seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Oct 12, 2018 12:18:35 GMT
Like many of you, I have swapped bulbs from filament though fluorescent to LED. 20 years ago when moved into my house, the lounge alone was 6x60W = 360W, then 6x23W=138W and now about 6x5W=30W.
This tremendous saving is most evident in mobile applications like camper vans or leisure boats. With traditional bulbs, the leisure batteries would be depleted after one night. With LED you are good for a week. With modest photo voltaic panels they will work constantly.
My recent area of interest is the type of "white"... daylight? warm? or cool blue? Daylight is really good for seeing stuff, but most people prefer warm white for relaxing during the evening. You can buy LEDs which go through the whole RGB spectrum. However, what I would like to see is white bulbs which can switch between the different flavours of white as required... For example daylight for reading and warm white for chilling out.
Cheers
Sean
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Oct 9, 2018 10:49:18 GMT
Many thanks!
Cheers
Sean
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Oct 9, 2018 4:16:16 GMT
I can get most if not all of the streaming services.... but there are a few issues.... Spotify offers me a bargain rate in Turkish Lira but will not let me pay with a UK credit card or paypal linked to a UK card
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Oct 8, 2018 19:04:48 GMT
Around 15 months ago, I put together a small system based around re-working an existing Raspberry Pi with an Allo boss DAC. It had to be small/light since it was coming to Northern Cyprus with me in my luggage. I added a Allo Volt D class amp granddaughter board and the smallest bookshelf speakers I could find quickly and cheaply (Mordaunt short M10s).
As well as the obvious need to fill my apartment with reasonable quality music, I wanted a system which followed the philosophy of the kit left back in blighty. In particular, my music collection is FLAC based on a NAS and I wanted new additional music to slot in with this approach. In addition, Volumio or Moode is used, typically driven from a mpd client on my phone. A 4TB USB3 portable HDD hangs off of my router and does a good job of pretending to the NAS. The stands came back with me after my first trip back to the UK.
There are obvious tweaks which could be done, better speaker cable and DAC PSU spring to mind. However, it is impossible to source stuff here.
Over this summer I acquired an Amazon echo dot which fits inside a better powered speaker with rechargeable batteries built in. While the sound quality is not a patch on the system above, I have to say the combination of portability, voice navigation and music streaming is very convenient. I will critically review my approach when I next move.
Cheers Sean
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Sept 16, 2018 14:56:56 GMT
SpeedySteve.....
Volumio (or similar such as MoodeAudio) will mount a SMB (or NFS) share across the network using SAMBA.... roughly translated... yes it can do Windows file serving and play files from a NAS or PC share
I have always played FLACs stored on a NAS in this way.... However currently, (travelling light in Northern Cyprus) a large USB3 drive hanging off the back of my router is doing a good impersonation of being a NAS and works the same way
As it happened, I experimented with moving to volumio from moode yesterday and was stumped for a few minutes in this area.. a quick google revealed the need for a version option to force the version of samba/SMB in use
Cheers
Sean
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Sept 16, 2018 13:55:44 GMT
I have been thinking about this recently, with some observations of food going off or not. For the past year I have lived in Northern Cyprus. Fresh produce here is seasonal*, while it is not organic, much has a "homegrown" feel to it. The produce is generally very good quality#. However, despite careful storage and refrigeration it rots in a few days... completely rotten, well on the way to decomposing!
For the first 6 months, I saw this as a bit of a pain since it means I have to shop about 3 times per week. Then are looked at it from the other way around since I know homegrown produce, despite coming straight from the garden, goes off quickly compared to supermarket produce.
Then I began to question what has been done to supermarket produce to stop this? My estranged wife is terrible at hoarding food... the salad crisper at the base of the fridge was effectively a compost heap...despite months of neglect and good conditions for festering, much of the produce only had a little surface rot.
So I share you point and thank you for posting.
However, as a science teacher, I have heard a counter argument. There is a solid evidence to show that the toxins produced as food rots are definitely harmful to human health. There is only suspicion that preservatives are harmful. However, as a counter-counter argument, I fear that the results from such research would be spun by the industry.
* I am in favour of seasonal food, in terms of air miles etc. However, I have to say that it is a bit of a shock... You just get used to insanely tasty whatevers at a bargain prices and they are gone again
# There are a few weeks at the end of the summer when things are all a bit sad and limp looking... I assume this is due to the very high temperatures at the end of this growing season coupled with crazy high temperatures in the shops
Cheers
Sean
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Sept 15, 2018 7:05:42 GMT
Annoyingly, there is no single/simple/obvious answer to this for me at this time...
I currently use Amazon music.... free trial about to turn into paid subscription.... I have ended up being a big prime customer, (never actually planned)... also this summer, I picked up a couple of the small cheap echo dot Alexas and Amazon music is the natural route here.... The echo dots were a £30 experiment which I am enjoying... I actually have a 3rd party speaker with rechargeable battery which makes the dot like a portable version of the larger echo. This can follow me around the apartment for rooms where the hifi isn't and provide music locally at a low volume (noise is potentially a problem in my apartment)
However, I am also experimenting with "Android Auto".... runs on my phone.... puts the phone into a cut down.... SatNav / Music only mode with big buttons and "OK google" voice control. This is very useful since it removes the need to navigate/search a large tree hierarchy structure of artists/albums/tracks.... just jump straight in with "OK Google, play ashes to ashes by david bowie". (alternate live/demo/extended/remix versions confuse this however). Powering on my bluetooth dongle, (which hangs out of the aux socket in my reasonably priced hire car) puts my phone into Android auto mode automagically. Google music is obviously the natural streaming route here.
I am probably of the opinion that spotify is the most established/universal streaming service and I am keeping a watching brief on lossless services
Having reached the end of this post, I have concluded that there is a growing link between choice of streaming service and choice of smart speaker and other related technology.... which is exactly why they sell them cheaply. Had I gone for a Google speaker, the division above would have been avoided. Moreover, my experiments with voice control have convinced me of it's value when you are listening to music and doing other things at the same time. I sense history repeating itself.... around 20 years ago I first ripped my CD collection to moderate rate mp3s with an old laptop acting as a player via 3.5mm jack!. Obviously, sound quality was severely compromised at the time, not least by affordable disc space. However, with a young family, for casual listening, the ease of use justified the loss of sound quality. The blatant loss of sound quality was addressed during the last 20 years with lossless rips, spdiff and in recent years raspberry pi's et al. Voice control can be really convenient and ultimately I play more music when I probably would be otherwise preoccupied... so here I go again!
Cheers Sean
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Sept 9, 2018 15:37:08 GMT
That is a very good point, it must of taken hours of trial and mostly error
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Sept 9, 2018 5:55:37 GMT
I teach Physics for my day job, mostly at the top end of secondary school ('A' level and IB). I was pleased with the title of this subject ("Physics is fun"). One of the biggest problems I face is parents giving my subject the instant kiss of death with phrases like "yeah, it's alright dear, I was rubbish at Physics when I was at school, don't worry".... or "It's very hard". I like the video above, I use such things to illustrate Physics in everyday things.
The video below is at least 11 years old, and is probably old hat, I think you can get games on phones which do this sort of thing. But at the time, it was pretty state of the art and students seemed to enjoy it
Cheers
Sean
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Aug 4, 2018 14:40:35 GMT
There is a review here....
While the review goes into a lot of detail about power supply options (lots and lots), the multiple daughter boards and in particular the discrete rather than IC opAmp board, Hans does not go into his usual level of detail about sound quality IMHO.
The multiple board and discrete OpAmp with hand trimmed offsets probably justifies the relatively high cost for this Pi DAC. For Pi DACs this is a "high end" product, firstly AFAIK, it is the most expensive Pi DAC daughter board produced and is 10-15x the cost of entry level ones.
Cheers Sean
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Jul 23, 2018 10:10:17 GMT
Dear All, Allo released their new high end DAC (Katana) on the 17th of July. I have not tried one, and I will not be in a position to do so for the foreseeable future. In relative terms, this is an expensive DAC (Circa 200-300 Euro/USD) which is 3-4x the going rate for most DACs. However, I do believe that Allo are an innovative company and their products are usually worth looking at. As I have said before, while Pi based systems already offer significant sound quality and VFM, I also think that the technology is still in rapid evolution, with each new iteration offering a jump in sound quality for little upgrade cost. I also accept that many of the Pi users on here are using a "digiOut" board with external DACs www.allo.com/sparky/katana.htmlCheers Sean
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Jul 3, 2018 16:15:36 GMT
I'm guessing that this is to do with the version of the SMB (samba) protocol... If so, I had exactly the same thing between a W10 machine and my NAS after a W10 update
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Jul 2, 2018 15:02:30 GMT
There is a longer audio version of this programme here www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3cswvr7However, I have not listened to it yet... I think this is a really interesting idea.... and one can look at it as brutal economics, sick people cost society money. I *think* that I am slowly concluding that until recently, our knowledge of how food is metabolised in our bodies is poorly understood. AFAIK calorific content is found by measuring the energy given off when the food is burnt in a lab, not in the body. Certainly, carbs, fats and protein take different amounts of energy to metabolise and so a 100 calories of each going in gives the body different amounts of energy to use. So a calories are not equal. The low/zero fat advice given for many decades.... at best it has pushed people towards carbs leading to an increase in type II diabetes, and worse, it has been just plain wrong. As a science teacher, I am interested in how this information is presented to the general public.... I have found recent TV programmes which equate everything to spoons of sugar to be clear and useful. In contrast, food companies, which get away with printing colour coded traffic light nutritional information in B&W should be stopped! Cheers Sean
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Jun 27, 2018 14:11:14 GMT
Martin,
I like DBpowerAmp but EAC and the associated free FLAC tools and/or lame should be able to do a similar job... from the features part of the EAC homepage
"Support of external MP3, WMA, flac and OggVorbis encoders for automatic compression after extraction (supports multi-processor environments)"
Trackname editing with local/remote CD databases support and more features like ID3 tagging
Browse and edit local database
Certified Escient ® CDDB(TM)Compatible
Local CDDB support
Automatic renaming of MP3 files accordingto their ID3 tag
ID3 V1.1 tag editor with drag and drop ability from track listing and CD database browser
Cheers
Sean
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Jun 27, 2018 12:00:21 GMT
Some further musings......
I treat my FLAC repository as the master copy and this is obsessively backed up. I use dBpowerAmp to generate other "disposable" conversions from it. For example low quality mp3s...These are used on my phone and laptop etc..... in fact I wind the quality setting down until my music collection just fits in the available phone memory/microSD card. DbPowerAmp will generate all folder/filenames automagically from the metadata.
The FLAC repository ends up being experimentally played from all manner of clients, TVs via dlna etc. Obviously, this was not a requirement, or even a sensible thing to do, but it was interesting, and by and large the metadata and album art sorted itself out.
One common theme, particularly on phone based players is the truncation of path and file name information.... Following on from my first reply this morning, I would probably recommend putting the most unique/relevant information at the start of the filename rather than the end....
For example :
trackNo-TrackName-Artist.flac
"Special" characters such as "?" in the artist/album/track name upsets filenaming... However, these seem to get magically converted. In the case of a question mark it gets mapped to a upside down / back to front question mark which can be used in paths and filesnames (well at least under windows/samba)
Cheers
Sean
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Jun 27, 2018 10:01:19 GMT
- If I convert WAV to FLAC I need another utility, or can EAC create FLAC directly? Sorry, I haven't looked.
Typically, the ripping process will launch a related "helper" application.....flac for flac or lame for mp3 to do the conversion. dBPowerAmp does this. The helper apps may or may not come as part of the original ripper application install
- To tag FLAC files, can I use Mp3Tag or is there another utility, or will EAC do it in one go?
I have dBPowerAmp do this at the time of ripping. MP3Tag will do it after the event... it will do clever stuff like rename the filename based upon the metadata contents and vice versa
- I have never seen anything that can convert DSD DSF or DFF files and feel I should leave them in native 1-bit format. Correct?
I do not know anything about this... but I always considered keeping master copies of things when conversion is required
- Does embedded album artwork in each file trump artwork in the folder? Do I need both?
Ultimately, I don't know.... I deliberately have both since it's automatic and seems to keep all players happy
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Jun 27, 2018 6:55:58 GMT
This is a partial answer which I will add to... I have put a lot of effort into this and I still think at best I understand 85% of the problem. Firstly, I *think* that I rely on the embedded meta data to do most of the work for me... I aim to only use flac format and convert WAVs for this reason. I also aim to have a directory/file structure naming scheme which is "human readable" and mirrors the meta data information. I use this : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mp3tagTo do a lot of the donkey work for me.... However, I ripped files to match what I wanted at the time of ripping My music is stored in a tree of folders artist/album/ If it is a "double album" then I add CD1 etc to the above... but modern albums are inconsistent in this respect Files are named : Artist-TrackNo-Trackname.flac Actually, it is the "AlbumArtist" tag rather than artist tag which is used Logically, to be standalone and unique, the filename should have album in there somewhere, but I found it made paths too long and actually caused me problems since many players only display a short string Some thought needs to be given to the naming of different versions of the same album I embed the artwork in the file and also have a copy named folder.jpg in the album folder One thing I do not fully understand.... there seems to be "flac tags" and ID3 tags.... sometimes these seem to interact. Often things just work... possibly when they shouldn't. If I am 100% honest, while I have a system which is 95% working in terms of album art and data...I am not confident even which tags I'm using. I have toyed with writing a tool to check integrity but have never got around to it. Cheers Sean
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Jun 22, 2018 15:17:23 GMT
Martin & Paul,
I have mentioned before, back in the UK, I play my music from a NAS... a 4 bay QNAP one... Since it is the only brand I've owned, I cannot compare, but the ongoing firmware support has been rather good with new features added all the time. NAS's are can be much, much more these days... DLNA media servers etc. Anyway, at the time, I went for 2 straight 3TB drives since I could not justify the cost of RAIDING them at the time. Backup of music is to two separate USB3 portable drives and a standalone PC. Backup of work (school lesson resources) is the same with added Dropbox.
The files are made available via SAMBA, standard windows network file sharing.....
However, I read somewhere that NFS (Unix network file sharing) is better for audio. The the NAS and Pi will support this out of the box.
While I am here in Northern Cyprus, a 4TB USB3 portable drive is hanging off of the router pretending to be a NAS.... actually it does a very good job all things considered.
Cheers Sean
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Jun 9, 2018 15:24:35 GMT
Sligner,
Sorry, I had not fully understood your problem. I have very occasionally seen issues like this... once or twice in 4 years or so of tinkering. If I can, I try and keep a backup of a working stable distribution image once configured and set up. In this way, while you have to reformat/rewrite the memory card it comes back 100% as it was including sources and even an out of date music library.
Cheers
Sean
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seanm
Rank: Trio
Posts: 162
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Post by seanm on Jun 9, 2018 15:01:43 GMT
Hi,
If it is just that the IP address of the Pi and other devices has changed there are 2-3 solutions
1. Give the PI a hard fixed IP address of your choice.... For example, I typically let the router assign IP addresses in a pool of say .100 to .200 and manually assign "servers" hard coded addresses starting at .254 for the router and work down
2. Still use DHCP, but tell the router to always issue the same IP address via the MAC HW address -> IP look up table. All network interface devices have a unique hardware MAC address which is 6 bytes and looks like "00-14-22-01-23-45" Many routers allow you to reserve an IP address from the DHCP pool so that a specific piece of HW always gets the same IP address via DHCP each time
3. I *think* that you can access volumio by name something like "http://volumio" here the router is doing the DNS lookup for you. HOWEVER, I have rarely got this to work
I use 2. It has the advantage that it always gives the same IP address for the PI hardware board regardless of the state of any installed distribution(s)... ideal for tinkering. This is also the basis for making Wifi more secure, you only allow known hardware to access your wifi by using MAC address filtering.
Cheers Sean
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