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[mstan]

Is it possible to playback live digital audio on MC for mac?  Under windows one just selected "open live" to route the digital input through JRiver.   I see no such option in Media Center (V30) under mac OS.   

My 2012 mac mini hardware with Windows boot camp has failed and I am trying to substitute my m2 mac mini pro for it.  It will be a no go for MC on the mac if I can't playback live TV digital audio through JRiver.  Tell me there is a work around.

[mattkhan]

Feature not implemented on Mac or Linux unfortunately

[mstan]

Feature not implemented on Mac or Linux unfortunately

That is unfortunate.  I have found a workaround, though a little inconvenient.   

I open up a session in Logic Pro where I can see the digital input from the DAC.  From there I redirect the 2 channel input  to four output channels - 2 for the L/R mains and 2 for L/R subs - where I can also add low pass filters for the subs and control volume.   

So the functionality is there in Mac OS if the JR developers wish to add it; I hope they consider it.

[blgentry]

Are you trying to use MC as a digital signal processor? 

In my opinion, this isn't a good idea.  While MC does have that functionality for playing files and it does include a digital "input" in windows, it's not a product that is designed to be a DSP.  It's a media player.

If you want DSP, it would seem like a much better idea to buy a device that is designed to do that.  MiniDSP is extremely popular, inexpensive, and is a dedicated device with purpose built control software.

This is only my opinion and I have nothing to do with JRiver.  I'm just a customer who's reading the forums.

Brian.

[mstan]

I am simply trying to take the digital audio feed from my TV and bring it into Media Center for playback on my audio system just like I would for music and video files I have on hard disk.   I use the digital signal processing capabilities of JRiver - and it is plenty capable for the things I want to do -  to send 4 channels of audio to my DA converter for further routing to mains and subs.  The beauty of media center is that I can apply any number of EQs and filters discretely to each channel in the digital domain and do it from my laptop remotely accessing the PC that is running JRiver.  And of course, I use JRemote on iPhone for playback.

All of this works great on Media Center for Windows but not on the Mac version.   I would think the digital input feature is a core function of Media Center and would be added post haste.  Until it is I will not use the Mac version, which BTW, I am experiencing lots of other problems with on Apple silicon running Ventura - most likely the fault of Apple and their very unstable OS.   I am now in the hunt for a Windows box that is quiet; suggestions welcome. 

[mattkhan]

there's no problem using MC as a DSP engine, it's designed to do this and works fine (albeit can be sensitive to buffer sizes). It's just a big gap to my mind that this feature has never been implemented on linux and macos.

[mstan]

there's no problem using MC as a DSP engine, it's designed to do this and works fine (albeit can be sensitive to buffer sizes). It's just a big gap to my mind that this feature has never been implemented on linux and macos.

Agree.  Without this feature a huge slice of media playback, namely streaming video/audio, is unavailable.     

[blgentry]

I disagree with you both, but that's ok.  We can each do our own thing and still be friendly.

On the technical front:  JRiver as a company has shown very little interest in porting Windows specific features to MC on other platforms.  Things like decoding of DVD and BD, the WDM driver, and visualizations all use libraries or components that are only on Windows.  Duplicating them for Mac or Linux is apparently a lot of work without enough return to justify the effort and expense.  So, in my opinion ONLY, we will never see these features in MC for Mac or Linux or any other platform; only on Windows.

As for MacOS having problems, I'm sorry to hear you are having trouble.  The platform itself is rock solid.  I often find that former Windows customers have a hard time switching to Mac because they are expecting this non-Windows platform to behave like Windows.  It obviously does not.  But it can be hard to get used to thinking of things in a different way.

Or perhaps you really want to use some programs that work really well on Windows, but not so great on Mac.  I can tell you from experience that the Mac can be an extreme stable easy to use platform.  But not if you are trying to force it to act like Windows.

I sincerely wish you the best of luck.

Brian.

[JimH]

On the technical front:  JRiver as a company has shown very little interest in porting Windows specific features to MC on other platforms. 

Sorry, Brian, but that's definitely not the case.  In the last couple of versions we've added Television, JRVR, etc.

Bob and I have worked with Unix and its derivatives (which both Linux and MacOS are) since about 1986.

Most everything we do on Windows eventually comes to Mac and Linux.

[blgentry]

I guess that's my mistake then. 

It might be interesting to have the 3 features I outlined, which are currently windows only, be available on Mac.  In particular playing BD and DVD structures.

Brian.

[JimH]

Isn't makeMKV available for Mac?

[blgentry]

Isn't makeMKV available for Mac?

Yes.  I've used it many times.  MakeMKV decrypts and turns discs into MKV files.  These MKVs are not the same thing as as disc structure. 

Disc structures contain multiple video titles and menus.  MC for Mac will not read any DVD or BD structure whether it is encrypted or decrypted.  MC for Windows reads DVD and BD structures.  It also decrypts on the fly if you have a BD/DVD decryption tool installed.

Brian.

[mstan]

Sorry, Brian, but that's definitely not the case.  In the last couple of versions we've added Television, JRVR, etc.

Bob and I have worked with Unix and its derivatives (which both Linux and MacOS are) since about 1986.

Most everything we do on Windows eventually comes to Mac and Linux.

Glad to hear this, Jim.   So what about the record input/live monitor feature for Mac?  Without that feature half of what I do in MC is cutoff on the Mac side.   There are any number of DAWs on Mac that provide real time monitoring of the input.  How hard technically is it to implement that in MC?   

[mstan]

I disagree with you both, but that's ok.  We can each do our own thing and still be friendly.

On the technical front:  JRiver as a company has shown very little interest in porting Windows specific features to MC on other platforms.  Things like decoding of DVD and BD, the WDM driver, and visualizations all use libraries or components that are only on Windows.  Duplicating them for Mac or Linux is apparently a lot of work without enough return to justify the effort and expense.  So, in my opinion ONLY, we will never see these features in MC for Mac or Linux or any other platform; only on Windows.

As for MacOS having problems, I'm sorry to hear you are having trouble.  The platform itself is rock solid.  I often find that former Windows customers have a hard time switching to Mac because they are expecting this non-Windows platform to behave like Windows.  It obviously does not.  But it can be hard to get used to thinking of things in a different way.

Or perhaps you really want to use some programs that work really well on Windows, but not so great on Mac.  I can tell you from experience that the Mac can be an extreme stable easy to use platform.  But not if you are trying to force it to act like Windows.

I sincerely wish you the best of luck.

Brian.

  I am not a newbie on either Mac or Windows.   I have been using Macs in earnest since 2008 and even earlier having owned an Apple IIe.   And, of course, who hasn't used Windows.   There is no overall "best" between them.   The Mac is better at some things (e.g., hardware/software/services integration and lately power efficient computing a la arm silicon) and Windows at others.   Actually, Mac OS in its latest form (Ventura) is not that stable and demonstrates a deteriorating trend in Mac OS quality.   

The specific problems I have experienced recently on Mac OS (both Ventura and Mohave) with regards to audio performance have been frequent disconnections of my Lynx Hilo ADDA usb drivers either at the completion of a playback sequence on MC or wake from sleep requiring a power cycling of the Hilo to reload the drivers.  This does not happen on Windows.  So that is a Mac OS issue not a MC one.  As I said earlier my issue with MC for Mac is mainly lack of an essential feature for me.

I don't know technically what it would take for JRiver to implement the record in/live monitor feature found in every DAW.   But, right now, without it is like using a DAW that can only playback and not record.   Who would use such a thing? Not me.  So it is back to Windows for MC for me.