HQplayer 4 and Mac-mini M1

[Jud]

11 minutes ago, juniorbudel said:

I still notice static when touching the device's housing.

If there’s a spark, the unit is grounded, I would think. You would notice the same from touching any other piece of metal connected to ground.

[juniorbudel]

44 minutes ago, Jud said:

If there’s a spark, the unit is grounded, I would think. You would notice the same from touching any other piece of metal connected to ground.

I notice that feeling of switching off in small jumps when I run my hand over his body when I'm barefoot. I don't know if it's possible to measure static with a multimeter.

[Schafheide]

23 hours ago, juniorbudel said:

Sorry for the off topic but there are many MM users here as a transport or Core.

 

Has anyone used any way to eliminate static electricity on the Mac Mini case?

 

I think about grounding using USB A, but I don't know if it is grounded in this model. I don't use a monitor connected to the MMM2 Pro, filter and external linear source but I still notice static when touching the device's housing.

This is not normal - I think you should think of getting the Mini checked.

Normally, if you receive a tingle from any household item, plugged into an AC outlet, you should consider it unsafe, due to the possibility of a fatal electric shock.

I have 2 Mac Mini's - neither have this tingle, if I touch the case.

[juniorbudel]

4 hours ago, Schafheide said:

I have 2 Mac Mini's - neither have this tingle, if I touch the case.

Barefoot? I don't feel it either with shoes or carpet.

[Schafheide]

Your decision.

[MasterWarzombie]

I just purchased a 16 inch MacBook Pro M2 Pro with 32 GB to replace a Dell I9 16 GB
I downloaded hqplayer 4 desktop on the mac. Everything went well but I had some dropouts at the beginning. I moved the buffer to 10 ms.
I have the latest version of mac for ios

Are the preferences different from Windows?

What are the recommended settings? I'm in PCM for a Chord Qutest DAC

I note that I played HPLAYER, it remained "cold" without flinching and without a sound
thanks for your advices

[creativepart]

Did you download the ARM Mac OS version of HQP 4? You didn't mention that... but it's what you need.

 

I too have the Chord Qutest and an M1 iMac.

 

I use the following settings - your preferences may be different:

 

 

 

 

[MasterWarzombie]

18 minutes ago, creativepart said:

Did you download the ARM Mac OS version of HQP 4? You didn't mention that... but it's what you need.

 

I too have the Chord Qutest and an M1 iMac.

 

I use the following settings - your preferences may be different:

 

 

 

 

yes I downloaded the correct HQPLAYER version for my mac.
  I use Sinc M
I wonder if adding HQplayer version 5 is of any interest in my case because I only use PCM. I go through bnc

[creativepart]

It's my understanding that ver 5 is of greater benefit to DSD playback and since the Qutest doesn't do native DSD, I haven't upgraded to it.

 

I did download it and use it as a trial and it completely revamps the Setting Preferences menus. I'm sure I'll upgrade at some point but the discount offered for 4.x version owners to upgrade was minuscule, so, not at this point.

 

Sinc-M is a FIXED number of taps at 1 million, where Sinc-L and others is variable depending on the resolution of the source file. The number of taps with Sinc-L is 131070x the conversion ratio.

 

I use Sinc-LI with is also adaptive number of taps (65536xConversion Ratio).

[Miska]

33 minutes ago, MasterWarzombie said:

I wonder if adding HQplayer version 5 is of any interest in my case because I only use PCM. I go through bnc

 

It depends whether you'd like any of the new features.

 

I don't really see how this would be particularly related to PCM or DSD output.

 

[MasterWarzombie]

8 hours ago, Miska said:

 

It depends whether you'd like any of the new features.

 

I don't really see how this would be particularly related to PCM or DSD output.

 

I admit that I left music aside a little because I bought a new television and modified acoustic elements in my room.

I haven't really followed the evolution of version 5 and its particularities.
I probably need to upgrade.

[creativepart]

21 hours ago, Miska said:

 

It depends whether you'd like any of the new features.

 

I'm not saying the ver 5.x is in any way deficient in playing PCM files. Not at all. I'm only commenting that the majority of new filters and features in the new version benefit DSD playback. I do recognize that the software has had a rewrite, that it offers a number of changes and improvements. I believe it is less CPU intensive, etc. Plus, as I mentioned, the settings in the Preferences section is completely different and better laid out.

 

When deciding on $200+ software upgrades I have to judge what advantages I will get for my money. That's all.

 

Miska's software is excellent. His level of customer support is second to none. I firmly believe that he and his products are entirely deserving of financial support. As I said, I'm sure I will upgrade. But at this moment I'm sticking with the still excellent ver 4.x software.

[Miska]

19 minutes ago, creativepart said:

I'm not saying the ver 5.x is in any way deficient in playing PCM files. Not at all. I'm only commenting that the majority of new filters and features in the new version benefit DSD playback.

 

Why do you think so? All new filters are available for both PCM and DSD? The only additional thing I enabled recently is that I made number of filters that were previously only available for PCM outputs also available for DSD outputs.

 

There are just very few PCM DACs, so naturally there's plenty of focus also on SDM outputs.

 

19 minutes ago, creativepart said:

I do recognize that the software has had a rewrite, that it offers a number of changes and improvements. I believe it is less CPU intensive, etc. Plus, as I mentioned, the settings in the Preferences section is completely different and better laid out.

 

And there's now support for number of additional Qobuz features.

 

[creativepart]

3 minutes ago, Miska said:

Why do you think so?

And there's now support for number of additional Qobuz features.

 

When the new version was released, I was taken aback by the cost. Many others felt the same way. The "word" on the various forums... here and on Roon... was that there was not a great deal of additional benefit for those not using DSD. Perhaps that's not true. I never saw it refuted. I apologize if I'm spreading negative comments that are not valid.

I not aware of any new Qobuz features - however, I use Qobuz via Roon and not via the Qobuz app itself. But I'd love to know if I'm mistaken and missing out on some new features or improvements.

 

I sure can understand any devleoper not appreciating someone totally ignorant in the specifics making statements that others could interpret as reasons not to upgrade after all the work you've done to create such a fabulous product.

[Miska]

1 minute ago, creativepart said:

When the new version was released, I was taken aback by the cost. Many others felt the same way. The "word" on the various forums... here and on Roon... was that there was not a great deal of additional benefit for those not using DSD. Perhaps that's not true. I never saw it refuted. I apologize if I'm spreading negative comments that are not valid.

 

5.0.0 was the starting point. Just like 4.0.0 was a starting point (in March 2018 for Embedded and April 2019 for Desktop). Lot of things were added along the way.

 

1 minute ago, creativepart said:

I not aware of any new Qobuz features - however, I use Qobuz via Roon and not via the Qobuz app itself. But I'd love to know if I'm mistaken and missing out on some new features or improvements.

 

HQPlayer has had native built-in support for Qobuz since Dec 2021. So Roon or Qobuz app are not needed to listen Qobuz with HQPlayer.

 

[juniorbudel]

Guys, a question.

 

We are approaching summer here, the temperature of the environment where the MMM2 Pro is installed is around 27 degrees Celsius at this time but in summer it goes to 34.

 

My concern is with the CPU temperature, with the HQP in use, around 50% cpu load, temperature is at 95 degrees, and the cooler is at 30% of capacity. Is this temperature normal? What is the acceptable limit for this model? I didn't find this information.

[Miska]

12 hours ago, juniorbudel said:

My concern is with the CPU temperature, with the HQP in use, around 50% cpu load, temperature is at 95 degrees, and the cooler is at 30% of capacity. Is this temperature normal? What is the acceptable limit for this model? I didn't find this information.

 

Apple has programmed cooling profiles into their Mac firmware and macOS. You don't need to worry about such, it will either cool enough, or limit the CPU speed to prevent overheating (so called thermal throttling).

 

On devices like MacBook Air and iPad Pro where M1/M2 doesn't have active cooling, all thermal management happens through thermal throttling.

 

95 degrees sounds pretty normal silicon temperature for a modern CPU.

 

If you do some rendering, gaming or video processing, your CPU can be constantly at 100% load on all cores for many hours in row. Totally normal and any properly made computer must withstand that within specified operating temperature range.

 

So far only devices I've got to overheat have been my mobile phones and tablets in direct sunlight. They will just tell that they need to shutdown or limit things in order not to overheat.

 

[Schafheide]

@Miska I have just downloaded the HQPlayer Desktop (Arm64) file. What should I do with the ".sh" file and , what purpose does it serve? TIA.

[Miska]

5 hours ago, Schafheide said:

@Miska I have just downloaded the HQPlayer Desktop (Arm64) file. What should I do with the ".sh" file and , what purpose does it serve? TIA.

 

It is for LosslessSwitcher(/BlackHole) automatic rate switching, I think I also copied the instructions here on this forum earlier. If you don't need this functionality you can just ignore the script.

 

[Markus8]

So running Roon (with a small library) and HQPlayer (latest version) with a convolution filter and Upsampling to 192/24 PCM should be fine with a M2 Pro with 16GB RAM ?

[Miska]

22 minutes ago, Markus8 said:

So running Roon (with a small library) and HQPlayer (latest version) with a convolution filter and Upsampling to 192/24 PCM should be fine with a M2 Pro with 16GB RAM ?

 

Yes, certainly. I don't see any potential problems in that.

 

[Markus8]

14 hours ago, Markus8 said:

So running Roon (with a small library) and HQPlayer (latest version) with a convolution filter and Upsampling to 192/24 PCM should be fine with a M2 Pro with 16GB RAM ?

@Miska Will more likely decide for a www.cirrus7.com complete fanless / passive cooling PC. What CPU/specs and operating system would you suggest for my usecase?

The PC then should hand over the data via NAA to Holo Red. 

[MikePid]

16 hours ago, Markus8 said:

So running Roon (with a small library) and HQPlayer (latest version) with a convolution filter and Upsampling to 192/24 PCM should be fine with a M2 Pro with 16GB RAM ?

I'm running HQPlayer and Roon on a Mac Mini M1 with 8GB with no issues upsampling to DSD256x44 with most filters, using EC-Super. I am not doing convolution though. Mostly streaming though, including Qobuz 192/24.

[ra990]

@Miska I'm experiencing a very strange issue. I just got a M2Max Macbook Pro so I downloaded and ran HQPlayer Desktop with the exact same settings as my Windows PC. Same v5.4.0 version of the desktop software on both. They are both configured to output to an NAA v4.6.0 which is feeding my Holo Spring 3. 

 

EDIT - figured out the issue. while setting up my convolution filters, for some reason on the macbook, they got compounded, multiple file entries per channel, which ended up attenuating the volume more. I pasted the file path into TextPad and saw there were a bunch of paths strung together, duplicating the filters.

[Miska]

6 hours ago, ra990 said:

EDIT - figured out the issue. while setting up my convolution filters, for some reason on the macbook, they got compounded, multiple file entries per channel, which ended up attenuating the volume more. I pasted the file path into TextPad and saw there were a bunch of paths strung together, duplicating the filters.

 

Yes, this can happen if you click Browse and select a file more than once for the pipeline. Each time will append one more filter. So if you just want to replace the filter file path, remove the earlier one from the Process entry first.