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Post by sondale on Sept 3, 2018 16:38:00 GMT
... this arrangement allows me to upsample everything to 384k. As I said previously I will do a write up on pCP - I may as well start doing that now. Why? All you're doing is adding lots of zero entries at silly sample rates, which takes a lot of needless processing.
Why? I do this when running a DAM1021 R2R dac which as far as I am aware will upsample to 384K and then it applies a filter to the result. Opinion seems to be that if the upsampling can be done by software (for example the excellent SOX program) then the result is much better as the filter is not applied. Now I cannot in any way give you an Objective set of results as I do not have any equipment to do so BUT to my ears using Stax SRM-T1s into Sigma Headphones the difference is clear - it may be placebo effect but if it makes me happy listening to music then Why Not? As far as processing is concerned the RPi seems to handle it with ease - I have to say that I have only been doing this on RPi 3B and 3B+ machines.
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Post by sondale on Sept 3, 2018 15:44:08 GMT
The piCorePlayer (pCP) is a music player designed to run wholly in the memory of a RaspberryPi; the operating system is based on TinyCore and the two functional parts of pCP are Logitech Media Server (LMS) and Squeezelite (SQL but obviously not the SQL language). In the past I have used Logitech Squeezeboxes and Touch which meant I was familiar with LMS; when Logitech dropped all the Squeeze devices people looked around for replacements for them and eventually ported the software onto the Raspberry Pi. LMS allows access to music files wherever they are stored (USB drive, NAS device etc) and has many apps to access streamed music (Spotify, Qobuz, Internet radio et al); Squeezelite is the music player hooking up to dacs. There are Apps for running pCP from various devices and it can be run from any web-browser. Although both LMS and SQL can be run on the same RPi I tend to run them on seperate boxes. Communication between the parts of the system can be hard-wired or using WiFi - I have mine running on the home network which for the most part uses TPLink Gigabyte routers. pCP is free but donations are welcome - please note I have absolutely nothing to do with the people writing and supporting the various programs - details of the supported devices and packages can be found at forums.slimdevices.compCP have just released version 4.0.0 which can be found at www.picoreplayer.org/One of the first you notice about pCP (assuming you have downloaded one of the many other players) is how small it is - download takes seconds and not much longer to burn to an SD card - on my MAC I use SDFormatter to clear the SD cardand ApplePi-Baker to burn the image. Startup of the RPi takes less than 30 seconds - you may notice when you setup pCP that for a reboot it automatically sets the restart timer to 30 seconds but it has usually rebooted in half that time. There is one thing that puts people off pCP and that is it shows its Linux roots - there are a lot of things that you CAN do if you either know Linux / Unix or are willing to learn a little BUT you can setup the software without having to get your hands dirty! The people on the SlimDevices forum are incredibly helpful (and patient!) as I have found when trying new things. Is it worthwhile? For me the answer is Yes, I like the fact that you have a pared-down operating system which still has as many features as other players but fits into memory. Whenever you make changes thay are stored on the SD card immediately and therefore on unexpected shutdowns no data is lost and the card is not corrupted. I have only had one failure and that involved me managing to physically bend the card whilst assembling the case!! Sound-wise I like it a lot - I have been running pCP based systems for a few years and I have been tempted by other offerings but I have always returned to this setup. I will describe my setup in the next post.
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Post by sondale on Sept 3, 2018 14:25:11 GMT
A couple of weeks ago I compared the same track (Steely Dan / Ricky Don’t Lose that Number) FLAC file vs Spotify vs Qobuz and the best was Qobuz, then Spotify then my FLAC file.
After some head scratching I think I understand why - my FLAC was ripped losslessly from the Citizen boxed set - further listening made it clear that the SQ of the boxed set is lower than the individual discs. QOBUZ and Spotify may well have the remastered discs as sources.
So I may have to re-buy my SD albums or use QOBUZ - I have already purchased Aja so I will probably get a set of remastered albums.
Rather than using Volumio I used piCorePlayer on two RPi’s, one for LMS (Logitech Media Server) and the other for Squeezelite, this arrangement allows me to upsample everything to 384k. As I said previously I will do a write up on pCP - I may as well start doing that now.
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Post by sondale on Aug 27, 2018 19:41:46 GMT
Nice and easy in-situ update, a quick listen to Rachel Podger, all seems to be working fine.
More serious listen tomorrow.
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Post by sondale on Aug 24, 2018 12:05:33 GMT
On my piCorePlayer setup I have been using Archimago settings for awhile to good effect.
I think I will start a separate thread on the various setups I have tried with pCP.
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Post by sondale on Aug 24, 2018 9:33:17 GMT
Martin,
I have just set the Volumio Pi to your settings so I will have a good listen later.
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Post by sondale on Aug 24, 2018 7:48:21 GMT
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Post by sondale on Aug 21, 2018 7:52:25 GMT
Oddly enough I can get QOBUZ working but I get a DNS error on Spotify Connect!! I tried setting to Virginmedia DNS servers, this locked up the Pi and a hard reboot was needed. I also tried the Google DNS servers with the same result - so I will burn a new card and retry.
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Post by sondale on Aug 20, 2018 19:33:40 GMT
I have to say ( just checked it ) that piCorePlayer is roughly the same format for QOBUZ - but it does have a New Releases button.
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Post by sondale on Aug 20, 2018 19:03:50 GMT
Well I downloaded MyVolumio, loaded etc, entered my QOBUZ credentials and it all works (musically) very well.
Interface looks like it was designed on the back of a much used fag packet on a Friday afternoon - I thought they were supposed to be integrating QOBUZ in which case I would have expected a close approximation to the desktop gui. There is no way I can live with that on a day to day basis. It does not even have the initial QOBUZ New Releases menu. Hopefully those who are allowed to send feedback might comment on this I am surprised that QOBUZ let it out as it is.
I spent months trying to get Amarra 4 working - wonderful sound but you never knew whether it would load your library on next startup - I ditched that despite the sound. One good thing did come from that - I bought SQ+ which is basically the A4 music player - again good sound but it only runs on the mac and mine is now at its End of Life so no upgrades.
Back to Volumio - Buddy Guy - The Blues are Alive and Well - mmmmn - thats nice.
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Post by sondale on Aug 13, 2018 18:43:26 GMT
Stan,
If you look at the people on this forum, and others, quite a few people are fronting their Beresford DACs (especially the SEG) with Raspberry Pis fitted with a board to generate SPDIF. If you could take the essentials of the SEG or other DACs and create a board to fit the RPI with its HAT connector then you could be on to winner.
There are of course a lot of people now making DACs for the RPI and they are starting to creep upwards in sophistication and price.
A lot of the manufacturers are sticking to the same small footprint and therefore their DACs become 2 or 3 boards high which would include a power-supply plus other bits.
It might make sense to see how small you could make the SEG without having to worry about inputs (you get that from the Pi I2S pins), outputs would be RCAs and you would probably need 5volts input.
I do not know whether people would want headphone output - in my opinion you would need a fair amount of power to do that properly.
So a lot to think about.
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Post by sondale on Jun 11, 2018 14:03:35 GMT
Just to clarify my setup I have a VirginMedia Hub to which I attach my TPLink modem/router; my network hangs off the TPLink box.
This means that if I have to change supplier or hub then my network is not affected. It also gives another level of security, hopefully.
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Post by sondale on Jun 11, 2018 11:33:25 GMT
Hi Sean, I couldn't access the Pi through the "new" i.p. address either, and once I'd deleted that address from the hub settings the Pi failed to reacquire it, or any other i.p. address. I didn't try any other solutions except to reinstall Volumio, and I've no idea why a corrupted Volumio distro would bugger about with the port allocations like that. I'll take your #2 onboard though, when I've finished making my changes the Volumio code to improve it, again and after my music is rescanned, again. I used to have problems like this until I set up fixed IP addresses for nearly all my equipment ( includes tv, Blu-ray etc). IP addresses for normal home use would be 192.168.1.xxx where xxx is 0-999; some modem/routers will automatically assign IP addresses in the range 100-255 leaving 0-99 for static IP address assignment. If you set an RPi/Volumio to have 192.168.1.114 but you have not reserved this on your modem/router then if you ever switch it off then 114 is now free/available, now plug in a new piece of kit and 114 could be assigned to it. TROUBLE! So setting up Fixed IP addresses has essentially two parts, select a free IP address in the range say 10-99 and assign that to your RPi then set your RPi to have this static IP address. Easier said than done! the first part means having to logon to your modem/router, telling it the range of Fixed IP addresses and then linking the MAC address of your RPi to the Static IP you want to use - let us say 192.168.1.20. Exactly how you do this depends on the make of router / modem you are using, I have TPlink kit which I find has a reasonable gui for doing the above. having told your modem/router what the Static IP address is for your RPi the next thing to do is tell your RPi about this - having done this via Volumio before this should be easy! Both parts are needed to ensure unique Static IP addresses - just telling RPi/Volumio you want a Static IP does not make it so. Apologies if you already knew this.
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Post by sondale on May 25, 2018 10:39:56 GMT
Note to self - must visit optician
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Post by sondale on May 25, 2018 8:03:29 GMT
The Najda has SPDIF, Optical, USB/I2S and Analogue inputs; I used to run mine via a Wavio board.
I am currently running my RPi into a DAM1021 ladder dac using the I2S outputs on a Kali isolator/reclocker; the wires from Kali to DAM1021 are longer than 4cm without any problems. Software used is pCP (Pi Core Player).
I would think that the Nadja could be run directly from the RPi without the need for the Wavio converter.
I have run an RPi / DigiOne / SEG but my preference runs to the DAM1021. I have not done any mods to my SEG and it is running from a home built 12volt psi - at some point I must give Stan’s New psu a tryout.
Jusr re-read John’s post about the usb input - I thought that all Najda boards had the full set of inputs with options being set via software/firmware.
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Post by sondale on Jun 1, 2017 11:48:09 GMT
Just read the Amplifier report - the comment by a retailer makes chilling reading for we manufacturers.
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Post by sondale on May 15, 2017 10:31:01 GMT
Other con-artists are getting in on the act - just had one of those Indian Microsoft Support calls saying they noted I had problems with my Windows software - as usual told them I am Apple.
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Post by sondale on May 15, 2017 9:20:07 GMT
I would be very interested - I already have a design in mind.
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Post by sondale on May 14, 2017 17:36:22 GMT
Oh come on, Dave. That is a reply from a retailer who has an interest in perpetuating the cable myth foo. It is wrong on so many levels, one simply being that a well put together £1000 system can sound better than a poorly compiled £50,000 system. You yourself heard the dreadful result when you introduced TQ Black at Owston into a system. Everyone hated it and the cheap cable quickly went back in. My system does have the resolution to reveal the differences between cables and every time I try a different flavour, my own DIY options are preferred by me and others. Of course, I did try various types of cable to find what worked best, but the benefit of DIY is it is cheap to experiment, requires minimal electronic knowledge, requires minimal soldering skills and each cable can be made bespokely to a specific required length. As said, my best speaker cable is made from cheap as chips CAT5 and my standard interconnects are made from silver plated OFC with twin core and shield in PTFE insulation at a cost unfinished of £12 per meter. Sometimes it is worth looking at what the manufacturers use themselves, particularly when hidden from the punters observation. By way of example, Magico S5 speakers now retail at over £40,000. The internal driver hook up wire used is a Belden product that retails for approximately £2 a meter. A savvy friend of mine who happens to have a pair of these speakers found that using the same Belden wire for his main cables gave him as good a sound as anything else he tried regardless of price. Greg, First of all just to be absolutely open and honest about things Colin and I obviously make cables - just in case anyone was in any doubt - and therefore we are biased in our point-of-view. So please take that into account when reading the response...... I am not sure what "the cable myth foo" means; you cannot be saying that cables make no difference as you can obviously hear differences between your DIY cables and the various other flavours you have tried. So are you saying that it is the price that is the problem, if so then at what price-point does a cable stop sounding different / better, i.e. is it simply price versus performance versus claimed performance? In the past I have made up lots of diy cables for myself and friends including the various TNT-based CATx cables, Jon Risch designs, various micro-wave hosepipes and many other (at times) strange configurations. I found that they all of course sounded different as you would expect - resistance/capacitance being two of the many cable parameters capable of altering, for example, the amplifier/speaker response. If you are happy with the overall sound of your system with your cables then (and I am not being patronising) I am happy for you. To put this into context over the years people who know that I am into music / hifi ask me what they should buy - the answer is simple - whatever makes you enjoy the music. Many years ago when I got fed up with the constant changing of equipment as I tried to achieve audio nirvana I got rid of it all and spent about 3 years listening to a little Sony radio. Nowadays when I test equipment my main criteria is whether or not I get enjoyment out of the setup, do I become more involved in the music, if introducing a new cable does not do that then it is wrong FOR THAT SETUP. I just wish that I had enough time and money to look at why cables (of all types) can have a positive effect on one system and a negative effect on another system AND most importantly be able to quantify all of the reasons for this. What I think is good nowadays is the spin-off from Distance Selling in that people can try (on a sale or return basis) cables from a large number of manufacturers and are therefore able to make up their own minds whether or not Cable A is better than Cable Z IN THEIR OWN SYSTEM and return the cables if they do not work. Since it is usually 30 days this allows people to get over the honeymoon period (for me about a week) and any expectation bias and start to hear any adverse sounds and then to go back to the original and see if it is worthwhile buying the new cable - which may actually be cheaper! Part of the ethos of Bake-Offs is to allow people to hear different equipment and to be able to say (to themselves at least) - I did not like A but B was my type of sound - Cable X was better/worse than Y etc - especially if their kit was part/all of what was being listened to. Whether or not manufacturers / dealers should be there demonstrating their wares is a moot point - if that is what has caused friction then perhaps it should not be allowed in future.
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Post by sondale on May 12, 2017 15:08:09 GMT
A marked improvement over the first one What is the price difference Colin and Chris ? The 3 metre pair of LS-25 cables (I have stopped calling them LS-XXV as it takes to long to say!) that we demo'd would set you back £576 - so I would imagine just a bit more (??) than the Belkin. That does of course include VAT.
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