The Audiophile Thread

[BobM]

As to whether $4500 is "reasonable" that all depends on your budget. For a high end table it's cheap.

Well Robert, I stand corrected and apologize. I figured anything this costly would go against your preferences. Yes, I agree, for high end tables this is not over-priced, though I still think it is rather ugly.

[rcarlberg]

I'm not against high fidelity, and I'm not against quality construction.

I'm against audio woo.

[Pr33t]

Damn, that must take quite a motor to spin that platter.

[rcarlberg]

Damn, that must take quite a motor to spin that platter.

Not necessarily. It's all about inertia. If you're willing to wait five minutes for spin up a small motor works fine.

The restaurant at the top of Seattle's Space Needle rotates every 42 minutes. It is powered by one 1-1/2 hp electric motor.

[trurl]

Not necessarily. It's all about inertia. If you're willing to wait five minutes for spin up a small motor works fine.

The restaurant at the top of Seattle's Space Needle rotates every 42 minutes. It is powered by one 1-1/2 hp electric motor.

Good point, but if you have some kind of feedback control to keep the turntable at a stable speed aren't you going to want a motor powerful enough to make those speed changes quickly and accurately? Of course, if the corrections are being applied constantly and don't have to be very large the same argument applies I suppose.

[rcarlberg]

That's where mass becomes an advantage. Larger mass = larger inertia = less wow & flutter.

[rcarlberg]

In fact to read a woo-free article about tube-based electronics go here:
http://www.stereophile.com/interview...PYvurr6W73h.97

It *is* possible to discuss audiophilia without resorting to BS.

[Jerjo]

Can someone decipher this post from the Hoffman forum? I saw something about computer audio in a post and thought I'd open it to find out tips on how to improve the connection between my computer and my office system. This just left me baffled as to what this person is talking about. What the hell kind of difference can it make running your digital files through a server?

So I decided to take my current setup and dual-boot to Server 2012 R2 (formerly using Windows 7 Ultimate). Anyone else made the switch? I am honestly blown away at the difference. I was *really* digging my W7 setup but as with so many things audio, for one there's a difference between "different sounding" and "better sounding" and "you don't know what you're missing until you've tried something else."

...I was dubious as to any differences, but hopeful and even anxious to try. I am very glad I did. Server 2012 is just very good at music reproduction.

My ultimate goal is to use Audiophile Optimizer in "minimal" mode, then just control the playback and surf the Internet with my iPad. For now, just using Server2012, JRiver, and ASIO, I am really happy.

[rottersclub]

I'm not a Windows expert by any means, but my take on this is that the author got a copy of Windows Server 2012 R2 (which is a corporate type of Operating System, that is not something that Microsoft gives away). You can have multiple Operating Systems on Intel-based computers (usually Windows and Linux) and when you are booting, you are given the opportunity to select which O/S you want to run. My guess is that the audio components are all stripped out of the Server 2012 software, so you are getting a clean "flow-through" from the audio-player software to the DAC.

[trurl]

I'm not a Windows expert by any means, but my take on this is that the author got a copy of Windows Server 2012 R2 (which is a corporate type of Operating System, that is not something that Microsoft gives away). You can have multiple Operating Systems on Intel-based computers (usually Windows and Linux) and when you are booting, you are given the opportunity to select which O/S you want to run. My guess is that the audio components are all stripped out of the Server 2012 software, so you are getting a clean "flow-through" from the audio-player software to the DAC.

Well... that's new. The OS shouldn't be doing any processing/dithering to a digital audio path that I know of but... it's Windows, who knows...

[rcarlberg]

The OS shouldn't be doing any processing/dithering to a digital audio path that I know of but...

Well bear in mind, this is the *Steve Hoffman Forum.* Those discussions are often so far into woo that reality is a long-distance call.

[rottersclub]

I know a guy who built his own music server and used a version of XP in which he only installed the stuff he needed for the task. I think the same principle holds in this conversation. Remove all the extraneous stuff and then the processor and peripheral components only need to do the required processing, nothing more. No Internet, no anti-virus, etc. Hardly woo, IMO.

[rcarlberg]

I know a guy who built his own music server and used a version of XP in which he only installed the stuff he needed for the task. I think the same principle holds in this conversation. Remove all the extraneous stuff and then the processor and peripheral components only need to do the required processing, nothing more. No Internet, no anti-virus, etc. Hardly woo, IMO.

By removing "all the extraneous stuff" you free up processor cycles to process audio without waiting.

You DO NOT affect the sound of said audio.

[rottersclub]

Yes, I understand. The goal is to send a bit perfect stream to the DAC to process. But it works out to the same result, no? Less intrusive Windows crap = less potential data loss. BTW, now that I think back, I don't believe there were any fans in the server so he left the cover off to keep it cool.

[rcarlberg]

The goal is to send a bit perfect stream to the DAC to process. But it works out to the same result, no? Less intrusive Windows crap = less potential data loss.

You figure if the CPU is busy it simply discards bits?

Could be, I suppose. But it is my understanding it doesn't work that way. I mean that's true of a router:

(A different beast are input drops. Packets that the router’s CPU should handle go into an input queue. Once that queue is full, additional packets are dropped. Regular packets on their way to a remote destination don’t cause input drops on most routers; input drops are usually caused by a busy CPU or an excess of ARP or similar traffic.)

but I'm not sure this is true of a computr's CPU. Is it?

[Edit: Hmmm, maybe so - https://www.ableton.com/en/help/arti...nd-drop-outs/]

[rottersclub]

In my case, I am running a USB cable from my laptop to the USB port on my PREAMP/DAC.

[BobM]

The few bits of info I can contribute to computer audio are:

- you can get better sound using a USB connection into a DAC than you can directly from a soundcard (of any quality)
- You should use a dedicated USB port to feed the DAC, if another device is using that port then find another port
- find a good ripping program, they are not all created equal (JRiver is usually highly recommended, so is EAC)

[Jerjo]

It took some siphoning through the thread but I finally found Ken's description of his digital audio source:

....a modified Mac Mini which is running off of a Red Wine Audio Black Lightning battery power supply. For a DAC I'm using the Bricasti M1. Connection is via a Synergistic Research Active USB cable. Digital files are stored in another room on a Synology DS1812+ and fed to the Mac Mini via standard Cat6.

So if I understand this correctly, the Synology is just a external drive that feeds into the Mac. Files are played on the Mac, travel through the USB to the DAC and then to the pre-amp. Correct?

[LASERCD]

It took some siphoning through the thread but I finally found Ken's description of his digital audio source:

So if I understand this correctly, the Synology is just a external drive that feeds into the Mac. Files are played on the Mac, travel through the USB to the DAC and then to the pre-amp. Correct?

Yes - exactly. The Synology sits in my office next to my everyday computer - I can rip files while I'm working. I transfer the aiff files to the Synology since its on the network. I have a CAT6 cable running into the sound room from the Synology NAS and its connected directly to a modified Mac Mini which is used as a conduit to feel the files to the DAC.

[Jerjo]

So is the office computer a Mac as well? Do you use iTunes as a player on the Mini to control what's playing? I'm trying to figure out how to set this up when I get my DAC and I'm wondering what I should use as a media player to control everything. My default has always been Windows Media Player because it seemed to work the best as recognizing all my RIOS and lossless files.

[trurl]

So is the office computer a Mac as well? Do you use iTunes as a player on the Mini to control what's playing? I'm trying to figure out how to set this up when I get my DAC and I'm wondering what I should use as a media player to control everything. My default has always been Windows Media Player because it seemed to work the best as recognizing all my RIOS and lossless files.

Really? I didn't know WMP would even open a FLAC file. Winamp always seemed to be quite solid if it's not a piece of ruined bloatware by now.

[Jerjo]

Well, there's a little playing with the codecs to get it to recognize FLACs. But the majority of my stuff is in WAV anyway and I've never had a problem with that. I know some tags can get lost between converting from FLAC to WAV but I haven't seen any problems. I tried Winamp and it did a terrible job of recognizing files and ignoring tags. Same with Foobar.

[trurl]

Well, there's a little playing with the codecs to get it to recognize FLACs. But the majority of my stuff is in WAV anyway and I've never had a problem with that. I know some tags can get lost between converting from FLAC to WAV but I haven't seen any problems. I tried Winamp and it did a terrible job of recognizing files and ignoring tags. Same with Foobar.

Interesting. I don't doubt that Winamp has devolved into garbage. I'd say use a "pro" program like Sound Forge but that wouldn't really do things like playlists.

[LASERCD]

So is the office computer a Mac as well? Do you use iTunes as a player on the Mini to control what's playing? I'm trying to figure out how to set this up when I get my DAC and I'm wondering what I should use as a media player to control everything. My default has always been Windows Media Player because it seemed to work the best as recognizing all my RIOS and lossless files.

I only use Macs. No one on the planet uses iTunes for serious listening. The Mac Mini uses Audirvana for playback which I control with an iPad. Audirvana plays back all hi-res formats including DSD. I also have Amarra which sounds marginally better than Audirvana but still can not handle DSD files.

The Mac Mini has been heavily modified. It has a solid state drive to run the OS. The switching power supply has been removed and it is powered by a Red Wine Audio Black Lightning battery power supply. Super quiet.

I know that a lot of Windows users seem to like J River. Might be worth exploring.

[Jerjo]

No one on the planet uses iTunes for serious listening.

Hell, I never use it for anything other than loading my iPad but I had no idea what else you would use on Apple. I bookmarked Audirvana just in case we decide to go Apple in the living room. Might have to in order to have a decent solid state drive. But I'm looking at J River in case we stick to the Windows world.