Raspberry Pi's are an underrated source.

[sajunky]

I don't think this falls in the catagory of "bit is bit is bit". All it takes is a spare SD card, try it out, and if you like it, keep it.

I don't think it is worth an effort. How long is Rpi on the market? How many models were introduced? And they didn't figure out that USB performance is a key feature. Now Rpi4 comes out which fixes some limitations and all efforts are still at adjusting system clock frequency to the transfer rate.

First things which shows immediately failure of this approach is that system clock is not directly linked to the USB frame rate as USB is a shared bus with multiple devices on the bus. Even with a single device USB driver waits for a proper time to send a next frame to the isochronous sink and precision of this moment is related to the delays in the interrupt driven routine that calculate this event in a software. Jitter is inherent in this design. I think there is confusion between bit-clock stability inside the frame and the time that marks the beginning of new frame. Number of samples inside the frame is adjusted a bit to achieve the average sample rate close to the standard audio sample rate frequency. It means that bit-clock cannot be used for the clock synchronisation, only a frame clock which is evaluated in a software.

Secondly and the most important is a point I made before. With a proper USB driver design there should be an option in software to switch to the event driven mode, similar to the applications for PC and MAC OS. Such option is mandatory as some older USB receivers cannot handle event mode, only a push mode (I described how it works in the previous paragraph). Lack of such option is an indication that Rpi is unable to work in the event driven mode and I know it would be wasting my time to try Rpi. Sorry guys...

 

[simon740]

Ok, I checked the RPI4 bus situation. USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 connect to each their bus. Of the four USB ports, two are USB 2.0 only, the other two are dedicated to USB 3.0, but handles USB 2.0 as well. The Amanero USB receiver in R2R 11 is USB 2.0, so if you get a USB 3.0 hard drive, you should be able run the two on separate buses. That way sq might not suffer from RPI4 working as both streamer and server. Also, with the USB receiver being Amanero, I think it might well be worth going with USB, rather than Coax. If you go the above route, and need help with pCP/LMS/iPeng along the wasy, feel free to PM me.

Hello,

so this mean that I can use USB 3.0 on rpi4 for my hdd/ssd and USB 2.0 for my Ares II dac? Hmmm...interesting

regards,
Simon

 

[kumar402]

All my streamers are Pi based . Digione signature and Pi2AES. Love them

 

[Zaurux]

I'm posting here, a problem with my new Rpi4 which absolutely does not recognize my Pegasus even though it works fine with my Allo USBridge (Rpi3 compute - GentooPlayer).
The RPI4 is under DietPi but I have tried other distributions with always a problem of recognition.
I wonder if this is a new RPI4 batch. I can't lock to USB2 or USB3.
More details about my problem here:
https://dietpi.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=9748

But without more support or solutions...

 

[rdale]

I don't know, I tried. I can't find such settings. It is more said about switching Rpi system clock between base frequency of 44.1/48kHz than anything else. This feature becomes irrelevant when USB frames are synchronised with a DAC frequency as opposed to a USB Host controlled transfer speed. I can't find such feature, sorry.

USB packets are always sent at the bus frequency of the USB host regardless of whether the USB audio is using asynchronous USB mode or not. Asynchronous USB allows the DAC end to control how much audio data is sent in the packets for flow control purposes, so that its buffers don’t overflow with data. The USB packets arrive in bursts every millisecond.

 

[sajunky]

USB packets are always sent at the bus frequency of the USB host regardless of whether the USB audio is using asynchronous USB mode or not. Asynchronous USB allows the DAC end to control how much audio data is sent in the packets for flow control purposes, so that its buffers don’t overflow with data.

I spoke the same all the time.

However there are two USB isochronous asynchronous modes for audio tranfers in addition to the older: synchronous (completely outdayed) and an adaptive mode (that brought first time satisfactory results). One with a frame clock created at the host. In this scenario USB host receives a feedback from a sink (USB terminology for a down stream device) and a speculative correction is taken based on this feedback. I described it in one previous post. It is a synchronised mode with a master clock on the receiver, so it should be no jitter added, but in practice a host may have problems with synchronising frames, reacting to the system requests in time. When there is a problem with synchronisation, we can hear short occasional prr.prr.. associated with music. As Rpi users speculate about improvements in SQ when adjusting CPU frequency to the multiplies of the audio 44.1/48kHz, I suspect that before Rpi4 came out, it worked in this mode.

A second mode is much simpler and easier to implement on the host, it require not so much resources and a transmission do not break so frequent. It is called the asynchronous mode with an explicit device end point. The end point is programmed to send requests for the next frame when a receiver is ready for it. Host do not decide when to send a next frame, just a device, it is a difference.

As some devices are not able to work in this mode, while there are reporting that they could, usually there a setting in the app to deactivate this mode.

 

[JazzVinyl]

I was slow to move to a small server for listening and did most of my listening on my PC or DAP, but since moving over to streaming locally I can't see going back

I use a Pi3b to fetch music off a hard drive connected to the router. It uses WiFi to fetch the tunes, sends the ones and zeros to a VDAC (that is powered by a much better than original power supply). Output of VDAC goes through a tube buffer running 2x 12AU7's then on to SS preamp and SS 120 watt amp, to DIY bookshelf speakers / sub.

Pi3 is running headless, I SSH into it from any PC (linux is best) or phone to control a command line player app called cmus (command line music). Works superbly!!

I wrote a bunch of executable sh scripts to help find exactly what you want to listen to, and send it to a playlist that gets loaded into cmus.

Here is a picture of the tube buffer (souped up with Supra and Mundorf (aluminum in oil) caps)

Only bad thing is...my wife also has the SSH app on her phone, and can (and does) turn the volume down from the other room!

.Cheers

 

[Brava210]

I love the reliability of Raspberry Pi4 with Volumio into iFi Zed DAC v2.
It's a simple solution and sounds so good with Tidal too.

 

[jmaz87]

I love using my RP3b with allo digi spdif and my RP4 over usb in different rooms using Volumio. I really loved using Plexamp but couldn't find a reliable way to "cast" from a phone and at least volumio supports foobar over upnp and tidal/spotify connect. guess I can't complain. they do need resets from time to time though...

 

[Jandu]

I love using my RP3b with allo digi spdif and my RP4 over usb in different rooms using Volumio. I really loved using Plexamp but couldn't find a reliable way to "cast" from a phone and at least volumio supports foobar over upnp and tidal/spotify connect. guess I can't complain. they do need resets from time to time though...

Both Moode and PiCorePlayer would work as well, you may want to try them out. Enjoy!

 

[jmaz87]

Both Moode and PiCorePlayer would work as well, you may want to try them out. Enjoy!

As alternatives to Volumio or for using Plexamp? I don't use the Volumio app to play music just tidal/spotify connect or foobar from pc via upnp which is nice. I'm still hoping Plex drops a new RPI OS I would be so happy

 

[Jandu]

As alternatives to Volumio or for using Plexamp? I don't use the Volumio app to play music just tidal/spotify connect or foobar from pc via upnp which is nice. I'm still hoping Plex drops a new RPI OS I would be so happy

As music server and player. Moode can do both with a single RPi, PiCorePlayer can do one or two (server & player) RPi mode.

 

[jmaz87]

My music Library is on a Plex Server on my PC so I use plexamp to play my local stuff or just spotify/tidal. when I'm home I use Foobar instead of Plexamp. What is the benefit over volumio?

 

[Jandu]

My music Library is on a Plex Server on my PC so I use plexamp to play my local stuff or just spotify/tidal. when I'm home I use Foobar instead of Plexamp. What is the benefit over volumio?

Sound quality is reported to be better.

 

[Ike1985]

Maybe somebody here can answer my questions, very hard to find answers:

1. I don't mind paying a bit more, is there a DAC-less streamer that is clearly better than both PIE2AES and Digione signature that I should look at for use with Hugo2?

2. What's the best way to connect the PIE2AES to Hugo2 for maximum sound quality?

3. What's the best way to connect the Digione Signature to the Hugo2 for the best sound quality?

4. Will I be able to stream bandcamp/youtube/jriver flacs from my Macbookpro to these streamers? I haven't really heard anyone talk about using these services with these streamers.

5. I understand that the Digione signature needs 2 PSUs, does that mean that 1 Shanti can power it or do I need to purchase 2 battery packs? Bit confused about the power situation.

6. On the software side, given my use cases above what do you guys recommend, volumio, Ropiee, something else?

7. Since I already have a Hugo2 would it make more sense to get the 2go? How do devices like PIE2AES and Digione Signature compare to the 2go?

Thank you