Audirvana Plus 3.5

[Undertone]

44 minutes ago, RunHomeSlow said:

i don't know RAID format, but could it be that? 

 

My understanding is that RAID couples two drives together -- in my Mini, two 8GB SSDs. Read and write speeds are increased in a RAID array compared to non-RAID.

 

Another possibility: my music library is on a conventional HD, and Audirvana is reading very large files from a drive that isn't sending a fast enough data stream, even at USB 3.0. If that is the source of the problem, I'll have to use a large-capacity SSD to hold the music files.

 

RunHomeSlow has been providing helpful feedback to me about this problem over at the Audirvana forum. 

[RunHomeSlow]

I didn’t remember you from Audirvana site  many questions complaints there to answers...

[RunHomeSlow]

You could try googling raid and 4gb file, you know when you format a usb stick in fat32 you can’t copy large files even if the stick as 16gb... maybe raid the same?

 

[Undertone]

1 hour ago, RunHomeSlow said:

You could try googling raid and 4gb file, you know when you format a usb stick in fat32 you can’t copy large files even if the stick as 16gb... maybe raid the same?

 

 

There is a 4GB file size limit in FAT32-formatted drives. The Mac Mini's SSDs are HFS+ formatted, and there is no problem copying very large 4K video files onto the RAID.

 

The largest file in my DSD128 music collection is just over 2GB, a 20-minute-long piece.  

[RunHomeSlow]

Now you know that i don’t know RAID like I said 😀

 

then, have you tried the 3 steps for optimizing your database file? Or delete it and redo it? Trash your prefs files of Audirvana, you should not have trouble playing dsd128 As you said.

 

does this came from The dsd128 done with that software? Have you tried downloading a free exemple of dsd128 to see?

[RunHomeSlow]

Tried to find a song at DSD128... to show my mac mini 2012 i5 16gb playing a song... takes around 3 seconds to load into memory, then Audirvana load the second track while playing the first one... Then, Mac Mini is sleeping to the end of the CD almost 95% of the time and doesn't stop for me... So, with your setup and Mac i7, it should be easier then mine... then, what i think, is related to RAID (maybe not ) or the soft you made your DSD128 track with, that is buggy...

 

Here some pictures seen playing the first song of a DSD128 track not done with a software offline...

 

Hope it helps you resolve that bug...

Mmmm, bugs, with all hate them

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Chopin75]

Can you monitor. the. RAM on the minimac? I. use Dr. cleaner to  monitor my MacBook. You would be surprised how much. RAM a Mac uses even it appears not to be doing something more than playing Audirvana. When I was. running MacBook Air with audirvana I was no able to play. DSD256 because of the huge files and difficulty in processing, similar to what you experience. But with your 16GB there should be enough RAM. I ended up switching to a. 16GB RAM. MacBook Pro though it still gets cranky with DSD255 because it keeps using all my RAM or no good reason. But I have all this crap like touch. bar and God knows what other background processing it is doing. Then I switched to Euphony audio and all problems with DSD256 are solved, and can play native DSD. You can boot your Mac mini with Euphony Audio thumb drive and it would use your RAM more efficiently. Those DSD files are huge! you and every single RAM available.

 

[RunHomeSlow]

yes, it is call Activity monitor, it is with all Mac, utility folder, you can see memory used, cpu load in real time...

 

Audirvana, when not upsampling, just playing bit perfect flac file or dsd native file for example runs on nothing, if your dac can do what you are playing... if your dac can't proceed DSD256 like mine (max 128), it will play the file to 352pcm... even that, doesn't need much ressources...

 

but taking a 16//44 file to process (upsampling) to dsd128 like with my maximum dac can do, uses my computer mac mini much more ressources... and can skip or hangs sometimes... i5 16gb... i guess with a new iMac 6cores, 8gb of memory by default, that will run easely...

 

 

[Chopin75]

While running quboz on audirvana, can one load the files temporarily onto the playlist (like eCache) and then disconnect from WiFi ? I can do that with the Quboz streaming app itself but not with Audirvana. 

[Undertone]

Replying to RunHomeSlow and Chopin75:

 

I have several native DSD128 albums, downloaded from the vendor in DSD128. The conversion software is not the problem. Before I used offline conversion, when upsampling in Audirvana to DSD128 or DSD256, the same audio dropouts occured, and there was much higher demand on CPU resources. There is something about the configuration of my Mac Mini that is not allowing  optimized use of RAM.  

 

I'll look into Euphony Audio as an alternative.

[RunHomeSlow]

I think mac mini is good, could be Audirvana, when buying dsd128, no problem, but Converting dsd128 to others format, cannot Answers that, @damien78 could ?

[jimdukey]

AV won't upsample DSD at all, only PCM to DSD.

[jimdukey]

Korg Audiogate will Convert DSD to higher DSD , and export.

Then AV won't have to upsample.

But you have to have their Dac too.

[Undertone]

29 minutes ago, jimdukey said:

AV won't upsample DSD at all, only PCM to DSD.

 

Correct, Audirvana does not upsample DSD, and upsampling PCM-DSD on the fly in Audirvana demands high CPU resources.

 

Instead of Audirvana, I use an offline SRC to pre-convert PCM files to DSD128. I've also tried remodulating a few ripped SACDs to DSD128, with very good results.  

[jimdukey]

I haven't had any problems with dropouts on AV, including PCM to DSD 128.

I have an iMac, 16gb Ram, and 3.2-3.6 GH Processor.

There are a few Filters in HQ that won't play at all, due to needing greater resources.

But the ones I use sound fine and have no problems either.

Can't get DSD 256 at all.

There are people here and at HQ that have playback problems, I'm crossing my fingers...

[ThijsA]

On 7/24/2020 at 1:35 AM, RunHomeSlow said:

I didn’t remember you from Audirvana site  many questions complaints there to answers...

This issue remained without a solution there

[ThijsA]

It’s the other way around. Remote works when connected to the Mac with the RAID-system. Remote hiwever does not display Albums when connected to the other Mac with the conventional  harddisk

[Undertone]

I have a question for @damien78  

 

My Mac Mini has 16GB of RAM configured in a RAID array.  At any setting of maximum memory allocated for pre-load, from very low to very high, playback of large DSD128 files of classical music is sometimes interrupted by brief audio dropouts (silence).

 

When I adjust the maximum memory allocated for tracks pre-load above 8.2GB, the display for time for pre-load reverts to 0 seconds@768kHZ (see the second screenshot). 

 

Less than 8.2 GB allocated

 

More than 8.2 GB allocated

 

Does this mean that on a Mac with 16GB of RAM in a RAID configuration, Audirvana can only access 8GB, one-half of the RAID? Or does the max. memory allocation access the full capacity of the first 8GB, and then accesses the second 8GB of the RAID?

[bnbayer]

54 minutes ago, Undertone said:

My Mac Mini has 16GB of RAM configured in a RAID array. 

 

Are you sure it's your RAM that's configured as a RAID? Usually RAID configurations are used for hard drives. (Perhaps this is a video editor trick for speed?)

 

What level of RAID is it using? (RAID 0, RAID 1, etc - these are totally different in the amount of memory the computer can actually see. RAID 0 would let you use all 16GB, I think, while RAID 1 would only allow 8GB, but mirrored.) There are at least 6 RAID configurations. Most of them would reduce your 16GB to smaller amounts, with redundancies.

[Undertone]

2 hours ago, bnbayer said:

 

Usually RAID configurations are used for hard drives. (Perhaps this is a video editor trick for speed?)

 

bnbayer, you are correct on both points. My previous post does not make sense. Apologies for the misstatements, but I can't edit the earlier post.

 

RAID joins two or more hard drives or SSDs. Disk Utility shows that my Mac Mini has two 250GB internal SSDs configured in a RAID 0 array. RAID 0 produces faster read/write speeds for video editing purposes. 

 

My Mini has two 8GB DDR3 RAM for a total of 16GB. I have been using Activity Monitor to monitor the Memory Used and Cached Files numbers in relation to audio dropouts when playing DSD128 files. If I'm pushing the Mini past its capacity to stream DSD128 without intermittent dropouts, then I'll have to find another solution.

 

One thing I've begun doing is running the "sudo purge" command in Terminal, once or twice each listening session, to keep the maximum amount of memory available for Audirvana. 

[bnbayer]

2 hours ago, Undertone said:

 

bnbayer, you are correct on both points. My previous post does not make sense. Apologies for the misstatements, but I can't edit the earlier post.

 

RAID joins two or more hard drives or SSDs. Disk Utility shows that my Mac Mini has two 250GB internal SSDs configured in a RAID 0 array. RAID 0 produces faster read/write speeds for video editing purposes. 

 

My Mini has two 8GB DDR3 RAM for a total of 16GB. I have been using Activity Monitor to monitor the Memory Used and Cached Files numbers in relation to audio dropouts when playing DSD128 files. If I'm pushing the Mini past its capacity to stream DSD128 without intermittent dropouts, then I'll have to find another solution.

 

One thing I've begun doing is running the "sudo purge" command in Terminal, once or twice each listening session, to keep the maximum amount of memory available for Audirvana. 

OK - I'm not a techie, and my setup is different... but at least now I think I understand your setup!

 

I don't think the RAID is relevant: that's handled by the MacOS and the RAID software. Audirvana should just see a hard drive. And even without RAID striping, the SSD should be more than fast enough for Audirvana. (NB: My RAID is a NAS, but I don't think yours being internal should matter.)

 

If I understand that your files are not stored on the SSD, you might try that as an experiment. Copy the whole piece (not just one track) to the SSD, and get Audirvana to play from there.

 

The time showing on the slider dropping to 0 @768kHz isn't normal. It should keep going up as you increase the buffer memory. That might be a clue. (That's not your RAID, but the 16GB DDR3 RAM.) Mine goes up to my total RAM less about 1 Gig - it should let you go up to about 15GB.

 

Are the dropouts repeatable? (ie, always in the same spot?) The closest thing I have to your problem is on a DXD (24/352.8) Mahler 3, which has a momentary dropout about 70 minutes in. Always. (If I re-start from that movement - not from the beginning of the work - it plays right through without the dropout.) I've wondered if the buffer is not re-filling until it's completely empty, and it always runs out at this same spot.

[Undertone]

bnbayer: My music files are stored on a 4TB USB-attached and -powered external HD. I could copy an entire classical piece in large files to the SSD; but would I need to create a separate Audirvana database for it, or just point to that file location? 

 

The dropouts are not repeatable and not predictable. Your example of playing a long Mahler symphony in DXD and experiencing a dropout at the same point in the work suggests that there is a buffer capacity issue, because you can play the movement by itself without the dropout occuring. Today I've been using the sudo purge command after 20 minutes of playing DSD128 files, and that seems to reduce instances of dropouts. But I still do not know the cause of the problem. 

 

The first screenshot shows that the max. memory allocation slider can be set to 15k MB, but notice that the time indicator shows only 10 minutes at 768kHZ. The time indicator resets to zero minutes when the slider is moved past 8.2k MB. 

 

15,360 MB

 

8,200 MB

 

8,000 MB

 

 

[bnbayer]

30 minutes ago, Undertone said:

My music files are stored on a 4TB USB-attached and -powered external HD. I could copy an entire classical piece in large files to the SSD; but would I need to create a separate Audirvana database for it, or just point to that file location? 

 

 

 

The first screenshot shows that the max. memory allocation slider can be set to 15k MB, but notice that the time indicator shows only 10 minutes at 768kHZ. The time indicator resets to zero minutes when the slider is moved past 8.2k MB

I doubt this is your problem, but it would be fun to try, just to positively rule it out. (You've got this blazing hot SSD set-up, you might as well play with it! It would also be interesting to find if you can hear any difference. Taking a physical HD and a USB cable out of the path might open things up a bit...) So, put the files in a single folder, go to Preferences>Library, click on the + sign and select the folder on the SSD. This will give you a duplicate in your library, so I would suggest changing the album title a bit on the copy. When you're done playing, go back to the Prefs and click the - button for that folder. Or call it "Test" and just delete the files and put other ones in. (You could also do a drag-and-drop to the Play Queue instead.)

 

I see what the slider is doing, and it looks like a bug to me. (I can't test on my system as I only have 8MG RAM.) The question, of course, is whether whatever is causing this glitch in the slider also prevents Audirvana from buffering correctly over 8MB. 

[Undertone]

I'll test a Bruckner symphony, 24/96 recording upsampled to DSD128. Thanks for the suggestion! It's easy to add another folder to Audirvana, just something I hadn't tried. 

[Undertone]

On 7/26/2020 at 5:18 PM, bnbayer said:

You've got this blazing hot SSD set-up, you might as well play with it! 

 

In several listening sessions to DSD128 albums streamed from the internal SSD RAID 0 array on my Mac Mini, I have not heard any audio dropouts. To reduce the variables in the trial, I also tried not purging cached files to see if that was a factor, and there were still no dropouts.

 

It appears that the conventional HD I've been using for my music library can't provide a high enough data transfer rate to support large audio files. I'll replace the HD with an external SSD, since the internal SSD on the Mini isn't large enough to hold my growing library. 

 

Many thanks to @bnbayer for making this suggestion! I should have tried it months ago.