HQPlayer Impressions and Settings Rolling Thread

[shwnwllms]

NOS

Maybe Sinc L isn’t for you. Try DSD 256 with default filters

 

[Patu]

NOS

I’ll add the “HQPlayer fixins” made the sound less impactful, smoother, and notes generally weren’t as vibrant. Soundstage was expanded, but not in a good way. Hard to find the right words.

IMO, DSD oversampling is better than PCM oversampling with Spring 3. Also Sinc-L isn't that impactful and punchy sounding filter so I quite understand that NOS might sound more impactful. After all, NOS is perfect timing wise, not so much on other aspects. I'm also not sure why so many people want to run the Sinc-L. I guess it's because Sinc-L is the heaviest filter to run and people think that the heaviest one must be the best one.

For more impactful and clear sound, try poly-sinc-gauss or poly-sinc-ext2. And for DSD rates, DSD256 is more "in your face" and aggressive sound than for example DSD512.

 

[dericchan1]

IMO, DSD oversampling is better than PCM oversampling with Spring 3. Also Sinc-L isn't that impactful and punchy sounding filter so I quite understand that NOS might sound more impactful. After all, NOS is perfect timing wise, not so much on other aspects. I'm also not sure why so many people want to run the Sinc-L. I guess it's because Sinc-L is the heaviest filter to run and people think that the heaviest one must be the best one.

For more impactful and clear sound, try poly-sinc-gauss or poly-sinc-ext2. And for DSD rates, DSD256 is more "in your face" and aggressive sound than for example DSD512.

Sinc L to me at least is a legacy filter adequately improved upon by the Sinc LH.

Yes there is always going to be that “hard to obtain means better” mentality

Anyhow for impactful and clear sound, I would suggest the short MP or xtr short mp

 

[plumpudding2]

Sinc L to me at least is a legacy filter adequately improved upon by the Sinc LH.

Yes there is always going to be that “hard to obtain means better” mentality

Anyhow for impactful and clear sound, I would suggest the short MP or xtr short mp

Long apodizing filters cause a lot of ringing since a lot of recordings have a lot of energy in the transition band, the nice part of Sinc-L is that it's non-apodizing so while the impulse response is very long, it's not going to produce a lot of ringing especially not on good recordings because it leaves everything untouched. Kind of a way to have your cake and eat it too, but it only works for proper recordings.

For impactful and clear sound i've recently been absolutely loving poly-sinc-mqa/mp3 with ASDM7EC-fast 512+fs @ 512, the main difference between poly-sinc-short or gauss-short is that it rolls off early instead of late which works especially well for compressed pop music.

 

[IvanE92]

Sometimes less options is a good thing, lol. Apparently I need to experiment a lot more. Thanks everyone for your insights.

 

[Rayon]

NOS

I’ll add the “HQPlayer fixins” made the sound less impactful, smoother, and notes generally weren’t as vibrant. Soundstage was expanded, but not in a good way. Hard to find the right words.

To my ears 20 bits sounds exactly like that. Try with 18 bits. I've noticed that especially higher rates sound more open at 18 bits and I use it with 16fs and 32fs. That works nicely with lns15. Another good combination is 4fs with 21bits and gaussian dither, but it also works with 19 and 18 bits. 4fs punches well and is very revealing, but also more intimate.

Give PCM another chance. I used to be 100% DSD, but I've since learned that the reason was that I was using 20bits, which to my ears is just boring. It has more realism than 18bits, but it's so boring. It's a bit tragic that 20bits seems to be a general "set and forget" recommendation and many people may miss out on HQP'd PCM because of that.

 

[dericchan1]

New release. Testing the -6db fixed volume now!!

 

[shwnwllms]

New release. Testing the -6db fixed volume now!!

Nice! Glad Jussi was able to implement that feature so fast

 

[dericchan1]

Nice! Glad Jussi was able to implement that feature so fast

To be honest, I still dont know what the difference is between doing -3db then in matrix set -7db vs -6db fixed volume then in matrix set -4db.

Hahahahahahaha

 

[shwnwllms]

To be honest, I still dont know what the difference is between doing -3db then in matrix set -7db vs -6db fixed volume then in matrix set -4db.

Hahahahahahaha

Or setting min/max both at -4dB which is what I do now (old way of doing “fixed volume”). Not entirely sure what the optimizations are in the new way but if there’s a chance it’s more bit perfect or uses less resources then it’s a win ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[dericchan1]

Or setting min/max both at -4dB which is what I do now (old way of doing “fixed volume”). Not entirely sure what the optimizations are in the new way but if there’s a chance it’s more bit perfect or uses less resources then it’s a win ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Yes I used to just do min/max at -10db and not sure I ever heard any difference compared to now using this optimized fixed volume…

 

[LoryWiv]

To be honest, I still dont know what the difference is between doing -3db then in matrix set -7db vs -6db fixed volume then in matrix set -4db.

Hahahahahahaha

I don't have a pre-amp. to control volume ... I like HQ Player volume control to provide more range on amp. So for me not clear what fixed vol. would add...

 

[dericchan1]

I don't have a pre-amp. to control volume ... I like HQ Player volume control to provide more range on amp. So for me not clear what fixed vol. would add...

Well the fixed volume feature is obviously meant for use with an analog preamp. I just don’t find much improvements compared fixed at -6db and matrix -4db vs just do -10db min/max

 

[SmartCheetah]

Sinc L to me at least is a legacy filter adequately improved upon by the Sinc LH.

Yes there is always going to be that “hard to obtain means better” mentality

Anyhow for impactful and clear sound, I would suggest the short MP or xtr short mp

No filter so far has beaten PCM Sinc-L for impact, texture, and dynamics for me. I don't consider Sinc-LH a direct improvement, it's just different - more ethereal and distant. There are many other filters that are better at soundstage and holography etc., but I haven't found any that sound as impactful.

 

[dericchan1]

No filter so far has beaten PCM Sinc-L for impact, texture, and dynamics for me. I don't consider Sinc-LH a direct improvement, it's just different - more ethereal and distant. There are many other filters that are better at soundstage and holography etc., but I haven't found any that sound as impactful.

Individual preference I suppose.
Never a fan of Sinc-L. I did remember a couple years back when I had the Mojo 2 my preference was doing PCM with Sinc Medium or Long. Since then I have had a few other dacs like the ifi NEO, ifi pro idsd, the Cyan 2, Qutest, RME... but I always ended up just doing DSD only.

I guess I will never know since I have transitioned from having dacs that can do PCM but always opted for DSD to now I simply skip PCM altogether and only have DSD only dacs.