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[darthlaker]

Hope someone can please help me on this,

I have a dCS Puccini player/DAC and dCS U-clock and using a MacBookPro with JRiver.

I have had an issue for sometime whereby if a music piece is playing and then I click on another album track at a different sample rate (example 16 bit to 24 bit or vice versa), the sound coming out from the speakers is a "glitching noise" which is not terribly loud but reasonably loud. This happens when the Puccini changes from one sample rate to another.

So I am not sure if this is an issue with the interface with JRiver and the Puccini?

Any suggestions on how to prevent this from happening?

I don't want to use JRiver to do the grunt work and resample. I want the dCS DAC to do this.

Crossfade options did not work.

[JimH]

Some DAC's do that when switching sample rate.  The work-around is to use MC's DSP Studio > Output Settings to re-sample to the same rate.

[darthlaker]

Some DAC's do that when switching sample rate.  The work-around is to use MC's DSP Studio > Output Settings to re-sample to the same rate.

Thanks for the reply.

Unfortunately I don't want JRiver to change the sample rate......I want to use the DAC.

Any other solution you can think of?

[JimH]

MC has an option to play a little "leading silence". 

Did you try dCS?

[darthlaker]

Did you try dCS?

Hi, yes, I contacted dCS and they said it is the way the DAC is and some music software (such as JRiver) have this issue - and some music software does not....

Would be great if JRiver had some way of muting when changing sampling for a small (adjustable?) period of time....

[JimH]

Hi, yes, I contacted dCS and they said it is the way the DAC is and some music software (such as JRiver) have this issue - and some music software does not....

Did you confirm that other software actually does behave differently?

[darthlaker]

Did you confirm that other software actually does behave differently?

Yes, tried Pure Music and it was OK. I prefer JRiver though......

[JimH]

Is there a gap in playback?  Is the output sample rate actually changing?

In MC, did you try playing leading silence?

[darthlaker]

Is there a gap in playback?

In MC, did you try playing leading silence?

I tried leading silence and no good.

What do you mean gap in playback? Is that a setting in JRiver?

[JimH]

It is, but in this case, I was asking if you heard a gap of silence with Pure Music.

Try increasing the silence when you use JRiver.

[darthlaker]

It is, but in this case, I was asking if you heard a gap of silence with Pure Music.

Try increasing the silence when you use JRiver.

Thanks, how do I increase the silence?

[JimH]

In the same place where it is set.

Tools > Audio > Play Silence at startup

[darthlaker]

In the same place where it is set.

Tools > Audio > Play Silence at startup

Thanks - it didn't work.

[JimH]

Please try letting MC handle the problem by using Output Settings in the DSP Studio.

[darthlaker]

Please try letting MC handle the problem by using Output Settings in the DSP Studio.

Thanks, I can do this but the dCS will be better to do this for sound quality than JRiver (?)

[JimH]

I don't think so.

[darthlaker]

I don't think so.

Thanks. The dCS Puccini is a very good DAC. I would rather not have the computer change the original music sample rate.

[Hilton]

You can try changing the buffers to a higher or lower value for the DAC under MC device settings.

Pi2-ALSA-buffer by Hilton, on Flickr

[darthlaker]

Thanks. How do I get to that menu (ALSA Audio Settings)?

[Awesome Donkey]

Well, if you're on a Mac it'll look different (ALSA isn't available on a Mac - Linux only, but CoreAudio should be available) but you can get to the device settings by opening MC's options then going to the Audio section then finally clicking on Device settings...

[Hilton]

That's from a Pi Linux version of MC - not sure if the MAC version has such settings under the audio settings. I just know that it can effect the clicks your talking about on Linux and in Windows. (sorry don't have a mac)

[darthlaker]

Thanks guys.

I changed similar settings for my device and it did not fix the problem...

[Awesome Donkey]

I swear, I've heard of DACs that make sounds like this when changing sample rates before.

Anyways, I tried to reproduce this (going from playing a 16-bit 44.1 kHz file to playing a 24-bit 96 kHz file) and it works fine, no pops, skips, glitches or anything like that. I have the play silence at startup for hardware synchronization setting set to 1 second, with default buffer settings.

If it is indeed caused by the DAC itself, you may have to resample everything to one sample rate using DSP studio (e.g. 96 kHz) like Jim mentioned. Of course, this would defeat the idea of bit-perfect playback but it may be the only workaround available for DACs with this type of issue.

[darthlaker]

Thanks. Looks like there is no solution for me unfortunately.....

[JimH]

There is a solution and there is no downside.

[mojave]

Some DAC chips have mute circuits built in to the chips that prevent noise when changing sample rates. Other DAC chips do not.

If some software results in noise during sample rate changes of content, then that means the DAC chip does not have a mute circuit. If other software does not have the same noise then that means the software is resampling prior to output.

If you have the noise, then it is DAC related and no amount of software changes except one will fix the issue. The DCS instructions for Pure Music show that one sets a single sample rate in Pure Music:



The one software change that will fix the issue is to resample all audio to a single bit-depth. This is done all the time in pro-audio. I've never heard a single person complain in a live sound venue that the sample rate has been changed. Most recorded content we buy or stream has also gone through sample rate changes. It is a non-issue. 

Like Jim said, "There is a solution and there is no downside."

[Grundgütigster]

I have had an issue for sometime whereby if a music piece is playing and then I click on another album track at a different sample rate (example 16 bit to 24 bit or vice versa), the sound coming out from the speakers is a "glitching noise" which is not terribly loud but reasonably loud. This happens when the Puccini changes from one sample rate to another.

16 / 24 bit are no sample rates. Sample rates are 44.1kHz and 48kHz. This should be changed in the U-clock set-up for each source and each time you switch to CD for 44.1kHz and/or DVD/DAT for 48kHz (read the manual about that).

The 16 bit and 24 bit thing is called audio bit depth, resp. word length (which is only relevant using PCM formats).

This could be relevant for the problem with the dCS system, although I think that the system just wouldn't work with a wrong sample rate set-up. Did you try the set-up without the clock generator?

Edit: I just realized that the clock generator has a USB input and the Puccini does not. I don't know if your MBP has a digital outlet. If yes, you could try to use a S/PDIF cable from the MBP to the Puccini.