0.9z-8-2 (Windows 7)

[PeterSt]

Coen,

What happens when you ddo NOT activate "ALL Services" (shutdown) ? Well, assumed that you use that, or ?
Notice it needs a reboot for maximum (undoing) effect.

Regards,
Peter

[hf]

Thanks, Coen,

I'm experiencing exactly the same. From one album to the other there are big big differences. Yesterday I had a piano-concerto of Saint Saens and it sounded so boring; I switched it off.. Other albums sound superb (Buddha bar 3 and similar albums). I also have the impression that the sound is some factors weaker from time to time.
I restarted several times but the same happens.

The funny thing was I didn't suspect z82.. I was carrying around with my loudspeakers, inspecting the cables and the phasing (which is important for my amplifier) and even thought he, my speakers are maybe a bit dull; but then I saw Coen's post..

Hope this helps, Peter,

Hein

[CoenP]

Coen,

What happens when you ddo NOT activate "ALL Services" (shutdown) ? Well, assumed that you use that, or ?
Notice it needs a reboot for maximum (undoing) effect.

Regards,
Peter

Peter,

Thanks for the reply, I have checked the stop all services button now.  As I interpret your instruction: reboot to "normal" os, uncheck "stop all services" and reboot again to "min OS" and play 8-2.
I will try this.

I forgot to mention something important about my 8e setup. That is that i find it -sometimes much- easier to follow the musical melodies of instruments that are mixed into the "background" or "sides". Especially when the main instrument (usually a voice) kicks in.

@ Hein, thanks for your post. Tonight it happened again. This morning I enjoyed Henryk Szeryng playing Bach on 8-2 with a very realistic and melodious violin, but tonight it would not even do for background music. WTF?! The strange thing is that on 8e I never am bored with any music (provided that I like it).

Lets see what we can do next,

Regards, Coen

[stefanobilliani]

Coen,

What happens when you ddo NOT activate "ALL Services" (shutdown) ? Well, assumed that you use that, or ?
Notice it needs a reboot for maximum (undoing) effect.

Regards,
Peter

Peter,

Thanks for the reply, I have checked the stop all services button now.  As I interpret your instruction: reboot to "normal" os, uncheck "stop all services" and reboot again to "min OS" and play 8-2.
I will try this.

I forgot to mention something important about my 8e setup. That is that i find it -sometimes much- easier to follow the musical melodies of instruments that are mixed into the "background" or "sides". Especially when the main instrument (usually a voice) kicks in.

@ Hein, thanks for your post. Tonight it happened again. This morning I enjoyed Henryk Szeryng playing Bach on 8-2 with a very realistic and melodious violin, but tonight it would not even do for background music. WTF?! The strange thing is that on 8e I never am bored with any music (provided that I like it).

Lets see what we can do next,

Regards, Coen

that's funny Coen ,
I have been to a live concert pratically a couple of evenings before the 0.9Z8-2 was out . Then tried it and I did imagine  that *nobody* would really mix a record or a live set the way I hear it playing with the new software . Then I realized I am not a Phasure NOS DAC user , and well ... never mind .

Generally I *tend* to prefer earlier versions also .
 We'll see . ( W7 )

Stefano

[hf]

Hi Peter & Coen,

I did the following test:
-z82 with stop all services active. The sound was detailed, much black background but lacking 'body'
-z82 with 'stop all services' not active, reboot and again start up. A bit more punchy but more or less the same missing.
Then I went back to z81e and then the 'power' was there again. Just at that moment my wife passed by and she said 'hé, is it working again?'. I asked her what kind of difference she noticed and she answered: "The sound is fuller and more powerful"

Hope this helps Peter.. 

Hein

[PeterSt]

Speaking about Buddha Bar ...

Day before yesterday I put on XI which I actually never played before. I thought, ... yawn. Then into the 3rd track my wife told me "what a saltless album !".

Is it ?

[PeterSt]

Can't it be that we sort of compare apples to oranges when we now play with an SFS of 1 while it should be 2 for comparison ?

[CoenP]

Can't it be that we sort of compare apples to oranges when we now play with an SFS of 1 while it should be 2 for comparison ?

I've played 8-2 with SFS of 1, 1.5 and 2. Though different, this does not bring 8-2 alive so to speak.

I concur with Hein that 8-2 with "stop all services" off has more sparkle. In my brief listening I found character missing on voices, the violin and the saxophone. No grint if that is a word.

Regards, Coen

[christoffe]

Hi Peter & Coen,

I did the following test:
-z82 with stop all services active. The sound was detailed, much black background but lacking 'body'
-z82 with 'stop all services' not active, reboot and again start up. A bit more punchy but more or less the same missing.
Then I went back to z81e and then the 'power' was there again. Just at that moment my wife passed by and she said 'hé, is it working again?'. I asked her what kind of difference she noticed and she answered: "The sound is fuller and more powerful"

Hope this helps Peter.. 

Hein

Hi,
Hein’s impression of the SQ with 8-1e is congruent to what I hear too.
8-1e is presenting a SQ with a bigger soundstage (more air around the instruments). When I’m sitting in the direct line between the speakers to tune XXH on the PC the music is around me.
The bass is not very controlled (thick and tubby compared to 7-5 what I remember).

During a replay with 8-2 the soundstage moves away from me to the front side of the room. I’m sitting in front of the soundstage now, not within anymore. The stereo image is more accentuated to a left/right separation with less air around the instruments. The holographic image is gone.
The bass improved a lot, I hear now more distinct pitches in bass notes.

Joachim

[PeterSt]

Joachim,

I think you are close to what my own description would be, but I don't see it negative anywhere (and up till now). But remember what I promised (in that Windows 8 topic) : The sound would go towards that of Windows 8 (mainly for the stereo imaging, but now in a normal way).

I know, this is a quite useless post and I only wanted to express that I can recognize what you say.

What I do not see (yet) is how it will be much different when this ALL Services (to shut down) is not activated. On the other hand, each small thing changes SQ a lot these days, so maybe I additionally applied something I forgot (or don't realize).

Thanks,
Peter

[christoffe]

Joachim,

I think you are close to what my own description would be, but I don't see it negative anywhere (and up till now). But remember what I promised (in that Windows 8 topic) : The sound would go towards that of Windows 8 (mainly for the stereo imaging, but now in a normal way).

I know, this is a quite useless post and I only wanted to express that I can recognize what you say.

What I do not see (yet) is how it will be much different when this ALL Services (to shut down) is not activated. On the other hand, each small thing changes SQ a lot these days, so maybe I additionally applied something I forgot (or don't realize).

Thanks,
Peter

Thanx Peter,

SFS min back to 220,
- memory management is as per your explanation.

The outcome is: The holographic soundstage is back.

Joachim


P.S. I do believe the best performance with SFS=2 will be with an installation of XXH on a RAM Disc, so everything is in memory.

[PeterSt]

Well, the funny thing is that ever back in the Release Notes, when SFS Max was introduced, I told about the now more "infinite" combinations coming from SFS + SFS Max *IF* SFS Max would matter to the sound to begin with, and which I did not know at the time. Actually I still don't know, but I always keep my SFS Max to some higher value. It's a hunch (well, not really a hunch because I can expect it will matter). However, I never tried to A/B or try it in general.

So, SFS Max was created to go back and forth between SFS lower and higher values without the necessity of a reboot and was NOT created to influence SQ. But it could.

And so it does ?
Oh boy.

[PeterSt]

And then one more thing, but careful not to drop dead now;

*If* this really matters for a more holographic sound, it can be expected that in W8 it will matter too. What am I saying ? well, that in W8 it can well be that we should try to allocate the Contigious Memory (that's what this is all about) more towards the memory limit (the 16GB we may have in there). However, this is not possible and so it should be done the other way around : remove physical memory.

But nobody should try it unless you want to end up in mental hospital and I better try that myself some time.

Hmm ...

[PeterSt]

Thanx Peter,

SFS min back to 220,
- memory management is as per your explanation.

The outcome is: The holographic soundstage is back.

Before nobody understands, this comes from here : 0.9z-8-2 - Memory management

Peter

[christoffe]

So, SFS Max was created to go back and forth between SFS lower and higher values without the necessity of a reboot and was NOT created to influence SQ. But it could.

Hi Peter,

yes, the Music was just right beteween my ears again, with the advantage, there is nothing between those!
 
Joachim

P.S. The stored "memory" increases from appr. 850MB to more than 1330MB on the fly.