu you can update it from Update menu.

Now you can mount easier a local or network drive with a script .

Mount scripts are in a beta stage, please use with care.

For network mount you must install first nmap

pacman -S nmap

 

 

 

This isn't working for me.  I have a Lexar USB stack of SDXC memory cards. I can see the two "drives" sdb and sdc when I use the menu local mount option.

I enter sdb1, yes for a second drive, sdc1 for the second drive, exit, then enable Roonserver to run. Normally at this point with LXQT I find the attached music

drives in the media folder (linux1/linux2 or windows1/windows2 but I'm not seeing anything in any of the folders in this directory. What step am I missing?

Running extreme mode, boot to RAM on NUC7pjyh

[hifi25nl]

The script is in beta not yet complete version. For the moment you can mount only one ext4 drive to /media/linux1 and only one ntfs drive to /media/windows.

...after Christmas I will update. Also network share will mount only 192.168.1.x and one cifs to /media/samba and one nfs to /media/nfs

[hifi25nl]

Updated and fixed some problems in mount scripts. Now menu is version 081

 

Merry Christmas!

[seeteeyou]

On 12/19/2018 at 4:46 PM, beautiful music said:

May i know where is the best store that offers a good price of  NUC7i7DNBE.

 

There's a seller in New Hampshire who WAS offering each NUC7i7DNBE for $445 back in October, then someone bought 9 of them and therefore we could probably tell why

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Intel-BLKNUC7I7DNBE-Core-i7-8650U-Processor-8M-Cache-4-20-GHz-NEW-BOARD-ONLY-/202468077702

 

I also found another company in Taiwan as follows, they're selling NUC7i7DNBE plus their own chassis

 

http://www.g-alantic.com.tw/Product_Detail.aspx?no=NUC7i7DNBE

https://www.intel.com/content/dam/support/us/en/documents/mini-pcs/G-ALANTIC-GA5702.pdf

https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/NUC7i7DNBE-Intel-Desktop-NUC-Motherboard-Core_50039819728.html

https://www.taiwantrade.com/product/nuc7i7dnbe-intel-desktop-nuc-motherboard-core-i7-8650u-dual-core-4-20-ghz-1508655.html

 

None of us compared NUC7i7DNBE to NUC7i5DNBE yet, though the latter one costs about $360 before the last one is gone

 

https://www.provantage.com/intel-blknuc7i5dnbe~7ITEP5X5.htm

https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/NUC7i5DNBE-Intel-Desktop-NUC-Motherboard-Corei_50039850519.html

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Intel-NUC7i5DNBE-Desktop-Motherboard-Core-i5-i5-7300U-Dual-core-2-Core-2-60GHz-/232911859312

[rickca]

I got my NUC7PJYH to boot with an LPS-1.2 set to 12V.  All I did was disable SpeedStep, SATA and onboard audio.

 

The interesting thing is it works with an LPS-1.2 if I use the two USB3 ports in the rear for my USB flash drive and the USB cable to my DAC.  If I use a rear USB3 port for the USB cable to my DAC, but a front USB3 port for the USB flash drive, the NUC will not boot with the LPS-1.2.

 

Actually, the USB cable goes to a Berkeley Alpha USB which uses bus power only for the dirty input side.

[austinpop]

7 minutes ago, rickca said:

I got my NUC7PJYH to boot with an LPS-1.2 set to 12V.  All I did was disable SpeedStep, SATA and onboard audio.

 

The interesting thing is it works with an LPS-1.2 if I use the two USB3 ports in the rear for my USB flash drive and the USB cable to my DAC.  If I use a rear USB3 port for the USB cable to my DAC, but a front USB3 port for the USB flash drive, the NUC will not boot with the LPS-1.2.

 

Actually, the USB cable goes to a Berkeley Alpha USB which uses bus power only for the dirty input side.

 

Which suggests it's all about the current draw from the DAC or DDC on USB. Bus powered DACs will probably not work.

[rickca]

2 minutes ago, austinpop said:

Bus powered DACs will probably not work.

They will probably work if you have something like an ISO REGEN between the NUC and the bus powered DAC.

[davide256]

28 minutes ago, rickca said:

I got my NUC7PJYH to boot with an LPS-1.2 set to 12V.  All I did was disable SpeedStep, SATA and onboard audio.

 

The interesting thing is it works with an LPS-1.2 if I use the two USB3 ports in the rear for my USB flash drive and the USB cable to my DAC.  If I use a rear USB3 port for the USB cable to my DAC, but a front USB3 port for the USB flash drive, the NUC will not boot with the LPS-1.2.

 

Actually, the USB cable goes to a Berkeley Alpha USB which uses bus power only for the dirty input side.

the yellow port allows more current for USB charging, disabling USB charging will likely eliminate the front/back difference

[rickca]

10 minutes ago, davide256 said:

the yellow port allows more current for USB charging, disabling USB charging will likely eliminate the front/back difference

I didn't use the yellow port in front.  I used the blue port.  But you may still be right.

[lmitche]

9 hours ago, rickca said:

They will probably work if you have something like an ISO REGEN between the NUC and the bus powered DAC.

Yes, the ISO Regen takes very little vbus power itself and creates an independent vbus power source for a bus powered DAC. That's how I run the NUC7i7 on the LPS1.2 here.

[lmitche]

10 hours ago, rickca said:

I got my NUC7PJYH to boot with an LPS-1.2 set to 12V.  All I did was disable SpeedStep, SATA and onboard audio.

 

The interesting thing is it works with an LPS-1.2 if I use the two USB3 ports in the rear for my USB flash drive and the USB cable to my DAC.  If I use a rear USB3 port for the USB cable to my DAC, but a front USB3 port for the USB flash drive, the NUC will not boot with the LPS-1.2.

 

Actually, the USB cable goes to a Berkeley Alpha USB which uses bus power only for the dirty input side.

Sounds like you have more circuits to disable in the bios. At a minimum disable the network interface you are not using, (wifi or ethernet nic), hdaudio, microphones...etc.

[Monge]

Which numbers do the rear and front USB 3 have In BIOS CJYH/PJYH?

There are 6 USB 3 ports that can be disabled In BIOS incl USB headers. I only need two.

[Monge]

On CJYH

I tried to disable USB ports 4,5 and 6. So I think the blue port on front is number 4 course I could’nt use my wireless keyboard (connectet at blue port at front) after reboot.

So I think the USB ports on the rear is 1 and 2 and the front USB ports is 3 Yellow and 4 blue.

Also I have the option to set USB ports In the BIOS to “no detect”.

[rickca]

2 hours ago, Monge said:

Which numbers do the rear and front USB 3 have In BIOS CJYH/PJYH?

I can't recall but on the PJYH it tells you right there in the BIOS.

[Monge]

Thanks I’ll have a look at the PJYH BIOS as I have new PJYH too here waiting for ram to be delivered.

Cheers and Merry Christmas.

Monge

[BigAlMc]

One step forward, 2 steps backwards - an update on my AL adventures (or should that be misadventures).

 

Part 1 - Popped the popping sound

 

So my one step forward is that I had a brainwave that helped me get my i7DNBE board working nicely with my LPS-1.2

 

Long story short the SMS-500 was plugged into my AudioQuest Niagara powerstrip and the LPS-1.2 was plugged into a standard wall socket. Swapped them and the popping sound was now gone. The technical details of why this may be are over my head but it also explains why I was the only one reporting this popping noise on the LPS-1.2. Must have been something specific to how my system is hooked up.

 

Part 2 - Lost stability and losing my mind with Roon!

 

After fixing the popping sound I also downloaded AL0.7 and updated both the Server & Endpoint to use this latest version. In both cases I did a complete install from scratch on using Rufus to create the USB drives and then configuring them. I followed the steps that are now becoming all too familiar to me.

 

Renamed each device using: hostnamectl set-hostname

 

Mounted the SSD on the Server using: nano -w /etc/fstab

 

Set each device to boot in Extreme2 mode and set Realtime priority to Extreme.

 

Then once configured and playing nicely I set each to RamRoot, rebooted, saved and started playing.

 

And it sounds terrific.

 

But to paraphrase Ray Liotta in Goodfellas, then came the bad times ?

 

It plays fine. But once left for a while when I go back to play again nothing will play. I select an album and each track skips through quickly without making a sound. Previously when I'd encountered similar issues power cycling my DAC (PS Audio Directstream) resolved this but it doesn't work now. Rebooting either the EndPoint or the Server results in either Roon cannot see the EndPoint at all. Or Roon can see the Endpoint but cannot see it having a USB connected DAC.

 

Long story short over the last few days I find that rebooting the Server is the best option but it takes 2 to 3 reboots before it sees the USB Endpoint. This will last for a while and then drop.

 

I've also reinstalled both the Endpoint and the Servers version of AL - must be three times each now. Works for a bit and then drops out and needs several reboots to kick back in.

 

So I'm tearing my hair out wrt what to try next. Do I revert to an earlier version of AL? Is there some sort of best practice for which unit (Endpoint running Roon Bridge or Server running Roon Server) to configure and save to Ramroot first? Does the Ramroot AL server use the SSD for anything other that locating the music (i.e. is it saving anything that's tripping the settings up)?

 

Not sure if I've done anything stupid in the setup but I don't think so as it seems a fairly simple process:

 

1. Flash new image to USB drive

2. Change hostname

2b. Mount SSD (server only)

3. Boot and change to Extreme Boot mode

4. Reboot and change RealTime to Extreme

5. Enable Roon Bridge/Roon Server

6. Set to RamRoot and reboot

7. Boot and Save

 

But several attempts later and I'm finding it impossible to create a stable enough version that lasts more than an hour or so.

 

Any thoughts on what to look at or advice on best practice?

 

I'm wondering what the sonic hit is on installing Roon ROCK on the server to see if that's more stable

 

Cheers,

Alan

[davide256]

On 12/24/2018 at 6:45 PM, hifi25nl said:

Updated and fixed some problems in mount scripts. Now menu is version 081

 

Merry Christmas!

I can see that the script now creates folders for the mounts in media directory but doing a disk status from the menu still showed no mount point. I ended up manually

editing fstab to add the UUID statements with linux1 and linux2 mount points.