HQPlayer settings for specific DACs

[dusk]

so I just realized that the speakers I am currently outputting HQplayer > Chord Hugo2 to have their own DAC, even in analog mode

 

genelec 8361a

 

the on board dac is limited to 24/192kHz, so it doesn't make sense to send PCM > chord upsample to 768 to analog > genelec downsample to 192 digital > analog - the sound gets pretty muddy during high intensity pieces.  They do not do DSD at all.

 

I since took the chord out of the chain and hooked my holo red directly to the AES and the presentation is much cleaner (I had to boost each speaker output by 12db gain to get the slam I wanted)

 

I know most people here use HQplayer to max out the frequency, but I'm finding it rather enjoyable with the dither compared to not using HQPlayer at all, there is def a huge difference to my ears.

 

I don't see much if any talk about optimizing for 24/192 dacs, but what are optimal settings for my specific setup?

 

I read through the manual and came up with the settings I think make the most sense for my use case:

 

NS9 dither to take advantage of 4x rates (176.4/192) setting the output of HQplayer to 24/192

sinc-long most of the time (sounds the best to my ears from the ones I've tested)

sinc-MGa (local FLAC) or poly-sinc gauss-hires-lp (tidal MQA) if I get crazy Apod numbers 

 

am I on the right track or missing something?

 

(maybe down the road I'll upgrade to pmc mb2s xbd with pass labs amps and a T+A dac/streamer, but for now, I have to work with what I got, which is already pretty amazing :)

 

thanks!

[dusk]

2 hours ago, Miska said:

 

You are on right track! Remember to set "DAC Bits" to 24 just in case, so that there is no accidental truncation!

 

Just in case, I would also keep fixed 192k output rate. I'm not sure how the Genelec DSP works. Many times such devices use fixed rate  internally and if that's the case, it would convert 176.4k to 192k. Otherwise it would need to have some technical person from Genelec to confirm how they actually do things. So instead of sinc-MGa you could use poly-sinc-gauss-xla which is similar enough and gives you capability to convert to fixed 192k output rate.

 

oh this sounds really good

 

damn, this is the best (cleanest) I've heard these speakers sound

 

thanks!

[dusk]

On 9/8/2023 at 9:43 AM, Miska said:

 

You are on right track! Remember to set "DAC Bits" to 24 just in case, so that there is no accidental truncation!

 

Just in case, I would also keep fixed 192k output rate. I'm not sure how the Genelec DSP works. Many times such devices use fixed rate  internally and if that's the case, it would convert 176.4k to 192k. Otherwise it would need to have some technical person from Genelec to confirm how they actually do things. So instead of sinc-MGa you could use poly-sinc-gauss-xla which is similar enough and gives you capability to convert to fixed 192k output rate.

 

alright, just spoke to someone at Genelec and was able to confirm that the THE ONE range converts everything to 24/96, so I don't want to have the speakers doing any unnessesary conversion so I'll send it 24/96

 

now, on the HQplayer side, what's the best dither/filter combo to optimize for 24/96?  I have it set to Gauss1 and poly-sinc-guass-xla but shaped or NS4 could also be options, still playing around with them but wanted to get some additional color on those filters.

 

thanks!