A toast to PGGB, a heady brew of math and magic

[mcewan71]

I did a trial of PGGB last Spring but didn’t follow through with a licence purchase. I can’t completely remember my reasons for this, but recently I rediscovered the remastered files and really enjoyed them. I recalled that some trial and error, mainly with the ‘onboarding process’, did determine whether or not it gave me what I was hoping for. So I basically just didn’t have enough time in the trial, and now am contemplating buying a license. I have a couple of thoughts, and wondered if anyone would help me out a bit with this. I am going to sound a bit daft here so please bear with me: 

 

1. So I get how this works in theory with the taps etc. I am just wondering how this actually happens - it’s kind of ‘breaking apart’ the PCM file then restructuring it from the pieces, right? I guess I have the experience of understanding that with digital audio files, you cannot put in what was not there in the first place (e.g. creating a lossless file from a lossy one would be a simple example). So - without reference to the information on the website (I know where to find it, and I think I understand the technical basics), could someone please humour me and translate this into layman’s terms? I guess I need to completely get my head round how I can feed in a PCM file of whatever bit depth and sample rate - and get a much better sounding file the other end. 
 

2. It’s probably fair to say I am definitely along the budget end of the scale when it comes to the DACs I have. Of course, this will change over time and circumstances, but my budget DACs max out at 24/96 just now. As much as I would love to buy a Dave or even a modest step up from what I have now, it’s not within my reach currently. For my listening rooms, I use iFi Zen DACs and for headphone listening I use Audioquest Dragonflies, both red and cobalt (told you they were budget!). Point is, I enjoyed what I heard with the PGGB files using these means. As I said, I will invest in higher spec equipment over time. I just read of what seems like insane sample rates folks’ DACs handle in here, and find myself wondering if it would be pointless getting a license given my current limitations? 
 

Thanks for any thoughts on these points! 

[mcewan71]

A belated brief word to say thanks to those who had responded to my post from about a week ago. I appreciate your responses @Kalpesh @austinpop @Zaphod Beeblebrox and @kennyb123 - they've been helpful and so I've moved things forward slightly. I've bought a Chord Mojo - which is realistically the only Chord I can afford at this time, and over the weekend got 4 short tracks processed via https://pggb.io/ which has helped me look further at this. The Chord is certainly a great use for my cash so far! 

 

Living rurally in the Scottish Borders as I do, our internet bandwidth here is way beyond poor (15 gbps DL on a good day) - which has tended to seriously limit any streaming consumption (I had to use very small files for PGGB IO as the upload kept timing out, for starters!). I mention this because for now my PGGB'd files would need really to be either local on my PC (using JRiver possibly - I did have Roon but it's not ideal for bandwidth-challenged folks like me, though Jriver I'm sure would be the same), or, on my ipad with Mojo/headphones. So, though the Mojo can handle 32/768 or so, I found only one ios software which can handle these rates - Kaisertone. It sounds ok but I'm not a huge fan of its' basic sound signature. The one I prefer is iAudiogate (designed to accompany Korg DACs) because I prefer the sound and yes, the UI (so shallow...!) but it only handles 24/192 PCM, though does work with higher DSD rates. Shame - I'm no expert as you know, but there seems fairly limited reason to process files to the max the Mojo can carry to then downsample via the software. 

 

Still, I've confirmed my PC can definitely still handle the specs required, so if do decide to pull the trigger on a licence, we're good to go! And hopefully sometime this year our bandwidth is scheduled to hit the dizzy heights of 30 gbps (which the Scottish Government excitedly classes as 'superfast'...)

 

Anyhow, thanks again for all the advice and help. As I say, they were much appreciated. 

[mcewan71]

4 hours ago, kennyb123 said:

The Mojo delivers a huge bang for the buck.  To get to 768K you could add a Poly or a number of streamers.  I just recently got that working myself with a Poly playing PGGB’d tracks off an SD card and the sound quality is insane for the price.

 

Thanks @kennyb123! I may well investigate this, so thanks for the tip. I would imagine you use an enormous SD card (I think they max out at 1TB?) - so far, I can't see whether local playback of WavPack through the Poly is possible: can you confirm? Thanks again!

[mcewan71]

4 hours ago, kennyb123 said:

Correction:  I should have said Micro SD card.  I have a few of these leftover from my previous mobile device, a Pono.  I intend to buy a few more of these.  

 

I can't imagine that the Poly supports WavPack as it's running an older version of MPD.  I've yet to have much success with WavPack.

 

I'm not sure how much you plan to use your Mojo on the go vs having it set in a stationary position, but if the latter is the plan, there are some streaming endpoints that might server you better.  A microRendu was something I used with a Mojo a while back and it worked really well.  Not sure about the current market for such devices and which support 16 FS though.

 

Thanks Kenny. I have a fleet of Raspberry Pi devices as budget streamers and they are great for what they do - which is multi-room playback using Volumio OS. The most I can get using an optical 'hat' on this device is 192 out into the Mojo, so that's a bit of a limitation. I'll keep the Mojo as a portable device mainly for headphones. But thanks for the Poly tip! Which software do you use to play local micro SD card files on your Mojo? 

[mcewan71]

Hi

 

Has anybody noticed any issues with the onboarding? I'm not sure if Marvin is unwell...

 

Following the instructions in the guide, I have set my in and out folders, but following through the process, even at the first stage it seems to be overwriting the initital files (i.e. one file at natural transparency setting is being overwritten by the version being produced at front row setting). I can't see the suffixed folders or files in my output folder. I noticed that, of its own accord, the mode options on the 'process' page are switching automatically from 'create new' to 'overwrite' after the first version of each track is made. Should I attach the debug log here?

 

Perhaps @Zaphod Beeblebrox can advise - I can't see I've made any obvious errors in the settings, is it maybe a bug?

 

Thanks!

[mcewan71]

On 2/7/2022 at 12:21 PM, Zaphod Beeblebrox said:

I looked at some more (I have not tested this feature in a long time) it is important to put your test tracks in a folder and provide the parent folder as input. Then you will see the expected results with the setting names prefix.

 

For example Put you tracks in a folder:

 ..\blah\blah blah\Input\Onboard test\

In PGGB as your input folder choose the parent folder:

 ..\blah\blah blah\Input

 

Do not choose full path ..\blah\blah blah\Input\Onboard test\

 

Please let me know if it resolves your issue and so I do not have to send Marvin to the infirmary :)

 

Hi @Zaphod Beeblebrox, thanks - that works! Much appreciate you looking into this. Marvin is hereby spared further medical investigation!