Search the Community

It has been somewhat a journey for me, personally, in digital audio since I joined SNA..... From a CD-Transporter as the only source to modernise Computer Audio. It was all began with my laptop using Windows XP, usb into my WaveIO and subsequently into my DDDAC. From there I travelled from a normal working pc, to the little ARM-boards like the Raspberry PI, BeagleBone Black, Banana Pi with great SQ appreciation via I2S protocol........ This complete setup is still operable and very engaging til date. Pity, it only does PCM and does not do DSD, which is also a pity again when my ears can only appreciated the DSD materials better.....! Through this journey, I have learned so much in tweaking a computer audio to sound more analogue. In doing so, I had successfully converted some hard-core local SACD player(s) and Turntable audiophiles into Computer Audio. Well, I think it is time for a reality check....., will these digital audio stacking up again our traditional SACD-player(s) or even close to a Turntable setup? I will leave that question for you're to decide at this provision gtg, Sunday 30th April. Hopefully, with that given much notice will receive better participation? There will be few servers' up for your ears to judge....., atom base server, i3-6100, and i7-7700K. If time permits, I have a TT setup to give you a reference between Digital vs Analogue......, just for the fun... I will provide light beverage on the day......

Hi, After using the JPlay dual PC setup I was getting interested in how and why this works. It is hard to do a comparison between a Dual PC and a Single PC setup, but let's say it did not sound worse. That came a bit as a surprise since JPlay is adding all these extra layers in the audio playback chain. For what I understand the following playback chain is in place (Feel free to correct me) Playback software - JPlay ASIO driver - JPlay service - Network - JPlay service - DAC driver - USB - DAC For what I understand you use one PC to do all the hard work, and the other just for passing on the PCM bits stream to the DAC. (Feel free to correct me) The result would be to isolate the noise from the playback PC It is not uncommon to use Ethernet for real time audio http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_over_Ethernet The questions that I am having are the following: What is the reason for using USB instead of LAN? Is there any development in building a LAN to USB converter by using for example a Wandboard or a Raspberry Pi? Are there any player that can send a PCM bit stream over Ethernet Does it make sense to do this at home?

How bad are mobile devices when it comes to being used as a digital source. Battery power, no mechanical storage and a digital output sounds like a pretty good place to start. The Astell & Kern sounds like the ideal source. Battery powered, SD storage and dedicated playback software, but I can't find a digital output on this. Any thoughts of what the ideal digital source would look like?

Hi, I am currently setting up 2 PC's and 5 OS systems for a one on one comparison between sound quality and software. I tried a USB hub between the 2 PC's and my DAC but the hub is blocking the handshake between DAC and PC. I was wondering if anyone has tried this as well. I like to connect both PC's to the DAC without having to swap the cables. I am not sure if there is some control chip in, USB hubs, that is preventing the handshake. Any advise here?

Looks like it is made from the right parts. http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=211&products_id=27791 http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=211&products_id=27790 Not sure how you can isolate these sound cards from the harsh environment inside the PC. I do have a Xonar D2X, and it was well worth it. But in this day and age with USB audio I no longer see the point in having a high quality internal sound card.

My SONORE one year on... I’ve lived with my Sonore for almost a year and after some initial teething problems, I’ve gotta say it’s a simply brilliant bit of kit and CA is the only way to go. Firstly an important qualification: Rather than a formal review of the Sonore unit itself, this is intended to be more of an “essential few steps in getting started toward CA, featuring the Sonore†as a more than capable central source. I’ll leave the more scientific reviews of the unit itself to those so equipped. I should also point out, that no-one asked me to do this, nor do I have any commercial affiliation with any of the companies to which I refer. Acquiring Sonore From the very first contact (from Sydney Australia btw) I found the support first class in every way. I was finding my way with computer based audio and went through an exhaustive learing curve, made all the more enjoyable by my natural curiosity, a high Australian dollar and the almost real time responses to my many questions. We then got to specific config detail, which in my case included an early generation of their standard box, 2 X 2TB Western Digital Blacks and WIFI - price agreed and I pushed the (paypal) button. All was in motion. Adrian proactively kept me in the loop as key events unfolded, with a shipping/tracking number. The box arrived about 3 weeks later, precisely on schedule. For reference my entire system is: McIntosh MC452 (L&R), McIntosh MC452 (Second Zone - 2 Channel), McIntosh MC303, McIntosh MX150, Revel Ultima Salon 2's (L&R), Revel Ultima Voice 2 (Centre), Revel Ultima Gem 2 (Rears), Revel Ultima Gem 2 (Second Zone), MIT Magnum MA (Interconnects/XLR's), Audience AU24e (Speaker Cables), Sonore Music Server, Oppo BD95, Pioneer Kuro 60â€, Nordost QX4 (Mains Purifier) Quantum Base QB8 (Power Distribution), Nordost Blue Heaven (Power Leads). Set up is as follows >> Unit is to reside in my rack, fed lovely 240v via the Nordost QX4 (Mains Purifier) Quantum Base QB8 (Power Distribution), Nordost Blue Heaven (Power Leads). I rescinded the wifi capability on fine tuning the spec., after a “doh†moment, in guidance from Jesus. Essential message here was that having the unit hooked into your network wirelessly is adding an unnecessary layer of complexity. Hardwire it straight to your router (if you can) and there’ll never be any “connectivity†issues. Simple. So its etherneted to the router, juiced from Nordost, talking via a 1 meter Cardas AES/EBU cable to the MX150 and controlled remotely by Berrie’s, MPaD app (more later), which can be “stolen†at 2.99 from that store. The Box – contents and mission The Sonore is an industrial Linux box (Redhat / Apache web server I believe), the heart of which is a studio grade Lynx AES-16 audio card (serious kit), which will be outputting, in my case, via the AES EBU to the AES 5 EBU MX150 input. So Linux, Apache, 2 WD Black’s and a Solid State drive where the O/S lives (makes sense right) and sufficient storage capacity for a gazillion CD’s (in excess of 50k tracks anyway, all losslessly encoded). Also, understand that the Sonore is what’s called “headlessâ€, Its mission in life narrowly defined as “store and deliver†when asked, nothing else. So you need an interface to it. Your options are both web and app based. The web GUI is nice but doesn’t provide the portability, responsiveness or flexibility of the iPad route, but gets the job done. MPaD is the player in the space here – natively and exclusively developed for the ipad/iphone platform, it’s evolved, attractive, highly functional and mercifully ad free. You need go no further. Plugged it all in, lit it up and after a few minutes while the MPaD and Sonore introduced themselves to each other, had full control of all my music in a simply brilliant GUI. Well so I thought. Now this is what I call “Support†No sound…….. zilch – disappointment city. Rechecked everything, I don’t know, maybe 1,000 times and still nothing. At this stage I’m thinking I’ve now got a $2700 music platform which is not only aesthetically uninspired, it’s also mute. I then called Jesus – the Sonore tech genius – who spent over an hour with me remotely logged into my laptop and rechecking all variables in the Sonore setup (trust me here, there’s plenty). I then, under Jesus’ guidance pulled the box apart to see if anything was awry. All looked good and the unit had tested perfectly before being shipped. This call was to be the first of perhaps a dozen calls , Jesus would have with me. Through all of this and various helpful inputs from Ron Cornelius and Chuck Hinton at Mac (who were all very supportive), I’m thinking the probable weak link here is the Sonore. A second Cardas cable was tried but still no voices. Adrian and Jesus remained 110% convinced it was a Mac issue and were standing by their components and build quality. Back to Florida The only real way to resolve this was to ship this puppy home and plug it into an MX150 there. Chuck Hinton promptly volunteered to send the Sonore chaps an MX150 (how cool is that?) and back for a short Florida holiday, went the Sonore. Within days Adrian, I think it was, popped up with an only just discernible “told you so†tone, to confirm that my box was fine and they’d traced the problem to what appears to be a non-standard config on the MX150 input. Without going into insomniac arresting detail, from what I understand, the hot signal and ground were non-standard on the McIntosh implementation and no configuration tweak we attempt would resolve it. Within a few days I had a confirmation from Adrian, cost/time to have Cardas perform a minor modification of my AES/EBU wire – something like 6 days and 80 bucks. About 10 days later DHL was grinning through my front door. Another really nice touch here before I forget: Jesus kindly offered as a gesture of goodwill, installation of newly available sotm sata filters (these cunning little devices contain/substantially eliminate unhelpful noise generated by the HDD’s before they get to your music signal) plus an upgraded bunch of firmware. Nice Take 2 Plugged it all in, lit it again, fired up MPaD, selected an album, selected a track a voila, noise. But not just any noise; arresting noise, immediately discernible with purposeful authority, intricacy and presence. It was at this point I’m thinking all that research was time well spent and that I’m going to enjoy getting to know and living with my Sonore for many years to come. A year on… Almost 12 months on, I’m still revelling in just how good this thing is. From the subtlest of highs to bass so effortless and enveloping and everything in between, the sound is crisp, sharp, detailed, delivering microscopically detailed soundstages with aplomb and where until now, they hadn’t existed. The highs are particularly intricate with effortless detail delivered so crisply that I’ve often looked at the top of my speakers, wondering, “how could you have made that sound?" (the bell in the MASH theme song for eg.). Of course Mssrs. Mac and Revel could stake a valid claim over responsibility here and while that’s of course true too, it all starts with the source. That’s why they call it the source. To now engage so conveniently with my entire music collection via a robust, beautiful GUI and a “so close to perfect, who gives a toss?, sonic quality†source, is indeed a revelation; ability to handle all your Redbook standard CD’s at 44.1 kHz and all the way up to the new, increasingly prevalent “high resolution†96kHz and 192kHz material, immediate, down to track level access to all of my collection, browse and search via album covers, tracks, artists, genres, etc., on the fly playlist creation – that you can sit down for 5 mins a create your perfect, occasion specific playlist is just awesome. And with almost 3000 watts of Mac power available, the neighbours are just loving it to bits too. Bless them. As an unexpected bonus it also outputs my several multi-channel (WAV and DTS files) with outstanding authority over all 6 channels, which the neighbours just love too. So your takeaways here are: 1. Throw out all of you CD’s – medium is dead, loose em 2. Sorry – re-digitise them first (EAC / FLAC) - yes it’s tedious, if you have capacity to outsource the learning curve, pay the kid next door to do it - with output tested, no variation workflow agreed (EAC/FLAC with all tags and album art) and then loose em. 3. Computer based audio is the only way forward; it’s moved on now to the point where sonic attributes can easily exceed those of more conventional, traditional sources. You’ve already bought your last CD. Notice how all the heavy hitters of the Hifi industry are now doing CA; they all have different/proprietary names for it, but open any of their boxes and you’ll find essentially the same PC based architecture wrapped around audiophile grade power supplies and other components. 4. Also check out – EAC, Jaikoz, MPaD, VLC, iTracks 5. The beauty in the Sonore is in its purity, simplicity and robustness – designed, engineered, purpose built for task, nothing else. It’s also an open platform where no proprietary surprises lurk. Yes it’s a complex beast but Jesus and the end product shield you from all of that. You just plug it in and turn it on as a preconfigured black box and your bragging at work the next day. Your laptop sees it as simply another drive, where you can drag/drop folders. 6. Macintosh support is legendary. Thanks to Ron Cornelius and Chuck Hinton, lovely work guys. 7. Quality/Bang for buck ? Under any objective measure the Sonore is the “AMG Black†of the class and without knowing it, probably defines the genre today. With criteria restricted to devices that “just store/output musicâ€, I challenge anyone to offer a demonstrably superior platform at any price. 8. And finally, the Sonore guys are exceptional. They take great pride in their craft and cheerfully go above and beyond what could reasonably be expected; hey I had Jesus working Sundays there for a while. They’re small, devoted pioneers within what will later be more mainstream acknowledgment of this as a transition period and deserve our support. The MX150 rocks . On a totally unrelated tangent, the MX150 has an uncanny ability to absorb stereo input (TV/STB) and via some very ingenious up-sampling, transform it into startlingly accurate 5.1, (shoved out via the MC452 2X 450w and the MC303 3X 300w) curiously isolating voice/dialogue to feed the centre channel, whilst presenting a discernible L&R and preserving enough nuances for rear effects. It’s really quite extraordinary and I’m not sure Mac itself even knows just how good it is. Your turn… Anyway, if you’ve delayed diving in to CA because it’s well you know, all a bit much, it’s time to get off your bum; the only tedious bit is getting your CD collection migrated – once done though, everything else sort of falls into place. Ohhh and another thing, don’t be a tosser and rip to MP3’s when 2 Gigs runs 100 bucks. I mean, really. Go to a Lossless only format, totally ignore all the WAV verus FLAC ping pong and go directly to FLAC, (EAC is the gear), also consider your folder structure, naming conventions, etc. before commencing and ensure you ID tag everything correctly as you go (Jaikoz). Once done, trust me you’ll love me for this tip. This article would have helped me immensely 12 months ago when starting out in search of a clearer understanding of all this. I humbly submit it as the foundation for yours.

I should be ashamed. I am guilty of gross audio negligence. I have a home theatre set up in the lounge. I have surround sound, custom built subwoofers, digital signal processing, DTS, room correction, the works. It takes me four remotes to drive it, but the enjoyment is worth it, so I manage. Not so my better half. I come home one Saturday afternoon, and there she is, happily clicking through yet another batch of cat videos freshly posted on Facebook, giggling away while surrounded by noise emitted by something resembling a pair of square Coke Zero cans. And not the big Australian mother of cans at 375 ml either, no Sir. This must be closer to the 330 ml European garden variety. Your honour, I submit to you exhibit A: I hang my head in shame. I repent and volunteer myself for community service, I shall try to make things right. But how? No token sale of indulgence would suffice. Salvation from this could not be simply bought, extended ordeal is called for. Therefore, it shall be DIY. At first, looking for inspiration, I did what everyone else does, and turned to the Oracle from Menlo Park for some advice, finding aplenty. How am I supposed to know which advice is worth follow? I considered building a closed box version of the 'Purismi'. Straightforward enough it seems, obtain a pair of Seas co-axial drivers, stick them into a pancake box against the wall like so: http://audiovideo.fi/opas/kaiutinrakennusohje-purismi-neljan-sahkoisen-osan-kaiutin-65-tuumaisella-koaksiaalilla I could fit he 2 x 20 L of internal volume in the space I have between the desktop and the bookshelf. However, 87 dB/W sensitivity and 80 W power handling (220 W short term) at less than a metre away for quiet to moderate listening levels is mighty excessive. That's gluttony staring right into your face. Think again. What about a small-ish full range driver in a closed box? A 3" or 4" driver, strategically positioned at natural boundary provided by table, bookshelf and back wall, for a meaningful extension at low frequencies: http://www.prosoundtraining.com/site/author/pat-brown/how-boundaries-affect-loudspeakers/ Turning to the oracle yet again, it soothingly tells me I again have plenty to choose from. I could try to get my sticky hands on some of the following: Vifa 9BG Vifa TC9FD18-08 or TG9FD10-04 Peerless PLS-75F25AL03-08 Dayton Audio CE 65W Dayton Audio ND90 or ND91 ScanSpeak 10F/4424G00 to name but a few. So this becomes a question of local supply and and refinement. I haven't heard any of these, not knowingly anyway, but usually the Scandinavian corner is a relatively safe place to start. Now, what to drive these with? Don't suppose a headphone amp would have enough oomph, not the reasonably priced anyway. Small amplifiers don't seem to be hard to come by, and I will likely only need a watt or two. At a metre away I would prefer them to be high quality watts though. I don't think I am ready for SET yet, but again, which one to choose? We have options including but not limited to Hypex DS 2.100, Dayton DTA100, DA30, DTA1, or DTA2. XTZ A-800 T-Amp (?) Ignoring the umpteen no-name ones on ebay, the NAD D 3020 power DAC could offer a single box solution, at a price point three times what I'm likely to spend on the rest... oh well, I suppose I could just get a pre-loved DacMagic and hook it to the idle Yamaha micro system amp, or to a 4040 Creek that's been on light duties for a while now. Whatever the combination, it would be nice if it could also handle plugging in a second computer and/or headphones. The re-configuration effort required to do so would have to be exactly zero. Zip. Nada. Anything else becomes too complicated. It would just have to automagically switch from one source to the next. This is so she can enjoy her cat videos and not be bothered with lowlier things such as switching things on or selecting sources. Any fiddling with plugging cables and we're back at the gross negligence where we started from. To conclude, your honour, I am willing to do my time, but I will need some guidance. Show me the way.

Hello. I wondered if anyone is using their PC as a music streamer, but finds the noise of their computer to be too intrusive? I was doing this for a while experimentally, and then part by part took away all the noisy components of the PC, and replaced them till I had a silent one. It takes a little time and know how, but well worth it to get rid of all that background noise. Sound quality wise I think CD players still have the edge, but for those who are streaming and want the convenience of everything coming from their computer without the background noise let me know. I am happy to do this as part of my hobby, since I believe it is not putting anyone out of business. I am happy to help for the cost of the parts, which are reasonably cheap (compared with hi-fi). I am not a computer engineer as such, but I am a sound engineer, and have approx 10 years experience with computer audio. Send a PM or leave a message. Cheers, Richard

http://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/downloads/Windows_7_Optimization_Guide.pdf Using the process described here, I managed to remove the dropout/unlocking problem between my PC and my NAD M51 DAC. Hope it helps everyone.

in my spare time, I like listening to music, so I want to buy a good computer audio, anyone can recommend some to me? thanks in advance

After 7 years my faithful Audio GD NFB 15.32 is dying on me, so I'm looking for a new solution. My use case is Windows PC -> DAC/Amp -> Headphones and powered speakers I primarily use my speakers over my headphones, probably about a 85/15 split. For what it's worth, speakers are JBL 305p MkII and headphones are Sennheiser HD 58X but both of these are subject to future upgrade, so I don't mind going with something that might seem 'overkill' for this tier of hardware. Features / things that I'm ideally after are; Great sound quality / specs for the price Pre-amp control for my speakers Being able to switch between headphone and pre-amp output without unplugging headphones (I'm used to having this with the Audio GD for years now, but I could adjust to not having that feature. I'd just rather not have to ?) Ideally have multiple inputs (USB, optical, coaxial) Nice build quality Balanced would be kinda cool but really, really not necessary The main unit I've been eyeing is the JDS Labs Element II combo, $400US. I own the atom amp in my turntable set-up so I have the utmost confidence in the sound quality of the unit, and I think the design is very, very sleek and would look beautiful on my desk. They also have a stellar reputation for their post sales support. The only major misgiving I have of it is that it only has USB input. Given that I'm only/primarily using it with my computer, that theoretically shouldn't be a problem, but it's not implausible that I might want to plug a game console into it along with my PC at some point in the future. I think it's just a bit of a bummer that it's single input for the DAC, it's always nice to have the option for other inputs. There is the option to buy the separate dac and amp units instead of the combo unit, but that's an extra $150US, which is too much. Another unit I've seen is the Monoprice Monolith THX combo unit, $499US. It's $100 more than the Element II, but, it has multiple inputs for the DAC and it even has a balanced headphone amp! I do find it annoying that it doesn't have balanced outputs for my speakers, though, which would be cool and seems like a missed opportunity tbh. Only 1 year warranty as well, which doesn't inspire a great deal of confidence at this price. At this point I'm just shopping around, but I'd appreciate any pointers or impressions. Thanks in advance!

Item: Elfidelity SATA filter Location: Melbourne east burbs Price: $20 shipped regular, $15 pickup Item Condition: As New, have the original packaging Reason for Selling: No longer needed Payment Method: Pickup - cash, Paypal Extra Info: See below Pictures: Att'd Improved SQ in my rig when my SSD was powered by the PC DC-DC, when the PC is powered by a LPS with a separate feed to the SSD it feels better to leave it out. Is it for you? If you're not using an SSD, sure. If you're using an SSD and not powering it separately, in my experience it was a good thing. If you're just keen to try, absolutely. Cheap bit of fun for those interested. PM if interested.

Item: See list below Location:Mosman 2088 Price: see below Item Condition: Reason for selling: Payment Method: Pickup - Cash, Paypal as friend, COD Only Extra Info: 1) Gigabyte BXBT-1900 (NUC computer running Vortexbox 2.4, 250GB SSD(M-Sata in adapter ) 2GB DDR3 Memory Music left on it if you like $100 2) RPI 3 in aluminium casing with internal CPU heat-sink and aluminium feet(Blue tacked on) Running Volumio on 8GB. Had this running on mains powerboard USB so RPI and micro power cable only. $70 3) Cubox i4 Pro (top specs version) Running Volumio and will include hifimediy sabre usb dac (also as USB/SPDIF converter) and quality Monster cable 3.5mm to stereo RCA $120

Item: Auralic Aries Femto with Linear Power Supply Location: Perth Price: $1100 Item Condition: mint Reason for selling: upgrading to G1 Payment Method: Pickup - Cash, Paypal, COD Only Extra Info: just love this streamer and now I have the upgrade bug can post if you wish at buyer expense , in as new condition. plenty of good reviews on the net Photos: Advertisements without photos of the actual item will not be approved.

Item: Antipodes Music Server. Location: Brisbane Price: $1180 (plus postage) Item Condition: Excellent Reason for selling: No longer required. Payment Method: Paypal Extra Info: Based on the CAPS 2 server as designed by Computer Audiophile. Featuring the Sotm tx usb 2.0 PCI card with Gieseler Audio upgrades. Solid State internal HD with Win 7 operating system. Fanless Design for ultimate silence. DVD/CD ripper built in. Outstanding sound quality by any measure. Pictures: