Topic: ASIO OUTPUT: Guinea Pigs Needed... (Read 6309 times)

Matt · « **on:** August 05, 2002, 01:27:00 pm »

Hey everyone.

If you've got an ASIO capable soundcard and would like to test an alpha of Media Jukebox 9's ASIO-enabled player, download this file and follow the included instructions:

ftp://ftp.jriver.com/pub/downloads/music/MJPlayer9A.zip

Note: this is ALPHA software -- no guarantees or promises.

Looking forward to any feedback.

Thanks for your help.

-Matt
JRiver, Inc.

KingSparta · « **Reply #1 on:** August 05, 2002, 01:49:44 pm »

>> Note: this is ALPHA software -- no guarantees or promises.
What!

Anyway i don't have a clue what ASIO is.

maybe this is something i need to get when i get my next computer.

LCtheDJ · « **Reply #2 on:** August 05, 2002, 02:03:44 pm »

King, this should explain ASIO:

http://www.artlogic.com/dd/asio.html

KingSparta · « **Reply #3 on:** August 05, 2002, 02:55:50 pm »

you may think it does.

so like what sound card supports this?

Siezmik · « **Reply #4 on:** August 05, 2002, 03:13:02 pm »

I'm with KingSparta, it's Greek to me. I'm assuming that ASIO is not something that the average Soundblaster Audigy or Live! would have or be capable of. For that matter, what would the benefit (if any) be in the first place for the average Joe User?

Siezmik

Matt · « **Reply #5 on:** August 05, 2002, 03:33:43 pm »

Do a forum search for ASIO. You'll find some good info.

Basically ASIO is the only way to do bit-perfect output on Windows XP (and maybe other OS's too). It matters if you're trying to do a pure digital connection from your computer to your stereo.

So has anyone gotten it to work?

konicky · « **Reply #6 on:** August 05, 2002, 03:34:46 pm »

Apparently the Audigy is ASIO capable, not sure what this means though !!

JimH · « **Reply #7 on:** August 05, 2002, 03:37:52 pm »

Matt,
I just added a link to this thread on AVSForum.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=159819

Jim

Vlad · « **Reply #8 on:** August 05, 2002, 04:47:03 pm »

Matt,

I got it to work (I think). It played, anyway. Can't say that I could detect any difference but I only got a few minutes to play with it before heading off to work this morning.

I'm running Win2k and haven't updraded to SP3 yet, so it still has the Kmixer bug of truncating everything to 16 bit. I thought that the whole point of ASIO was to bypass the Kmixer. As far as I could see, I was still only getting a 16 bit output even though MJ was set to 24 bit.

I'm running a M-Audio Delta DiO 2496 and an external DAC. The DAC is only 20 bit and has a LED that is supposed to light up when it recieves more than 16. I don't know what it will make of a 24 bit stream yet. It may not even work.

Hopefully I'll get a chance to do some critical listening tonight.

Is there any way to test what is actualy happening internally?

Regards,
Vlad.

PS. If you save Options, it doesn't just reset the registry entry. It sets it to high-values rendering MJ unable to play. You have to manually set it to zero to undo.

Mike Noe · « **Reply #9 on:** August 05, 2002, 05:24:14 pm »

Well, I'm one of the dudes asking for it and I've got to go out of town for the next week (maybe two), so I won't get to it until at least next week. THanks for the fast response, I can't wait to start playing with this.

Matt · « **Reply #10 on:** August 05, 2002, 05:55:06 pm »

The output bitdepth is decided by the soundcard. My M-Audio uses 32-bit integers. Not sure if that's standard or not. I coded in support for lots of formats just in case. (it's in the readme.txt)

And if you play a CD with no DSP, you'll just be sending 16 audio bits and then 0's for the rest of the bits. If you run any DSP's (or have > 16 bit files), then you'll really be using the extra bits. You're DAC might pick it up then...

Thanks everyone.

-Matt

PhatPhreddy · « **Reply #11 on:** August 05, 2002, 08:19:31 pm »

OK please see my AVS post for the appreciation post... You guys are stunning...

My ASIO souncard equipped machine is currently seperated from my media store (dont ask... Moving house is just such a stress) but I will try and perform some A/B comparisons with an M/Audio 410 via analogue and digital either later tonight or tommorow...

Again... I have never had the pleasure of a Dev team so eager to please... When are you planning this as a permament release (only in V9 ??)...

Osho · « **Reply #12 on:** August 05, 2002, 09:04:28 pm »

EXCELLENT !!!

Matt and you all guys at J river !! This is awesome!! I am going home and downloading it today and checking it out.

Osho

JNKH · « **Reply #13 on:** August 05, 2002, 10:21:06 pm »

Hi Matt,

I'm using Creative Extigy, and it is suppose to be ASIO compliant- using USB for audio streaming. It comes with a driver to use the Extigy device. Is there a difference in using MJ 9.0 ASIO support?

PhatPhreddy · « **Reply #14 on:** August 05, 2002, 11:32:13 pm »

Well there are a few ifs...

If you are running a WDM OS driver (and if you are on 2k or XP you are) then your sound is being put through the KMixer unless the application SW is communicating via ASIO...

So if using these OS's... And if your card is truly ASIO compatible... And if the MJ9 support works... You should be getting 100% bit perfect reproduction from the digital out of your soundcard as from the highest most expensive boutique transport out there...

There are rebuttal arguments saying that PC's may have worse jitter charachteristics and some claim to be able to deferenciate between a M-Audio card (same DAC's as Lexicon) and RME or EgoSys but by this point the gap is beyond the resolving power of my systam and ears...

Knowing unmangled bits are marching out your SPDIF as they would from any other transport is good...

jann · « **Reply #15 on:** August 06, 2002, 02:32:59 am »

Hi Matt,

I've just tested the Asio output with my RME Digi 96/8PST Soundcard, but after about one minute playback stopped and following message appeared on the screen:
"Internal Play buffer error: playing buffer accumulated too much spent data".
Maybe I made something wrong, but I followed everything you described
in the readme-file.

Jan

Mike Noe · « **Reply #16 on:** August 06, 2002, 02:55:22 am »

Couldn't resist! Had to get up early and try it before I left this AM. I too have the RME 96/8 PST and have only one problem so far:

When choosing the optical input (DirectTV receiver, 48kHz) and playing with MJ at the same time, the tempo of the playing music is faster. I think this is most likely a problem with the RME driver, but I'm not sure, I'll post on their forum too.

I did some rudimentary A/Bs this AM, I don't think it's "audiophile neurosis", there's quite a difference on my system. Also I have three external "DACs" and I can really hear the differences between them now.

Listening to: 'The Duke' from 'Miles and Quincy Live At Montreux' by 'Miles Davis' on Media Jukebox

Poison Dan · « **Reply #17 on:** August 06, 2002, 05:19:56 am »

This might be an interesting article for those of you who want to know more about ASIO and audio drivers in general:

http://www.staudio.de/kb/english/drivers/

Oblong · « **Reply #18 on:** August 06, 2002, 08:40:06 am »

Hi,
I tested the ASIO plugin with my M-Audio Di0 2448 and experienced the exact same symptoms as Jan (i.e. "Internal Play Buffer error: playing buffer accumulated too much spent data") and MJ begin to loop a very short segment of the song until I shut it down.

Oblong...

Matt · « **Reply #19 on:** August 06, 2002, 10:26:12 am »

If you had problems, please download and install this version:

ftp://ftp.jriver.com/pub/downloads/music/MJPlayer9B.zip

(all you need to do is overwrite MJPlayer.dll if you already have 9A installed)

Then, let me know:

- do you still have problems
- what the popup message says when you first start playback (it'll help with debugging)

Thanks.

-Matt
JRiver, Inc.

jann · « **Reply #20 on:** August 06, 2002, 12:11:24 pm »

Matt,

I'm sorry - exactly the same error message with alpha 2.
After testing this with 512 buffer samples I've changed the buffer samples in my RME card to 2048, but this didn't solve the problem. Maybe playback stopped a little bit later.

Jan

Matt · « **Reply #21 on:** August 06, 2002, 12:29:42 pm »

Jann,

What does the message box say when you start playback? Those numbers will help me figure out what's happening.

Thanks.

-Matt

Kenny · « **Reply #22 on:** August 06, 2002, 12:38:37 pm »

I'll repost what I put on AVSForum:

First thing I noticed is that

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\JRiver\Music Exchange\1.0\Media Jukebox\Properties\PlaybackOutputMode

doesn't appear in the registry, so the value can't be changed (I'll assume that is should be created by hand if it doesn't exist, but the process that should have created it didn't).

Question was asked if I downloaded 8.0.336 first...yep, I sure did.

Nikolay · « **Reply #23 on:** August 06, 2002, 12:55:02 pm »

Kenny,

Just go into options and "Save" once. After that, the playback settings will be in the registry. Sorry if that was confusing.

-Matt (on Nikolay's computer)

jann · « **Reply #24 on:** August 06, 2002, 01:14:17 pm »

Matt,

Information:

Asio Playback starting alpha 2

Buffer Sample type: 16
Buffer samples: 512
Sample Rate: 44100

Error message after playback stopped:

Internal play buffer error:
playing buffer accumulated
too much spent data

I hope this helps a little!

Jan

Matt · « **Reply #25 on:** August 06, 2002, 01:31:36 pm »

Thanks Jann.

Your soundcard uses 16-bit integers for ASIO output. I had a silly bug for cards that didn't use 32-bit output like my test card.

It's fixed and uploaded here:

ftp://ftp.jriver.com/pub/downloads/music/MJPlayer9C.zip

Thanks again everyone.

-Matt

jann · « **Reply #26 on:** August 06, 2002, 01:46:30 pm »

Thank you very much, Matt!

Problem solved!

Jan

Mike|PLS|Noe · « **Reply #27 on:** August 06, 2002, 02:23:46 pm »

Matt,
I think I found a bug. When I exit MJ, it doesn't leave memory (still shows in task manager). Subsequent runs create new "instances" and they too stay resident after I close them.

Is it possible the new DLL is not releasing properly?

Media Jukebox PLUS 8.0.336
Install Path: C:\Program Files\J River\Media Jukebox\

CPU: Intel Pentium III 448 MHz MMX
Memory: Total - 261 MB, Free - 73 MB
OS: Microsoft Windows XP Workstation 5.1 (Build 2600)

Internet Explorer: 6.0.2600.0000
ComCtl32.dll: 6.00.2600.0000
Shlwapi.dll: 6.00.2600.0000
Shell32.dll: 6.00.2600.0000
wnaspi32.dll: 4.71 (0001) , ASPI for Win32 DLL, Copyright © 1989-2002 Adaptec, Inc.
Aspi32.sys: 4.71 (0001)

Mike Noe · « **Reply #28 on:** August 06, 2002, 02:32:31 pm »

Little more info...Using DLL 9C (alpha3).

Okay, if I open MJ and never hit play, then close it, it frees itself as you'd expect. If I hit play, then close it, it stays out there.

Also, the 9C rev is causing major skipping and popping on my rig:
RME Digi96/8 PST driver 2.0.23.

Matt · « **Reply #29 on:** August 06, 2002, 02:34:08 pm »

It could be that the ASIO driver for your soundcard is a little buggy and doesn't release properly.

There's also a bug with the ASIO SDK that I had to code around where it won't stop and release properly. (happens even in their sample program) Not sure if it's ASIO or the driver but it could be related.

Any chance there's a newer driver available for your card?

Take care.

-Matt

Mike Noe · « **Reply #30 on:** August 06, 2002, 02:39:42 pm »

Could be. It's their first version for ASIO 2.0 and multicard support for this card and I've noticed some little things but nothing major. I'll post out on their forum, see what I can find out.

Oblong · « **Reply #31 on:** August 06, 2002, 06:36:22 pm »

Thanks Matt!

Your latest version (9C) resolved the problems I was having.

Now to do some serious A/B comparisons.

Oblong...

Vlad · « **Reply #32 on:** August 07, 2002, 03:03:38 am »

Matt,

now I'm getting the "Internal Play Buffer error: playing buffer accumulated too much spent data" message intemittently. I'm using the alpha 3 version with the following details:

Buffer Sample type: 18
Buffer samples: 384
Sample Rate: 44100

MJ then locks up and has to be closed with Task Manager. When restarted it plays fine. I can't say for sure that the above details are the same when I get the error.

My system details are:

Media Jukebox PLUS 8.0.336
Install Path: C:\Program Files\J River\Media Jukebox\

CPU: Intel Pentium III 1004 MHz MMX
Memory: Total - 523 MB, Free - 303 MB
OS: Microsoft Windows 2000 Workstation 5.0 Service Pack 3 (Build 2195)

Internet Explorer: 6.0.2600.0000
ComCtl32.dll: 5.50.4704.1100
Shlwapi.dll: 6.00.2600.0000
Shell32.dll: 5.00.3502.5436
wnaspi32.dll: 4.71 (0001) , ASPI for Win32 (95/NT) DLL, Copyright © 1989-2002 Adaptec, Inc.
Aspi32.sys: 4.71 (0001)

My soundcard is a M-Audio Delta Dio 2496. I have logged a support query with them today asking the following questions:

1. Your documentation states that the card supports "up to 24-bit/96kHz performance". Depending on what? There is nothing in the Control Panel to specify the bitdepth but according to the MJ development team, the bitdepth is determined by the card.

2. MJ have provided support for the following soundcard buffer formats:

ASIOSTInt32LSB24
ASIOSTInt32LSB20
ASIOSTInt32LSB18
ASIOSTInt32LSB16
ASIOSTFloat64LSB
ASIOSTFloat32LSB
ASIOSTInt32LSB
ASIOSTInt24LSB
ASIOSTInt16LSB

What is the required format for the Delta DiO 2496?

3. I am using an Apogee DA-1000E-20 DAC which is a 20-bit device. It uses a "status flag indicating up to 22 bits activated" in the S/P DIF signal. Is the Delta DiO 2496 capable of a 20bit output? If so, how can this be achieved?

I hope any answers I get will be helpful to you (and me).

Listening to: 'Breezin'' from 'The Very Best Of George Benson' by 'George Benson' on Media Jukebox

Vlad · « **Reply #33 on:** August 07, 2002, 04:01:04 am »

Matt,

did you realise that your information dialogue pops up on a change of sample rate. All my CDs are ripped to APE but I have a handfull of MP3s care of MJ. One just came up on my playlist and playback got interrupted by the Info dialogue.

Listening to: 'Le Chant du Coq' from 'Live at Orchestra Hall' by 'Gran Pan Pan' on Media Jukebox

JGourd · « **Reply #34 on:** August 07, 2002, 04:34:01 am »

Does this mean multi-channel OGG support is coming?

JNKH · « **Reply #35 on:** August 07, 2002, 05:14:31 am »

Hi MJ users,

The ASIO is really interesting. It seems we can increase our audio MP3 reproduction by using ASIO compatible devices, which hooks up the audio converter through USB.

I'm using Creative Extigy, and it seems to be compatible with ASIO. Does this means that when I upgrade to MJ 9.0, I can expect better sound reproduction from my Extigy. This is possible because the Extigy will be converting the digital signal from MJ to the extigy directly because MJ will pass the digital data to my Extigy using ASIO?

Also, I would like to know what are the best ASIO compatible product to purchase. I've seen some Apogee etc. Which is the best buy?

PhatPhreddy · « **Reply #36 on:** August 07, 2002, 05:33:34 am »

Best buy will be entirely relative to $$ verses performance... I have seen people rave about some >2k USD souncards but then if I spent that I would be raving to...

A significant minority on AVS are moving up from the M-Audio cards to the RME cards these are about 600 or a little more... I have heard very nice things said about the Ego-Sys cards too and am very curious as thier 24/192 internal offering is about 199 street 299 RRP IIRC thier rackmounts should logically have superiour power cuircuitry and are outside of the PC case but I am a little gunshy about being a guinea pig for a >599 soundcard... Have heard rumors of a DVD-A player though and this is the only card that has full 24/192 pipelines required for full DVD-A compliance..

If you mean run of the mill high end audio cards (of you can handle that contradiction you can handle anything) the M_Audio line are very well respected and developed... The AP24/96 is fine for a purely digital output but I would (did) spring the extra $20 for the 410 which has 8 analogue outs as well... This card future proofs you and gives you basic pre pro functionality with the Digital Connection drivers... This is available from the good folks at www.digitalconnection.com ... Tell them I sent you and they will probably laugh and deny the order but maybee not... These are in the 150 - 200 category...

A nice review of the 410 v its bigger brother the rackmount 1010 was done by Bill Gaw... This is only comparing its analogue outs IIRC... Look here for it http://www.enjoythemusic.com/magazine/viewpoint/0802/aachapter36.htm

Osho · « **Reply #37 on:** August 07, 2002, 08:39:33 am »

I am using ASIO output 9C DLL with 8.0.336 MJ and it is working great. I don't have any complaints so far in my listening, which definitely have improved. I can feel a lot more air and open ness in the sound. (I have Lynx L22 sound card).

thanks a lot to Matt and everyone at J River which made this possible!!!

Osho

Wagg · « **Reply #38 on:** August 10, 2002, 01:22:08 pm »

I thought I'd chime in here. Let me say I don't own MediaJukebox,(mainly because it's a bit buggy for me under XP) but if you get the ASIO working I'd definately consider purchasing it. I tried your Asio plug-in in the demo, and it would crash immediately upon saying something like "asio output mode 3" etc. It's fairly useless to me untill you can get it to shift output channels so I can output through my SPDIF.

That said, let me also say that I appear to be one of the few Guinea Pigs who went out and purchased an EgoSys Waveterminal 192L, which is the cheaper of their two new cards (192/24out but 96/24 in). Got it for $150 shipped, so I couldn't pass it up. I've been using it with the Winamp Asio plug in and it's sweet. 2-channel output sounds great and DTS digital output right to my stereo under XP w/CDREADER works nicely. Much more stable overall with ASIO in use.

This card is well worth the money if you're into music, or want a cheap hometheater setup (6channel output, 8 w/daughterboard). And, No, there is no software to play back DVD-A disks, regardless of what EGOSYS claims. They also desperately need to add some bass mgt. features, so I'm still letting my Onkyo 595 do decoding because it does a better job of that. (No sub for me, I live in an apt.)

If anyone wants more info on the card just ask.

PhatPhreddy · « **Reply #39 on:** August 10, 2002, 08:19:27 pm »

Wagg, wow finally found someone whi has tried an EGO-Sys...

I know they have no DVD-A player yet (there is no SW decoder but the HW is the only card on the market with the full capability I think)...

150 is cheaper than I thought they went... Have you tried the analogue outs ?? Have you tried other high end cards for relative comparisions ??

Do the divers work suitably for DD and DTS decode with SW dvd players ??

I am one of the few who may not need Bass control... I have 5 matched speakers all nearly equdistant from my setaing... i have crossover and volume on my sub so feel I may be lucky...

Rather than hijack this thread could you email me an let me ask some more Q's ?

Mike Noe · « **Reply #40 on:** August 11, 2002, 03:36:48 am »

Seems with 9c...

- While ripping a CD, playback has a choppy distorted burst every 3 seconds.
- Occasionally while exiting MJ, XP tells me the app won't exit with the old "End Now" dialog. This appears to cause the machine shutdown to freeze as well.

RME DIgi96/8 PST ASIO 2.0 driver 2.023

Listening to: 'Teeter Totter (Alternate Take)' from 'Our Thing' by 'Joe Henderson' on Media Jukebox

PhatPhreddy · « **Reply #41 on:** August 18, 2002, 08:58:03 pm »

How is this project going...

Is it likely to make v9 or is there a chance we can get a working plug in even sooner ??

Have you considered the upsampling and oversampling suggestions for v9 ?? (on the fly bit depth and sample rate conversion) as this is always cited by w..... users on AVS as 'the' reason they cannot give up w..... due to the MAD plug in having higher SQ...

Matt · « **Reply #42 on:** August 19, 2002, 06:18:18 am »

How is this project going...

Is it likely to make v9 or is there a chance we can get a working plug in even sooner ??

It mostly works, and we'll shake the rest of the bugs out once we hit beta for version 9.

Have you considered the upsampling and oversampling suggestions for v9 ?? (on the fly bit depth and sample rate conversion) as this is always cited by w..... users on AVS as 'the' reason they cannot give up w..... due to the MAD plug in having higher SQ...

We dropped in high-quality resampling, but pulled it again because it seemed like a silly, CPU expensive feature. If you're that extreme, you wouldn't have a soundcard that resampled poorly or at all.

And MJ already does bit depth scaling. Everything is 32-bit internally, and scaled on output to whatever you set in options. (in version

Oh, and about MAD, you can use it in MJ already, but it's mostly smoke and mirrors. Lack of precision isn't why MP3's sound bad...

Take care.

-Matt

PhatPhreddy · « **Reply #43 on:** August 19, 2002, 06:39:14 pm »

Glad that the ASIO will make it...

So I can convert the bit depths to 24 bit already in options... Have to check that...

Many people swear by the MAD upsampling but not tried it as I use MJ exclusively... Its just I am thinking of a 24/192 card and I dont know if the drivers will resample (well) the signal from 44.1 to 192...

I am a little confused by your statement that a soundcard would not resample at all (the M-Audio ones can be locked in drivers) but I would like to experiment with real time upsampling from 44.1 to 192 which is convieninetly enough over the nyquist 2.2 barrier that may make accurate resampling not induce errors...

ALl of this would be with APE only....

Poison Dan · « **Reply #44 on:** August 20, 2002, 04:11:43 am »

We dropped in high-quality resampling, but pulled it again because it seemed like a silly, CPU expensive feature. If you're that extreme, you wouldn't have a soundcard that resampled poorly or at all.

The soundcard in my home PC resamples properly, but the problem is I don't only listen to music on my home PC, but also at work. Now at work, the resampling of the AC97 onboard audio is pretty crappy, but I'm not in a position to add a high-quality soundcard to that system (it's not mine). Also, as a contract programmer, I often get assigned different systems.

So I don't need the high-quality resampling feature at home, but at work. I know it will be rather CPU expensive, but maybe you could make it optional, disabled by default, and add a warning dialog about the increased CPU utilization when the user enables this feature.

Oh, and about MAD, you can use it in MJ already, but it's mostly smoke and mirrors. Lack of precision isn't why MP3's sound bad...

I totally agree with this statement.

mikeh · « **Reply #45 on:** August 20, 2002, 01:03:12 pm »

If this works as its supposed to - heres hoping

I,m straight out to buy a new soundcard.

Matt - what supports it. My external DAC supports 24 bit HDCD

Never had it light up - Is this a possibility.

Matt · « **Reply #46 on:** August 20, 2002, 01:10:03 pm »

I think that light on your DAC may only respond to a certain bit-pattern that's inside HDCD's, so I'm not sure if MJ can do anything about it.

I could be half-baked on that, but I think that's what I remember somebody explaining once.

Take care.

-Matt

mikeh · « **Reply #47 on:** August 20, 2002, 01:24:49 pm »

Matt. Please explain.

You say everything inside MJ is 32 bit but scaled down ??

So if i record from line in a Vinyl album to Hi Q .ape.

Really it records to .wav at 16/44 and then the .ape compresses.

So the max Q must be the .wav file which is 16 bit.

If MJ processes all inside in 32 bit how does it do this ?

Does it scale it up ?

So now you see where i'm going with this. Can i record to .ape in true 32 bit and use ASIO to send this direct to my 32 bit DAC (when they exist)

I have a few other programs that allow recording in 24/96

Whats the future ?? (Small question) (large answer)

Matt · « **Reply #48 on:** August 20, 2002, 01:57:45 pm »

Yeah, Media Jukebox scales everything up so that internally, it always works with 32-bit data. Scaling back down for output is a bit-perfect operation if you don't run any DSP's. So, you could record at 24 / 32 bit and actually play it in its full glory with MJ.

And about the future, who knows. I'm betting on Media Jukebox 9

Take care.

-Matt

Mike Noe · « **Reply #49 on:** August 20, 2002, 06:24:00 pm »

FWIW, my HCDC "light" comes on when playing my APE encoded HDCD music via MJ to my DAC.

INTERACT FORUM

Author Topic: ASIO OUTPUT: Guinea Pigs Needed... (Read 6309 times)

LCtheDJ

konicky

Mike Noe

JNKH

jann

Mike Noe

Oblong

jann

jann

jann

Mike|PLS|Noe

Mike Noe

Mike Noe

Oblong

JGourd

JNKH

Wagg

Mike Noe

mikeh

mikeh

Mike Noe