Interestingly enough, it is not about that. It's responsiveness (think in terms of priorities).
But, the more in use, the less responsive. Now, miss 50 samples one time, and all is in the sh*t and stays there (implied by my means of playback, so *that* is my own fault).

Working on it ...

Yeah, but I don't think it is much of our business.
The VST people should benefit most from Q processors, that *is* about audio, but how is that related to you or me.

Fact is that I recognize the problems software concerned (e.g. Cubase) have, which they so far can't even solve. This is one of the reasons I introduced the other appointment schemes, and mind you ... they do sound (very) different (so what) but could easily lock out processes on a Quad Core (I tried to explain earlier that with a 2 core this is no problem, for no one).

Let's drop the subject for now.

Ok Gerard. For me, however, it is not the real solution. I mean, if you were able to play with Q1 lower, and now that can't work anymore (because of crackling) I want to understand why ...
Actually, for you it should be something not to "accept", because the Q1 is there to create the best sound for you, not for avoiding crackling.

For others : above only counts when you could proove (in the past) that the lower setting worked without crackling.

Lastly, it becomes more or less complex, since the lower settings of Q1 require more from the CPU; no matter it is far from 100% (or 50% looking at the one servicing core) it is about "response times" of the CPU. However, the more it's busy already, the less responsive it will be.
At the far end, those with, say, more than 10% CPU useage during XX playback, should first look into their system where that comes from. Compare with XX closed etc.
BTW, I am not *urging* for answers, but I kind of hate it when you can't achieve quality which should be possible to achieve from theory. Worse is that it worked before, and the most worse is that (for some of you) in an earlier version it did not work, then it worked, and now not anymore.

The only things changed in this direction is the priorities and appointment (processor affinity). Playing with those might (or actually should) help (better/worse), although I realize that these are lengthy processes.

As a reference, please note that -as I always claimed from the beginning- there is no way I myself can impeede for the smallest crack or glitch, not even with a SataII -> SataII heavy I/O backup (say one album per 4 seconds) from the music data, lasting many hours and playback keeping steady (as I did yesterday evening with 0.9s-1 Attended, playing music from the same disk as the backup source).
During this process my CPU is never above 5% (2x 2.4GHz processor).

Sidenote : When I say that cpu should be under 5% during normal playback (which obviously is related to the cpu rate), I am referring to SPDIF and RME (Fireface) drivers. Do note however, that when I'm using USB, cpu useage is virtually ZERO (like the right-side core looks at playback, but now the left-side is so too). Thus ... anyone using USB (with legacy (MS) USB drivers) ... if they have 10% or even 35% ... something is very seriously wrong in your system.

Gerner,

Maybe it comes confusing to you as an "insider", but this is what I said :


which means I just "approved" it for XX audio. The hint is though, to be careful with other software.

Gerard, I can't be sure whether you did this already :

Your reocurring cracklings should be caused by Unattended Playback (or playing FLAC/MP3 in general), and XXHighEnd reciding on drive C:.
So, if you put your XXHighEnd folder on the music drive it may help.
If you already did that, I don't know yet ...

Somehow we must go the route of trial and error what is causing this in your systems. But not now, because it needs conveniently shutting down the Processor Core Appointment, and I don't think this is in there (like the before version which could realtime do it by unchecking the checkbox which was in that version).

Also, I'll try to find some means of capturing what's happening, reporting the buffer size of the DAC and all I can think of in order to attack these IMO unnecessary happenings. No matter all is stressed indeed, it should be able to cope with it (proved by before versions).

Two questions for Leo :
- Did you try this Unattended ?
- Could you please provide your data in your signature like the others do ?


PS: There is no way you should be using 35% CPU, not even with Doubling (then 5-6 or so). This seems a pattern for those with crackling ...
Leo, what's you CPU (and rate) ?

Today I don't know this anymore (the XP versions of back then were compared with Foobar 0.8.3), and as you may know, I can't listen (anymore) to XX at XP at all (plain ugly to my ears).

Do note that the Core Appointment does not work in demo mode.

It should theoretically, Bu I did not notice so. The most important things is that it would be a "dead" program, so on that matter it would not harm.
But it's not much useful either.

Maybe you don't know half of what good playback can do to a woman;

Actually my wife isn't so much interested in music at all. But she is a measuring device ...
When the sound does not work out, she is talking about stupid noise (tering herrie), and it does not matter what song is playing. If it worked out the week before, I can tell what I want "but last week you liked it so much ?!", the mood gets bad and stays like that until the next day.
So last week I had a lot of time to work on XX, hahahaha.

Not so tonight (and I can feel that myself) : the volume goes from a quarter-to to 12, and there goes Enigma (the worse for MP3), Little Feet, Led Zeppelin, and Boudewijn de Groot plus Mark Knopfler as a bonus. Not tyering and just working out as intended.
Women are great if you listen to them sometimes.

Have to go now.

Because some people perceive some misunderstandings about the why's and how's, here is a small outlay :

First of all, Unattended Playback is about one thing only : getting the influence of SQ out of the way of any program normally involved at Playback.
Strangely enough, in our case that would be XXHighEnd itself ...

So Unattended Playback just moves XXHighEnd out of the way, and playback commences out of any control.
When a Playlist is loaded, and Play is clicked, the XXHighEnd screen disappears, but the Playlist is walked through as if under the control of a program, and all tracks are played automatically.
If you do not like this, just do not tick the checkbox concerned, and all is back to normal, which means the screen (better : program) you see, influences SQ. So you could say : ultimate SQ emerges from shutting down the player (XXHighEnd) itself ...

Edit : Below is obsolete. Here's the current situation : http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=279.msg2443#msg2443

If a track is playing, and you want to know the title, you can restart XXHighEnd, and the playing track will be at the top of the Playlist. Seen it ? just click Off, and nothing changed.
But if you want to alter the Playlist, or you want to commence to the next track etc., click Stop always !
Then click on the track where you want playing to commence, and click Play again.
Currently no other means (like clicking Next etc.) is supported. It will in the future, but not now.

If music is playing in the background and you want to get rid of it (go to sleep etc.), just start XXHighEnd and click Stop. Done.
If you want to load new tracks : start XXHighEnd, click Clear, load the tracks, click Stop and click Play.

There is really not more to this, but you need to understand it;
Doing these things without clicking Stop in between will cause anomalies, hence things not covered for yet (!).

If you can't get comfortable with this, just don't use Unattended Playback !

Peter

Hi,

After a small week of listening to 0.9s (Vista/#3), and actually being satisfied by the relative difference, there was a thing that kept on attacking me : sibilance in the higher regions.
I think astacus21 pointed it out here : http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=272.msg1722#msg1722, he of course not knowing that I recognized it. So yes, if it looked like one thing, it was uncomfortable jitter ...

My settings WERE : Unattended Playback, PlayerPrio Low, ThreadPrio RealTime, Processor Core Appointment Scheme-1 (all as advised as per the Release Notes on 0.9s-0), and Q1=14, Invert).

Let's say that 30% of albums I listened to were the most satisfactory, but of 70% I did not know ...
For that 70% there was a discomfort, varying indeed from sibilance to too much dynamics. The latter will be unknown to you, but it expresses as your wife telling you to put down the volume, while it wasn't that low ever, just because you yourself already turned it down. Discomfort ... hard to explain why.
Already yesterday I tried Processor Appointment Scheme-2, my feeling telling me the P.A. was to blame somehow (no logic !). It did not help.
Well, today I was explicitly testing albums (tracks) for it, and it was not difficult to find that Scheme-3 is the way to go ! (I did not try 4 yet).

So, with other settings unchanged (see above), I only changed the P.A. Scheme to 3, and for many hours - the volume 3-5 dB louder opposed to the past week - not only me, but also my wife did not complain. Furthermore, I sensed rather explicitly that the sibilance had gone. In fact, nothing to complain, and all of the other benefits remained. Great great great.

Please note, that to my own findings (yesterday), things get over the hill at playing MP3's if this is not right. Highs sibilance get over expressed in a way I did not know from the (relatively short) experience I have from XXHighEnd playing MP3's. I was very much disappointed, because playing MP3's (at the higher bitrates) turned out to be so well. So very much unexpectedly well. But not anymore ... With Scheme-3 all was good again tonight.

Experiences so far tell that what counts for one, count for others as well. So please try it.


One more note : Do not get fooled by crazily smooth recordings, them being not so smooth before 0.9s;
It occurred to me that smoothness gets overexpressed now, just as well as things being more harsh get overexpressed (in a good way). Mind you, smoothnes of before got grainy, whereas more harsh intended got less fresh (in fact all got more smeared). So both are good now. But try to look through what was intended. It is really not difficult once being in the stage of listening to live instruments. But beware : when something even smells like being a flair (putting its signature to all music), then for sure it's wrong.
With A.P. Scheme-1 this was so. According to me.

Peter


Edit : As it appears now, "Scheme-3" is mentioned twice in the combobox for Processor Core Appointment Scheme (thank you Gerard !). Choosing the second will select Scheme-4 anyway.

Thank you Andrey ... you are correct.
If you'd only have the experience why ...
But as said, I will try my best in the future.

Peter

Well said Boggie.
All changes in SQ to #1 and #2 were unintentional, just as they were unintentional to #3 btw. There are just more things going on than as expected, and that can be in anyone's disadvantage. I know it now though, so in the future I'll sure try incorporate it. Somehow !.

That's all happening already (and more) ...

Forget about Behringers !
cr*ppy hardware, cr*ppy software (drivers). The're just too cheap.