Why use foobar?
Oct 31, 2004 at 4:59 AM Post #16 of 51
About the Chaintech, it all depends on how serious you're gonna get. I got the chaintech, and I'm already starting to regret it, because, as with many others, I'm really getting sucked into all this evil, head-fi crap. i.e, my system plans are growing fast enough that an EMU 0404 or 1212 would make a lot more sense for the price. But, as of now I have crappy HK speakers so a chaintech does make a lot os sense. I think there is an audible improvement even with crappy everything, and I'm only using ~192kbps+bitrate mp3's... I'll use 128 if I absolutely can't find it in another bitrate or if it's LAME mp3 encoding, which is the best. Honestly, I can't really hear any difference yet anyways.

Did I mention gapless playback? For some reason winamp doesn't have this by default, which I think is totally stupid. As a trance fanatic, this is a must... It makes me want a Rio Karma.... but they have HD issues that scare me off. The iPod doens't take too long to load songs, anyways, I guess.
 
Oct 31, 2004 at 5:00 AM Post #17 of 51
A friend told me that a highly likely cause of "popping" from pc sound can be because of the 1/4" jacks from the back of the soundcard getting a knock now and then. He said that soundcards (like the E-Mu 0404) are much better because they have external looms and will last longer and have less interference.

Now I'm leaning towards the plan above but with the E-Mu 040 instead
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Oct 31, 2004 at 5:09 AM Post #19 of 51
One thing that caused pops and clicks for me, which was very rare until I changed to Chaintech and was putzing around with the foobar settings... when I had some of the settings wrong I'd get a lot of pops/clicks. Now that I have everything set properly, I have no problems. I have a feeling that with the right settings in foobar you may be able to eliminate the problem, this way. Worth looking into, at least.
 
Oct 31, 2004 at 6:18 AM Post #20 of 51
I think you should listen to both and make your choice. I'd like to start off by saying I am no audiophile and I just listen to the overall song and not the nitty gritty details that a better ear may notice. I've listened to both Foobar and Winamp uneq'd. Winamp under Direct Sound and Foobar in KS and really I don't notice a different despite all the settings that I've applied. However I do use it because it's less strain on my computer and I like the difference in interace. I've used Winamp for many years and I've decided that I'd like something new to look at.
 
Oct 31, 2004 at 7:06 AM Post #21 of 51
Crackles and pops, if they're kinda quiet, not super loud, are often caused by a bad cd rip. Not much you can do about that, especially if you downloaded the mp3s from somewhere. Does it do this with your own CDs that you play on it?

Or, it could be something else entirely.
 
Oct 31, 2004 at 7:59 AM Post #23 of 51
None of the pops I'm hearing are from the song file because whenever I hear one I rewind 10 seconds and listen to the same passage again.. The pop NEVER happens again. I'm going to listen to CDs and see if it's related to Winamp.
 
Oct 31, 2004 at 10:56 AM Post #24 of 51
ASIO, KS, resampling, etc, etc......plus with Columns UI, you can still have a cool looking program:

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Oct 31, 2004 at 12:48 PM Post #25 of 51
I beg to differ. Foobar's output IS a million times better than most mainstream MP3 players. I gave a friend of mine foobar and said to try it against iTunes and he said there's absolutely no comparison. It also has way better quality than a bunch of other music-service type programs, like RealRhapsody, MusicMatch, and WMP of course (the new version has worse quality, if anything).

Tweakable? You bet.
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Oct 31, 2004 at 1:58 PM Post #26 of 51
Something that nobody has mentioned thus far, is that I AFAIK, Foobar is the only player to decode internally at 64-bit precision, which doesn't mean a whole heck of a lot if you're just playing an mp3/flac/ogg/whatever straight... but if you're also applying replaygain and equalizer settings, it makes an appreciable difference in potential artifacting.

I went back and forth on Foobar vs Winamp for a long time, and finally settled on foobar for it's robust power. It does EVERYTHING... and even though my cpu has more than enough horsepower, I like the fact that Foobar still uses less cpu time and less memory than winamp to do the same resampling and bit-depth.
 
Oct 31, 2004 at 2:32 PM Post #27 of 51
To answer many of your questions rincewind:

Foobar:

Foobar is the best audio player out there, period. It supports all file types, outplug/input plugins (asio & kernal streaming come with), many DSPs, great EQ, better DB tagging, customizability, cue file support, etc. And yes, it does 64 bit internal precision, winamp is 16 bit.

Winamp requires way too many plugins to make it even useable.

That is a decent speaker/amp combo you have, I have the same amp, and the monitor 5s, you do not need a headphone amp with that NAD int. amp, it is more than sufficient for what you have, when you upgrade to the 650s, you may consider a much higher end headphone amp, one that costs quite a bit more than the NAD.

#1 thing you need to do is replace your source, this may sound harsh, but I suggest you erase all of your 128 mp3s, it will get you motivated to replace them, you need to start buying CDs, and/or finding other sources to get high quality music, I would go no less than 192 CBR, preferably you want lame extreme VBR encoding for mp3s. But otherwise, rip your CDS lossless. With that quality of gear, anything less is a waste, even with a new soundcard, playing those mp3s will sound horrible.

I would skip the chaintech, and go straight to the E-MU cards. Buy some quality interconnects, you'll need 1/4 -> rca check out headphile.com for their custom ICs that will match the E-MU cards.

I would not upgrade your cans until you have upgraded your source, and listening material. Welcome to head-fi btw

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Oct 31, 2004 at 3:56 PM Post #28 of 51
Quote:

Originally Posted by rincewind
None of the pops I'm hearing are from the song file because whenever I hear one I rewind 10 seconds and listen to the same passage again.. The pop NEVER happens again. I'm going to listen to CDs and see if it's related to Winamp.


How much CPU is Winamp or Foobar using?
 
Oct 31, 2004 at 5:16 PM Post #29 of 51
I'm having the same problem with pops. In my case, I'm fairly certain it's the power. I get crackling when I switch on the light, and a very loud pop when I switch it off. Yesterday I even picked up what appeared to be radio communication! I have no idea how that happened, but I assume it was some very local transmission...

So, I have given up on using my PC as a source. At the moment, my main source is a SlimX 450.
 
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