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[Gerry_the_Merry]

Since most of my music is digital, have decided to get serious about computer audio. All these days I was running a optical SPDIF from a media player into Accuphase DAC. The sound was laidback and soft, though quiet.

I have now introduced an i7 quad-core mac-mini with 4GB ram (2012 model). Am currently trying out different digital USB cables. They do seem to change the sound, but the basic sound is not settled as of now (it is quieter, but am just playing wav files through iTunes). I am connecting to a TV through HDMI, and using 3 USB ports (mouse, keyboard, DAC).

A few things to do:
- get rid of the monitor and use a Windows laptop (which is in the same room) as controller. I have experimented with Chrome Remote Desktop. Takes 5 min, but very slow. Also fuzzy. Cant see the full Mac screen (especially dock) in the PC window. Will complement with control through iPad remote. Problem is making playlists is not very easy. Must experiment with better remote software. Am gambling that better software will start happening in 2013.

- with the above, one can be rid of the USB mouse and keyboard as well. Will stick to apple Bluetooth Mouse and Keyboard (which I already have from my other Mac).

- download trial versions of Amarra, Pure Music and Bit Perfect. Will stick to flac for now. Will if needed, batch convert using DBpoweramp or XLD to AIFF. Will choose one - obviously this is not the only factor, but Amarra seems to be thankfully able to play flac off its own playlists.

- Improve isolation from vibrations (have no clue if it matters, but will do it in a minimalist manner).

- make sure by disabling various functions (which all???) that bit perfect feed is given to DAC. Am pretty sure the DAC is not asynchronous. I am hoping that the internal buffer is sufficient for re-clocking on the fly. The DAC has other strengths (fits into the amp itself instead of cluttering the space with interconnects).

The music belongs to many genres - Indian / Western classical, musicals, rock, a bit of jazz, sufi/qawwali/ghazals. Let us see what goes best.

 

[ranjeetrain]

Looks good to me.

Personally I would not dot on a Mac box to be the best transport. It is a good one, indeed a good one, but can be bettered, IMO. I have used Mac as well as Windows laptops as transport. The best feel I have got is from a Windows laptop.

Why are you using USB Cable connection? Did you find it superior to SPDIF from the Mac?

I couldn't hear a difference between USB cables. All my cables are good though. Never used a el-cheapo cable. They have all sounded same to me, including an USD 80 USB cable from Nuforce.

 

[mowgli80]

Different USB cables should not change the sound. Generally, all digital communication protocols including the USB protocol have some form of error checking checksum embedded. I simpler terms, reciever will always know if the signal gets corrupted. So cables should not really matter. I think USB is better than spdif optical because spdif optical has limitations on the resolution it can transmit. However for supported resolutions, both USB abd SPDIF should sound similar.

 

[arj]

Ranjeetrain, USB is much better to the Mac SPDIF. also the reason Mac has better USB is only due to better cards in use by Apple. using a desktop on Windows with a separate internal USB card (and not the motherboard native) greatly enhances the output quality. also the native SPDIF converter is very jitter-prone. I have used an airport express in the past and a re-clocker made a big difference.

Not sure of cables on USB..but ive tried it on Firewire and cables did make a difference.

Main problem I have with Mac is you are limited to FLAC and Apple Lossless other than Wave.

 

[cooltoad]

I am using audirvana (not plus - got it when it was free before it became a paid app) and it plays flac, ape, 24/96(of course downsampled with my 16/44.1dac). I've also converted many files to ALAC for convenient playback with itunes with the remote app of ipod/ipad. Still, it is cumbersome and i miss the convenience of foobar. But the overall mac experience is satisfactory with no need to reinstall in 2 years, no firewall, no AVS(not the case at least for me with windows).

 

[Gerry_the_Merry]

Thanks guys for your comments.

- Chose mac because of my impression that it is likely to be almost noiseless whereas normal PC definitely has audible fan noise, wherever I have seen. Haven't dared to experiment with fanless cooling etc. as I feel these are not yet fully ironed out by the audio community

- chose i7 instead of i5 principally because the stock release is better configured in terms of HDD and RAM, and I was not worried on the extra heat/noise etc. of the i7 in a well engineered comp.

- I am going to widen the software list to bit-perfect, pure music, amarra and audirvana. JRiver for Mac will be shortly in also, as per Computeraudiophile.

- USB because in mac, the toslink is an minijack socket, and I don't feel comfortable with that or adding a minijack to normal toslink converter, though these are available from good brands. But along the way, will try that also, though till now I have found it a bit noisy.

- DAC has 24/96 only in USB and toslink, but 24/192 on coax, but since I dont have too many 24/192, have skipped trying to extract this advantage via coax (for which I would have had to go windows PC + sound card way).

Arj, when you did firewire what was it at your DAC end?

 

[arj]

double post

 

[arj]

....

- USB because in mac, the toslink is an minijack socket, and I don't feel comfortable with that or adding a minijack to normal toslink converter, though these are available from good brands. But along the way, will try that also, though till now I have found it a bit noisy.

- DAC has 24/96 only in USB and toslink, but 24/192 on coax, but since I dont have too many 24/192, have skipped trying to extract this advantage via coax (for which I would have had to go windows PC + sound card way).

Arj, when you did firewire what was it at your DAC end?

I used an M audio audiophile SPDIF converter which i fed into my DAC (Reimyo DAP77). the sound quality fluctuated with Firewire cables.
But my transport was still doing a better job so stopped my experimentation till this genre evolves a bit more.

regarding Toslink..it is heavily compromised in the converter chip which converts from Digital to Opti..suggest you go USB. in fact the cable used to transmit is also compromised as most are plastic..AT&T used to make a great Glass cable but it is not so widely available these days.

 

[Staxxx]

I have about 4Tbs of digital music now and am seriously also committed to it. I found that different digital cables (S/PDIF) made a HUGE difference in the sound in my system, which, however, is very revealing. I am not sure about USB cables and the interface although I hope to try it at some point using the DAC in my Esoteric player (K-03) which has an ansynchronous input. Perhaps something to plan with our audiophile friends in Bangalore.

 

[Gerry_the_Merry]

Have converted the MM to a headless config. At present connected to router by wifi, and the same network has a windows laptop for controlling.

The software for Remote Desktop is splash top. I am satisfied with the Mac screen appearance on the laptop, and latency is minimal.

This lets me remove USB mouse, keyboard and HDMI connection to TV for browsing. Downside is that splash top does not have a very good iPad App.

For iPad control, using the music playing software is a better idea. I am going to experiment for music playing software over the next 2-3 months with Audirvana, Pure Music, Amarra, Decibel, Bit-Perfect. By the time I am done, J-River for Mac is expected to be ready (mid-feb). That is my destination since I have heard PC audio with Jriver, and the user interface is extremely impressive. Ultimately the sound will matter more so I intend using the trial versions fully before deciding.

There are a host of other strip downs I have done which I will list in a subsequent post. These include removing various unwanted settings, widgets, processes etc. They have contributed to major improvements in sound compared to the initial output.

But many more changes are still to be done to raise the tempo of the music.

 

[jls001]

..AT&T used to make a great Glass cable but it is not so widely available these days.

Now I know what that optical port mysteriously marked "AT&T" on my DAC means But that new found knowledge does not make it any more useful as my sound card has plain old TOSLINK, S/PDIF and AES/EBU and no AT&T (I use AES/EBU).

PS: And I thought AT&T is a telecom carrier!

PS 2: Happy New Year, everyone

 

[jls001]

The software for Remote Desktop is splash top. I am satisfied with the Mac screen appearance on the laptop, and latency is minimal.

Interesting config you have there! How does it compare to your earlier digital sources?

Also, does Mac support something like a Windows Remote Desktop. As long as the music computer and controlling computer are on the same (WiFi) network, I find Remote Desktop very convenient.

I have read very good things about Amarra. Please try this player first. Also, since you now run Mac, you can probably think about Spatial Computer (though it's hardly cheap).

 

[hydra]

I have the same opinion about Amarra. Last week a friend and I A-B'd his Mac Mini running Amarra (full version, with iTunes as the front-end) with my Win 7 Music PC running JRiverMC v17. Other than the transport and the connectivity (MM via USB and Win 7 Music PC via Coaxial), everything downstream was the same.

The MM + Amarra wiped the floor with JRiver. Everything was better on Amarra: Stage width, height, tonality, everything. In fact there was significantly more attack and speed in the MM+Amarra combination as compared to my Music PC+JRMC combination. In fact, JRMC was sounding quite lazy and sleepy, as compared to Amarra.

Just last month I'd bought a CDP for transport duty and spend a significant amount on some CDs from Elusive Disc (Mostly what I already had on FLAC in my PC). I now regret not having spent that amount on buying a Mac Mini instead.

 

[Gerry_the_Merry]

Mac supports a Windows Remote Desktop but only for controlling the Windows PC with a Mac, not the other way around. Other RDs I have tried include Google Chrome Remote Desktop (terrible, and keeps shutting down), Team Viewer (needs login every time on the headless Mac Mini, which means that I have to connect the keyboard, then login, then disconnect the keyboard, and is extremely slow). The one which is highly recommended for controlling mac from PC is Real VNC (mac already has built in VNC), and I will get to that.

In this config, using windows PC, i can shut MM down if I want, and press the power button on MM to restart it, and it is primed to automatically login, and I have fed splashtop into the login script, so splashtop starts on login, and hence no need to use mouse, keyboard, TV. After this I start teh windows PC, and run splashtop, again with password remembered from previous login, and can immediately see the screen of the MM.

Eventually I must wire the MM to the router and disable wifi, but before this, other improvements (especially a good C7 power chord), need to be made.

I had heard a decent CD player in my system - Arcam CD37, and this is vastly superior. It is enabling me to enjoy the amp properly for the first time. Will get to Amarra too, but since it is the most expensive, must try out all of them before deciding. Bhagwan uses J River, and that is uppermost in my mind. Will look at Spatial too. One step at a time.

 

[hydra]

If you use a playback software that will accept iTunes as a front end (like Amarra), you will be able to control the music playback via the iTunes iPad app (over the same network). I used to hate iTunes, but the current version (and the app) is excellent.

Amarra now has a mini version (fewer features) that's reasonably priced ($49). It's called Amarra HiFi.

EDIT: I'm not 100% certain, but I think Amarra itself (without iTunes) can be controlled via an iPad App.

 

[karmapilots]

Since most of my music is digital, have decided to get serious about computer audio. All these days I was running a optical SPDIF from a media player into Accuphase DAC. The sound was laidback and soft, though quiet.

I have now introduced an i7 quad-core mac-mini with 4GB ram (2012 model). Am currently trying out different digital USB cables. They do seem to change the sound, but the basic sound is not settled as of now (it is quieter, but am just playing wav files through iTunes). I am connecting to a TV through HDMI, and using 3 USB ports (mouse, keyboard, DAC).

A few things to do:
- get rid of the monitor and use a Windows laptop (which is in the same room) as controller. I have experimented with Chrome Remote Desktop. Takes 5 min, but very slow. Also fuzzy. Cant see the full Mac screen (especially dock) in the PC window. Will complement with control through iPad remote. Problem is making playlists is not very easy. Must experiment with better remote software. Am gambling that better software will start happening in 2013.

- with the above, one can be rid of the USB mouse and keyboard as well. Will stick to apple Bluetooth Mouse and Keyboard (which I already have from my other Mac).

- download trial versions of Amarra, Pure Music and Bit Perfect. Will stick to flac for now. Will if needed, batch convert using DBpoweramp or XLD to AIFF. Will choose one - obviously this is not the only factor, but Amarra seems to be thankfully able to play flac off its own playlists.

- Improve isolation from vibrations (have no clue if it matters, but will do it in a minimalist manner).

- make sure by disabling various functions (which all???) that bit perfect feed is given to DAC. Am pretty sure the DAC is not asynchronous. I am hoping that the internal buffer is sufficient for re-clocking on the fly. The DAC has other strengths (fits into the amp itself instead of cluttering the space with interconnects).

The music belongs to many genres - Indian / Western classical, musicals, rock, a bit of jazz, sufi/qawwali/ghazals. Let us see what goes best.

Hey Gerry,
Why don't you put up some photographs of your set up?
I'm thinking of getting into Computer Audio like you since I too have loads of digital music and was planning to go the MacMini route. So as and when I start my journey will ask you for guidance.

Sham.

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

Firewire is a digital transmission method, used for data connections to hard disks and other devices. It's digital, and should not affect sound in any way. But... a bad or damaged cable can cause all sorts of problems and I don't think the connectors are born equal. These purely physical aspects will, if problems are there, affect any data transmission, and yes, music will suffer too. It is one of those protocols where replacing a cable can make the difference between working and not working at all. Even I wonder why I have to reconnect my firewire interface sometimes to get my system to recognise it: I just do not know if the problem is with the interface, the cable or the pc end.

Firewire is also two other things...

--- still the interface of choice for pro audio, but only just, because it's...

--- a thing of the past. Especially now USB3 is here, even though the audio world has hardly noticed that yet.

PS: And I thought AT&T is a telecom carrier!

Hee hee... without AT&T, there would be no Unix and no C programming language. Without Unix there would be no Linux, Android, or the current Mac OS.

I've never been tempted into the Mac garden, so can't comment on any of their products. The Mac Mini is a great-looking little box for a media PC, though. Enjoy

 

[Gerry_the_Merry]

Thad. You are right. That is why I am not eagerly jumping into connecting a separate HD thru FireWire, which is what is generally recommended instead of accessing built in HDD. I would rather install a SSD (later) and keep files on FireWire connected HDD just for storage.

I don't know if the Mac mini's looks and uploading photos will be of any use as I have slotted it into a low height slot in my rack and can hardly see it.

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

Google images ...for those, like me, who just needed a reminder of what you had bought

 

[Gerry_the_Merry]

Some of the changes already done and those which are planned (the ones planned will need at times, capability in the DAC also, which I have not verified as Accuphase is quite uncommunicative; others like firewire HDD, are to be verified first, and at present are merely ideas)

removing unused languages
turning off infrared remote control
disabling spotlight
disabling login items (there are a bunch of items within login script,they all turn on on their own)
disabling automatic software update (will do manually)
disabling time machine automatic backup (will do manually)
Disabling file sharing
Disabling Blue Tooth (headless config does not need this)
Turning off speech recognition, universal access
Disabling all widgets on the dashboard
Disabling sleep, power off settings, screen saver, etc.
Removing all applications like Chess, other games etc which are not needed
Making mac mini login automatic
Running remote desktop on login
to do De-clutter desktop
to do Installing 64 bit kernel start-up mode selector
to do Defrag files through idefrag (OSX defrag does only for files less than 20MB)
to do Set playback on command line playback, integer mode and hog mode
to do Optimization of RAM split for OS and music
to do Install music on firewire external HDD
to do Upgrade later to SSD
to do Upgrade later to 8GB RAM

Already the sound is hugely improved, in every dimension, and I sense this is just the beginning. This is turning out to be the best audio decision I ever made.