New OSX Opensource audiophile player : Audirvana

[chilest]

Forgive my naive understanding of the following, but can someone explain the "Quality" setting under the SRC window, what it should be set at and how, if any, the setting may effect sound quality?

 

I am using libsamplerate and forced upsampling 4X or 2X only. I have the exclusive access mode checked and the max I/O buffer size checked, the max memory allocation is at it highest setting. I have a MacBook Pro with 4 GB of memory, 1067 MHz, have the Mac linked to a Bryston BDA-1. When I try 4X or 2X upsample and the above settings, the music sputters and skips and repeats about a 5 second section of a music file. Can't seem to fix this problem.

tom

 

[Encore]

Brought my EVO over to a friend's place last night. We downloaded Audirvana on his mac, and it clearly beat VLC. As well as my netbook with Foobar. And it beat his Audio Note transport. Good work. I'm gonna have to get myself a dedicated MacBook Pro now :-S

 

[Jud]

After another listener's comment regarding a preference for the sound when his MacBook Pro (IIRC) ran on the 64-bit kernel, I was skeptical, but my curiosity was piqued.

 

Also, I'd commented to damien that with my setup (Audirvana running over Airfoil to Airport Express, then through optical-to-coax converter into DAC), I wondered whether exclusive access mode ("hog mode") was starving Airfoil and creating the occasional dropouts I've experienced.

 

So I did a bit of listening.

 

I'm frankly surprised, but I did hear a consistent difference with the kernel operating in 64-bit vs 32-bit, and I preferred 64-bit. I felt 64-bit presented better defined instruments and voices within the soundstage, along with a closer-to-the-stage perspective. For example, in "I Fall to Pieces" from "Rhythm, Country and Blues," the slight sibilance of Aaron Neville's "s" the first time he sings "pieces" is clearer. It's not overly pronounced, it just gives the right feeling of a large man (ever seen Aaron Neville?) restraining himself as he begins the song softly.

 

I do wonder what is creating this effect. I don't know whether the difference lies in something that is present in the software chain supporting sound reproduction in 64-bit mode, in the absence of several 32-bit extensions the 32-bit kernel has to support that the 64-bit kernel doesn't, or somewhere else.

 

Now, as to hog mode - there are definitely more dropouts with hog mode, once or twice every 3 or 4 songs, versus a single dropout in several hours of listening with hog mode turned off. Unfortunately, to me Audirvana definitely sounds better in hog mode, so I may have to put up with more frequent dropouts. (Maybe not - an 8 GB RAM kit for my MacBook Pro is scheduled to arrive Tuesday to replace the current 4 GB. At less than $100, I couldn't *not* buy it.)

 

[Bob Stern]

The spacebar does not work for me to play/pause Audirvana.

 

Does anyone else have this problem?

 

[Bob Stern]

Here is an AppleScript that will add to the Audirvana playlist the tracks currently selected in the iTunes browser.

 

I recommend that you store the script in the following folder:

~/Library/iTunes/Scripts/

 

The script will appear in the Scripts menu in iTunes, and you can assign a shortcut key to it in OS X Prefs > Keyboard.

 

[Jeff In San Diego]

I will try this out this morning. Have been hoping somebody would get around to doing this before I had to learn AppleScript myself and get it done myself.

 

Since no good deed goes unpunished, can I ask for help/suggestions on adding a couple more things to the script that will make it even better for me?

 

1) What line would I need to add to the script to tell Audirvana to empty the existing playlist as a first step (since I usually just listen one album at a time and will use this as an easier way to queue up the next album to listen to).

2) Can you think of a way (in script) to make iTunes select all the songs in an album? The iTunes UI is currently rather clunky in this regard. For me, clicking on the album artwork on the left should select the whole album, but it just selects the first song. Currently that would mean manually selecting all the songs of an album before hitting the keystroke for your script.

 

Thanks again, really appreciate you sharing this with the group!

 

[Jeff In San Diego]

"The spacebar does not work for me to play/pause Audirvana. Does anyone else have this problem?"

 

Yes, I have noticed that too. Have been hoping he would add it. It is a minor thing, but I got used to having that in iTunes.

 

thanks,

jp

 

[Jeff In San Diego]

Hi Damien,

Would you please add these items to your todo list? I think each one is about 10 minutes...

 

1) change "Space" on the play menu item to "space" so it will work

2) add a "Cut" or "Delete" Edit menu item hooked to the '-' button in the playlist

 

The second one is for scripting. It will make it possible for me to empty the playlist before the recently-posted Applescript for dumping an iTunes selection to Audirvana playlist. (note that my Select All addition works, but no way to then delete it from script)

 

I'm curious...what was the use-case you were going for with the "prune" menu item? I can't think of a way I would use that. As near as I can tell it deletes everything except the current item. Must be for a work flow I haven't thought of yet.

 

thanks much,

jp

 

[Jeff In San Diego]

I needed something to do while I kind-of watched the SuperBowl, so I decided to hack around on the script that Bob provided to make my own version.

 

This one is intended to be used by manually selecting one or more files in iTunes and then run the script (perhaps with a command-P key combo like I did). This should replace whatever is currently in Audirvana's playlist with your iTunes selection (and start playing it).

 

A word of caution, this is a fragile script. It had to depend on the order of windows and of buttons in the window because there is (so far) no menu item for removing the current selection from the playlist (Cut/Delete). It could easily get broken by small changes in the app over time. Also it has only had a very small amount of testing. I don't know jack about AppleScript, so there are no doubt some better ways to do some of this. Your mileage will probably vary.

 

Installation is same as described by Bob above. Thanks again to Bob for getting the ball rolling.

 

[Bob Stern]

Good work, Jeff!

 

To eliminate the "fragility" you mentioned:

replace:

click button 5 of window 1

with:

keystroke (ASCII character 8) -- backward delete key

 

[Bob Stern]

In your "do_menu" handler, the "try" statement prevents the script from returning an error if the menu commands fail. However, I expect you want to know if the script fails. Therefore, you probably should delete the try, on error, and return commands. The resulting simplified handler would be:

 

on do_menu(app_name, menu_name, menu_item)

tell application app_name to activate

tell application "System Events"

tell process app_name

tell menu bar 1

tell menu bar item menu_name

tell menu menu_name

click menu item menu_item

end tell

end tell

end tell

end tell

end tell

end do_menu

 

 

Also, as a matter of visual style rather than substance, if you wish you can collapse most of the tells and end tells into one very long command:

 

on do_menu(app_name, menu_name, menu_item)

tell application app_name to activate

tell application "System Events"

tell menu menu_name of menu bar item menu_name of menu bar 1 of process app_name to click menu item menu_item

end tell

end do_menu

 

[Jeff In San Diego]

I've made the changes suggested by Bob above and created a new copy of the script. It seems to run faster now too, for reasons I don't know and don't want to contemplate.

 

(BTW, most of the "original" code was not mine. It was scraped up and modified from several different sources through some distracted googling -- I don't even know enough AppleScript to be dangerous)

 

Now if only somebody would figure out enough iTunes scripting to make it extend selection of the first song of an album to encompass the whole album. Then one could just click on the album artwork and hit the shortcut key for the script...and Voila! High quality music emanating from Audirvana.

 

[damien78]

I initially used space bar as the shortcut for play/pause.

But the issue with it is that space bar is already used by the standard OSX UI as "Action command" for the currently highlighted control in the active window.Similar story for Return key.

So instead of making a complex hack, the easy way is to use another key shortcut.

What do you think of having: P for Play/Pause, B for Backward (previous) track, N for Next track, S for full stop ?

 

I'll add a "Delete selected track" in the edit menu. No pb.

Do you have other 30s requests for making great scripts that link iTunes & Audirvana ? It'll be a pleasure to add them.

 

Anyway, you'll have to wait for next release, as I'm currently making important changes to include Integer Mode capability. I hope to have it done by end of this week.

 

Damien

 

[synapse]

for some reason i cannot get audirvana to play when in upsample mode......i can do this on my 5year old macbook pro with 1.5gig Ram but not on my newish mac mini with 4gb? the only difference is the mac mini has hiface, is there a known conflict here?

 

[damien78]

@synapse: is your DAC connected to the hiface able to handle 192kHz sample rate ?

In Upsample mode, Audirvana currently upsamples to the max sample rate the device can handle, and this may be the case in your setup with a bridge in front of a DAC.

I'll add a "forbidden rates" feature in the preferences in a future version to cope with this.

 

Damien

 

[synapse]

no, both the hiface and dac are 192kHz able....I can play 192 hi res files.....curious

 

[bjast]

As noted above, the space bar does not work when using an Apple Bluetooth keyboard. This make using Audirvana awkward - mouse driven - for the many of us who have to use these keyboards with our Macs. The addition of this feature would be much appreciated. Thanks

 

[damien78]

synapse: BTW, what is the exact symptom ?

Upsampling with libsampleRate at max quality requires lots of CPU power that the mini may not be able to handle.

This gives 5seconds play, then pause, then 5sec play, ...

As a video loading on youtube.

But you can still listen to tracks at this quality upsample level, by pressing pause until it loads way beyond the play position. And the next tracks should be fine, as the second core of your CPU takes care of them.

 

Damien

 

[synapse]

i'm not near my hifi at the moment but from memory i can see it load but even when fully loaded will not play or if it does play there is no sound

 

is there a choice of CoreAudio or libsampleRate when upsampling?

 

best

 

mark

 

[damien78]

User prefs>Audio Filters

 

[bjast]

I noticed that Audirvana can be used with the Apple Remote.

 

1. Is this the handheld Apple Remote, or can it be used with the iPhone Apple Remote?

 

2. How does one go about getting Audirvana to work with even the handheld remote?

 

I have a headless Mac Mini (2010).

 

Thanks

 

[damien78]

It is the IR handheld remote for now.

I have (long term, spare time needed ) future plans to implement library management (e.g. to handle my huge FLAC lib...) with UPnP, thus enabling network remote control.

 

Damien

 

[audiozorro]

Why not just use Mocha VNC Lite which can do everything.

 

http://www.mochasoft.dk/iphone_vnc.htm

 

 

[seta]

After flirting with the new Audiofile-Engineering Fidelia for the past 48hrs and fooling around with Decibel over the past week or so, I'm coming back to Audirvana.

 

My own rankings of the three music players...

 

Audirvana (upsampled) > Decibel > Audirvana (native) > Fidelia > Fidelia (upsampled)

 

Which is a bummer for me since I did have very high hopes for Fidelia's iZotope SRC. But in upsampling mode, the soundstage collapsed. Music that used to image well beyond the far left and right side of my speakers now are now no longer and just emitting from the speakers themselves.

 

Fidelia's overall sound is clean and clear but leaner and more hifi-ish, not as natural.

 

The buggy Audirvana still reigns sonically, so keep it up Damien!!

 

[jhwalker]

"The buggy Audirvana still reigns sonically, so keep it up Damien!!"

 

While I agree Audirvana reigns sonically, I can't agree it's "buggy"

 

Haven't had a moment's grief with it, even on a 4-year-old MacBook Pro with only 2gb RAM. I'm only upsampling to 96/24, but it's been rock-solid for me throughout.

 

I *would* like the ability to play directly from the iTunes library - the Fidelia interface is nice here.