[Erick Muller]

Hey folks,

I am currently stumbling over many online discussions about which hardware to get to run HQPlayer at pretty high settings optimally.

I am in a bit of an interesting situation right now in that I’m buying a “new” PC for the sole purpose of running HQplayer, Roon will run somewhere else.

The PC is from a friend of mine, so certain components are what they are, but I can choose the graphics card:

Ryzen 9 5900x (12 core, 3.7GHz)
32gb RAM
1TB m.2 Samsung 980 Pro
750W Corsair PSU

Now the question: for DSD 512 with the more demanding filters, should I go for an RTX 3080 10GB
or is an 8GB 3070 enough? Does anybody have experience with those cards for CUDA offloading?

Cheers!

I'm using an RTX4070 with a PC with lesser specs than yours and I'm running DSD512 with really high end modulators and filters, no problem, only I have to deal with lag and very rarely I have to deal with drop outs. Hope this helps.

 

[shwnwllms]

Hilho.

I report.

Not really HQP related but is.
Today I trialed Tidal again in anticipation of reduced rate and more Flac conversions. While many titles still have not converted, today I noticed difference with Enable MQA core decoder toggled on in Roon as I have always had on in past. With files still triggering MQA Authentication and unfold to 88.2. This was not the case before or I can notice more now as result of minute changes since.

The sound was slightly off from usual so I tried the usual assortment of troubleshooting from uninstalling HQP and rebooting, etc. Roon had difference in sound compared to Qobuz still until I tried turning core decoder off. Now the sound is more similar as Qobuz Flac.

A non issue with files already Flac, but the ones triggering MQA authentication, with core decoder on, something seems wonky now from the past trials.

My previous understanding was allowing core decoder on was best and then upsample from there. This is not the case now in my test and base 44.1 without core decode is now equal to sound of Qobuz. Maybe something has changed now since their transition or this could be placebo. But, if one has noticed difference using Tidal or Tidal and Roon, this could be the reason.

I am curious if the flag for MQA is wrong and we are now being served Flac.



Core decoder on:





Core decoder off:

I’m not really sure what’s going on behind the scenes with Core Decoder on vs off in Roon, but I think you are on to something

I haven’t used Tidal for awhile, but like you I was under the impression letting Roon do the first unfold (Core decoder on) and upsampling from there was preferred

I was also under the impression that this setting made no difference to non MQA material so I left it on (and apparently forgot about it) when I ditched Tidal for Qobuz awhile ago

On a whim I turned it off today, playing Hires via Qobuz sounds better to my ears when core decoder is off rather than on. Better dynamics, perceived loudness, bass impact. Could be placebo, but it’s almost like there is some additional processing happening in Roon (even on non MQA content) when Core decoder is toggled on causing compression / loss of fidelity.

I have no data to back this up but as a Qobuz user it makes sense to have it off as a precaution to limit any DSP or chance Roon isn’t passing a bit perfect stream to HQP

 

[Promee]

Hey HQPlayer people,

Question for all of you, and please let me know if this is the wrong thread for it. I’m wondering if it is possible to set up HQPlayer Embedded on a Raspberry Pi 4 and use USB input from an iPhone and USB output to my Mojo 2. I’m thinking if I could use a setup like that with Roon Arc, that would be a wicked Upsampler + DAC/AMP combo for traveling. On a related note, I wonder if it is possible to use an app on iPad or iPhone to configure the player over USB. I stream most of my music from Qobuz via Roon Arc, so using a hotspot mode would probably complicate things a great deal. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated!

 

[gammi]

Currently having an issue with my Cyan 2 and HQPlayer where it keeps getting stuck in PCM mode even though I have it set to default to DSD. Not sure if it's an issue with the Cyan or HQPlayer. Thoughts?

 

[bogi]

Question for all of you, and please let me know if this is the wrong thread for it. I’m wondering if it is possible to set up HQPlayer Embedded on a Raspberry Pi 4 and use USB input from an iPhone and USB output to my Mojo 2.

Latest HQPlayer Embedded (as well as NAA version 5) adds some special functionality regarding USB input on Pi4 and UP board.
I would recommend you to use HQPlayer OS (bootable image, use raspberrypi4-holored image) for this purpose. It has USB-C port pre-configured for peripheral device role (USB slave mode).
Technically such a thing is possible only with specific peripheral device side hardware, which is contained in Pi4 and Pi5 as well as UP board and some Intel NUCs. Operation of such hardware is handled by firmware code, which is now part of the newest HQPlayer Embedded and NAA. Usual computers and laptops contain only standard computer ports in USB master mode, they are controlling device operation by means of device specific driver.

So this is possible:
iPhone ---USB cable---> Pi4 running HQPlayer OS ---USB cable---> DAC
Really it is with two USB cables. Pi4 is presented to iPhone as USB audio device, something like directly connected DAC. That's the new USB input functionality. You can redirect all sounds from iPhone to HQPlayer Embedded like to an external DAC.

It is also possible to use wireless way from iPhone to Pi4 by using UPnP, which is supported by HQPlayer Embedded. You can run mConnect Player or JPLAY on iOS as UPnP Control Point and send Tidal or Qobuz stream wirelessly to HQPlayer Embedded acting as UPnP Renderer, with output set to your Mojo. Going from phone wirelessly is easier for phone operation than to have an USB cable plugged into it, but you cannot pass output from any app to HQPlayer Embedded this way.

 

[Ghoostknight]

So this is possible:
iPhone ---USBcable---> Pi4 running HQPlayer OS ---USB cable---> DAC
Really it is with two USB cables. Pi4 is presented to iPhone as USB audio device, something like directly connected DAC. That's the new USB input functionality. You can redirect all sounds from iPhone to HQPlayer Embedded like to an external DAC.

oh, thats sweet, i was using a rpi4 + ian canadas transportpi digi for a while where i route audio from my main pc over usb to the rpi, hqplayer seems to make it way easier to make a pure digital audio processing chain

tho unfortunaly i came to the realization that this setup isnt much better than usb directly connected and running hqplayer on the main pc, but keep in mind it wasnt usb vs usb... i was using spdif to connect the rpi hat to the dac which probably is the reason..

 

[plumpudding2]

Currently having an issue with my Cyan 2 and HQPlayer where it keeps getting stuck in PCM mode even though I have it set to default to DSD. Not sure if it's an issue with the Cyan or HQPlayer. Thoughts?

On my Holo May HQPlayer cannot set the dac to DSD mode if it is enabled as an output device in Roon. Disable the ASIO driver in Roon and you can play DSD.

 

[wagninger]

I'm using an RTX4070 with a PC with lesser specs than yours and I'm running DSD512 with really high end modulators and filters, no problem, only I have to deal with lag and very rarely I have to deal with drop outs. Hope this helps.

This absolutely helps, thanks! I’m assuming win10 or 11 as the OS, and that DSD512 in general is more taxing than, for example, PCM 1.5Mhz would be?

I also saw that the 3080 has significant more CUDA cores than the 4070, which is what would help here, right?

 

[Erick Muller]

This absolutely helps, thanks! I’m assuming win10 or 11 as the OS, and that DSD512 in general is more taxing than, for example, PCM 1.5Mhz would be?

I also saw that the 3080 has significant more CUDA cores than the 4070, which is what would help here, right?

Windows 10, people seem to be having issues with windows 11 right now with HQP and drivers and all that stuff....Windows sigh.... makes you want to take the leap and change to a linux... but I'm afraid of change.

and yes, in general the 3080 is better than the 4070, from CUDA core count to bus width and all of that, for me the change to the 4070 made sense coming from a 2070, non Super.

 

[Promee]

Latest HQPlayer Embedded (as well as NAA version 5) adds some special functionality regarding USB input on Pi4 and UP board.
I would recommend you to use HQPlayer OS (bootable image, use raspberrypi4-holored image) for this purpose. It has USB-C port pre-configured for peripheral device role (USB slave mode).
Technically such a thing is possible only with specific peripheral device side hardware, which is contained in Pi4 and Pi5 as well as UP board and some Intel NUCs. Operation of such hardware is handled by firmware code, which is now part of the newest HQPlayer Embedded and NAA. Usual computers and laptops contain only standard computer ports in USB master mode, they are controlling device operation by means of device specific driver.

So this is possible:
iPhone ---USB cable---> Pi4 running HQPlayer OS ---USB cable---> DAC
Really it is with two USB cables. Pi4 is presented to iPhone as USB audio device, something like directly connected DAC. That's the new USB input functionality. You can redirect all sounds from iPhone to HQPlayer Embedded like to an external DAC.

It is also possible to use wireless way from iPhone to Pi4 by using UPnP, which is supported by HQPlayer Embedded. You can run mConnect Player or JPLAY on iOS as UPnP Control Point and send Tidal or Qobuz stream wirelessly to HQPlayer Embedded acting as UPnP Renderer, with output set to your Mojo. Going from phone wirelessly is easier for phone operation than to have an USB cable plugged into it, but you cannot pass output from any app to HQPlayer Embedded this way.

Thank you so much for this! That’s just what I was thinking as well. So it sounds like it would be the port that is also used for charging the Raspberry Pi, so it would maybe need some supplementary power, as I doubt the iPhone would be able to power the Pi 4 over USB output. Maybe with a Y-cable to connect phone and another charger… I’m definitely going to try this out, but I appreciate the confirmation - I didn’t want to go down the rabbit hole without knowing that such a setup was possible in principle.

 

[shwnwllms]

Thank you so much for this! That’s just what I was thinking as well. So it sounds like it would be the port that is also used for charging the Raspberry Pi, so it would maybe need some supplementary power

I believe you can also use a RPi PoE HAT

 

[wagninger]

Windows 10, people seem to be having issues with windows 11 right now with HQP and drivers and all that stuff....Windows sigh.... makes you want to take the leap and change to a linux... but I'm afraid of change.

and yes, in general the 3080 is better than the 4070, from CUDA core count to bus width and all of that, for me the change to the 4070 made sense coming from a 2070, non Super.

Don’t be afraid I switched to Ubuntu when windows Vista was about to come out, so nothing was as stable as it is these days…. One day I had an issue with my graphics driver and had to ssh from my dad’s computer to either recompile something or rewrite some lines in the driver myself to have monitor output again… fun times, but audio support was already way more robust than on windows…

 

[bogi]

So it sounds like it would be the port that is also used for charging the Raspberry Pi, so it would maybe need some supplementary power, as I doubt the iPhone would be able to power the Pi 4 over USB output. Maybe with a Y-cable to connect phone and another charger…

It's really possible. There are more possibilities of additional charging for Pi4.

USB-C PWR Splitter designed for Pi: https://www.pishop.us/product/usb-c-pwr-splitter/ with 3d print case https://www.printables.com/model/71952-usb-c-splitter-case/files (ask for option without barrel jack or it has to be desoldered to fit into case)

Serial port connection option to Pi with add on USB-C power port: https://www.adafruit.com/product/3589

Powered USB hub, for example this one tested by Jussi: https://www.tp-link.com/us/home-networking/usb-hub/uh720/

Powering through GPIO pins: https://forums.raspberrypi.com/viewtopic.php?t=248280#p1689955

Y cable: https://www.audiophonics.fr/en/usb-...c-for-power-supply-and-data-20cm-p-14052.html

I am interested to know also other options provenly working with Pi4 if somebody finds such ...

 

[jlaako]

high Q isnt that important i think... the gain you apply is actually usually more phaseshift bending then the Q factor (of course you can make it worse with high q but the gain determines largely how large the phaseshift is, and therefore how much FIR needs to correct

Higher Q makes the filter, and thus ringing longer. Lower the center frequency, the more. Of course also level of the adjustment matters a lot. Some low 1 - 2 dB is not as bad as cross-over filter.

i might have a question here... i noticed that nearly all Poly filters have somewhat a similar sound but are quiet different to FIR or sincM variants, i kinda dislike them, is there something to Poly filters that make them "worse" to others?

No, the poly-sinc ones are technically (mathematically) the best ones.

Of course, if one is used to sound of the simplest traditional approaches, you may notice certain lack of certain glare and harshness.

 

[jlaako]

I know! I'm just very curious whether there's something that makes up for the poor transient timing and high frequencies that makes it appealing to me, or whether my ear just doesn't seem care much about these things. I would expect music reproduction that has broken transients and high frequencies to also sound wrong to the ears.

I would say there are two aspects. One is the top-end roll-off NOS has. And another is lack of the time-domain ringing aspects. So for your case, I would try with various filters categorized "short".

I find it less likely that the ultrasonic leakage and the resulting intermodulation products would be among the "nice" aspects.

Sorry maybe I should have clarified that indeed the top picture represents a very long filter and the bottom picture represents NOS. You do agree though that the top picture is kind of a visual representation of what happens to your music transient with a very long filter?

Not really, rather a very slow smooth blur (fade) from the background to the object. So more like out-of-focus picture.

That kind of effect that is shown in the picture is more feature of the particular filter design. Also analog filters and minimum-phase filters are more prone to such behaviour.

So what is the consideration is a way that removes the jagged edges, but doesn't cause the blur (out of focus) nor the overshoot (accentuated edge). This is feature of the filter's transfer function, and the reason we have so many different filters that each have somewhat different properties in multiple aspects (since this transient reproduction is not the only aspect).

I really love gauss-long and gauss-xla but for some reason gauss-short has never really clicked with me.. do you like it yourself or prefer poly-sinc-short-mp?

poly-sinc-short-mp is my go-to "progressive rock filter". One of my favorite albums is Pink Floyd's Meddle. And I've listened that album countless times while developing that filter and many times since. Especially the San Tropez track from that album. And this is with the old original RedBook mastering (which is the best). Point was to get all the transient (drumming) snaps just correct. This recording is originally analog, and thus doesn't suffer from digital problems.

But depends on the content!