[Balthazar B]

(sorry to rain on your parade)
the PC USB card is more software / driver development than hardware. and potential software maintenance nightmares with each subsequent version of Windows 10 (e.g 1508 vs 1704 vs 1708 vs 1903 vs 1906 vs 2004). doesn't matter how fast / good the USB chip on the card is if the OS and streaming source doesn't have the bandwidth / processor speed / task prioritization to prevent data underruns to the DAC.

CD transport will have guaranteed quality vs any real-time off the internet streaming. (or cache the music files locally onto an SSD, then play back with other PC tasks stopped / minimized)

Maybe Schiit could rig it so that the card is supported only by Linux. It would be like a stealth campaign to rid the world of the affliction of Windows.

 

[Timster]

Foobar2000's interface looks from well, the year 2000 but for a free player works.

There are also a lot of skins for FooBar, so you can easily change the interface.

 

[ev666il]

+1 for Audirvana. It is great and well worth the license cost; besides, bit perfect is literally the only way it can work so you don’t even have to worry about setting it up for it.

 

[wout31]

For someone not familiar with audio players, settings and plug-ins Foobar is a no go monster that looks and works like a bad Linux fork.
Try something simple plug and play like Musicbee. Also 100% free.
Windows media player always goes through the resample to 48 kHz machine and will not play at the downloaded bit depth and sample rate.

 

[433521]

@Jason Stoddard you guys ever consider updating the product page for the Hel! to include the Dan Clark Audio Aeon RT and the ModMic / Hel package they sell? I didn't think I'd ever need the mic + input, but the other day I was late setting up a meeting and the computer with the photographs I wanted stream from my pc was being blocked by default settings in Zoom. I had to speak for two seconds to the admin but no camera, no mic and my phone was set up to stream in the other room. I could see the ... WAIT! I have a mic and an input right on my desk so I don't have to mess around "back there" with all the dust and cables. So I plugged in the ModMic to the Hel and put on the Aeon RT's, got the slide slow moving and the meeting was saved from my incompetence. So I actually used my Schiit uh, productively (no ).

BTW I love Hel. Great clean solid neutral sound. But the bass is great too!

 

[Pietro Cozzi Tinin]

For someone not familiar with audio players, settings and plug-ins Foobar is a no go monster that looks and works like a bad Linux fork.
Try something simple plug and play like Musicbee. Also 100% free.
Windows media player always goes through the resample to 48 kHz machine and will not play at the downloaded bit depth and sample rate.

Time for you to come by and explain all this to me.
Oh and... that bottle of excellent wipsie you gave me is finished......

 

[quimbo]

There are also a lot of skins for FooBar, so you can easily change the interface.

settings

My preferred interface

 

[wout31]

Time for you to come by and explain all this to me.
Oh and... that bottle of excellent wipsie you gave me is finished......

New stock is available.



Traveling by train and bus, not now thank you. Sorry.

 

[Clemmaster]

settings

My preferred interface

That’s very 1990s...

 

[quimbo]

That’s very 1990s...

Yep. Started programming for money in 1980, still like the look for things like this

 

[wout31]

As I said:

looks and works like a bad Linux fork

Tried it several times, but gave up. Nothing there others can't do and waaaaay too much work to get there.
Maybe improved a little over the years, but it is still a geek interface to get things working.

 

[adydula]

You better not be caught rolling NOS tubes with these new fancy music players!!!

Old players sound better with those old NOS tubes than these "in vogue" music players!!!

LOL!

Alex

 

[Ableza]

I finally stopped trying to cheap out and make free-ware work and invested in Roon. I am glad I did.

 

[bcowen]

Yep. Started programming for money in 1980, still like the look for things like this

Glad I'm not the only, um, well-seasoned person around here that still finds comfort in a DOS prompt.

DOS 1.1 was the first of the memory hogs, requiring a whopping 250 more bytes of system memory than DOS 1.0 (and yes, that's bytes without a K, M, or G preceding).

 

[bcowen]

You better not be caught rolling NOS tubes with these new fancy music players!!!

Old players sound better with those old NOS tubes than these "in vogue" music players!!!

LOL!

Alex

New players sound better with those old tubes too.