Hqplayer: best NAA with best sound quality

[Miska]

This is what I use mostly:

https://up-shop.org/home/339-up-gws01w4g-memory32g-emmc-boardwo-vesa-plate.html

It also works for USB input side.

 

I may soon add also one more ARM-based board that also works for USB inputs.

 

[Miska]

1 hour ago, firedog said:

That board seems to only have 32GB of storage. Isn't that an issue when you do a Windows Update? It is. for me with my similar little device - or do you have additional storage attached? Also, will it pass on  all sample rates, or is it limited?

 

I don't use Windows. HQPlayer OS image is 1.5 GB of which about half is empty. While NAA image is only 261 MB.

 

I have a minimal Debian Buster installed on some of those (just things needed to run HQPlayer Embedded) and the OS and HQPlayer Embedded takes 3.8 GB (with bunch of extras for debugging), and the storage has 23 GB of space left.

 

[Miska]

There tend to be couple of challenges with ARM based platforms.

 

One is that they lack capability to describe their own hardware structure and connections. So Linux kernel needs a so called device tree file that describes this. This needs to be done by each hardware vendor who designs some kind of board around an ARM SoC. They know how things are connected together. Different hardware vendors have different quality level and response time of their Linux kernel support.

 

This leads to the second problem, which is that many times the available supported kernel is pretty old. In worst case which is also rather usual is that the kernel matches the Android kernel which is ancient. This means having kernel version 3.14 (from year 2014 - 2016), while Linux kernel is at the moment on version 5.6.

 

Intel/AMD platforms don't have this problem because they have a firmware system called ACPI that can describe the hardware configuration to the OS. Hardware manufacturers only need to place information about the hardware in their BIOS (sometimes they have bugs on this too, though). But they don't need to work on the OS at all. Then you can just pull very latest Linux kernel and start using it. Sometimes they just issue BIOS updates to fix bugs in their ACPI data or similar, however this is independent from the OS.

 

[Miska]

By the way if you wonder who's behind the UpBoard, it is subsidiary of ASUS. This one just works in embedded/industrial market.

 

[Miska]

1 hour ago, sledwards said:

I am trying to install naa-411-x64 on my NUC6i5SYH. First question: Does this image work with an i5?  I try to boot from a bootable USB stick and no OS is found.  Please advise.

 

Yes it should work just fine on your NUC. Please make sure your BIOS is largely at default settings, IOW it is trying to boot using EFI and not legacy. And that USB storage is enabled as a boot device with priority over internal storage.

[Miska]

1 hour ago, rossco said:

Now I need to find something available in the UK, please shout if anybody knows of an equivalent (ish) device to the one Miska linked to earlier in the thread. Thanks.

 

If you search for example Amazon UK for the CPU type; "x5-Z8350" you can find some devices.

 

For example this looks like Apple TV:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Pro-x5-Z8350-Graphics-Computer-Bluetooth/dp/B07D9YX3W6  (2 GB RAM)

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Windows-x5-Z8350-Graphics-Desktop-Computer/dp/B081DR8CVN  (4 GB RAM)

 

But note that some of these may have a small and loud fan hidden inside, so be careful. And many likely have plastic cases unlike the one I recommend. The device should be passive cooled so that it doesn't make unwanted acoustic noises. It doesn't need much cooling, but it still needs heatsink to keep the CPU cool (like RasPi4 too).

 

[Miska]

4 hours ago, ambre said:

Hello Jussi, Just bought the Pro-X5 2Gb.

Which NAA and no operating system do I need to install looking at your site? Please advice.

 

Best regards, Andreas

 

The naa-411-x64 is the latest at the moment.

 

[Miska]

4 hours ago, rossco said:

I was looking at this one

https://www.amazon.co.uk/ACEPC-T11-64GB-x5-Z8350-Computer/dp/B07P9GVDTQ/ref=asc_df_B07P9GVDTQ/?tag=googshopuk-21&linkCode=df0&hvadid=310708967400&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=13497436158468797862&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9045661&hvtargid=pla-697774880534&psc=1

 

It seems to have 5v and not 12v, which means I could use an IFI power supply I have knocking around. And, it does seem to be fanless, so it ticks that box. I can't seem to find a cheaper box without windows, which is a shame as I would just be installing the NAA image instead.

 

Yes, that's another option. There seem to be at least couple of possible options. I don't have any of these, because I use the UP-Board one (practically made by ASUS). Unfortunately you end up paying some amount of "Windows tax" on the price. But OTOH, you can leave the Windows on eMMC and boot NAA from USB memory stick or microSD. Windows is probably horribly sluggish on such small memory and low power CPU. But for NAA running my image it is perfectly fine.

 

In the picture the Wintel Pro uses 5V DC power, hopefully feeding it straight to USB VBUS too.

 

The iFi PSU is probably a bit too weak for those. For 5V I'm using a Meanwell medical grade 5V 6A PSU brick, the model that has floating (two pin non-earthed) mains connector. There is also 12V model of the same with just lower current rating (because Wattage is the same).

 

[Miska]

24 minutes ago, rossco said:

I need to research PSU's then a bit, thanks for the info.

 

PSU I'm using is Meanwell GSM60B05-P1J

 

27 minutes ago, rossco said:

On a related note, I have your NAA working on my RPI4 now as a bit of a test, just listening on my office set-up (its usually running ropieee). I might have a listen on the main endpoint too. I wonder if I will be able to tell the difference between USBridge Sig, rpi4 or the Atom unit?? Interested to see.

 

You could also try my image on the RasPi4 instead of Ropieee.

 

Very hard to make estimates how much if any difference you will notice. I find the Atom ones most robust, but RasPi4 is certainly much better than the earlier versions.

 

[Miska]

1 hour ago, ambre said:

Do i need Win10 installed first and than launch your NAA software. Like i did on MacOs instelling via terminal?

Or is abovementioned image bootable in itself? Via usb stick ?

 

No Windows, you just boot from it. It is complete custom built OS for this purpose.

 

[Miska]

On 5/25/2020 at 4:24 PM, vortecjr said:

Our ARM processor...is working just fine with Linux. I can see an issue if you are building an ARM based DIY solution though.

 

It doesn't matter if it is DIY or not if you are using the same SoC.

 

[Miska]

4 hours ago, DancingSea said:

Do I understand correctly that this $189 device is a NAA?  Meaning it does the same job as one of the Rendus?

 

Yes, it is recommended for NAA use (input or output). It can also run HQPlayer Embedded with some basic PCM to PCM upsampling and such.

[Miska]

1 hour ago, DancingSea said:

Please indulge my lack of knowledge a bit further.  I’m Mac based.  Is the UP Gateway Atom already a NAA?  Or must I do something to make it a NAA?  If yes, what must I do, and how do I do it?

 

It's a PC, not entirely regular one, very low power one, but still a standard PC. You need my software to make turn it into a NAA.

 

From my web page you can download bootable NAA images that include OS and the NAA software module, all in one. You dump such image for example on USB memory stick using tool like Etcher, and then boot up the device using that image. And that's it. When there's software update, you dump the new version on a stick (same or different) and boot up from that one.

 

[Miska]

10 hours ago, DancingSea said:

 

Thanks!  I didn’t know what to search for.  Is this one @Miska approved?

 

What sort of power linear power supplies work with this?  Will this one work with it?

https://allo.com/sparky/shanti.html

 

Possibly from 3A output, but 3A is a bit on the low side. I would use 5/6A PSU.

 

[Miska]

20 hours ago, ambre said:

Clue: I have installed my Mini PC W8 Pro Intel x5-Z8350 HD Graphics Fanless Mini Desktop Wireless etc. with many updates etc.

 

I did not know resp could not find that this NAA-image only support wired Ethernet and not Wireless.

 

Since NAA image has practically read-only filesystem, it is not possible to change configurations on it.

 

HQPlayer OS boots a normal read/write filesystem and thus allows adjusting settings and such. It also contains drivers and other components needed for WiFi (wpa_supplicant), although this is not officially supported feature and not tested much.

 

[Miska]

4 hours ago, ambre said:

Is there a SQ benefit to switch from Hqp 4.0 to embedded? For the NAA task? 

 

There are some functional differences between Desktop and Embedded. But algorithms are the same and thus sound quality is the same for both.

 

4 hours ago, ambre said:

For upsampling etc I still need My present Apple Mac Mini 6 core I7. Or an I misstaken?

 

Upsampling happens wherever HQPlayer is running. So if you have a separate HQPlayer Embedded server, you don't necessarily need your Mac Mini for anything.

 

I personally run Roon on iMac (previously Mac Mini) and then HQPlayer on various other servers.

 

[Miska]

2 hours ago, bobflood said:

Would there be any advantage to the NAA being on a Win 10/64 board with the Holo Spring ASIO driver installed to feed it vs using your Linux image on the same board?

 

I am thinking of using one of the UpBoard variants for this project. I saw your post that you use one for running the NAA with the Linux image. I was considering one of the more capable versions that I could run WIN 10/64 on if there would be an advantage to this approach.

 

I have had good results with ASIO drivers for my desktop system but had not previously considered the Win/ASIO approach for the NAA for my main system.

 

No, there is no advantage, but a big disadvantage of using Windows for NAA. Windows just adds massive amount of unnecessary bloat. My bootable NAA image is very minimal OS custom built for this particular purpose.

 

[Miska]

17 hours ago, motberg said:

Does the Windows NAA always use the DAC's ASIO driver? No possibility to use Windows KS ?

 

By default ASIO, optionally WASAPI. KS is ancient obsolete unofficial remnant from the days before WASAPI.

 

But running NAA on Windows or macOS is sort of workaround for the cases where you cannot run the bootable image for one reason or the other.

 

[Miska]

16 hours ago, dmccombs said:

   If I get the UP/Atom computer, what is the minimum size USB stick size that you recommend, and does the USB stick transfer speed matter?

 

Current NAA image is about 300 MB, so let's say 4 GB stick gives you plenty of extra capacity. Speed of the the stick affects the time it takes for the system to boot up. Since NAA image runs from RAM, everything is read at boot time and then not accessed after.

 

RAVENNA version of HQPlayer OS is the biggest image, which is now at 1.7 GB, of which about half is empty. So for that purpose too, 4 GB stick would be fine. Difference is that the HQPlayer OS image runs from the stick, but the speed mostly affects boot time, because after boot up the amount of access is minimal.

 

You can also run either one from a microSD card, either using a USB adapter or your computers microSD or SD card slot if it has such.

 

16 hours ago, dmccombs said:

Can you point me to the latest image for the atom computer and NAA software?

 

There are links to the folders from the website, I'm not eager to post links here because those become outdated too fast.

[Miska]

16 hours ago, Zauurx said:

Please, can you integrate ASIX AX88179 driver in NAA image ? 😉
So your version become compatible with more usb ethernet adaptater (good audiophile solution with 5v PSU) and with Allo USBridge Signature. Most distributions have problem with NAA and PCM (751/768 >> 60Mb ethernet flow with some clics and drop out).

 

I believe I have all USB ethernet drivers enabled, but I can check.

 

However, I would strongly recommend against using USB for networking or music content storage. It causes lot of unnecessary CPU load.

 

RaspberryPi4 is first that uses the on-chip ethernet controller and it is much better to use that one than a USB one. With USB connected one you easily end up with problems that RasPi2/RasPi3 had with their USB connected ethernet controllers, ending having clicks and pops on the playback. Transformation between ethernet and USB packets is unnecessary work.

 

Ethernet controllers should be connected directly to the CPU data bus, or alternatively to PCIexpress. Not to anything else. Also pay attention that the ethernet controller has proper DMA access support and hardware offload for TCP/IP checksumming and such.

 

If you want an external ethernet controller, you should use a Thunderbolt one instead, it is essentially same as PCIexpress connected one.

 

[Miska]

2 minutes ago, ambre said:

in case of Thunderbolt =Usb C connector for an Apple Mini 6 Core machine.

 

Yes, it is USB Type-C connector, but it has the lightning logo to indicate Thunderbolt capability. Type-C connector is special in a way that it has multi-role support. In addition to USB, it can function as Thunderbolt or DisplayPort connector if the hardware supports it. So just having the connector doesn't mean it would have Thunderbolt or DisplayPort functionality, both the host and the device need to support such for it to work. Thunderbolt functionality is thus indicated with the lightning symbol. Essentially these change completely meaning of the connector pins, and only the physical connector itself stays the same.

 

Apple makes Thunderbolt - Gigabit Ethernet adapter.

 

9 minutes ago, ambre said:

Due to use of another big powercord there hardly space for using regular ethernet connector.

What is your advice ? Dump the special powercord?

 

Yes, I would dump the special power cord and use regular one and the built-in Ethernet. There are also thin round CAT6 UTP cables and flat ribbon CAT6 UTP cables that have also relatively small connector, so these may be easier to accommodate in tight spaces.

 

[Miska]

5 hours ago, seeteeyou said:

FYI - Allo USBridge Sig (ASIX AX88179) should be different from the plain vanilla RPi (Microchip LAN9512 / LAN9514) according to these sources

 

Which RPi version are you talking about? RPi4 is totally different from the earlier ones. Since RPi4 is so much better than the old ones and so cheap, I don't see a reason no to upgrade to RPi4. Just remember to install heat sinks on the CPU and memory.

 

[Miska]

48 minutes ago, Zauurx said:

A good streamer but i can't used your image. So i suppose is ethernet driver.

 

I think it is more than just a driver, likely it would need a Device Tree Source (.dts) for the board to work.

 

[Miska]

4 hours ago, blueninjasix said:

I would very much like to be able to SSH into Miska's NAA image for the sole purpose of downloading the asix driver from Allo so that my USBridge Signature might operate correctly.

 

There's no SSH because it is not very useful and for security reasons because it would be bad idea with a default password.

 

OTOH, drivers need to be built specifically for the kernel they are being loaded on, so you cannot download a driver from another kernel. In addition, many distributions for RasPi are 32-bit, while my OS images are completely 64-bit. This would make anything built for a 32-bit OS version not work.

 

[Miska]

14 hours ago, dmccombs said:

Is there a noticeable improvement in SQ if you upgrade the stock power wallplug, with a better power supply?  If so what would you suggest?

 

This is very much system dependent.

 

For my UpBoard and UpSquared I'm using Meanwell's medical grade PSU:

https://www.meanwell-web.com/en-gb/ac-dc-medical-desktop-adaptor-output-5vdc-at-6a-ac-gsm60b05--p1j

 

For my CL100 I'm using a Mascot PSU:

https://www.mascot.no/catalog/power-supplies/acdc/desktop/230v/9320/c-24/c-1318/p-122

 

If you like something better, take a look at Teddy Pardo PSUs, you get those with various different power connectors.

 

14 hours ago, dmccombs said:

Also, have you found any benefit to upgrading the stock usb cable between the Mini PC and the DAC?

 

I use inexpensive ones with a ferrite bead. This can significantly reduce amount of RF/EMI noise entering the DAC.