Bowers & Wilkins sound system ...... Ouch ....

[CatmanV2]

Sonos Play 3 £248
Sonos Connect £278 (think you need to add amp + speakers)
Sonos Connect Amp £398!

Indeed. Very dubious. Although my mate in the business says Sonos have it stitched up very tight. Never *ever* get cheap Sonos on the high street.

C

 

[Maser Sod]

Would love to see the interface, MS

C

They say a picture tells a thousand words, but I'm not sure it does here! It's all a bit cobbled together, but the LCD interface scrolls the current track playing on the RPi. (Note that any visual oddities in the pictures are due to the photography and not the display.)

My neighbour has a 3D printer, so the next step is to beg its use so I can build a larger case for the RPi so I can give it an integrated LCD.

 

[Maser Sod]

I'm always a bit leery when people start talking about jitter and so forth on ethernet connections (FFS, Cyrus even supply a choke for the ethernet cable with the StreamXT). Leaving wireless aside, you've likely got a 10G ethernet connection. That leaves *so* much extra bandwidth for dealing with out of sequence / lost packets I just cannot see how it can ever be an issue. Granted if something starts sucking the server resources, and slows the read speed, then you're going to have buffering / stuttering, but that's a different kettle of fish.

C

The bandwidth isn't the issue, it's the limited capability of the RPi's wifi and - in particular - the very limited ability of my 4G wireless router, which has to sit a couple of floors up from my living room in order to afford me a true 4G capability. Even keeping a connection can be a challenge.

It's worth noting, as an aside, that wifi is more susceptible to interference - e.g. from other routers on the same frequency - and this can cause dropped frames. TCP/IP of course guarantees that lost packets will be resent, but streamed music is very-near real time (depending on buffer size) and it could be that a dropped frame (and thus lost packets) is no longer useful when it eventually does arrive.

I don't know how the different players' software deal with this problem, but I imagine it is exarcebated with non-PCM material due to decoding overhead. I only stream .wav files because PCM is simple and closely matches the I2S which is used just before the D2A conversion.

I don't understand all the intricacies of the processes, but I'm learning all the time as I intend at some point to bypass USB and see if I can physically stream to the circuitry beyond the DAC's internal asynchronous USB circuitry. That's probably biting off more than I can chew, if I am honest!

 

[CatmanV2]

They say a picture tells a thousand words, but I'm not sure it does here! It's all a bit cobbled together, but the LCD interface scrolls the current track playing on the RPi. (Note that any visual oddities in the pictures are due to the photography and not the display.)

My neighbour has a 3D printer, so the next step is to beg its use so I can build a larger case for the RPi so I can give it an integrated LCD.

View attachment 16592View attachment 16593View attachment 16594View attachment 16595

Interesting. I had something very similar in an in car MP3 player I built 'some years' ago. Is it on the GPIO port, or something else?

C

 

[CatmanV2]

The bandwidth isn't the issue, it's the limited capability of the RPi's wifi and - in particular - the very limited ability of my 4G wireless router, which has to sit a couple of floors up from my living room in order to afford me a true 4G capability. Even keeping a connection can be a challenge.

It's worth noting, as an aside, that wifi is more susceptible to interference - e.g. from other routers on the same frequency - and this can cause dropped frames. TCP/IP of course guarantees that lost packets will be resent, but streamed music is very-near real time (depending on buffer size) and it could be that a dropped frame (and thus lost packets) is no longer useful when it eventually does arrive.

Yeah, but I wasn't talking about WiFi, quite deliberately. I don't run my stuff on wireless either

C

 

[GhostyDog]

Might find the standard setup is B&W anyway, I have them as standuard in my XF and there was a factory optional branded system with some more speakers and an amp.

In the XF I find the standard system to be the best i've had in a car.

 

[Maser Sod]

Interesting. I had something very similar in an in car MP3 player I built 'some years' ago. Is it on the GPIO port, or something else?
C

Yep, I was able to match up the GPIO pins to the appropriate pins (holes) on the LCD.

The LCD expects 5v but the GPIO only presents 3.3v, but it seems to work nonetheless.

I'm usually pretty cack-handed with these things, but got it all up and running in about 3-4 hours total. (No thanks to the LCD vendors, who neglected to send a datasheet/pinout with the product!)

The Pi is great fun for trying out all these things, and it's been a revelation to hear great SQ from it. I just wish the MPD music player was a bit more robust.

 

[Grinzzz]

Think I'll stick to my gramophone player.

Adam, I found an easy no fuss method to meet my requirements with AppleTv. Picked up a yamaha receiver to deal with multi room. Best bit is it's all controllable from the phone and not a CD or DVD in sight anymore, they all sit on Itunes running on a virtual server dedicated to media. When I buy a new CD or video on my laptop iTunes it gets transferred automatically to the server.....drat I sound like an apple fanboi.

I know the audiophiles will laugh but now I'm older I can hardly tell the difference (so long as no one tells me the price) and I tend to put ease of use over serious sound quality nowadays.

 

[Grinzzz]

Looks like you're having fun with that, Pat. Been playing with arduino myself, next job is to replace the crappy heating controllers and thermostats.

 

[Maser Sod]

I know the audiophiles will laugh but now I'm older I can hardly tell the difference (so long as no one tells me the price) and I tend to put ease of use over serious sound quality nowadays.

I certainly won't laugh - there is no longer a night-and-day difference between relatively inexpensive equipment of decent quality and a fairly high-end rig.

I can drive my system entirely from my laptop or my iPhone, so I get both ease of use and good sound quality.

 

[CatmanV2]

I know the audiophiles will laugh but now I'm older I can hardly tell the difference (so long as no one tells me the price) and I tend to put ease of use over serious sound quality nowadays.

I thought I was getting to the point where I wouldn't notice any serious improvements. Turned out I was wrong

Whatever floats your boat, frankly.

C

 

[CatmanV2]

Yep, I was able to match up the GPIO pins to the appropriate pins (holes) on the LCD.

The LCD expects 5v but the GPIO only presents 3.3v, but it seems to work nonetheless.

I'm usually pretty cack-handed with these things, but got it all up and running in about 3-4 hours total. (No thanks to the LCD vendors, who neglected to send a datasheet/pinout with the product!)

The Pi is great fun for trying out all these things, and it's been a revelation to hear great SQ from it. I just wish the MPD music player was a bit more robust.

Groovy. So are you running a daemon on the apple server, and some kind of client on the Pi, or both on the Pi? I thought you'd mounted the music share on the Pi is all.

Have you checked out RaspbMC? Does video and photos as well (rather fine) as a development from XBMC (X-box media centre), nice library, phone / web / remote control etc.

C

 

[Maser Sod]

Groovy. So are you running a daemon on the apple server, and some kind of client on the Pi, or both on the Pi? I thought you'd mounted the music share on the Pi is all.

Have you checked out RaspbMC? Does video and photos as well (rather fine) as a development from XBMC (X-box media centre), nice library, phone / web / remote control etc.

C

I have MPC (client) and MPD (server) both running on the Pi.

I did originally have all my music running off the Mac (using Audirvana+ as the player) and I can still use it with a USB connection to my DAC, but frankly the Pi setup sounds better. In many respects it shouldn't do, but it just does, so I'm sticking with it. I'm guessing it might be partly to do with the simplicity of the Pi circuitry and associated power requirements.

RaspBMC is an excellent interface, and was my first choice. But it would not work on wifi for me (it's a known bug, which nobody has rushed to fix). Also, you cannot get a command line session up from the default interface. So you are reliant always on the UI config. This to me is kind of against the grain of Linux. Yes, you can open an SSH session remotely, but if you can't get a network connection in the first place then you are stuck!

I still have RaspBMC on one of my SD cards and have ordered a different wireless dongle, so will retry as the interface is really very good.

I've tried about 4 different flavours of RPI-oriented operating systems, including at least one audiophile-oriented version, but i have stuck with Raspian since it seems stable and functional. I actually never perform updates, since I wasted a day or two recently trying to work out why my movies were no longer displaying on OMX player, only to find out eventually that the latest OMXplayer build is faulty. Grrr.

FWIW, my set-up sounds very 'analoguey', however the monitors (LS50's) paired with the Cyrus 8 leave the sound a little bit on the thin side. Not sure how to add more bass. I don't want to dump the speakers so maybe the amp needs changing out. What ever happened to tone controls?

 

[CatmanV2]

I've tried about 4 different flavours of RPI-oriented operating systems, including at least one audiophile-oriented version, but i have stuck with Raspian since it seems stable and functional. I actually never perform updates, since I wasted a day or two recently trying to work out why my movies were no longer displaying on OMX player, only to find out eventually that the latest OMXplayer build is faulty. Grrr.

FWIW, my set-up sounds very 'analoguey', however the monitors (LS50's) paired with the Cyrus 8 leave the sound a little bit on the thin side. Not sure how to add more bass. I don't want to dump the speakers so maybe the amp needs changing out. What ever happened to tone controls?

Hmm. Didn't know that there was an audiophile RasPi build. Can you recall what you tried?

If you're finding the LS50s thin, I'd suggest the positioning is wrong. Everything I've read indicates that they are pretty good with the bass (for their size, which could be an issue). Of course the Cyrus is going to be rather less than bass heavy, even though it should be delivering pretty awesome clarity. Perhaps an Naim, or add a PSX-R to the Cyrus.

C

 

[Maser Sod]

I don't think it is the speakers that are thin. The KEF's are correctly positioned according to the official advice (and the limitations of my room), and with the right level of port blocking also (they come with removable rear port 'dampers'). They are also on the recommended stands. There are hints of good tight bass on certain tracks, so I'm not pointing the finger of blame at the speakers.

I found my old Cyrus 1 revealing but a little thin also, so I think I know where the blame may lie. I've been thinking about a PSX-R. But then when I think about spending a few hundred quid on a power supply, I start thinking about moving away from integrated amps altogether. It's hard to decide. I'm modding a valve amp at the moment (VR 70-E) so let's see how much fuller the sound is when I have completed that project. My DAC also allows op amp rolling as well as tube rolling, so I may play around there too (although I prefer the solid state sound to the tube sound as things stand).

This is the RPi audiophile project:
http://www.raspyfi.com/

 

[CatmanV2]

Groovy, thanks.

I'd not be surprised if the Cyrus was making things sound bass light. Bass is not where they aim, really. It's all about the detail, which suits *me*, but not many others.

And it is possible to deliver awesome bass. I have the Matrix soundtrack on right now, and am *still* amazed by what these little speakers can put out. Which I guess is why I'm not really in any hurry to lob cash at Vienna.

Hmm, that looks like the making of a rather nice second system for garage / bedroom.

Hmmm, some more. I really should use my minipods for *something*, but I'll still need an amp.

C

 

[GhostyDog]

I will be getting a Sonos system in the new house. I just don't see anything else on the market for Multi-room Multi-zone that compares. Their App for mobiles is also excellent, allowing you to stream directly off your phone.

Unless of course there's something better out there?

I'm currently running a Arctic Cooling Audio Relay, it's DNLA compatible and I control a Asset uPNP mediaserver serving up tuns to it using an iPad app called media:connect by persona software. The Audio Relays can be had for around £80 a pop and have audio RCA and toslink, can be wired up to a house LAN or a WLAN.

Asset Media server can rencode on the fly, so if you have FLAC you can reencode on the fly to another hi bitrate streaming file that is compatible with the Audio Relay.

**** site cheaper than Sonos with a lot of the same functionality. Media:connect also gives you acces to internet radio and shoutcast servers

 

[CatmanV2]

Looks rather like an embedded DNLA client in a wireless box with re-encoding?
C

 

[Maser Sod]

I always work with .wav files, built with EAC, since the files are neither compressed nor encoded - the only 'stuff' other than the raw PCM data is a 44 byte header. Hence no need for decoding.

Means less processing overhead - always good!

 

[bigbob]

When I got the Ghibli price list I was surprised at how light the standard spec was. In fact it would not surprise me if at transaction prices with like for like spec, a QP V6 is a similar price to a Ghibli V6S.

For you guys that like sound surely the best way is always just to fit your own stuff?