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[BenterHorst]

Hello
 
I am here for the first time and a user of MC 17.  Is is indeed realy a great product.

I have a few questions and wonder if anyone can help me.

1/ Does any one know if you are putting your audio files to an SSD  drive,  if this gives a sound improvement instead of a normal harddrive ?
2/ I am looking for a room correcting tool- software  that works together with  MC 17 , it should be integrated with MC 17
3/ Are there any tips how to get the best "sound " out of J River

I am using for  Ayre QB 9 Dac , Audio Quest  Diamond USB cable and some High end speakers and amps.

Hope to hear from someone  ?

Thanks in advance any way

Ben ( Netherlands)

[DarkPenguin]

I find that the subtle "whooshing" noise one gets from the spinning bits of a normal rotating hard disk is gone with a SSD.  But let your ears be your guide.

http://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/Audio_Setup

[FastKayak]

There are many choices in how to arrive at a PC that is nearly silent to completely silent.  An SSD would eliminate one source of noise in a PC.

Ignoring the mechanical noise (or lack there of) does an SSD provide a better audio experience?  I can think of no reason it would.

FastKayak / Larry

[sKiZo]

SSD is supposed to be better because there's no vibration or tracking error to deal with. Then again, it's all 1s and 0s, so you'd have to be fairly picky to notice any difference. And there's the cost, especially - astronomical for a drive capable of storing a decent collection. I HAVE toyed with the idea of getting a smallish SSD that would act as a swap drive for whatever's playing, but not sure exactly how you'd implement that in JRiver ...

There's an interesting series of articles in Absolute Sound dealing with HTPC tweaks, but you're talking some serious tweaks like $1000 power cords and such. I'd have a hard time enjoying music knowing the kids are going hungry because of a power cord. You can find some decent looking stuff on eBay for around $50-70US that might be in my budget.

For room correction - not sure why it would have to integrate with JRiver ... I use TrueRTA, and it's pretty much a one shot deal unless you do something to change the room acoustics. I run it from a laptop with a calibrated mike, then just transfer the resulting curve to my equalizers.

PS ... I understand about the best bang for the buck using an outboard DAC is going with the shortest possible usb cable. Rumor has it that even a cheepo one footer will outperform an audiophile grade three footer. Don't know myself - I'm real happy with an E-MU expansion card.

Also considering adding an asynchronous timer to the setup. Something like the Musical Fidelity V-Link. It just plugs in between the computer output and your DAC and basically replaces the onboard clock. Simple version as I understand it - the OS generates audio in blocks of data jumbled up with all the other stuff that's happening at the time. The asynchronous timer's job is to sequence all the little blocks of audio data correctly before hitting the DAC, and it also sets the audio stream as top priority on the computer's to-do list, eliminating a lot of processing delay and potential hiccups. Supposed to be a major improvement in sound quality and very reasonably priced if it's half as good as I've heard.

Obviously, if you're running an Ayre QB 9, cost is no object, so hey, get one of everything. <G>

[Vincent Kars]

I wonder if the articles in TAS are “interesting”.
The articles where offered first to Stereophile and they refused to publish them because of “technical issues”. A very elegant way to state that the article if full of nonsense.
Claims like converting a WAV1 > FLAC > WAV2 will yield a WAV2 sounding different from WAV1 (going form lossless to lossless to lossless) are not very creditable.
Their conclusion that converting to FLAC degrades sound quality permanently made them the laughing stock on many an audio forum.
http://www.audioasylum.com/cgi/t.mpl?f=pcaudio&m=101549

Also considering adding an asynchronous timer to the setup. Something like the Musical Fidelity V-Link

Sorry, this is total nonsense.
The V-link has an asynchronous USB input just like the QB9.

Ben
There are  claims that swapping a HD by a SSD can improve sound quality as it lowers the “electrical” noise.
However the QB9 comes with async USB and optical isolation by design.
Because of this it is very well isolated from the source both on protocol level and galvanic. I’m inclined to say it shouldn’t be affected by the source.

Your best bet is probably using the WASAPI driver.
There is a nice setup guide on the Ayre website.
A bit more about WASAPI: http://thewelltemperedcomputer.com/SW/Players/MC14/MC_Wasapi.htm

[sKiZo]

I'm sorry ... is this the room for argument? <G>

Not total nonsense ... excuse me for going a bit generic with that comment,but ... Most DACs currently don't do asynchronous until you get into TOTL equipment. The V-Link is a good example of why that may not be necessary for us commoners who can't necessarily afford going that route. And yes, I'm sure there's differences in quality between something like the QB9 and the V-Link, not to mention other DACs that leave the QB9 in the dust.

You obviously agree that going asynchronous is an improvement over synchronous or adaptive. That the OP already has that capability does eliminate the need for yet another box, but others could benefit from knowing that having a DAC that has that feature can make for major improvements in fidelity and accurate reproduction of the original music.

PS ... I'm currently changing over from WMA 100% lossless to FLAC as my standard, so I also take the TAS commentaries on FLAC with a grain (or maybe a pound) of salt. Why change? Mostly because FLAC tends to be less of a resource hog, and JRiver makes the conversion easy.

[NickF]

Hello
 
I am here for the first time and a user of MC 17.  Is is indeed realy a great product.

I have a few questions and wonder if anyone can help me.

1/ Does any one know if you are putting your audio files to an SSD  drive,  if this gives a sound improvement instead of a normal harddrive ?
2/ I am looking for a room correcting tool- software  that works together with  MC 17 , it should be integrated with MC 17
3/ Are there any tips how to get the best "sound " out of J River

I am using for  Ayre QB 9 Dac , Audio Quest  Diamond USB cable and some High end speakers and amps.

Hope to hear from someone  ?

Thanks in advance any way

Ben ( Netherlands)

Hi Ben,

A personal view on your questions:
1.  Using an SSD has some advantage in reducing physical disc noise, as has already been mentioned.  If you are going to invest in an SSD, put your OS and the MC17 app on there too.  As far as sound quality is concerned, there is no difference as all data from your files is buffered in RAM anyway.
2.  It depends on what type of room correction you are talking about.  If you want a basic delay correction and level correction related to speaker positioning, MC17 has a very good capability in the DSP section.  Go to Tools > Options > Audio >  Settings > DSP & output format.  Check Room Correction and go through the setup.  If you want the full Convolution capability, MC17 also provides that but you need to create the required filters using a product like Audiolense.  See this forum thread where I got a lot of help:

http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=69312.0

3.  The most important setting for good audio quality is to select ASIO or WASAPI Event Style to route the audio to your DAC.  Go to Tools > Options > Audio > Audio Output and select your preferred mode.  There seems to be some doubt as to whether there is an ASIO driver for the QB 9 DAC so you will probably use WASAPI.  Look at Audio Setup in the WIKI:

http://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/Category:Frequently_Asked_Questions

Good luck.

Nick.

[Vincent Kars]

To the best of my knowledge, QB9 doesn't support ASIO.
One might try ASIO4ALL (= kernel streaming, not to be mistaken for ASIO) but it doesn't work on modern mobo's with WAVERT drivers

[BenterHorst]

I hope i am doing this right because i want to say      ... thanks to you all for your fine answers ,  but  i am not sure if iam answering my own subjest 

I will look into several matters that you all suggested and hope to get some improvement although i will think these are small steps.

I am an old audiophile, but i am really surprised how good this JR with, computer, ayre 9, audio quest cable sounds on my system.

I was using a 7000 euro Marantz cd player and I can say  that the combination of JR and the other stuff is sounding better then the cd version of the Marantz.

The sacd of the Marantz still sounds better but with less air.

So i will be busy the next few weeks to test some the things you all suggested and then i will be back

Thanks   

Hope i did not send this message to myself   i am not a big forum guy 

[Vincent Kars]

That is the funny thing with computer audio.
Get a (according to audiophile standards)  dirt cheap source, just a PC.
Buy an application like JRiver at a price that won’t buy you even an audiophile grade RCA plug.
Combine this with an excellent DAC and you have a great sound.

Fool around a little, try WASAPI, Memory playback and see what is does in your system.
That’s the other fun part.
A lot of things you can try for free instead of buying a new expensive box.

Veel plezier met alle experimenten