What is your configuration for Computer Audio?

[Nikhil]

One of the best things to happen to my computer set-up. In recent times, all my upgrades appeared to follow the law of diminishing returns. With some changes, I would perhaps not be able to hear the improvement without first reading the review, or without knowing the price, or in a double blind test. But not this time! The improvement these USB cables made took my breath away!. I got 2 of these cables, one between PC and regenerator, and the other between regenerator and DAC. They replaced my Shunyata Venom, a worthy contender.

The regular 1 foot cables each cost $320 or so, but I got I the 8" patch cables directly from Curious Cables in Australia for $120 each. Great service too. Relatively small investment but, man, what performance. They come with an 8 hour burn in but recommended is 50 hours. To me, they are fantastic from the word 'go'!

Congratulations Kishore! I was also curious about "Curious" but did not pull the trigger.
Great to know that they are working in your setup with such a positive improvement.

It's always really satisfying when these moves pay off.

Regards!


.

 

[rikhav]

I have now been using Roon since few months now. One pc on the network works as a roon server and i3 windows 10 laptop as a roon bridge
No linear supply or special network devices
Just a usb regenerator amber is in the chain with the usb out from the pc

I was really liking the sound from the windows 10 laptop which is not optimised processes wise , but still thought of trying raspberry pi as a roon bridge via usb out and amber regen

I again lost musicality in the sound shhch I got when using windows 10 laptop as soon bridge . Witg daphile too the sound was very clean but again lacked the musicality I get from the windows 10 laptop. Daphile as we all know is totally optimised for audio

Windows 10 specially after the creators update is sounding very good

Has anyone else experienced such a change with sound with different operating systems or experienced better sound wrt musicality with new windows 10

I know hardware matters a lot but in my case none of my laptop's using daphile or windows 10 are anything special

 

[Kannan]

Why do you guys prefer Windows on the Mac rather than Mac OS (from the music playback angle alone)?

No particular choice other than I have dabbled more with Windows than Mac OS. Also I prefer foobar which is no more developed for Mac.

 

[Gerry_the_Merry]

What difference does it make to sound quality or noise proliferation? I mean disabling versus physical removal. I also use a headless mac mini running barebone windows 7 via bootcamp as my audio source. I either use RDP or teamviever to control the mac mini from my laptop.

The physical removal is followed up with a test to confirm that the mac mini is acknowledging that there is no physical card anymore, and does not keep checking whether it has to be on standby. Disabling is akin to standby. The processes that lookout for when BT/wifi is switched back on don't get shut down.

If your question meant what types of improvement one gets in the sound, it really starts from a large drop in the noise floor, and that results in all round improvement, of such magnitude that one need not lose oneself in the details of the nature of improvement.

 

[Kannan]

The physical removal is followed up with a test to confirm that the mac mini is acknowledging that there is no physical card anymore, and does not keep checking whether it has to be on standby. Disabling is akin to standby. The processes that lookout for when BT/wifi is switched back on don't get shut down.

If your question meant what types of improvement one gets in the sound, it really starts from a large drop in the noise floor, and that results in all round improvement, of such magnitude that one need not lose oneself in the details of the nature of improvement.

What if you disable these services in the windows configuration

 

[Fiftyfifty]

What if you disable these services in the windows configuration

Or maybe Cocktail can do it on the Mac OS?

 

[Gerry_the_Merry]

What if you disable these services in the windows configuration

No idea buddy.

 

[sound_cycle]

Hi

I figured that this thread is for running configurations and did not ask on here earlier. Did not see any responses on the other thread I created. I updated that original question here.
https://www.hifivision.com/threads/computer-source-for-audio.70073/#post-774065

ciao
gr

 

[bornfi]

I installed trial version of JRiver and could hear the difference anything played through JRiver vs e.g. through Windows Media player. But since most of my listening are through Apple Music or Pandora, JRiver isn't suiting my needs. So, as usual while reading through internet articles found ASIO4ALL and ASIO Bridge and installed them. Now, what I have realized that the kind of benefit I was getting playing my personal music collection through JRiver is now available to anything played on my computer.

Since both the pieces are easy to install, I would encourage enthusiasts here to give this a try.

As for benefit, I would say that everything becomes more clear and thus increases the perceptibility. In other words, haziness around every piece of sound reduces drastically that gives a feeling of better separation.

 

[firearm12]

I use rpi+allodigione as the media player with osmc image on top of it. Osmc is basically Kodi as media player and we can install mpd on osmc for dedicated music playback (mpd is also the backend software used in volumio). Now with an mpc client on my android mobile I can control the music and with a Kodi client I can control the other media playback. It's super convenient and can be used for music and movies. Media can be stored in a USB or on Nas. Above all audio quality is way above any windows laptop I tried and can be left turned on 24x7. I don't think anything can get more convenient than this with audiophile quality sound for both music and movies and ofcourse streaming YouTube is a treat.

 

[adhingra]

Intel i5 NUC running W10 64bit with a 256 GB SSD
Audiophilleo 2 USB to SPDIF
NAD M51 DAC
Emotiva XPA 200 amp
Goldenear Triton 2 speakers

 

[Surrealistix]

I7 pc - roon - hqplayer
Allo usbridge with hqplayer bridge - sotm ultrausb with sotm sps 500 - T+A Dac 8 DSD

 

[audiocrazy]

Asus X 55 laptop.. Asus Xonar Essence Sound Card.. Jbl lsr 305

 

[jaiwant_alex]

Jriver on Raspberry pi 2 ,controlled with Android app
Schiit Modi Multibit DAC
Norge 1000 amp
Norge bookshelves

 

[blackscorpio]

Jriver on Raspberry pi 2 ,controlled with Android app
Schiit Modi Multibit DAC
Norge 1000 amp
Norge bookshelves

Which distro are you using to run Jriver on raspi?

 

[jaiwant_alex]

Which distro are you using to run Jriver on raspi?

Raspbian 9 (stretch)

 

[eastofthesun]

Hi guys , I have attached two diagrams , one of my current computer audio set up ( current setup diagram) which I intend to upgrade in a step by step manner (proposed upgradation diagram). I propose to do it in phases by adding components like a network switch ( SOtM sNH - 10G SE), followed by a USB signal regenerator ( SOtM tX - USBultra SE) and finally a Mikrotik Router (without wifi ) . Will keep you posted as the new additions happen .

Cheers!
Anand

 

[Gerry_the_Merry]

My old Windows Dell Studio with Intel Core 2 Duo with JRiver sounds quite nice, thanks to FM Keith. It is as good as my mac mini, perhaps a bit better. Running JRiver on both. JRiver is less configurable in certain respects than Audirvana Plus as one cannot change rolloff steepness and anti aliasing etc., but has other numerous customizations. But most importantly, it can be controlled from any PC using a JRiver panel web page. One can also stream music from the main mac mini or PC to one's workstation using the same control page. The windows has the advantage that I can use the eSata Port with a docked & powered HDD. In the mac, I am yet to figure out how to set up an equivalent, instead of using the internal SSD as I am forced to do now.

 

[edjamesx]

My system built mainly for watching movies & its little old dated ,but still works great .. Except some Dolby signal interruptions for some movies.

Intel I5 processor 2.5 GHZ
2GB ram
1 GB Nvidia Graphics card (with HDMI & DVI output port) - dont remember model number
Xonar sound card with SPDIF out , for dolby signals
500 GB in built hard disk ( no SSD , need to upgrade)
1 TB external hard disk

Player : mostly use Home Cinema media player
Sometimes Roku player

 

[Mayank Shah]

Windows 10 - x64 / Intel i5 4460 / Asus H97ME mobo / 16 GB DDR3 ram / Jriver & Foobar
Some German make USB cable
Schiit Modi Multibit
DAC RCA interconnects
Rega Elicit R
Mogami speaker cables
Tannoy XT8F