Thank you for the feedback, Ramesh !

Ramesh,

As far as I know such mixed Playlists are covered for.
I must be a little bit cautious because since the Playlists functionality was created, the MQA setup has changed somewhat;

Assumed the errors were an other kind of accident, take good notice of what the bits per second shows (in the top of the Coverart during Unattended); it would be the only measure to check whether all is correct.

Regards,
Peter

PS: Somewhere in the back of my mind I recall that a Playlist may contain "a" track, but that you in the US (me in NL) are not authorized for that track anyway. This can produce oddities (error ?). Thus, if I'd create a Tidal Playlist with Earth & Fire in it (which is Dutch - not Earth, Wind & Fire ), chances exist that this is not authorized in the US. Still (I think) the track would be loaded from the Playlist.

Yes ...

Search for Playlist in here :
XXHighEnd Model 2.08 - Easier Install, More Tidal, MQA Testing, SQ improved

Notice that you can not create Playlists within Tidal by means of XXHighEnd, but I don't think that is what you mean.

Peter

Haha.
Well done !
Good that it's all solved now.

Regards,
Peter

Done.
But after unzipping, you still should compare the files (number of) with the contents of the zip I sent.

Check XXHighEnd for the Driver Signing still to be Off; All the Google finds still lead to that for this message (FWIW).

Peter

Mani, what about considering the message to be true and that somehow the copying from whatever source prevented a file to come along ? Or, that the unzipping of the original zip file (I guess you have that) disallows that file(s) ?
As we know, similar can happen with the install of XXHighEnd.

Peter

Hey Badger,

By pure coincidence yesterday I got fed-up with that setting I proposed on A/S - for quite exactly the reasons you now mention. However :

After trying some other XXHighEnd settings for worse or even better (which is of course what "we" do as well ), nothing satisfied me at all any more (but I did not go back to the "Consensus"). In the end - and now for those with the Mach III Audio PC, I found that the way more "sharp" (as in pinpointed) 24 core setting instead of an also quite consensus 20 core setting (for the 28 core processor), ... that this did all the bad tricks. Thus, while the 24 core setting shows way better attack on everything, this may just be the thing that the "consensus" setting can bear. But the setting proposed on A/S is ... well ... too edgy;
My wife complained within minutes, but I held on for a month or so (she had to hold on too ;-).

I am now thus trying yet an other setting I ever back found and liked and just like I never could tell about the "A/S" setting in here yet because I was not sure, I will take as much time as needed to express my ideas if for the better at all.
Meanwhile I could also try your and Ramesh' setting.

Thank you very much for your feedback !
Peter

Hi Mani - this is what I just sent you by email (I surely received yours (twice)) :

Although your screenshots are barely readable, it is my estimate that this is about the Driver Signing not being shut off. This can be done n XXHE settings, remember ?

After changing the setting, reboot (IIRC).

But in here (forum) I am able to read what's in your screenshots and now I don't know. The message about the catalog file and the tampering is unknown to me, although I'd understand what it means.
Try the Signing thing anyway, and let me know whether it helps. By forum would be the best, assumed others may run into this as well ?

Kind regards,
Peter

Hey RW,

My first advice would be : bring it back. It seems that it will hunt you with oddities forever. Additionally, I think (not sure !) there's some Chinese XMos driver in order and they don't shine for "compatibility". Tweaking, yes (you won't like that).

https://www.forum.rme-audio.de/viewtopic.php?id=26980
Reading through that, tells me enough. Do notice that the most "severe" problem is the sampling rate which won't change automatically, which is why you probably won't understand what is happening. I did not sort it out, but think like : always first set the sampling rate in the control panel (be sure it took the change) and then next start playback which matches that sampling rate. And 384 is max, as it seems.

The fact that Foobar works does not tell a thing because it can work with WDM and as far as I recall also in non-exclusive mode (the good old not bit perfect resampling mode). Read : In Foobar it still does not work, but you don't notice that the used sampling rate is different from what you "set".

Summarised, to me (and at first glance) it looks that the RME is too much of a Pro device (using ASIO and everything works).

Lat thing : A DAC which does not support Kernel Streaming does not exist in my book. So this could be a matter of installing the proper driver. Maybe you can ask on that forum.

With changing the 24 bit / 32 bit setting you may see some success suddenly more success (see screenshot below, the DAC Needs section).

WASAPI is available when you did not shut off the WASAPI Services. See second screenshot.

I hope you can get it done, but remember, it will always annoy you because the sampling rate won't change automatically.

Kind regards,
Peter

Hi again Ramesh,

Yes, but ... I just woke up with knowing again how it is "constructed" ...
And it's applied for so long (like 15+ years), that I did not even realize any more that it is how it is;

The power amp, be that internal or be it yours externally, acts as a pre-amp for the bass section. This also solves the level difference between the mid-high and the bass section; once set = always set.
And for myself I could not explain that with my previous explanations.

Internal Mid-High amplifier(s) with fixed volume -> DSP -> Bass amplifier(s).
or
External amplifier with variable volume -> DSP -> Bass amplifier(s).

(bass is always levelled with mid-high, once set orderly (via the DSP volume))

Thus with Line Level input there's internally an Y split behind the one of the two amps servicing the mid-high and one branch goes to the mid-high and the other branch goes to the DSP (which is thus fed Speaker Level signal, but not the bass level which would be too much for it);

With Speaker Level input, the Y is right behind the input (but thus behind your external amplifier) and again one branch goes to mid-high and the other goes to the DSP.

---

With multi-channel input the same principle could be applied, now all externally. In that case, there too the balance between mid-high and bass would be preserved, once set orderly.
In this setup no internal filters are active whatsoever, so this now all has to be applied outboard, be that passive normal filters or be that DSP or a mix.

Peter

I suppose this "explanation" was not clear :


Notice that "Speaker Level" is nothing else than a higher voltage level than Line Level. The Speaker Level is amplified Line Level and it can just be attenuated (brought back to Line Level). This happens internally (my mentioned "inherently") or it has to be done with the DSP Input Level (and attenuate that). If you don't recognize that you have been doing the latter, it will be the former.

Peter

Hi Ramesh,

I do think you understand, but possibly my first post about this was not made fully clear (about the "External Amp" input).

With External Amp :

- You'd feed Speaker Level signal from that amp to the Mid/High section;
- The Filter setup now will be different, but there surely still is a filter on the Mid and on the High plus an XOver obviously;
- The bottom part of the Mid is also filtered, to form the XOver towards the Bass units;
- The bass amps plus DSP remain active as they do with the (single) line level input.

Don't ask me how the level of the bass amps is attenuated, but or it has to be inherently (this is definitely possible), or the attenuation has to be done with the DSP (input level).

But you tell me ... contrary to me you used the External Amp, right ?
So if this is correct, what are your findings regarding this subject ?

Peter

PS:
Maybe I feel stupid not to be able to present a schematic, but this is because there are a million schematics in emails floating around, and the emails with Bert are 1000s on the Orelo alone (yes, this was all arranged for via email - believe it or not).

Hi Ramesh,

Yes. As far as I know from the design ...
(but I never really tried myself ...)

Peter

Which will imply THD.

The "Crossover" is nothing more or less than two filters, one with a roll off to the upper frequency range (for the mid) and one with a roll off to the lower frequency range (for the tweeter). Of course there is more to be filtered, like the bottom of the mid (also crossover) and the upper of the tweeter (protection). And besides and maybe merely : make the frequency response more smooth than the horn normally (acoustically) allows for without aid.
The "active" part is in this latter and it only serves 3dB of more efficiency (without this feature the efficiency of the Orphean would be 115dB - now it is 118dB). So this is why two amplifiers are in order - one is to boost the tweeter more than the mid, so the inherent dip in the tweeter is now smoothed by filtering down all but the dip. I name this an "active" application because it is an amplifier which does something additional to the tweeter. In the end it is part of the filtering, which, as said, also is for smoothening bumps. Dips can't be smoothened - they need to be amplified (which is what in net comes down to in this case).

With outboard filtering the efficiency goes down by said 3dB or else this dip is there (bad for SQ of course). In the end there is thus also a different relation between mid-high on one side and the bass on the other (bass (also) needs to be attenuated by an additional 3dB if the active filtering is not present. Not that you would notice for real with the multi channel setup, because it would be one pile of "settings" anyway.


Theoretically this would be possible (if I am not mistaking) but whether it is worthwhile ... I doubt it. You (or someone else) would need to design the whole lot which thus starts with the normal filter part itself (think years of work). Notice that this has *not* been done inside of the Orelo because that is a high level filter (Speaker Level) with different components and very different impedances (all reacting differently than how they do now). It would be true, however, that there's not the downside of the additional A/D - D/A.

So this is
DAC -> Filters (Line Level) with 6ch output -> 6x Poweramp.

Thinking this over for a bit, I think it should exist - at least from older days when DSP was not available yet, but Line Level filters were (Speaker Level filters wouldn't exist anyway, IMO). I think I recall devices costing 4K or so. And they would really be active (with OpAmps).
Maybe this is far more normal than I am currently contemplating. Hmm ...
Didn't Linkwitz carry something like that ... (don't laugh now because in that case this is how you got the idea in the first place - right ?)

Peter

PS: Plus you'd own it already unless you sold it ...