RPi 4B and DAC Hat

[premoddev]

Hello Guys,

Anyone using Raspberry Pi4B model with any DAC Hats like Allo Boss? I have a Pi 4B 4GB model and planning to add a DAC on it. Finally will be using as a streamer with Volumio or similar OS. But most of the DAC HAT boards are supported till 3B+ as per their site.

If anyone using similar setup with Pi4B, please share the experience here..


Thank you all.

Premod

 

[Anshul_J]

I recently got a digione player which came with a RPi4b, Allo may have updated Dac hats with rpi4b as well. Best to write a mail to them for clarification.

 

[premoddev]

Thanks @Anshul_J for the info... I have already sent mail, but no update even after a week time. Anyway I will write again... thanks.

 

[premoddev]

Finally I bought the DAC from fabtolab, which is more cheaper than the price quoted by Allo directly. Got it by next day with bluedart courier.

 

[Anshul_J]

Great, I also got mine from fabtolab. I was under the impression that the prices were same from both.

 

[MaSh]

Finally I bought the DAC from fabtolab, which is more cheaper than the price quoted by Allo directly. Got it by next day with bluedart courier.

Which dac did you get?

MaSh

 

[premoddev]

Great, I also got mine from fabtolab. I was under the impression that the prices were same from both.

Yes I was also in the same impression that the direct selling price will be cheaper...but it was on the other way.. anyway I had good buying experience as well with fabtolab, though it was my first purchase from them.

Which dac did you get?

MaSh

@MaSh I bought BOSS v1.2 DAC.

 

[MaSh]

Yes I was also in the same impression that the direct selling price will be cheaper...but it was on the other way.. anyway I had good buying experience as well with fabtolab, though it was my first purchase from them.

@MaSh I bought BOSS v1.2 DAC.

The difference in price could be due to Allo website is US based while fab2lab is Indian with Allo also being Indian based out of Bangalore?

Do give a brief impression on the Boss DAC. I read somewhere it has a Burrbrown chip, does it?

MaSh

 

[premoddev]

I had contacted Allo through their website's "contact us" form and they replied with the pricing, which is in INR. They mentioned, the mode of payment (EFT) and details in the quote, which is actually more (almost 40%) compared to the online pricing on fabtolab & waretohouse. So I went ahead and bought from fabtolab. I couldn't get a case for the same, as it is out of stock in fabtolab.... so running it without case.

Yes it has the Burrbrown PCM 5122 chip from TI... I got it delivered this morning and just started playing on RPi4 with different player images (runeaudio, moode etc..) and the initial imression is very good. It is currently connected it to the RCA port of an Edifier R1700BT active speaker pairs, which is not a perfect device to get all the juice from a DAC I guess.

Before adding this DAC, I have tested the Pi through the 3.5mm out and HDMI ports. Audio from HDMI out was very good and runeaudio worked very well, but in some reason, volumio and moode didn't work on HDMI out. Through DAC, all those players working and sound quality is almost same on all of them. I read it somewhere in this forum only this DAC have a burn in period of 2 weeks, not sure.. but waiting...

 

[MaSh]

I had contacted Allo through their website's "contact us" form and they replied with the pricing, which is in INR. They mentioned, the mode of payment (EFT) and details in the quote, which is actually more (almost 40%) compared to the online pricing on fabtolab & waretohouse. So I went ahead and bought from fabtolab. I couldn't get a case for the same, as it is out of stock in fabtolab.... so running it without case.

Yes it has the Burrbrown PCM 5122 chip from TI... I got it delivered this morning and just started playing on RPi4 with different player images (runeaudio, moode etc..) and the initial imression is very good. It is currently connected it to the RCA port of an Edifier R1700BT active speaker pairs, which is not a perfect device to get all the juice from a DAC I guess.

Before adding this DAC, I have tested the Pi through the 3.5mm out and HDMI ports. Audio from HDMI out was very good and runeaudio worked very well, but in some reason, volumio and moode didn't work on HDMI out. Through DAC, all those players working and sound quality is almost same on all of them. I read it somewhere in this forum only this DAC have a burn in period of 2 weeks, not sure.. but waiting...

That's wonderful. Thank You for the short crisp writeup. How does the volume control behave via Volumio?

MaSh

 

[premoddev]

All these MPD players are having nice web UI to control it on any devices(laptops, phones, tab etc.) connected on same network. Also there are apps available for android and apple OSs. Volume can be controlled using the web UI or app, also there is option you can completely bypass the volume controlling to the amplifer.

 

[jayakrishnan k]

All these MPD players are having nice web UI to control it on any devices(laptops, phones, tab etc.) connected on same network. Also there are apps available for android and apple OSs. Volume can be controlled using the web UI or app, also there is option you can completely bypass the volume controlling to the amplifer.

Hi Prem ,
Can we stream directly from sites ?like soundcloud

 

[smdeep64]

Hi,
I am using the BOSS DAC V1.2. I wrote to allo.com and they directed me to a Indian retailer in Pune. At that time fab2lab.com did not have the DAC in stock. The Pune company charged me almost double the price fab2lab.com charges.

I am using a Raspberry Pi 2 with the DAC. I read somewhere that the burn in period is 50 hours. I haven't used it for 50 hours as yet. I am using moOde audio player as my main source is a USB pendrive attached to the Pi. Volumio worked of a few days and then suddenly decided not to read the Pendrive. I tried multiple different pendrives, none worked. moOde works quite well.

Anyone using the Volt+ or Volt + D amp? Am thinking of buying it. Not much in the way of Youtube video reviews.

 

[smdeep64]

Hi Prem ,
Can we stream directly from sites ?like soundcloud

Most of the images for the Pi will have a Spotify plugin, some work with Tidal and Qobuz too. I haven't seen any Soundcloud plugins but am sure there should be workarounds.

 

[premoddev]

Hi Prem ,
Can we stream directly from sites ?like soundcloud

I haven't used anything other than Spotify and as @smdeep64 said it will support Spotify, tidal or qobuz but not sure about others. If you intend to use the dac on a latest Pi (3 or 4), bluetooth will be there, so you can stream from phone or computer through bluetooth. Bluetooth is readily available on Moode, but it's paid option in Volumio.

 

[premoddev]

Hi,
I am using the BOSS DAC V1.2. I wrote to allo.com and they directed me to a Indian retailer in Pune. At that time fab2lab.com did not have the DAC in stock. The Pune company charged me almost double the price fab2lab.com charges.

I am using a Raspberry Pi 2 with the DAC. I read somewhere that the burn in period is 50 hours. I haven't used it for 50 hours as yet. I am using moOde audio player as my main source is a USB pendrive attached to the Pi. Volumio worked of a few days and then suddenly decided not to read the Pendrive. I tried multiple different pendrives, none worked. moOde works quite well.

Anyone using the Volt+ or Volt + D amp? Am thinking of buying it. Not much in the way of Youtube video reviews.

Infact Allo quoted much higher than fabtolab and that's why I went with them.

I also tried with different images like runeaudio, Volumio, picoreplayer, max2play etc and finally settled with moodeaudio.

I am not having any experience on what you asked last..

 

[smdeep64]

Infact Allo quoted much higher than fabtolab and that's why I went with them.

I also tried with different images like runeaudio, Volumio, picoreplayer, max2play etc and finally settled with moodeaudio.

I am not having any experience on what you asked last..

Thanks for your reply!

 

[premoddev]

Nice to hear you have bought the BOSS player and RCA cable from Allo... even I also bought one RCA cable from Allo, as you said its a nice piece.

Not sure why the issue you are experiencing with Wifi..though few questions about your setup..
This issue is only when you add BOSS DAC in the system? without BOSS, RPi working fine on Wifi?
On which band your home wifi running, 2.4GHz or 5Ghz channels? I had some issue with 5Ghz channel, but work seemlessly on 2.4Ghz...

 

[Navi Kumar]

Hi,
I am using the BOSS DAC V1.2. I wrote to allo.com and they directed me to a Indian retailer in Pune. At that time fab2lab.com did not have the DAC in stock. The Pune company charged me almost double the price fab2lab.com charges.

I am using a Raspberry Pi 2 with the DAC. I read somewhere that the burn in period is 50 hours. I haven't used it for 50 hours as yet. I am using moOde audio player as my main source is a USB pendrive attached to the Pi. Volumio worked of a few days and then suddenly decided not to read the Pendrive. I tried multiple different pendrives, none worked. moOde works quite well.

Anyone using the Volt+ or Volt + D amp? Am thinking of buying it. Not much in the way of Youtube video reviews.

Hi..

I am using Volt+ and Volt+D amp on boss dac.. It works Really fine..

 

[premoddev]

Nice to hear about Allo's amps here...how is it differ between Volt+ and Volt+D sound wise? What are the speakers hooked into?