Hqplayer: best NAA with best sound quality

[Miska]

14 minutes ago, FooFighter said:

I have all that yet.

I meant the software config for UP Gateway 

 

Hmm, I just boot up my "ramfs" NAA OS image variant from a very small USB memory stick. First boot needs monitor attached to change the boot device, but then it keeps working. It is pretty much plug and play.

 

If you want to use the UAC2 input feature, then you need to configure the USB 3 OTG port to device mode in BIOS. (and you'll need a regular USB A - micro USB B cable) But I guess this context was still about output NAA.

 

[Miska]

4 minutes ago, FooFighter said:

I think you didn't get me.

I just wanted to know the voltage settings on your Oor display for UP Gateway 

 

You mean Hypsos? But I already told that? I'm somehow not following what you are after. "Custom setting".

 

[Miska]

On 2/1/2022 at 1:34 AM, FooFighter said:

Miska, I think I've asked before what to do after changing the DAC input to another source than the UP Gateway running your image and back and realising that the DAC isn't recognised anymore by HQPlayer Desktop after losing the connection.

Your answer was to shutdown HQPlayer Desktop, reboot the NAA and afterwards restart HQPlayer Desktop.

 

For me restarting playback usually works as long as HQPlayer wasn't playing when the DAC disappeared. Either with NAA, or local USB connection.

 

On 2/1/2022 at 1:34 AM, FooFighter said:

As this is quite a time consuming procedure, is it possible to implement a DAC-rescan function into the NAA image or some remote switch for that to be triggered?

 

There is, but it requires HQPlayer to reconnect. There's no information from the driver when the device disappears. The existing handles just begin to misbehave. In worst case the kernel driver gets confused.

 

Seems to work better with >= 5.10 kernels.

 

On 2/1/2022 at 1:34 AM, FooFighter said:

Am no expert but I guess only the USB port needs to be reset for that or is that rather a hardware constraint so the reboot is needed?

 

If the device driver goes nuts, then reboot is needed. Or sometimes replugging the USB device recovers the driver.

[Miska]

On 2/1/2022 at 10:18 PM, camott said:

I would like to make the same/similar request. Whenever I (re)power up NAA, I have to go into HQPD preferences, and simply resave the immediately recognized output device.

 

When you go to HQPlayer settings and save the settings, you are restarting HQPlayer. It is not much different from other methods of restart. It disconnects from NAA, disconnects all connected clients, tears down the UPnP stack and then restarts with default values and attempts to connect to NAA again.

 

On 2/1/2022 at 10:18 PM, camott said:

If HQPD can automatically detect the last output device when one opens the preferences, why not just have it automatically scan once every few seconds if there is no currently connected output device and set the last one again if it reappears??? It would make the NAA much more plug-and-play.

 

It does precisely that when NAA disappears. NAA is designed to be integral part of the DAC, just like the DAC's USB port. Too bad only T+A and exaSound are building NAA into some of their DACs. When the DAC is in use, it doesn't appear in the audio device scan because it is busy.

 

Nobody is asking that "DAC's USB interface should scan for the DAC chip or clock oscillator in case you ripped the chip off the board on the fly".

Just reboot NAA too when you reboot (disconnect) your DAC.

 

But so far, practically none of the USB drivers tell the application using the USB device that "oh, the device has disappeared". Only driver I've seen so far to properly behave has been TEAC's ASIO driver on Windows. It:

1. Reports to the application that the DAC has been "reset"
2. Maintains state when the DAC comes back it restores it back to the state it was before it disappeared

 

Most drivers are just totally nuts without any clear message once device has disappeared and need to be unloaded and reloaded.

 

[Miska]

3 hours ago, chriss0212 said:

Could you please give a hint, to your actual choice? Is it this one:

https://up-shop.org/up-board-series.html

And what Ram size do you recommend for two channel NAA?

 

This one:

https://up-shop.org/up-gateway-atom-x5-z8350-w-4g-memory-32g-emmc-board-w-vesa-plate-b10.html

 

4 GB should be enough for most cases.

 

[Miska]

48 minutes ago, billbillw said:

Forgive me if this is the wrong place to ask, but I am looking for playback OS/Software suggestions similar to Daphile to run on a headless NUC 6 (Apollo Lake). I would use tablets or my phone to navigate the library. I'm looking for something that is mature in development and stable.

 

Since we are on a HQPlayer thread, how about HQPlayer OS? With control using HQPlayer Client or HQPDcontrol. (mConnect Player and BubbleUPnP App also work)

 

[Miska]

1 hour ago, billbillw said:

I was wondering about HQPlayer and I almost immediately read that it was primarily an upscaler.

 

Yes, that is one of it's many DSP functions. Of course it is also a player too.

 

1 hour ago, billbillw said:

That is not something I am looking for. Or maybe I mis-read? I'm looking for bit-perfect playback of my source files.

 

Yeah, I'm taking the opposite route. I prefer DAC to be bit-perfect and rather have the needed DSP separately outside of the DAC. Much more processing capacity that way to handle digital filters, modulators and such.

 

[Miska]

37 minutes ago, maxijazz said:

I would like to use Wi-Fi instead of Ethernet.

 

This will take some effort, if you configure headless server OS for the purpose (recommended). I would recommend to check that it comes with Intel WiFi on board. Intel NICs usually have less battle with the driver support.

 

37 minutes ago, maxijazz said:

Can you recommend proper motherboard/CPU combo?

 

I've been using ASUS motherboards. Just check something that doesn't have a chipset cooling fan. Usually the B-series AMD chipsets are passive cooled while many times the X-series ones have a small loud fan on top. It may not be easy to detect from the pictures because the fan can be hidden under a cover.

 

I don't have yet experience with the new AMD generation, so someone else can probably comment better. For your case, passive cooling is certainly not an issue, since you can go with a very low power inexpensive CPU model.

 

37 minutes ago, maxijazz said:

Maybe completely different enclosure and LPS to make it smaller, and cheaper system?

 

My only bigger fanless HQPlayer server is in a Streacom FC10 chassis with their ZF240 PSU (SMPS). But that chassis is cheaper. Then also Akasa makes some fanless chassis.
 

37 minutes ago, maxijazz said:

What Linux would be best?

 

Ubuntu Server or Fedora Server as minimal installation. Depends on how familiar you are dealing with Linux command line...

 

37 minutes ago, maxijazz said:

I am still at thinking stage so I would take multiple option into consideration. No rush. 

 

37 minutes ago, maxijazz said:

My DAC has only AES/EBU input so I would like to use Pink Faun SPDIF AES bridge as output device.

 

How about Holo Red as a NAA? Or maybe even try running HQPlayer Embedded on HQPlayer OS there? The RPi4 can run quite many things to max 192k output rate if the Red has enough cooling for it (I have not yet tested this).

 

Another (certainly not cheap) option for AES output NAA is Aqua LinQ with NAA module. Or alternatively LinQ with both NAA and HQPlayer Core modules.

 

[Miska]

6 hours ago, Zauurx said:

A candidate for an inexpensive Intel Celeron-based NAA.

 

https://www.zimaboard.com

 

Story doesn't tell what kind of ethernet controller it has. These SoC models don't have built-in Ethernet, so it must be some external implementation. If it is connected to PCIe it is fine, if it is connected to USB then it is not OK.

 

The connector placement is not best possible though, as the USB is right under the Ethernet socket which has the magnetics built-in. So it has potential leakage between the two. It would be better to have more distance. On my UP Gateway, I have the boot media connected to the center USB block and the DAC (Holo Spring 3) connected to the USB block on the opposite edge from network connector.

 

[Miska]

44 minutes ago, Andrey Boldakov said:

Dear Miska, have you ever tried the Sonore ultraRendu in pair with Farad 7v LPS and a good (non stock) DC-cable? 

 

I have only microRendu. (and Zen Stream and Holo Red)

 

[Miska]

5 hours ago, Mike Rubin said:

Thank you for letting me know this. I always haven’t used the NAA that’s in the Sonicorbiter OS.  
 

Does each image update result in a new MAC address as is the case with the HQPlayer Embedded OS?

 

NAA OS doesn't as it doesn't use the network bridge setup.

 

Neither does HQPlayer OS on RPi4 because that doesn't use it either (since RPi4 has only one ethernet port).

 

[Miska]

2 hours ago, Mike Rubin said:

Didn't realize that there is no network capability.  I just learned that by playing with the NAA OS just now, before reading your post. 

 

What is the use case, then? To my knowledge, rendus all work only over a network connection. 

 

I don't understand your question. Of course there is network capability. The network is just configured in a different way.

 

HQPlayer OS on x64 uses bridge interface. While HQPlayer OS on RPi4 doesn't. NAA OS doesn't use bridge interface either.

 

MAC address change happens because the bridge interface is pure software interface that picks up a semi-random MAC address.

 

[Miska]

52 minutes ago, Mike Rubin said:

I am lost, then. Does the NAA OS work on all rendu models? 

 

At least on microRendu, and I think on ultraRendu too. I don't have anything else than microRendu myself.

 

52 minutes ago, Mike Rubin said:

I tried using the NAA OS on my optically-connected rendu. I burned the OS image to a compatible SD card, installed it, booted the rendu, and...   nothing.  I rebooted several times, but at no time did the rendu rejoin my network.

 

You have opticalRendu? Maybe it doesn't work on such.

 

52 minutes ago, Mike Rubin said:

Its LED never went from red to green

 

It won't control any LEDs at all, so you can safely ignore such.

 

52 minutes ago, Mike Rubin said:

I couldn't find it on the network using Fing and HQPlayer Embedded OS never saw it as an end point on the configuration screen. 

 

Maybe it doesn't work on your device then.

 

52 minutes ago, Mike Rubin said:

If I try again and can get the NAA OS to boot this device, is there an interface comparable to hqplayer.local:8080 that would allow me to restart NAA OS or would I have to use the rendu's power switch to recycle power? 

 

There's no web server on NAA OS, on purpose. It runs only NAA module and nothing else, it either works or it doesn't.

 

The microRendu I have doesn't have a power switch, I just unplug and replug the power to reboot it.

 

[Miska]

3 minutes ago, Mike Rubin said:

(The SonicOrbiter software includes reboot and power off capability like HQPE OS does.) 

 

I never bother to use the web interface for that on my HQPlayer Embedded machines. It is much easier with short press of a power button. (although most of those are just running 24/7/365)

 

[Miska]

18 minutes ago, Superdad said:

And even for the ultraRendu and microRendu, Miska's OS image will not turn on a key hardware performance feature of the Rendu series. I know what that is but am being vague because Sonore prefers I do not reveal the feature.

 

If it has anything to do with Linux kernel, they need to publish the source code due to GPL requirements... 😉

 

And yes, NAA OS doesn't have web interface, package manager or any other extra bloat, on purpose. It is plain firmware, you write it to SDcard, insert it boot it up and it is ready to go. To update it, you write a new image version to the card. If something goes wrong, you can always write another card. Every release includes the entire OS and software as one image.

 

But I'm using the Holo Red instead, they don't have an issue with me providing HQPlayer specific OS images for their hardware. Or anybody else doing something similar. You can even run HQPlayer OS there.

 

 

P.S. Your car's ABS brakes control unit doesn't have a web interface either.

 

[Miska]

27 minutes ago, Superdad said:

Nope, it is related to a key hardware feature of the baseboard's interface with the SolidRun iMx-6 module.

 

So it is touching device tree which is under GPL license just like anything that interfaces between kernel and hardware.

 

27 minutes ago, Superdad said:

Having heard the feature turned on and off (when originally tested; with the same unit and same OS) with less than a minute gap, I can assure that it is relevant and quite audible. So those using your cubox-i-rendu image for their ultraRendu are definitely missing out on that feature (the original microRendu does not contain the hardware component to make that feature turn-on worthwhile). 

 

Good that I don't hear it. 😅 Which DAC? Any measurement data from DAC outputs demonstrating this?

But I can hear the difference of having some piece of DAC hardware supported or not.

 

Although I don't really use Rendu that much these days. It just sits in box most of the time. My actively used NAA's are UP Gateway, Fitlet2, OnLogic CL100 and Holo Red.

 

Plus my living room i5-7600T based passive cooled server that runs HQPlayer Embedded + NAA. HQPlayer there is feeding Accuphase DAC-60 while NAA is feeding T+A DAC 200. Both are connected through separate Intona USB isolators.

 

 

You know, better I can work on a certain piece of hardware, better I can optimize my NAA software module for that piece of hardware. Just like HQPlayer OS, NAA OS is built as unified piece with tightest possible integration between the OS and the HQPlayer and/or NAA software. And I believe you can hear the difference! 😉

 

[Miska]

4 hours ago, Mops911 said:

Are you listening pcm over pcm path or are you resampling to dsd before feeding to the t&a? 

 

Never PCM, it would limit maximum digital filter rate to 16x instead of 256x or 512x. And I rather listen through my own 7th order modulators than through TI's 3rd order ones.

 

So always DSD.

 

[Miska]

4 hours ago, vortecjr said:

Also, there is no package manager App running on SO.

 

You still have something like rpm or dpkg there. NAA OS or HQPlayer OS don't have such things.

 

4 hours ago, vortecjr said:

I don’t have an issue with you doing this. However, I have to inform my customers of potencial issues as I see it.

 

I'm not particularly eager to build these old iMX6 images, but I once went through the trouble to add support for Rendu (in addition to the original CuBox-i), so I can keep doing it. I already once dropped support for these, but brought it up to date because people requested it.

 

[Miska]

3 hours ago, vortecjr said:

The app we use does nothing until the end user wants to install and uninstall something. Your comment about bloat is nothing more than an exaggeration and it's sad customers latch on to these ideas. 

 

NAA OS has essentially three components, Linux kernel, systemd and networkaudiod. All built from sources into one custom monolithic piece. No package manager and no web interface.

 

You do your things the way you see fit and do mine as I see fit.

 

If some hardware environment becomes hostile as platform, I just move over to another one.

 

[Miska]

1 hour ago, Superdad said:

If you look you will see that I only posted at all in this thread this week to point out to @Mike Rubin that his opticalRendu will definitely not run from Jussi's cubox-i-microRendu image for iMX-6.

 

That's a shame. Would have been nice to keep that as a supported platform.

 

[Miska]

39 minutes ago, robi20064 said:

You are missing the point, Up-board, fitlet and common RPI hardware was never optimised for audio use, while Sonore products are. They provide a good base, but some would still like to explore extreme possibilities with the software side as well. 

 

Holo Red is pretty nice audio optimized hardware. And officially supports third party OS images such as mine.

 

[Miska]

3 minutes ago, tdx said:

Not sure if this is the right thread to ask this, but is there a HQP NAA device with Ethernet in and Ethernet out? My AIO DAC/streamer sounds better via network than USB, but it's only Roon Ready, not NAA compatible. So I'd love to add a device before the streamer that would allow me to also use HQP over the network, but without having to output via USB.

 

You can do such for example for Merging RAVENNA and some people are already doing it. It is also nice way to be able to play to a RAVENNA DAC through WiFi.

 

But likely in your case, the streamer doesn't have a suitable protocol supported.

 

[Miska]

1 minute ago, tdx said:

That's correct. My DAC/streamer (Esoteric N-05XD) only supports Roon Ready via Ethernet. It does have other inputs, including USB, but I found that the network input has the best SQ. So ideally I'm looking for an NAA device that takes Ethernet in and also has Ethernet out. Almost all the NAA recommended devices on Signalist's website have Ethernet in but no Ethernet out, usually it's USB out only. 

 

If it only supports Roon's protocol through Ethernet, then you are out of luck and you can only use Roon through it's ethernet interface.

 

You could request Esoteric to add support for HQPlayer NAA.

 

[Miska]

1 minute ago, tdx said:

ok thanks that makes sense. So there is no device that would be like a Sonore Rendu that would be NAA-compatible but then output to Ethernet instead of USB?

 

Question is which protocol over Ethernet. Ethernet as such doesn't know anything about audio. You need to have some protocol to transport audio over it. NAA is one, Roon's RAAT is another one. RAVENNA is third, etc.

 

So there's no such thing as generic Ethernet output.

 

[Miska]

You can see devices such as Aqua LinQ, iFi ZEN Stream / NEO Stream, exaSound streaming DACs and recent Ethernet-enabled Gustard  DACs as examples of such.