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Achieving High Fidelity Sound

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Ash Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28 Nov 2022 at 7:15pm
If I do find that the bridges don't provide any improvement in SQ, I will sell them. I may even begin to move away from x86 computers and dive into ARM SBCs like the Khadas Edge 2, powerful enough to be a desktop computer. I have been really tempted to try an M1 Mac Mini but I just don't trust Apple's scummy business practices enough to drop several hundred pounds on proprietary hardware further restricted by locked-in software. If it breaks, only Apple can fix it... Might wait and try and get an M1 one at second-hand prices. The Mac Mini is a small single board ARM-based computer in an oversized enclosure but with better software support than ARM developer boards.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Ash Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 04 Jan 2023 at 2:10pm
Just received a very very capable PC; a HP Z240 SFF (small form factor) computer for the tiny sum of £140 including shipping. What an absolute steal this is. It is a modular server-type PC with rich input and output options. Let's analyze what I got for the spend.

-Four low profile PCIe slots at the back. Gen3 speeds, two x1, one x4 and one x16.
-One PCIe Gen3 x4 M.2 NVMe drive at the front with integrated heatsink. Rejoice! 240GB M.2 drive pre-installed with Windows 11 Pro.
-Two USB 2.0 and two USB 3.0 on the front panel.
-Six USB 3.0 on the rear panel.
-Three Display Ports for multiple monitors. 4K resolution at 60Hz refresh rate is possible.
-Gigabit LAN ethernet, COM port, line-out and PS/2 ports
-16GB (2x8 dual channel) DDR4 2133MHz RAM
-Four SATA3 ports
-USB2.0 and 3.0 motherboard headers
-LGA1151 socket for 6th Gen Intel processors. This one has a quad-core, octa-thread Xeon CPU rated at 80W TDP. Going to swap it out with a passively cooled 2-core 4-thread i3-6100T rated at 35W TDP.
-Durable metal case for EMI shielding.
-Tray for HDD and SSD expansion.
-Optical drive with CD/DVD drive installed. Will upgrade to SATA Blu-Ray drive.
-Second bay for more storage. Front panel is removable so I could fit a PowerWire Bitzie in there with some modification.
-SD card reader on the front panel too.
-Have online manual and documentation for motherboard. Easily available device drivers.
-Small compact power supply. Hopefully no coil whine.

What a buy!

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Fatmangolf Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 04 Jan 2023 at 6:32pm
Impressive hardware, fully loaded. Hope it works and sounds very good.
Jon

Open mind and ears whilst owning GSP Genera, Accession M, Accession MC, Elevator EXP, Solo ULDE, Proprius amps, Cusat50 cables, Lautus digital cable, Spatia cables and links, and a Majestic DAC.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Ash Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 04 Jan 2023 at 6:49pm
In December, I got a Dell Optiplex 7010 SFF PC for £95 after I bought a set of feet for it and upgraded the RAM from 4GB to 8GB. Only two PCIe slots, no USB 3.0 and DDR3 (slower than DDR4) RAM. I will sell that one on soon.

This latest HP chassis has enormous upgrade potential and can house multiple storage drives as well as hold my S/PDIF and USB Pink Faun soundcards securely, still leaving two free slots for wi-fi/cellular networking and potentially a second NVMe M.2 SSD. So many options. I will post some photos when next on the desktop and after I have dismatled it for a thorough clean. The 150KB size limit here means I have to edit photos before being able to upload them. I should learn to host them elsewhere then link them on here instead.

Tomorrow, I have a Minisforum UM690 mini PC due, which should be a beast. This uses a Ryzen 6900HX processor and is the first time I will have used AMD instead of Intel. The integrated graphics are going to be game changing and the RAM is DDR5, which I could upgrade above 4800MHz to further push graphics processing performance. Integrated graphics have come a long way for gaming/emulation and are useful for other things too. Uses liquid metal instead of thermal paste as the contact interface. Can't wait to look through the BIOS and explore new possibilities.

Looking to keep the UP Squared V2, the UM690 and the Z240 SFF then sell all my other computers.


Edited by Ash - 04 Jan 2023 at 7:07pm
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Ash Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 20 Feb 2023 at 4:27pm
Received a Raspberry Pi 4B 8GB model yesterday to compare to the 3B+. The HifiBerry Digi+ Pro on the 3B+ is literally plug and play in Raspberry Pi OS; you just select the audio device in the menu. The Pi2AES Lite uses the same driver so should operate exactly the same. When paired with the 4B 8GB Pi, the DAK 5V 3A will be used, which should be sufficient even if I connect a Bitzie to the Pi and also connect some SSDs or a CD drive via the remaining USBs. No point in using a screen, mouse and keyboard; headless network control over wifi from smartphone or my main PC would be better.

I've got a big flat copper heatsink on the way for the 4B and the Pi2AES Lite stack height is quite tall leaving quite a bit of space underneath for heat convection, even when in its acrylic case. I favour the more powerful Pi variant as it would be great to rip CDs with it rather than being restricted to only a playback device. Might be a wasted effort though as the GPU is mediocre at best so DVD/Blu-Ray performance might not be up to expectation. The Minisforum UM690 I have with the Pink Faun PCIe cards attached via adapters could be the better option, especially as it should be a 1080p 60Hz beast for enjoying video games so all audio sources will sound the best they can and the DAK 5V 3A supply will still be implemented.


Edited by Ash - 20 Feb 2023 at 4:55pm
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Ash Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 24 Feb 2023 at 8:49pm
Okay, so I'm a few years late to the Raspberry Pi club... but I got around to it eventually. As I type this, I'm listening to some music through the HDMI into my TV speakers as a start. The sound is at least as good as it is from a desktop computer, if not slightly better, but from memory, about the same, but nice and clear and immediate. I'm powering the Pi 4B 8GB from a GETIHU  10,000mAh 5V powerbank so if the display were a 5V USB-C screen, this could be a totally portable setup. The powerbank has a charge % display and the Pi sips away at it very slowly. As expected, the graphics performance sucks. But for a headless audio application, I can see how much potential this has... As the Pi has Bluetooth and wireless networking, this could be set up as a Bluetooth audio device to receive sound from a PC or other device like a phone or controlled via another computer over a simple network. The entire audio signal can be wired from storage to speaker via a Pi so yeah, this is as simple as an audio computer gets. When I get the Pi2AES Lite connected to the Majestic DAC, it's going to slay... A networked controlled audio system is the best type of system because no hardware changes have to be carried out at all, no swapping of cables or anything, just a change of streamer on the network.

Smile

P.S The audio jack sound quality also sucks, as expected. USB audio on the 4B should be better than the 3B+ as the USB and Ethernet buses don't share bandwidth. I have the Bitzie here to try, both with the DAK 5V 3A supply and from the powerbank. Studio quality audio is genuinely portable thanks to the very high energy efficiency of the ARM architecture, large powerbank charge storage and efficient headphone technology like MySphere 3.1.


Edited by Ash - 24 Feb 2023 at 9:01pm
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Ash Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 31 Mar 2023 at 9:11pm
I have been researching more single board computer stuff over the last few months as I am quite fascinated with how small and powerful computers have become in recent years. In my desire to create an optimized audio PC, I have shifted towards modest power industrial motherboards. I guess my ultimate question is which computer architecture can I achieve the best sound quality (and ideally maximum versatility) with; x86 or ARM. X86 CPUs produce more heat than ARM chips so very small femto-ITX (Raspberry Pi 4B size) x86 form factors cannot rely on passive cooling. The X86 platform has plenty of audio software that I want to try though plus I have my PCIe soundcards to connect. What I eventually want to do is pit x86 streamers against ARM streamers, but nothing pre-made. I want to be able to control as many variables as I can. Perhaps I'm overthinking it but I'm quite curious about how they compare plus a man's gotta have a hobby... I'm considering getting a PICO-V2K4 (pictured below) single board computer, which is 100mm by 72mm, so is smaller than my PCIe soundcards. I can get up to 32GB DDR4 embedded RAM, onboard NVMe storage but there is an M.2 PCIe x4 slot too plus SATA and mPCIe. Ryzen embedded processor with decent integrated graphics and HDMI that can do 4K 60Hz. I could set this up fanless and if configured for the 10W TDP, could power it with a battery or powerbank. I could even power a portable touchscreen with the USB-C display out.

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