Rpi4 playback DSD files

[bluesman]

As Stephano points out, you can use Moode, RuneAudio, or Volumio on your Pi.  Here's a link to my comparison review of multiple players and here's a link to the summary table of my observations - those 3 all did very well with DSD in my systems.  If by stream you mean play your own networked files, they're all excellent.  If you plan to stream from the internet, I thought that Moode made web streaming easier than the other two and Volumio was a bit easier than RuneAudio.  This may be a matter of taste in GUIs and work flows.  As none of them is bad at it, I'd try them all and see which you like best.

 

It may not matter to you, but there's one limitation to DSD in your amplifier (which is a very nice piece).  The DAC won't go above 256 for DSD or DoP, so you won't be able to play higher res files at their native resolution (which is not a big deal to me, but to each his own).  Other than that, any of those 3 players should make you very happy.

[bluesman]

3 hours ago, nikolaos1969 said:

Hi, I hope you have seen my answer to Stefano. Playback DSD via streaming over RPi4 USB input to amp?

The digipro will not let you play DSD files through your amplifier because that amp only does DSD via USB.  If DSD is your main concern, the hat will not do anything for you.  

 

3 hours ago, nikolaos1969 said:

until now I playback my files from my laptop (external disc) via USB hi res supra cable to my amp. But in order avoid cables my first thought was to set up a streamer

This is why I asked what you mean by "streaming".  If the cable you want to eliminate is between your player and the digital inputs on your amplifier, you can't do it.  The DAC in your amplifier cannot be accessed via WiFi, and it won't do DSD via Bluetooth.  So if you're going to do the same thing with a Pi that you do with your laptop, why not just use the laptop?

 

And if you just want to use a Pi as a standalone player instead of your laptop, I'd suggest just trying it first with your USB cable. I run several Pis directly into DACs and am not bothered at all by any noise or noise-induced degradation of sound quality - I simply don't hear it with the Pi 4s.  There are obviously AS participants who are greatly bothered by "USB noise", but neither I nor a lot of others here find it to be a significant concern in our systems.  Why make things more complicated than they need to be?

[bluesman]

5 hours ago, nikolaos1969 said:

Hi, the reason to use pi4 as player: I want to stream spotify not via bluetooth but via volumio (bandwidth is larger)

I think you’re a bit confused. Bluetooth is a way to connect the output from your player to the input of your DAC/amplifier. Volumio is a software player that supplies digital audio program material to your DAC from your computer / player. It uses whatever connection you choose (BT, USB etc) - but your DAC/amplifier cannot play DSD files over Bluetooth or SPDIF. You have to use the USB input if you want to play DSD at its native rate - and it only does that up to DSD256 or DoP256. You’ll have to downsample 512+.

 

Volumio is great, and it will sound very good over the USB output from a Pi 4 into your amplifier.  It does Spotify well, so you should be happy with it if you’re happy with Spotify. But I don’t think Spotify has a DSD stream - you’d have to upsample the best they offer, and I don’t think that will give you the true DSD sound quality you seem to want.

[bluesman]

3 hours ago, nikolaos1969 said:

I will try to burn the usb drivers of CXA81 on pi4 sd card.

I don’t think you need USB drivers - USB 2 in all modern Linux variants is class compliant for audio & has been for years.  Your amplifier should accept input from any USB output on a current device with a current operating system.  If you put Volumio on a Pi 4 and connect its USB output to your amplifier’s input, you will get music.

[bluesman]

5 hours ago, stefano_mbp said:

Using Volumio you have three options

usb connected hdd to the raspberry

lan connected nas

lan connected media server (MinimServer or other)

You have more options.  The Pi4 has 5 GHz ac WiFi. So wlan connection to either nas or to a network server (but not both) should be fine. My nas and my Roon server are on my lan via Ethernet, and I connect the Pi4 in our living room system via wlan. It sounds great using Volumio, Roon Bridge, or JRiver Media Center driving an SMSL SU8 into a PrimaLuna amplifier powering Focal 726 towers.  

[bluesman]

1 hour ago, nikolaos1969 said:

Hi, my current rate is 2.4GHZ so it would be fine. I would try to set up a miniserver as see how it goes. My first concern is about the sound of pi4 without any add ons. If I am not happy I do want to have another option. 1 a regenerate usb, 2. a higher value commercial product.

You don't need a separate server - Volumio will source your files directly from network storage.  I wouldn't store audio files on a HD connected to the Pi by USB, though.  You really don't want to be passing source files in and audio files out the same bus at the same time.  There could be playback issues with large, hi res files like DSD.

[bluesman]

34 minutes ago, nikolaos1969 said:

I understand that, what would you suggest?

You’re jumping all over the place in this thread. You started by saying that you want to listen to Spotify.  If so, you don’t need any storage to stream from the internet.  You could just use the Spotify app on your laptop or a Pi - you don’t need Volumio.  But you also said that you want to play DSD files.  Unless it changed, Spotify doesn’t stream DSD files - so you need storage for those files somewhere on your network.  They can be on NAS, on a hard drive in or connected to the computer that’s playing them, or on other removable storage media you can connect to that computer.

 

You’re already using a laptop to play music, so you must either have files now or be streaming Spotify or some other web service.  You said in an early post that you wanted to get rid of your USB connection between computer and amplifier.  But that can’t be done because USB is the only input on your amp that will play DSD or DoP.  So why not just keep using the laptop?  Are you playing your own files now?  If so, where are they - on the laptop?

 

If you don’t want to continue playing music from your laptop, a Pi 4 is a great music machine.  Put the Pi on your network by Ethernet or by WiFi.  If you want to have your own DSD files and you have a local network now, I’d add a basic NAS to it on Ethernet. Put the Pi on your network by Ethernet or by WiFi.  Put Volumio on your Raspberry Pi 4, add Spotify as a web stream, connect the Pi to your amplifier by USB, and you’re ready to listen to Spotify (assuming your local network is connected to the internet) and to your own music files.

 

You’re making this much too complicated.

[bluesman]

2 hours ago, nikolaos1969 said:

Hi, are you happy with foobar2000

I've used and loved it for about 15 years.  It's an outstanding package, although it requires more fiddling than JRiver, Roon etc. Foobar pioneered many of the features we now take for granted in audio players.  It was one of the first such programs to let you stream over the internet from your own server.  To make the most of it, you have to use the many plug-ins that have been developed for it.  But once you master the ins and outs, there's almost nothing you can't do with it.

 

Even though I use JRiver and Roon, I still use Foobar to rip my CDs.  I don't think the sound quality is any better than most other top quality players from MPD to Roon and beyond, but it's as good as any open source player I've used on any platform.  Library management is a bit clunky, but it handles my 10,000 or so without a problem. It does album art well too.

 

Foobar was developed as a Windows program, but they now have a MacOs beta too.  If you want to run it on Linux, you have to do so on WINE (which works well & I've done it for years - but I wouldn't use it on a Linux box because there are other players that are a lot easier than running Foobar on WINE - and their GUIs are more intuitive in my opinion).  As far as I know, you can't run Foobar2000 on an ARM processor yet - so it's not for a Raspberry Pi.

[bluesman]

On 4/25/2020 at 5:25 PM, nikolaos1969 said:

so via MPD you can manage 2 rpi4 but with which app ?

There are several MPD clients for mobile devices as well as x86 and Mac boxes.  You can register multiple MPD servers in apps like yaMPC and Rigelian, and select the one(s) you want to control from the server list.  Just Google MPD clients and you’ll get many good hits.

 

Many of the best ones from the early days of MPD are no longer available, but a new crop is in.  MPoD is apparently back for iPhone & iPad, and I have MPDPlayer on my iPad.  I use Cantata to evaluate audio hardware & software using MPD. But it’s now in bug-fix-only mode and will probably not be updated in the future. The developer is moving on to new things.

[bluesman]

2 hours ago, nikolaos1969 said:

thanks a lot, did you read #57 post and the attached file? Do you think that might be a problem control panel screen discovers ASIO active (PCM mode) instead of DSD mode

DSD files are converted to DoP from Foobar2000. That’s why you’re seeing the PCM mode. There’s a way to play iso files ripped from SACDs, but it’s complicated and requires at least 1 more plug-in.  I’ve never done it. AFAIK, DoP should produce the same SQ as native DSD on the same system.

 

The superaudio plugin for Foobar2000 may also do native DSD, but I don’t remember and haven’t tried.  If it does, it probably plays dsf files.

 

I think you should slow down a bit and spend some time listening to what you have, before adding or changing anything. Your long list of questions suggests that you have several options right now.  Put some time and effort into comparing them all with the same program material. Listen, learn, and make notes so you can remember your responses to each alternative.  Your choices will probably become obvious to you when you review your observations.

 

This is part of the great enjoyment most of us get from our audiophile efforts. Enjoy!

[bluesman]

12 hours ago, nikolaos1969 said:

Hi, I installed successfully on my network volumio but it seems to be a problem mounting a share file on my main drive C:. If my share file name is \\LAPTOP\Music1969, on the field Alias: an independent name, NAS IP Address: LAPTOP, Path: Music1969, File Share type: cifs, Username: LAPTOP, then save. Volumio asks for a password but I did not tick the option for a password in the network.

It’s probably your NAS that wants a password. Set up a user account on it for Volumio and use those credentials in Volumio to connect your Pi to it.  You can use your admin account credentials to access the NAS, but this is not good practice.

[bluesman]

13 hours ago, nikolaos1969 said:

If my share file name is \\LAPTOP\Music1969, on the field Alias: an independent name, NAS IP Address: LAPTOP, Path: Music1969, File Share type: cifs, Username: LAPTOP, then save

“I do not have a NAS”????  I’ve tried hard to help you, but I really think you need to find someone where you are to get you started.  With all possible respect and the clear understanding that you want to learn about all this, I must suggest that you’ve confused yourself terribly by trying to learn everything at once.

 

From your last post, it now looks to me like you tried to enter your laptop’s name as a proxy for the IP address of a NAS because you don’t have a NAS.  This won’t work.  A laptop is not a NAS and your network can’t access its drive this way.

 

Do yourself a big favor and find someone to teach you how all this works.  There are courses and workshops available through many retailers.  But the participants on a web forum cannot do this for you.  Slow down and try to learn each step before you move on to the next.  Your enthusiasm is great, but it’s getting in the way of your learning.