Article: Streaming & Local Content Through HQPlayer - A Nice Alternative With The sonicTransporter

[bibo01]

Is there going to be an Android version of JPlay app? @Marcin_gps

@The Computer AudiophileWould BubbleUPNP control HQPembedded and MinimServer with no gapless?

[bibo01]

17 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I’m not sure as I’d have to test on Android and both my tablet and Pixel phone are dead. 

Thanks.

I hope @stefano_mbp intervenes in this discussion because he also had a lot of experience in Embedded/MinimServer/gapless, contacting both developers about it and son on...

[bibo01]

8 hours ago, Cebolla said:

BTW, @bibo01, wasn't it you that mentioned that you were able to get HQPe to play gapless with LMS via the UPnP/DLNA Bridge LMS plugin?

Guilty as charged! 

Actually, Miska said that Embedded can do gapless even when the option in the plug-in is not on, especially if the plug-in acts up.

[bibo01]

@The Computer AudiophileDoes JPlay OS have to remain active all the time? I mean, if you swipe off, does playback stop? 

[bibo01]

For those asking to use HQPlayer Desktop to playback Qobuz streams, apart pairing Roon, I think under Windows there is a way to use LMS 8 and Material Skin with Muso (2.7 needed as it allows to bookmark any web URL). As far as I know, he Web URL bookmark works pretty well as a workaround. Then Muso sends stream to HQP for playback.

[bibo01]

@The Computer AudiophileDoes JPlay OS have to remain active all the time? I mean, if you swipe off, does playback stop? 

[bibo01]

@stefano_mbp@The Computer Audiophile @Miska I am still unclear about this UPnP business...

Miska, is it fair to say that HQPlayer is somehow at the mercy of Rygel in terms of receiving UPnP commands for rendering?

If that is the case, there must be some miscommunication between server-controller-Rygel in some particular circumstances that cause delay.

If, as Simon/MinimServer poited out, the delay is in the Rygel UPnP stack, is it possible to propose solutions to Rygel's main development group (Zeeshan Ali, Jens Georg, Thijs Vermeir, James Henstridge and Jussi Kukkonen) in the GNOME git repository?  (There is a "Jussi" there too )

   

[bibo01]

1 hour ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I would also love if some UPnP servers could send audio to HQPlayer natively rather than via UPnP. 
 

 

Yes, it would mean that HQP Desktop is supported. Perhaps Simon could do something about it 

[bibo01]

2 hours ago, Miska said:

11 hours ago, bibo01 said:

If, as Simon/MinimServer poited out, the delay is in the Rygel UPnP stack, is it possible to propose solutions to Rygel's main development group (Zeeshan Ali, Jens Georg, Thijs Vermeir, James Henstridge and Jussi Kukkonen) in the GNOME git repository?  (There is a "Jussi" there too )

 

That could be one way. I know Zeeshan and (the other) Jussi personally, they are my ex-colleagues from my Nokia days.

 

Rygel itself was used for example in our N9 phone and was DLNA certified already at that point. (there are many UPnP implementations talking about DLNA, but only few of those have been certified). Note that HQPlayer is not DLNA compliant, as it doesn't support 128 kbps CBR MP3 or WMA which for example are requirements for DLNA.

Then...can you please talk to them?! 

[bibo01]

5 hours ago, Miska said:

 

About what? That some third party software is not behaving nicely with their software?

I do not have a technical solution, but given that there is a miscommunication between server-controller-Rygel, I am sure you might have a good idea on what to propose in order to avoid a delay in Rygel's UPnP stack.  

[bibo01]

9 hours ago, Miska said:

 

I've added environment variable options to override default buffering values. This way it won't pollute regular settings. It will come out in next release. Three values (no need to set all):

1. HQPLAYER_BUFFER_TIME to set amount of buffer (in ms, must be multiple of 100 ms)
2. HQPLAYER_IDLE_MARGIN to set how much margin there is left before feed is needed (in ms, must be multiple of 100 ms)
3. HQPLAYER_IDLE_TIME to set how long to run idle before stopping

 

You can set these in /etc/default/hqplayerd

 

Can you please give us some indications on how to modify them - how they relate to each other, what is default value, etc...

[bibo01]

1 hour ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

24/192 gapless right now with the new version. This is lovely. 

Please, give us some details. Did you work on the variables? How? What controller did you use?

[bibo01]

9 hours ago, Miska said:

This is one area where you would win by using HQPlayer to play your album in album mode instead of playlist mode.

 

When you play through UPnP, HQPlayer doesn't know if subsequent tracks belong together or if they are separate items, so they are assumed to be separate unrelated items.

 

There's a "state reset" processing for unrelated DSD tracks in HQPlayer to reduce amount of pop/click you get when transitioning between tracks. I have now uploaded updated build where you can disable this by setting HQPLAYER_RESET_SDM=0 in /etc/default/hqplayerd. Now you get gapless playback for related DSD tracks, but louder pop/click when transitioning between unrelated tracks. Only solution to this is to play natively from HQPlayer's library.

Would it be possible for the server to send the information in album mode, if that feature was added to the server side? Can album mode be understood by the UPnP chain? 

[bibo01]

1 hour ago, Miska said:

No, it is not part of UPnP specification. But you can naturally switch over from UPnP protocol to HQPlayer's control protocol and then you don't have such limitations. Then you have also OpenHome style capabilities with server-side playlists and much much more.

Trying to understand.... Are you saying that it can only be achieved using HQPlayer's control protocol (like Roon) which "mimics" OpenHome style capabilities? Can album mode be achieved with an OpenHome media server like BubbleUPnP server? And is Embedded compatible as OpenHome renderer?