dCS set up problems

[Murrayp]

Hi,

I'm trialling XXHighEnd with a Sony Viao, USB and dCS Paganini upsampler (set to not upsample).  The only way I can get any sound out of the system is to set the dac settings to 24 bit.  Then I get sound but with a cracking noise interspersed irregularly in the music at a rate of about every 1 - 2s or so.  I can improve this to almost no problem by setting Q to -1.  With this setting I just get occasional small bursts of low level static sound in the music - quite infrequently.  Changing to -2 seems to work too but more static effect.  + 1 generally makes things worse with more cracking noises.  >+1 doesn't seem to even lock.

Anyway - it all seems a bit tenuous, especially since your note on the 24 bit selection says "Do not use!".

If I try to use other settings (16 bit or 32), I get a message "Endpoint create failed.  The Dac does not accept this byte sequence.  Try switching the DAC Needs from 32 to 24 (or the other way around)."

I'm using Vista and 0.9 y-4

Any ideas?

Sound so far seems pretty good!

tks

Murray

[PeterSt]

Sound so far seems pretty good!

Hahaha Murray, how to do that in your situation ?!

Anyway, your situation seems very strange although I have an idea what to look for. I mean, more people reported a "now" differently needed Q1 setting, and I possibly overlooked something at one of the later versions. In order to confirm this, you may try 09y-1d, see what that brings and report back. If that works, I will repair whatever it exactly is.

Btw, the 24 bit selection and "do not use" counts for far the most situations. But it *is* there for (USB) situations like yours. So, no problem there.

Thanks !
Peter

PS: Don't try to use 0.9y-1d for judging the sound quality. It's just about "does it work or not".

[Murrayp]

Hi Peter,

I tried 09y-1d as suggested, but the results were pretty similar.  I moved the player and thread priority to high, and that may have helped some - or it may be my imagination.

best

Murray

[PeterSt]

Then something else is wrong ...

I assume you have no USB disks connected ?

Did you try the oher USB ports on the laptop ?

How long is your USB cable ? hubs in there ?


Notice that for USB it is fairly common to have a high Q1. Think of 17 or so. Thus, what you experience is just a too low Q1 (it even fits your descriptions of what you hear) but now *something else* causes Q1 not be able to be higher.
I guess (or hope anyway) that answering above questions will bring something new ...

Peter

[Murrayp]

Thanks Peter,

no other USB devices or usb hub used; have tried other ports - no difference; run both 1m and 3.5m cables - no difference.  Tried various other Q2,3,4,5 - no difference.  Tried different processor settings - no difference.  Tried various Q1 settings - either nothing happens (no USB lock?) or locks briefly then drops out.  I'm using the laptop as the music plays.  If another process throws a high demand on the computer (eg opening a window, even XXHighEnd itself) will temporarily disrupt the sound (eg half second drop out).  All this as reported originally - ie only setting Q=-1 plays listenably, but then with occasional minor disruption.  I don't hear any difference between the sound character of the Q-1,0,+1 settings.

A number of other players have worked without any problem, with or without ASIO4all - except I have never managed to make Foobar wasapi work.  J River wasapi works fine.

On occaisions the music will just stop - sometimes with a message Engine No.3 did not start within required time or some such. Sometimes instead of causing a brief disruption, opening a new window will stop the player.  Pressing play will usually restart it ok, sometimes from the start of the song, sometimes from where it was up to.  Sometimes the Wasapi process or USB reciever is screwed up (then J River wasapi will no longer play either) and requires the USB to be unplugged and replugged. 

So it seems the program is not independent of other processes in the machine and is disrupted by brief demands elsewhere.   Have I maybe missed some set up step permitting the program the ability to maintain top priority?

Btw, despite setting 24 bit, the reciever shows it as 16/44.1 incoming - I guess that is normal though for a 16 bit Flac file.

Hope there is something there that might give a hint,

tks

Murray

[PeterSt]

Hi again Murray,

I have let this rest for a while to see whether I could come up with something, but I can't really.

Btw, despite setting 24 bit, the reciever shows it as 16/44.1 incoming - I guess that is normal though for a 16 bit Flac file.

This will be normal for "a" dCS I think. However when you'd attenuate a notch (or more) it should show 24 (as long as Dac Is is set to a 24 bit value (like 24/96)).

Now, can you recognize this needs an "install" for the USB device ? And when so, after that, how is the USB device called ?
To me it looks like this is not a normal USB device and it needs its own drivers ... which are not compliant. Also, I think it is JRiver which has a thread somewhere about setting some buffer size for WASAPI; this is a general thread about WASAPI (not about your dCS or whatever), but to me it seems the only reason why WASAPI for JRiver works, and other players do not. I am not saying that you changed that (btw Registry) setting, but the fact JRiver "needs" it, or is influenced by it, tells be JRiver may work different on this matter. And, to me it seems your buffer size is too small (which also causes other windows moved to stall sound).

"Your buffer size is too small" hardly can happen for a normal USB Driver (which would be called USB Audio - Loudspeakers I think).
In the end this same Registry hack may help you here, but it will be the very first time it is needed for XXHighEnd.

So for you (hence USB), key is : When Q1 needs to be real low (like your +1 or so), there must be something wrong somewhere. Thus whatever you do, when you can't get that higher the problem will remain. And, the problem *is* that it is (needs to be) so low.

Strange ...

Don't hesitate to throw anything at me you think may be related.
Peter


PS: Do you have the possibility to try another PC ? the Vayo has special sound capabilities unique to it; maybe it's related ?

[Murrayp]

Thanks Peter,

well, here's some more pieces of the puzzle.  Foowasapi has the same sort of crackles that XXHighend does, and no amount of buffer setting fixes it, though altering the buffer affects it.   J River plays fine no matter what buffer is set.  I loaded XMplay with Wasapi and it plays fine too.  I compared XMplay to J River - I accidentally set both playing - and much to my surprise they both played together.  I had thought one wasapi would grab things to the exclusion of another.  But, at least in J River this is a seeting option.  I tried J River with exclusive turned on - it then performed like Foowasapi and yours - clicks and crackles through the music.   A shorter buffer setting more or less fixed it.  XMplay was then excluded and couldn't gain acess while this was playing.  I put J River back to non-exclusive and tried to run Foowasapi or XXHighend with it - neither would play indicating that both are probably setting their Wasapi set up to be exclusive.  So..... we have two players that run fine in non-exlcusive, and three that play up when set to exclusive. 

dCS use an asynchronous USB connection.  It shows up as a separate dCS Player in the sounds setting window.  You can disable the ability of this USB to accept exclusive control.  If I try that, XMplay and J River run ok, but XXHiend and Foobar won't - both report errors, XXhiend reports "Exclusive mode not allowed". 

So...... looks like maybe if exclusive mode can be turned off in XXHighend (and Foobar) all might be well with Wasapi and the dCS driver.  Does that maybe mean a special build?

You can't say I don't try ;-)

best

Murray

[PeterSt]

Hi Murray - that (kind of) explains a lot.

First off, Exclusive Mode is there for a reason, and it shouldn't be shut off or otherwise you would be subject to the resampling of the OS (always !!).
Indeed both XMPlay and JRiver allow for Shared Mode, and of what I recall with XMPlay this goes unnoticed. Foobar - like XXHighEnd only allow for Exclusive Mode for sure, and this is a good thing (you will know what you're up to always).

But now the problem ...

I can not think of one single reason why Exclusive Mode would incur for smaller internal buffer sizes. And NOTE :
This is not about any buffer sizes you can adjust by normal means (like you said you tried) and this is about "some" Registry hack JRiver talks about (in some or several threads I once found).

Ok, there is (now) clearly something wrong with that, and I think you should address this to dCS. You might try Gordon (who created the code for it I think) as well, but he won't be able to change anything.

I have already been thinking to create a small debug version for you which will show that internal buffer size, but I can't do that very quickly. Maybe later today, or otherwise tomorrow. That will at least show dCS what is going on and what is wrong about it (mind you, *if* I am correct on all this).

Later,
Peter

[Murrayp]

Thanks Peter,

Well until I get this solved I guess that means I should run J River in exclusive - so now that you suggest it, it does sound cleaner and a step more alive.  Mind over matter maybe, but I doubt it. 

Ok, i can raise this with dCS -If you have time to send something that helps demonstrate what is going on - then that would be much appreciated too.

best

[PeterSt]

After some more thinking ...

It would be much more logical that the USB bus of your laptop can't cope. I'm still not sure how this can be related to Shared vs Exclusive Mode, but I think it can matter. IOW, you'd *have* to try another PC. Preferrably a desktop (I mean, not a laptop). I mean, it would be a kind of stupid towards dCS if it is just your PC, right ?

Notice that with USB many things can happen in order to not let it operate as should, which starts with not giving the USB bus the priorities it needs for this; you are sending data each few ms and since this is normal data it is two way communication and it doesn't take much to run out of bandwidth. And here you have the second potential problem : when the data is not right you will be having resends - them being not right either, and within no time your needed bandwidth for everything has gone.
Also, I have reasons to believe that the bigger the bursts of data, the more difficulties your PC (hence USB) has with it.

So I mean it, you *must* try this (another PC).
Peter

[pedal]

A dCS dealer told me that dCS had some dificulties with XX player. There was some "technical" mismatch between the two. The problem has been studied and discussed at dCS factory in the past. I don't know the year, or if this "mismatch" problem is still relevant to new dCS DAC's of recent production.

A request directly to dCS will prove useful.

[Murrayp]

Thanks Peter and Pedal.  I contacted dCS.  I'd rather not publish their reply but in essence they weren't too happy about Wasapi and felt it a bit immature and buggy.  For now they suggest ASIO as a more reliable solution, until Wasapi matures a bit more.  They say that early indications are that Win 7 is an improvement.

I don't have acess to any other Vista machines but I do have a complimentary upgrade to Win 7.  I've not been rushing to load this but I could now and try that.  Of course my expectation is that 50% of the rest of the programs will throw up  though ....

I've searched around and not found much else to help.  I have an xp laptop I could try - but I don't think XX supports XP does it, and certainly it'd not be Wasapi?

All this is a bit experimental for me - for the period of about half a song that XX runs before the USB stops (the player keeps running) it does seem to sound the pick of the bunch to me.  Oh, well, we'll see.

best

M

[PeterSt]

Hi Murray,

There is nothing in W7 that will effect the way XX deals with it all because all the "bugs" which were there from the beginning were worked around, and they just don't bug me (XX).
I tend not to believe much from what dCS is saying, although they may not know themselves. It is *us* the programmers who may have made a mess of it, and that includes me. The example is indeed a device like the dCS which can operate with 24 bits only, which is very uncommon. And thus, 8 months ago or so XX wouldn't play through it at all. I just didn't have the experience. Now :

All these atters are normally solved by the OS. Not with WASAPI, where everything from the ground up has to be done by the programmer. And so, the players aren't mature yet.
For this case I don't see how that matters though.

Anyway, skip W7; it will only be WORSE.

What you can do though - and I just saw this as a possibly option - play Unattended (checkbox at the bottom). Do NOT tick "Stop Services" (Settings Area) so you will be able to bring up XX by means of a taskbar icon, which should be there (drag an XX icon from the desktop to the taskbar). I have the feeling this will help. To what extend I don't know.

When this helps, invest some time in getting AutoHotkey properly running (it is part of the XX install), and next do tick that Stop Services box. This will then help more.

Let me know whether you see improvement, because if so, some other things can be done.
Peter


PS: You might want to tell your setup in your signature like most do; Today I know you use Vista, but tomorrow I won't know it anymore. I mean, this is really helpful for me and others (for support).

[Murrayp]

Hi Peter,

tending to be one who jumps in boots and all - I had already upgraded to W7 (no agony so far except it seems to have reset my permissions back to near zip) before reading your message.  Oh well .......

The results are that it doesn't alter the clicks and pops (or nothing at all) etc that I get at settings other than Q1=-1.  However it has made the USB much more resiliant.  Now on -1 There is no disturbance or interuption resulting from other computer activities (opening screens or programs etc) and the USB doesn't crash at all so far (fingers crossed).  So it is an improvement.  Sound wise - don't know - sounds pretty good to me - no worse anyway.

I tried "play unattended" - it did something all right - it stopped any usb output at all (well in so far as the dCS kit would recognise it anyway).  Stop Services wasn't ticked.  Should I try the rest of your instructions anyway?

BTW - is the few second wait on pressing play normal - I guess you are loading into memory or similar?

Many thanks for your support.  Will update my signature as you suggest

Best

Murray

[PeterSt]

BTW - is the few second wait on pressing play normal - I guess you are loading into memory or similar?

Yes, sort of. All the tracks you have in the Playlist Area are converted or whatever is needed with them.
In your case (for the trials) you should UNtick "Start Engine3 during conversion" (Settings Area). This will prevent hogging the USB bus (if so at all) by other activities. Thus, in this case (untick that checkbox) only when everything has been prepared, playback starts (and the USB bus will be addressed).

About the rest ... just perform all step by step so you get the grasp of it. Later, you will be telling us what to do when.

Nice hobby, eh ?