Author Topic: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real  (Read 11900 times)

Offline richidoo

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Re: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real
« Reply #15 on: April 12, 2017, 10:26:24 AM »
Volumio is working great. Airplay is always on, works good. Volumio sounds very good all by itself without resampling, unlike Moode. Moode has the excellent SoX resampling available which is required when using Moode in a high resolution system, imo. Volumio will be adding resampling once they find a version of MPD that is stable enough to handle the high processing demands. That made me wonder if the Moode stability issues I experience are due to having SoX resampling set to max (32 bit 354kHz,) which sounds glorious. Without Moode resampling turned on, upper mids are pretty harsh and unrealistic. The same test track (Coltrane Lazy Bird) has much smoother and realistic tenor tone, but slightly glassy cymbals, but otherwise very engaging. I don't expect perfection from a $75 digital source. But it is good enough for me at the moment.

I am using an OLD version of Sol's I-15 integrated amp. It is less resolving than the Mod-86 amps, so when I put those back in service this week, their higher resolution may expose more tonal issues with Volumio. Upgrades breed more upgrades.

At the last G2g, jtwrace brought over his SOtM sMS-200, a $600 highend, audio-optimized streamer, like uRendu. It sounded great with Anand's Mod-86 amps. So that's an option if I find the Volumio/Pi not good enough.

Volumio 2.0 has no easy way to program custom webradio stations. You have to edit the list file manually, remotely.

Volumio had resampling and webradio stations in ver 1.5, so they are supposedly in the pipeline for replacement in 2.0.

Offline tmazz

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Re: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real
« Reply #16 on: April 12, 2017, 03:21:04 PM »
Upgrades breed more upgrades.

Ain't that the truth.  :roll:
Remember, it's all about the music........

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Offline richidoo

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Re: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real
« Reply #17 on: May 27, 2017, 08:07:16 PM »
Couldn't get volumio to connect to my USB Dac tonight futzed with it for an hour before loading the Dac driver on my laptop to hear music. I will waste another hour tomorrow to ditch volumio and go back to newest version of moode audio for one last try at RPi before moving on to a PC

EDIT: Moode 3.7 up and running. I was using 3.4 last time. Lots of bug fixes and improvements since then. Looking forward to trying it out again. No Spotify Connect as was promised, but Airplay is still there, hope it works better now.
« Last Edit: May 27, 2017, 11:10:56 PM by richidoo »

Offline richidoo

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Re: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real
« Reply #18 on: June 15, 2017, 06:14:20 PM »
Jus keepin it real, yo...  Rpi is out of my system. After playing an album, working fine, suddenly Moode wouldn't scroll down through my NAS folders. It showed the first few folders, it was not frozen, everything worked fine, as long as I only wanted to play the first 6 artists in a folder.

I enjoyed unplugging it without first issuing shutdown command. That felt good. I needed it to be OFF asap. I wanted to throw it across the room hard, but I restrained myself to a soft throw only a few feet against nearby wall. There was a satisfying bounce. I think it felt slight pain, which was my goal.

My wife tried to tease me about it, so I threatened to turn it into a TV server and let her have fun with the bugs while she tries to watch "Fixer Upper." hehe

Sorry, but it's just too buggy for me. If I was 20-something and just as interested in linux as music I'd be fine. But I want it to be an invisible, reliable appliance, and it's not that yet. Volumio, Moode, different versions, all buggy. And can't play Spotify on it.

I'm spoilt by Sonos. But my DAC chokes on so much jitter. Really don't want to DIY anymore, so looking for a more fully baked streaming appliance.

Offline Nick B

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Re: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real
« Reply #19 on: June 15, 2017, 08:26:46 PM »
Jus keepin it real, yo...  Rpi is out of my system. After playing an album, working fine, suddenly Moode wouldn't scroll down through my NAS folders. It showed the first few folders, it was not frozen, everything worked fine, as long as I only wanted to play the first 6 artists in a folder.

I enjoyed unplugging it without first issuing shutdown command. That felt good. I needed it to be OFF asap. I wanted to throw it across the room hard, but I restrained myself to a soft throw only a few feet against nearby wall. There was a satisfying bounce. I think it felt slight pain, which was my goal.

My wife tried to tease me about it, so I threatened to turn it into a TV server and let her have fun with the bugs while she tries to watch "Fixer Upper." hehe

Sorry, but it's just too buggy for me. If I was 20-something and just as interested in linux as music I'd be fine. But I want it to be an invisible, reliable appliance, and it's not that yet. Volumio, Moode, different versions, all buggy. And can't play Spotify on it.

I'm spoilt by Sonos. But my DAC chokes on so much jitter. Really don't want to DIY anymore, so looking for a more fully baked streaming appliance.

Well, at least you got rid of some frustration...and a mediocre product. I'm loving my Auralic Mini nowadays. Don't know if it would work in your application. I probably mentioned this in another post, but Wyred4sound makes a board for Sonos. It is over $500
Nick
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Offline richidoo

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Re: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real
« Reply #20 on: June 15, 2017, 09:45:24 PM »
Thanks Nick.

I have the Auralic Vega DAC, trying to find good input for it. They make good stuff!

I did try a W4S Sonos a long time ago, but I preferred the stock Sonos so I sent it back. It had that "SRC sound," but there's no way to defeat the SRC.

I don't want to give the wrong impression. There's nothing wrong with RPi, as millions of users love it. There's only minor issues with the free music player OS, they're almost there, and it's no problem for a normal person to cope. Just reboot it and it would work. For $100 all in it is a miracle value with superb sound quality. The problem with it is me. I don't want to reboot it. I just expect too much from it. I'll give it a rest and try it again sometime.

Meantime I just ordered myself a SOtM SMS-200 for my berfday Tues. I've heard it sound great in my own system and seen it run flawlessly in less than ideal conditions. I got 1yr Roon for $70, so if that combo don't float my boat then I'm just incorrigible.

Offline mfsoa

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Re: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real
« Reply #21 on: September 16, 2017, 04:40:55 PM »
I have an Allo Digione  https://www.allo.com/sparky/digione.html coming to sit on one of my Pis. Supposed to cure the common cold and save the honeybees.
I'll run PiCorePlayer on it and output via RCA to my dac. The USB unput of the dac is fed by a fanless, cheap but amazing little PC https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01M24W77N/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o05_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 running Tidal, or JRiver, or YouTube, or Internet radio, or...
IME for bit rates that can be handled by both USB and RCA, the RCA wins out by a bit. More solid. Of couse if you want to go beyond 24/192 you need USB...
-Mike

Offline richidoo

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Re: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real
« Reply #22 on: September 16, 2017, 08:16:59 PM »
That's really cool Mike! I will definitely check that out.
Do you find PiCorePlayer to be very stable and reliable? Do you use LMS and Player running together on the Pi?
Thanks.

Offline mfsoa

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Re: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real
« Reply #23 on: September 17, 2017, 07:41:05 AM »
Hi Rich,

I run LMS on my main PC that's in another room, where the music is. I have many different LMS clients (if that's the right term) around the house so I treat the main PC as the mother ship and run the Pis, Duets, Radio and Touch from it. Haven't tried LMS on the Pi itself.

I have never had any stability /reliability issues with PCP. It's just a great program IMHO.

-Mike

Offline richidoo

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Re: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real
« Reply #24 on: September 17, 2017, 12:09:27 PM »
Nice! Thanks Mike

I like your idea of different digital inputs to the DAC for low res and hires streaming.

Offline mfsoa

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Re: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real
« Reply #25 on: September 17, 2017, 02:03:13 PM »
The ultimate goal is to get a Singxer SU-1 to go between the mini-PC and the dac so I can go I2S directly into the dac.

Hard drive - PC#1 - switch#1 - switch#2 - PC#2 - Wyred Remedy - future SU-1 - dac.  The purist audiophile  :rofl:

Offline HAL

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Re: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real
« Reply #26 on: September 17, 2017, 02:45:44 PM »
I have an XMOS XU208 USB to I2S Bus interface Singxer U208 board running on my MS-3 running Windows 10 Home Premium x64.  Going to be using it with an AKM AK4495S DAC via I2S BUS.  I just installed their USB 3.20 version driver and the board was running.

Going to compare it to the Amanero U8 Combo 384 USB board.

Not the SU-1, just the board level product. 

Offline shadowlight

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Re: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real
« Reply #27 on: September 19, 2017, 05:50:58 PM »
I have to agree with Mike that piCore is one of the simplest and stable setup for Pi.  I have tried both Volumio (sp?) and Moode Audio, with issues.  If anyone wants to try a Pi setup with Allo Kali and Piano DAC let me know and I can send my setup on tour.  It is configured to have LMS running on another system. 

Offline mfsoa

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Re: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real
« Reply #28 on: December 16, 2017, 05:31:57 AM »
If you accidentally feed a Pi with 9V, it goes POP, a little smoke comes out and it smells funky. Yup. In that order.

Offline HAL

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Re: Raspberry Pi - Keepin It Real
« Reply #29 on: December 16, 2017, 10:41:43 AM »
Sorry to hear you let the magic smoke out of the Pi.  :cry: