Believe Windows audio sucks? Think again.

[Kannan]

For a machine dedicated for audio playback, it is good to disable services not needed for audio. Those services will remain disabled between boots.
For a machine that is not dedicated towards audio playback and is needed for optimized playback in a session (boot), those non essential services are stopped / suspended on demand for that session. They come back up on the next boot or till they are manually started/resumed in the same session.

But one can have the best of both worlds. You just need to create another partition (100 GB should be sufficient) on your drive. Let's call it the "AP" (Audiophile Partition - Ha!). Install a copy of Windows on the AP. Your old license can be used on this to activate Windows on this partition. Optimize Windows on this partition. At boot you get a choice of booting into the AP or Full blown Windows that you have already existing. Have your cake and eat it without getting an upset tummy.

I also tried the same way, but found it cumbersome to have a dedicated machine for audio, changing songs etc was a problem as I had disabled all services related to remote control and networking.

After I switched to ALLO based transports I found it is easy to control everything with a browser on the same network.

I am not trying to make any comparisons here, I like both as I was on PC based audio for nearly 5 continuous years.

Ultimately to each his own, whichever offers the needed convenience and honey to the ears.

 

[keith_correa]

I also tried the same way, but found it cumbersome to have a dedicated machine for audio, changing songs etc was a problem as I had disabled all services related to remote control and networking.

In my limited experience, nobody opts to disable the n/w services since it is important to them for the reasons you mentioned. They always choose to keep them enabled.

After I switched to ALLO based transports I found it is easy to control everything with a browser on the same network.

I can understand the convenience.

Ultimately to each his own, whichever offers the needed convenience and honey to the ears.

Absolutely right!

 

[RRR]

But one can have the best of both worlds. You just need to create another partition (100 GB should be sufficient) on your drive. Let's call it the "AP" (Audiophile Partition - Ha!). Install a copy of Windows on the AP. Your old license can be used on this to activate Windows on this partition. Optimize Windows on this partition. At boot you get a choice of booting into the AP or Full blown Windows that you have already existing. Have your cake and eat it without getting an upset tummy.

This is useful information. Thanks

 

[abhi80]

I have worked a lot with Windows for sound playback, used a1 grade powersupplies, Xonar cards etc etc hell even used external dacs.. Somehow for reasons not known to me the sound from a windows pc is never the same from something like a mac mini.. Maybe I am doing something wrong.. I have used Jriver and Audirvana Trials also with external dacs but Windows simply doesn't work for me...

 

[IndianEars]

FWIW
I have a 29inch iMac (5K display)

Its dual boot.... Mac n Win10 via bootcamp.

In my setup, Win10 sounds consistently better. I use JRiver ... official universal (win n Mac ) license.

Have tried various Mac only software... Prefer JRiver on Windows.

DAC fed directly via USB ( not ethernet)

YMMV

To each their own.

 

[Mayank Shah]

+1 to Jriver on Windows 10 via USB to DAC.