Upstream of the Caiman (Beresford)

[Welder]

To answer a couple of your questions Chris.
I was using dplatency checker inside Wine. While the latency figures may not be accurate it does show up any peaks.

It seems Voyage MPD will do album art, remote access and a lot of other stuff I haven’t worked out yet.
I’m going to try Voyage MPD with Sonata inside Virtualbox on the PC next.
The laptop is in need of some post multiple crash attention

[Krisbee]

Well, Ubuntu wouldn't be my first choice for Linux, not least because PulseAudio is too embedded. There is a specialist audio version called “Ubuntu Studio”, but I don't know much about it.

The techradar article gives a good summary but starts from the point that it's all too complex, so it is rather negative. Man one''s complexity is another's flexibility. ALSA for example has at least as good if not better support for many sound cards than Windows except for some notable gaps like Lynx and the advanced Cmedia chips as data was not released for Open Source development. ALSA offers excellent and fine control over stuff like mixing, format and sample rate conversion.

I would agree that the introduction of PulseAudio seemed an unnecessary complication, and avoided it like the plague. But as a KDE user I could not avoid the introduction on Phonon when KDE moved from version 3 to version 4. My a/b comparison of sound apps under KDE3 and KDE4 didn't show anything detrimental and I stuck with using a Xine back end for KDE4 sound apps.

But my PC is a for general purpose as well as multimedia use and I haven't been overly paranoid about audio optimization other than the obvious things like avoiding mixers, sample rate conversion, format conversion and software volume controls. The SQ of audio playback over may DAC is very good to my ears. Perhaps it's possible to squeeze a little more out the audio performance. Right now I don't have a spare partition to install “Voyage MPD” properly and haven't tried running it from a LiveCD yet, it's only installed as Virtual Machine (VM). I must do this to cf with my other Linux installs and see if I can hear any real improvement, my guess is that with my ears and kit I won't detect a difference.

If you are interested in latency have a look at this:

http://www.alsa-project.org/~tiwai/s...io-latency.pdf

There's also an application called “latencytop” available for Debian based Linux.

You can mess around with kernel versions with different pre-emptive schedulers and real time features and different Linux files systems (ext3, ext4, ReiserFS etc.) to your heart's content, that's not something that is available to any Windows user.

If you want to build a sort of DIY Logitech Touch (which is an embedded Linux device) for audio on hardware like the ALIX m/boards then something like “Voyage MPD” or Vortexbox fits the bill.

Have a look at these:

http://cheap-silent-usb-linux-music-....blogspot.com/

http://plug.noloop.net/sheevaplug-ha...ext-to-speech/

http://www.computeraudiophile.com/co...-Music-Servers


But on a standard PC you could simply chose to install a server or base version of your favourite Linux which has no desktop environment (ie. no Gnome or KDE) and install the audio stuff you need. There also lightweight desktops like OpenBox, FluxBox and Xfce to try.

I don't have the experience to analyse the logitech Touch's performance critically, I've never heard one but it would be interesting to cf it with my current kit. People say it struggles when loaded with USB drives and both squeezecentre server and client reside on the Touch itself.

If you going to test “Voyage MPD” as a virtual machine in Vbox, then to get network connectivity between your real machine and the VM you'll need to use either “bridged” or “host-only” in the Vbox network setting. This allows you to install sonata or another MPD client on your real machine (host) and to control MPD which is running on the VM (voyage guest). Otherwise the default NAT network mode in the Vbox settings will only allow you to run MPD and a client on the virtual machine.

"Host-only" is more straightforward to use as you don't need to mess with the network config inside "Voyage MPD", unless for some reason you need your real machine to be network reachable from inside the The VM.

This is about as far as I got the other day, I've not had a chance to load any of the MPD web clients into the VM. this would let you point your real machine's web browers at the VM and control MPD.

[Labarum]

I've just read this thread from beginning to end and I'm quite exhausted.

I have a stock Squeezebox Classic connected to the Caiman by phono lead because I need the Toslink for the telly. If I'm watching video the audio is carried by HDMI to the TV and looped through to the Caiman by Toslink - it's plenty good enough. If I want to play FLACs directly from the laptop (not often) I connect by USB and run Foobar. With or without WASAPI mode it seems to make no difference.

I can hear no difference between phono S/PDIF, Toslink and USB through headphones or Quad 405-2 and speakers.

If I was starting today I would not bother with the Squeezebox and do as Stan suggested: use a Caiman with cheap Netbook for everything.

Why all the fuss? Just plug it in and listen to the MUSIC!

[Welder]

Thanks for the links Chris.

Back in the day when I had record players I was tweak mad. What helped a lot was having access to a machine shop and knowing how to use the machines and knowledge of what I was trying to achieve and why.
Now it’s a computer for a source. I was introduced to computer based audio by a friend and having heard his system and not heard anything as good to this day I suppose I’m trying to head towards that but without the same level of funds or knowledge. This is the guy who sorted out Voyage MPD on my server when my patience ran out.
I like to know a bit about how stuff works in general and Hi Fi tweaking keeps me amused and probably slightly deluded in believing I’m making considerable improvements to the sound.

So, the objective is to build a file based source that is an improvement over the Touch in power, connectivity, flexibility and hopefully audio quality and teach myself a bit more about computers as I go along. I’m fairly confident with the Windows stuff but as my friend warned me, there will come a point when Windows just won’t let you do what you want without coding knowledge and then it’s over to Linux (his system is Linux based) and it looks like I’ve reached that point.
Oh well, it keeps the brain cells moving around.
I’ll bear in mind the advantages of Host Only configuration. I’m only setting this up on the PC as a learning exercise really. It’s all a lot quicker and easier on a more powerful machine than my laptop.

I’m a bit annoyed with myself for not going for a virtual machine with Ubuntu. I chose dual boot and once Ubuntu is on, grub makes it more than usually difficult to remove. Lesson learnt methinks.

I did consider the Alix board style setup at one point but I was advised that I may find it short of processing power and connectivity options when it comes to trying out DSP applications and hi res formats. It is a good option for the money though when one considers the OS is pre installed and all that’s needed is a power supply and case to get up and running.

Chris Connaker runs an interesting site over there and seems to be a genuine and knowledgeable enthusiast and not overly prone to much of the audiophile hype. I visit the site from time to time but it doesn’t have quite the same atmosphere as AOS.

@Brian

“Why all the fuss? Just plug it in and listen to the MUSIC!”
Sure, a netbook and a Caiman may indeed do the job but where’s the fun that!
Also, I believe it can be bettered and I don’t want a netbook or a Caimen.

[Tim]

Why all the fuss? Just plug it in and listen to the MUSIC!

That is indeed a valid point, but at John's own admission he's a tweaker and modder and is learning (and saving money) along the way. As I think I have stated elsewhere, there's no right or wrong way, it's what works for the individual - just plugging in is not enough for some people (me included). I sit somewhere in the middle, having started with a netbook and a Caiman, but soon realising I could better it by building a dedicated server. I'm not inclined to go much further at the moment, but I have a 2TB Win7 server that gives me just what I want, much better performance than my CDP and instant access to my entire music library - best thing I ever did and I haven't spent a fortune getting there either

[Krisbee]

Why all the fuss? Just plug it in and listen to the MUSIC!

Well this is basically what I did, connected my Linux PC to a Stan DAC and enjoyed the results.

But for those, like John, who want to pursue alternatives, Linux certainly offers the possibility of something different to a standard PC as a computer transport for file audio. And with many web refs, the ALIX board + embedded Linux with MPD is a very doable project at a reasonable cost.

You could, of course, elect to pay circa £2300 for a Bryston BDP-1 digital player. Take the lid and what have you got? See Below.

A OEM modified ALIX 1.d m/board running Linux and MPD, the bottom half of a ESI JULI@ sound card (Envy24 chipset), modified to give a standard BNC coax connect or AES/EBU (XLR) for digital out, a power supply that has a £10 Mean Well PM05 at its heart with added electronics to give a clean 12v DC to power the board, a display (only readable up close) , standard consumer electronic control buttons linked to the m/board's comm header, and a fancy box. No doubt the embedded Linux has been tweaked but you'll never now how unless you can use the player's rear comm port to connect to it.

£2300 is a lot of money compared to something you could put together for around £200 plus the time to get your head around the Linux configuration and is going to sound just as good.

[Krisbee]

No doubt the embedded Linux has been tweaked but you'll never now how unless you can use the player's rear comm port to connect to it.

That wasn't one of my more lucid comments, the BDP-1 has a single lan port so depending how the embedded Linux is setup you could simply connect to it using ssh.