HQplayer 4 and Mac-mini M1

[Schafheide]

20 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Ouch. 

 

I researched doing this before upgrading, just incase I needed to do it. 

 

I think the main ways to do this are Time Machine backup, macOS Recovery, a bootable USB installer. 

 

Booting with Shift+Option+Command+R: Reinstalls the factory-shipped macOS. Given it's an M1, it's probably Monterey? However, it nukes your apps and data I believe. Not positive.

 

I think a bootable Monterey installer may be what you want. 

 

Download Monterey here - https://apps.apple.com/us/app/macos-monterey/id1576738294?mt=12

 

Then follow this - https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201372

 

 

Thank you. If the keystroke sequence reinstalls Monterey, then I assume I do not need to download it?

[One and a half]

1 hour ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Ouch. 

 

I researched doing this before upgrading, just incase I needed to do it. 

 

I think the main ways to do this are Time Machine backup, macOS Recovery, a bootable USB installer. 

 

Booting with Shift+Option+Command+R: Reinstalls the factory-shipped macOS. Given it's an M1, it's probably Monterey? However, it nukes your apps and data I believe. Not positive.

 

I think a bootable Monterey installer may be what you want. 

 

Download Monterey here - https://apps.apple.com/us/app/macos-monterey/id1576738294?mt=12

 

Then follow this - https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201372

 

 

Yes, if you download a new Monterey from the Boot Installer system (if that's tht it's called) it wipes everything and installs a new Os that the Mac was shipped with. For the M1 it's Monterey. My wife's M1 password wouldn't work, no matter what combinations, installed a new montery, then restored time machine files.

[One and a half]

1 hour ago, Schafheide said:

Thank you. If the keystroke sequence reinstalls Monterey, then I assume I do not need to download it?

No the downloading occurs with the boot installer system. Connect the mac to the Ethernet, it will enable the Ethernet port, haven't tried wifi, but imagine it would ask for network credentials. Seems to be easy like this. No such system exists in windows.

[Schafheide]

1 hour ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Booting with Shift+Option+Command+R: Reinstalls the factory-shipped macOS. Given it's an M1, it's probably Monterey? However, it nukes your apps and data I believe. Not positive.

So if I did this, then copied the Time Machine backup - it would work?

If yes, this would be easier than making a boot installer?

[rjanderjr]

Yes, HQplayer does work on Ventura (M1 Mac mini)

[The Computer Audiophile]

15 minutes ago, Schafheide said:

So if I did this, then copied the Time Machine backup - it would work?

If yes, this would be easier than making a boot installer?

Yes, this should work. 

[MikePid]

2 hours ago, Schafheide said:

I recently broke my golden rule, when I hastily upgraded to Ventura!

Can someone recommend a simple, fool-proof method to downgrade my Mini M1 to Monterey?

What broke when you upgraded to Ventura?

[Jud]

59 minutes ago, One and a half said:

No such system exists in windows.

Restore from a network location definitely does, but the from the public Internet, no.

[Schafheide]

1 hour ago, MikePid said:

What broke when you upgraded to Ventura?

I am having problems with my Fixed Wireless internet connection (very noisy when playing files on my NAS).  So I am trying to track the source.  Everything worked fine with Monterey, so I will start from there.

[Miska]

11 hours ago, AnHa said:

Hi Miska, or anyone who might have tried it already. Is HQ Player Desktop 19.3 ready for Ventura? Thx.

 

Yes, has been working fine on my M1 Mini what I've used.

 

[AnHa]

Thanks to all of you, AudioDoctor, rjanderjr, Miska. I am going to start the update.

[MikePid]

Just updated MMM1 to Ventura.  Works fine.

[Schafheide]

On 10/31/2022 at 8:29 AM, The Computer Audiophile said:

Ouch. 

 

I researched doing this before upgrading, just incase I needed to do it. 

 

I think the main ways to do this are Time Machine backup, macOS Recovery, a bootable USB installer. 

 

Booting with Shift+Option+Command+R: Reinstalls the factory-shipped macOS. Given it's an M1, it's probably Monterey? However, it nukes your apps and data I believe. Not positive.

 

I think a bootable Monterey installer may be what you want. 

 

Download Monterey here - https://apps.apple.com/us/app/macos-monterey/id1576738294?mt=12

 

Then follow this - https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201372

 

 

Well that worked! Pretty painless, although I did have to select "Options" and erase the Mini's HD, before installing Monterey. Also there were a couple of settings that the backup did not capture.

[alecm]

I wonder if the new macmini m2 pro will already be able to without interruptions dsd512?

[Miska]

1 hour ago, alecm said:

I wonder if the new macmini m2 pro will already be able to without interruptions dsd512?

 

Depends on the modulator, with simpler ones yes, with ECv2 likely not. So I have some doubts, since AFAIK the M2 CPU core is not much different from M1 CPU core.

 

And my MacBook Pro with M1Max cannot to DSD512 with ECv2.

 

But more CPU cores will make some more filters and other processing available.

 

[alecm]

On 1/17/2023 at 6:50 PM, Miska said:

And my MacBook Pro with M1Max cannot to DSD512 with ECv2.

 

Judging by the first tests, the Pro version is noticeably ahead of even the M1 Max: 1,952 points in single-core and 15,013 in multi-core mode against 1727 and 12643 points, respectively. 

 

it might work)

 

[Miska]

I'm eagerly waiting for first reports by HQPlayer users. I'm planning to upgrade my Mac Mini M1 to the new Pro model, but current guesstimate about time frame is some time late spring - early summer.

 

Prices for everything have jumped a lot recently, electricity being worst (5x prices in the middle of the winter). So no budget for hardware at the moment.

 

[camott]

On 1/22/2023 at 4:11 PM, Miska said:

I'm eagerly waiting for first reports by HQPlayer users.

 

Did some quick tests on a base M2 Mac Mini. Can't do DSD512 with ECv2 :(

 

HQPlayer CPU load is roughly 10% better than M1, in line with Single Core benchmark improvements, but not enough to get it over the hump. It looks like one of the four Power cores is maxed. I highly doubt the M2 Pro will be any different - single core clock speed is the same.

[AudioDoctor]

1 hour ago, camott said:

 

Did some quick tests on a base M2 Mac Mini. Can't do DSD512 with ECv2 :(

 

HQPlayer CPU load is roughly 10% better than M1, in line with Single Core benchmark improvements, but not enough to get it over the hump. It looks like one of the four Power cores is maxed. I highly doubt the M2 Pro will be any different - single core clock speed is the same.

 

Did that Machine have only 8GB of RAM?

[camott]

6 minutes ago, AudioDoctor said:

 

Did that Machine have only 8GB of RAM?

 

Yes and I was sure to monitor this. RAM usage for HQP was under 1GB and overall memory usage a non-issue.

 

 

[rjanderjr]

I have a Mac Studio Ultra with 20 cores, 4 of which are efficiency cores.  This is an M1 chip so the M2 performance cores will process faster.  I can not say if the M2 Mac mini Pro with 8 to 10 performance cores will be able to play DSD 512 using the ASDM7ECv2 modulator, but it should, depending on the source file.  I would guess that it could play any DSD file and upsample to 512, given how the cores are stressed on my Studio Ultra.  But could play a PMC file and upsample it to DSD 512.  That stress tests my Studio Ultra.  It works, but requires a lot of processors running at high load.  See image.  Finally.  I have found that running HQP on Ventura requires more processing power.  I have also found the HQP 4.21 requires more processing power than 4.20.2.  I run into dropouts running 4.21 and upsampling to DSD 512.  Right now I am running Ventura with HQP 4.20.2 with all stereo files and no dropouts. The most efficient is Monterey with 4.20.2.

[camott]

2 hours ago, rjanderjr said:

I have a Mac Studio Ultra with 20 cores, 4 of which are efficiency cores.  This is an M1 chip so the M2 performance cores will process faster.  I can not say if the M2 Mac mini Pro with 8 to 10 performance cores will be able to play DSD 512 using the ASDM7ECv2 modulator, but it should, depending on the source file.  I would guess that it could play any DSD file and upsample to 512, given how the cores are stressed on my Studio Ultra.  But could play a PMC file and upsample it to DSD 512.  That stress tests my Studio Ultra.  It works, but requires a lot of processors running at high load.  See image.  Finally.  I have found that running HQP on Ventura requires more processing power.  I have also found the HQP 4.21 requires more processing power than 4.20.2.  I run into dropouts running 4.21 and upsampling to DSD 512.  Right now I am running Ventura with HQP 4.20.2 with all stereo files and no dropouts. The most efficient is Monterey with 4.20.2.

 

Hi, that's very interesting! The single core speed of M1 Ultra is the same as other M1's afaik. And I was under the impression that the SDM modulation could only use 2 p-cores - which is the big bottleneck with DSD512 (again, from what I understand). And the rest of the performance cores were for filters, etc. [edit - you can certainly see the load distributed across your 16 p-cores, with the 4 e-cores lower.]

 

If more p-cores are making the difference here then yes the M2 Pro, with 6 or 8 p-cores, vs base M2 4 p-cores might do it??

 

 

[rjanderjr]

I will let Jussi respond to the number of cores question.  I think it is more complicated than your impression.  I am not qualified to say how it works, but from my image above, you can clearly see that a lot is going on and that the software is allocating cores based on the number of cores available and how you have selected the multicore processing button (and probably other factors).  I find that having it grayed works best for me.  That selection never did much when I had fewer cores, but it made all the difference when trying to get the most out of the Studio Ultra.  Most of my music is multi-channel and I am able to play all multichannel DSD files at 256.   

[camott]

Yes clearly it's not so straightforward. I will go back and hunt down Jussi's posts on this later. One thought is that the 48MB l2 cache is making the difference with the M1 Ultra. Regardless, great that you have DSD512 ECv2 working. I don't think I have seen any other reports of Mac users doing this.

[copy_of_a]

On 1/26/2023 at 12:51 AM, camott said:

 

Did some quick tests on a base M2 Mac Mini. Can't do DSD512 with ECv2 :(

If I may ask - if not DSD512 … can the base MMini M2 with 8GB RAM handle any source file upsampled to DSD256 with poly-sinc-gauss (long) and ASDM7ECv2?

Would be useful to know - many thanks in advance!