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Building a DIY Music Server


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6 hours ago, Hauser said:

I'm not game to try a dual CPU board build and having read the thread on the Phasure site, feel that complexity may not be justified.  The Asrock mATX board I was looking for is no longer available.  They do offer an ITX but it has the usual constraints; 1 PCIE x 16, 2 x M.2 and only 4 DIMM slots.  Supermicro's mATX  X11 SPM TPF has several ethernet variants and 3 PCIE slots, 1 x M.2.  This with a 4214 CPU will probably be my choice.


 

my initial plan was to use one of the Supermicro (I like them a lot) mobo with 3647 socket and the Xeon 42xx series but the real issue was lack of passive socket mounts and a chassis which can cool minimal of 100watts. Note that all the Streacom and Hdplex can effectively cool at 65watts beyond which the processor would start throttling big time. I have written to Streacom but they said 3647 and 100watts is not what they have in plans or remotely in future works. It’s time that Hdplex step up their game 🙂 there is another chassis Truemetal but it looks like their higher end model which would support higher TDP is not yet released and there is no hope to support 3647. Right now the only option, as @Nenon is venturing, is to diy it but long term stability will have to be seen.

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41 minutes ago, Dev said:

This leads me to believe that either the s/w and it’s communicating protocol being lossy, incur more latency or the network interface between the server and client is generating a noise pattern which is detrimental to SQ or a combination of both.

 

That's a good point. I think that low latencies are crucial. In a dual-PC system, data traffic must be optimized using Ethernet settings. JCAT gives its NET Card Femto a good manual.

 

There are also different ideas about the dual-PC system. Many says that the computing-intensive tasks (upsampling) are carried out in the 1st PC. The 2nd PC is only used as a low power system for rendering.

 

I'm goes the other way round. The music files and the music management (Roon Server) are in my 1st PC (Control PC). The power consumption is low and the server runs around the clock. It sends the data natively (without upsampling) to the 2nd PC (Audio PC). It runs in high power mode to give the HQPlayer enough computing power for the EC modulators and conversion to DSD. Everything else is switched off, especially the noisy SATA controller. It sounds fantastic and very analog. Just my subjective impressions.

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Re Dual Setup. Who is lucky enough to have 2 servers? Which are the exact same spec, so we can compare one box versus two. Not many. 
 

I imagine most people who originally had two box (like me) then moved to one concluded the one box was far better than two, why? In my case because my new one box is now far superior in spec than box 2.
 

Would be interesting to hear two extremes or statements as two box setups.

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6 minutes ago, ASRMichael said:

My understanding is, Fanlesspro is a distributor for Turemetal based in China, but if there is any specific motherboard and/or CPU planned to use in the build, either discuss with Fanlesspro or send Mical Wong at Turemetal an email, Mical likely can customize the enclosure for the specific requirements.

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1 hour ago, ASRMichael said:

Would be interesting to hear two extremes or statements as two box setups.

 

The Taiko Extreme is actually two servers in one case.

IIRC, two Extremes do not sound superior to one.

This may be different to Innuos and Pink Faun.

 

Matt

"I want to know why the musicians are on stage, not where". (John Farlowe)

 

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3 hours ago, ASRMichael said:

 

 

Thanks @ASRMichael I was looking at Truemetal website and it said they are still in beta.

 

3 hours ago, elan120 said:

My understanding is, Fanlesspro is a distributor for Turemetal based in China, but if there is any specific motherboard and/or CPU planned to use in the build, either discuss with Fanlesspro or send Mical Wong at Turemetal an email, Mical likely can customize the enclosure for the specific requirements.

 

Good to know. Thanks. Still need to confirm with them if they will still support 3647 socket and high clearance of the heat pipes if the RAMs are slotted on the side along the heat pipe runs. Also there isn't much info on the internal dimension of the chassis as well. I will write to them to get these clarified. The chassis are already on the expensive side, not sure if they charge extra for customization.

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8 hours ago, ray-dude said:

 

I am continually being surprised by the impact of network traffic (and network topology) on SQ.  The EtherREGEN started me down this path (surprise -> attention and study) but the rabbit hole is much vaster than signal regeneration.  Honestly, I thought this would be at the minor tweak level, but there seems to be something fairly fundamental going on here.

 

Having just switched from a 2 box i7 NUC setup to an Extreme, the impact of network traffic and topology has become at least an order of magnitude more obvious (more surprise -> more attention and study ;)  I'll have more to share next week, but when running the Extreme as an end point (Roon, HQP, etc) on the native Windows or booting to Linux from a USB stick, you are giving up a lot compared to running everything on Extreme in a one box solution.

 

 

 

 

Having looked at the Asus motherboard Taiko use, the ethernet connections channel through the board chip.  You may get better results connecting with a card through PCIE to the CPU.

 

Martin.

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Hi Dev,

 

Glad I was sitting down when I saw the price of that case.  My intention is to customise a Takachi case I have used already in a couple of power supply builds.  When reading Nenon's two box server build, the separate power supply seemed a good idea but somewhat hobbled by the need for extra wiring.  I thought I'd try using the bottom of the case for all the supplies; the lower 50mm, build a second level for the motherboard; the top 90mm.  I will probably use MP Audio regulators and 4 or 5 Toroidy transformers.  The internal dimensions are 324 x 286 x 141.  Apacer make low profile DIMMs 19mm high which may be necessary for heatpipes going to the case side heatsinks.  For the CPU heatsink, I'm thinking a custom lump of copper with with heatpipe holes drilled near the top with a Supermicro or Dynatron 1U passive cooler mounted on top.  I won't be doing any upsampling so expect to reduce consumption and heat relative to the Stealth 3.  I should note a fan is used in the Stealth.  I think the key to this is using a high power processor at near idle speed.

 

Martin

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1 minute ago, Hauser said:

Glad I was sitting down when I saw the price of that case.  My intention is to customise a Takachi case I have used already in a couple of power supply builds. 

 

Yes, the Truemetal is quiet expensive, even the HP5 at $600 is only 65watts but the chassis looks more beefier than the likes of Streacom or Hdplex. I am guessing the TDP support is probably underrated. 

 

Be careful with a Takachi for the computer build. I don't have enough information of all their models but I have 5 of their cases similar to the ones used in Uptone JS-2. If that is what you will be using, I don't think it will cut a 65watt CPU, let alone a 95watt. You need ticker aluminum and a lot of real estate to passively cool down a high power x86 CPU.

 

 

2 minutes ago, Hauser said:

When reading Nenon's two box server build, the separate power supply seemed a good idea but somewhat hobbled by the need for extra wiring.  I thought I'd try using the bottom of the case for all the supplies; the lower 50mm, build a second level for the motherboard; the top 90mm.  I will probably use MP Audio regulators and 4 or 5 Toroidy transformers. 

 

A two box is a reasonable compromise and that is also what I am targeting, provided you keep the connection as short as possible by stacking one on top of other. The ISO acoustic feet also helps dampen vibrations from the lower chassis transformers to the top.

 

12 minutes ago, Hauser said:

For the CPU heatsink, I'm thinking a custom lump of copper with with heatpipe holes drilled near the top with a Supermicro or Dynatron 1U passive cooler mounted on top. 

 

Those passive coolers actually works great but are designed to be used with a fan - either sucking in or blowing out the heat trapped in the fins. Not sure how good they work with heat pipes, so I would love to see what you come up with.

 

16 minutes ago, Hauser said:

I think the key to this is using a high power processor at near idle speed.

 

You got it! This is where the latency comes in. A faster processor can execute work loads (a set of instruction pipelines) very very efficiently and quickly if it has to work less. With heavy handed audio application as Roon is, this is also where more cores helps by taking advantage of it by using multi-threading and today's modern Linux (or even Windows) scheduler does a damn fine job around it.

 

 

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12 hours ago, dminches said:

 

Great points and something I have found to be the case as well even though I am not running an Extreme.

 

My biggest roadblock now is that I would love to have my files loaded on a card inside the server and not pull them from my NAS.  The issue is the amount of music I have.

 

I have similar problem, and my SATA internal 2 TB drive is likely too noisy running both euphony + storing files though I think running RAMroot has helped quite a bit (with nice industrial Apacer RAM). I often don't even play the music from the 2 TB drive as it is full so I would need to load new music I bought to Ecache and then play. It is a bit less convenient because I would have to erase those loaded files once full (or no more files can be loaded). But this can eliminate a large noise internal drive. So my plan is to run euphony on M2 Optane drive which is supposed to be best way to run euphony (at least few months ago, not sure if there are new updates) but the size is small so I would load music via network into the Ecache anyway to play the music (music stored on my laptop) It is now similar to loading a CD into a player. Lost the convenience but for better sound. I am not sure if having a large internal drive would be good idea, even if powered separately with a LPS. Unless others have better solutions. 

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1 hour ago, Nenon said:

There is no comparison between the Sonore products and the custom DIY servers we are building. But our hand built servers are quite more expensive too. 

 

Sonore do not build servers. So the comparison is always custom DIY server plus Sonore vs custom DIY server alone.

I bet what the outcome is when the server is good enough.

 

Matt

"I want to know why the musicians are on stage, not where". (John Farlowe)

 

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3 hours ago, Nenon said:

There is no comparison between the Sonore products and the custom DIY servers we are building. But our hand built servers are quite more expensive too. 

 

 

Oh yes, not even price comparable really nor the effort.  Also took some fiddling to make my cooling quiet enough to stick the PC near everything.  Not entirely happy about SMPS next to hifi stuff, but I do have 6x https://ifi-audio.com/products/ac-ipurifier/ in place which really do make a difference.

 

On another note, has anyone tried purchasing an EMI/RFI sensor?  I have tried one of these https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B071WPV8YK/ but I think its time to find something even better.  Quite the eye opener in terms of observations.

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4 hours ago, Nenon said:

I think there is a general (mis)concept that USB and ethernet ports that are not CPU-direct sound worse than CPU-direct. While this may be the most common case, it is not ALWAYS the case. Taiko Extreme's USB port goes through the ASM controller, and it sounds really really good - it's actually very hard to beat. My Asus ROG Crosshair build with ultraOCXO chipset clock is another example - after the clock upgrade the chipset USB ports started to sound significantly better than the direct CPU USB ports. Also, when you add a PCIe card to a PCIe slot that is CPU-direct, the card has chips on it as well, so you are not bypassing the controller chips. I know you referred to ethernet NICs, but they also have controllers. The Extreme comes with a Startech PEX1000SFP2 PCIe card, and many owners prefer that.

 

+1

 

Matt

"I want to know why the musicians are on stage, not where". (John Farlowe)

 

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Aren't these comparisons of the extreme and similar a bit skewed?  99.9% of the people will never have / afford such a device. 

 

Which then begs the question, where does the hypothetical "custom server" price point (direct connect to DAC) start to where some believe it surpasses a well implemented endpoint?  Which even stating that is pretty wide to interpretation / many variables.

 

The endpoint vs non endpoint (or direct connect) discussion are like cable discussions in many ways. 

 

I am genuinely curious though and have toyed with the idea, just haven't found a conceivable way to test the "theory".  I have tried with the resources available to me (multiple high end wkst in so far as performance), but the endpoint has won out.  Can't really justify spending $5k (whatever that number is) just to see so to speak.

My rig

 

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16 minutes ago, Foggie said:

Aren't these comparisons of the extreme and similar a bit skewed?  99.9% of the people will never have / afford such a device. 

 

Which then begs the question, where does the hypothetical "custom server" price point (direct connect to DAC) start to where some believe it surpasses a well implemented endpoint?  Which even stating that is pretty wide to interpretation / many variables.

 

The endpoint vs non endpoint (or direct connect) discussion are like cable discussions in many ways. 

 

I am genuinely curious though and have toyed with the idea, just haven't found a conceivable way to test the "theory".  I have tried with the resources available to me (multiple high end wkst in so far as performance), but the endpoint has won out.  Can't really justify spending $5k (whatever that number is) just to see so to speak.

 

You get the benefit without endpoint at much lower price points, please have a look at post #342.

 

Matt

"I want to know why the musicians are on stage, not where". (John Farlowe)

 

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3 minutes ago, Foggie said:

Aren't these comparisons of the extreme and similar a bit skewed?  99.9% of the people will never have / afford such a device. 

Agree.
 

 

4 minutes ago, Foggie said:

I am genuinely curious though and have toyed with the idea, just haven't found a conceivable way to test the "theory". 

 

I think there has been an advancement in recent tech; I was previously a endpoint type till JCAT XE + Ryzen 2900X came along.

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17 minutes ago, matthias said:

 

You get the benefit without endpoint at much lower price points, please have a look at post #342.

 

Matt

Yeah I don't quite understand that.  An extremely well optimized (clocking, USB reg) optical endpoint using LPS, is bettered by a noisy computer albeit with a good USB output (jcat).  I certainly don't discount that in any way and every setup is going to be different - in most cases drastically different.  That's why like cables, there isn't any general rule that says method 1 is better then method 2.

 

My experience has been the opposite, although the USB output from server isn't "audiophile".  However, t is running 2019 SVR, W2135, custom MB, ECC mem, rtx graphics etc..(significant cost).  I suppose for a small layout one could try a dedicated USB card. 

 

I would love to get my hands on one of these builds (not crazy $$) and experiment for myself.  

My rig

 

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36 minutes ago, guiltyboxswapper said:

Agree.
 

 

 

I think there has been an advancement in recent tech; I was previously a endpoint type till JCAT XE + Ryzen 2900X came along.

Yeah for sure.  Sounds like a great setup you have

My rig

 

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45 minutes ago, Foggie said:

Yeah I don't quite understand that.  An extremely well optimized (clocking, USB reg) optical endpoint using LPS, is bettered by a noisy computer albeit with a good USB output (jcat).  I certainly don't discount that in any way and every setup is going to be different - in most cases drastically different.  That's why like cables, there isn't any general rule that says method 1 is better then method 2.

 

My experience has been the opposite, although the USB output from server isn't "audiophile".  However, t is running 2019 SVR, W2135, custom MB, ECC mem, rtx graphics etc..(significant cost).  I suppose for a small layout one could try a dedicated USB card. 

 

I would love to get my hands on one of these builds (not crazy $$) and experiment for myself.  

 

Maybe it helps when you consider taking the money what your endpoint plus PS costs and upgrade with this amount your server, for example with an UHQ USB card like @guiltyboxswapper

 

Matt

"I want to know why the musicians are on stage, not where". (John Farlowe)

 

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2 hours ago, matthias said:

That's an interesting thread / info, thanks.  However, those guys are in the stratosphere $ and not apples to apples with many of us.  Even in that thread there are differences of opinion, as one would expect, on certain logic.  But as @guiltyboxswapper pointed out his setup was pretty straightforward, but I digress.

 

I don't stream and only use local library, which in of itself brings a slew of other variables (streaming).  Definitely some things to think about though. 

 

I could see trying out a dedicated USB card with LPS (like you pointed out) and putting the server in the listening room, direct to DAC.  I'll have to do some research. 

 

I was at this very same point when deciding on a OR, because I had tried some "general" direct to DAC tests and the endpoint setup was my preferred config, especially since I have no copper/eth, no converters and only running optical.  Fun stuff for sure.

 

My rig

 

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