The 64MB is a limitation of official MS signed drivers (XP only !); Engine#2 goes around that (but with different further features and different SQ).

If you are really into listening to music, you really really should move to Vista. When you'd use the PC for music playback only, it's no big deal really.
Note that the different SQ from Vista is not a coincidence; in there Vista-only features are used which explicitly allow for the much better SQ.
MUCH better. Please try it.

Uhhmm ... 



... Interesting ...

LydMekk is using XP (no operable Q1 sliders in there) and I really would not know what has changed in there that could have influenced SQ.
But okay, the program *has* changed, so I will try to find it.

LydMekk, thanks.
Peter

Start printing photo's ... then you'll get the grasp of it.
Or print your covers, one with 96dpi and one with 200. Both 500x500 ...

But never mind. 

Hi Bert,

Maybe a tad more difficult ...
Are you sure you have *and* 500x500 pictures *and* you can use them usefully ? What I mean is this :

When I scan a cover at 96dpi (which would be a normal monitor resolution), my pictures "become" 450 x 450 (or in that area, like 457 x 457). Note that this gives a 1:1 physical picture size, hence at measuring at the monitor (uhhm, 1280x1040) they will be egually large to the physical cover.

Of course I could make a 500x500 picture, but not without teaking the dpi. And if I do that, IMO things can't be 1:1 reproduced on the monitor (no matter what size you drag the picture, the dpi is wrong -> conversion).

In the end I don't bother because the cover will display as large as it is told, but since you would be very close to the 1:1 physical size, it would IMO be better to make it the real physical size (coming close to 12x12cm at 96dpi). Make it bigger and the scanner will extrapolate (or at it being bigger, interpolate, whatever).

Peter

Chris,


I don't understand this. These buttons are just there from the beginning. So what do you mean, please ?


This is by design ...
It allows you to get bored from a current Playlist, but allow the current track to finish neatly.
BUT, this does not quite workout as intended, because currently (in fact, always so far) when you operate it like I proposed (let that playing track neatly finish), that playing track will repeat again. And *this* is on the bug list.
I could allow for pressing Clear twice though, so at a second time that playing track would stop playing and disappear from the Playlist Area.



... Which most probably is because you don't know how to do it ?
So, indeed selecting a complete folder currently does not work. That will be in there though. However :
What you currently should do is :
Use Explorer to find your albums. Go into the album folder. Select the tracks you want (ctrl-click, ctrl-shift-click, etc.), and DRAG them onto the Playlist Area.
Remember, use Explorer.


No, you really would not want that. Why ? because the very first thing you canNOT do then, is select (individual !) tracks from a general means, like Explorer.
XX will solve that for you in due time.

If it's not clear, please call again !

Peter

Hi Johan,

As I told you some time ago (PM) ... I won't forget your good efforts on this ...

But on the cracks ... could you by some means send me the (or a) track you have problems with by email ?
I will be responsible for unauthorized copying ... (for those who might be interested in it )

If the file is too large, you might cut it ?


It's already on the list.

Thanks,
Peter

This actually is about one of the "means" to rip (or combine) into a format after which you're kind of stuck to that format, and if the player does not support it you can't play them.

"Format" in this case is the combining of all the tracks from a CD (or even more) into one large file, while at the same time a data file (cue file) is created that contains the actual start-end positions of the individual tracks, the tracknames going with that. In those files can be more data, like genre, year of origin and more (all by convention).

A Cue File as such, is in fact an "order form" of what to do (play) when. It's origin will be from the film industry (I think; didn't look that up).

The large file can be broken down into its individual elements (the individual tracks) and saved to disk again as how they were originally.
While the mechanism as a whole might have been beneficous because of the additional data (like genre etc.) is actually stored with it (though not in the same physical (e.g.) WAV file because of software anticipating on it, nowadays "players" are (or can be) sophisticated enough to store/perform things otherwise. This, btw, is exactly what a program like XXHighEnd (still) needs, and it is the thing which is currently worked on. In fact this is about the good old discussion "how / where to store my CD files", which should be unimportant and all is done (found, sorted) at retrieval time (Most convenient Storage Structure ?)

Something like that ?

For Vista 1GB ... it is the minimum. I mean, without loading WAV files it already would be.

But, your culprit will be more in the area of the HDDs which might have fallen asleep. I don't know though whether that can be the case in your sitution. If you can find power management properties for your *internal* harddisk (somewhere) you'd know what to look for with the USB (?) disks. Do find things in this sequence because if there's no power management possible for the USB (?) disks, you won't see anything. So you'd have to see how it looks like first (on the internal HDD).

Note that -if this indeed is the culprit- I could extend the "waiting time" for the data, but in the end this does not help you. It will imply "no gapless", which is not what you'd want. So you just have to solve the problem.
By heart, the current waiting time is 9 seconds or so, and this 9 seconds includes the full loading of the track. Thus, if that would take (for e.g. a full CD = 700MB) more, then you won't overcome the problem anyway. But since it happens with 25MB tracks also, it must be something like described in the above.
Btw, note that the message that Engine#3 did not start in the expected time appears 60 seconds after the first attempt. This is inconsistent with the 9 seconds mentioned earlier, but the 60 seconds is there because there can be other reasons for a wait time longer than 9 seconds, not related to your problem. So this is just background informattion.

Peter

When / since when / how often does this happen ?

All,

At some stage we'd have to present an official release;
I want to do that with a version which does not contain disturbing bugs. But do I know them all ?

Below is the list as I know it. If there is more, please feel free to add, but more importantly, please try to eleborate on how to copy the behaviour concerned at will.
Let's say I aim for the beginning of November (2007 ) for a 1.00 version. A few new features will need be added for that too, but that's another story.

---

• Won't run on Vista/64. (*)
  Solved in 0.9v-1
• A-B playing (repeating a selection) not implemented yet
  Solved in 0.9w-2
• Under Engine #3 only the "Primary Device" can produce sound (same with Engine#2 but that will not change).
  Solved in 0.9x-5
• Playlists cannot be copied to other PCs on the network, hence the drive references -as currently used instead of Computernames- will be wrong then. (*)
• Similarly, Playlists can be use locally only (from the install directory of XX). (*)
• Though the Properties area suggests otherwise (Info tab), currently only 2 channel 44K1 16 bit stereo playback is supported. (*)
  Solved in 0.9u later versions (but still only 2 channel (stereo) is supported)
• The currently playing track, eventually will move out of (under) the Playlist area (depending on the length of the Playlist).
  Solved in 0.9m
• When the Q1 slider is set to 0, that position is not remembered at the next startup. This bug was introduced with version 0.9k.
  Solved in 0.9l
• When a track is playing and the Playlist Area is cleared (Clear button), following by dragging in new tracks, the playing track may be the next playing (instead of the second track)
  Solved in 0.9l.
• Not more than one track at the time can be removed from the Playlist area by means of dragging to the Delete button.
  Solved in 0.9t-0.
• There's no running time visible.
• The possibility exists that an Activation Code of "0" is received. So far this happened once only (even today). In the end this is no problem because the Code can be sent manually.
• Startup of XXHighEnd from double-click on a WAV file in Explorer does not work (may be too difficult to solve without the official Install, which is intended to stay as it is).
• Only folder.jpg files are supported for coverart currently. This should be folder.jpeg as well.
  Solved in 0.9t-0.
• Edit as per http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=184.msg1076#msg1076 : Moving tracks within the Playlist Area produces an error (the moving itself is okay). This bug was introduced in the 0.9k version.
  Solved in 0.9l
• Edit as per http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=184.msg1077#msg1077 : Cue File tracks won't play gapless when the album folder (or higher up) contains diacritical marks, because of the whole album reloading at each track in this case (diacritical marks).
  Solved in 0.9t-2.
• When a "Cue File" album is loaded in the Playlist Area, and during playing Clear is pressed, the large WAV file appears as the playing track, instead of the currently playing real track (and (untested) further playing most probably goes wrong).
  Solved in 0.9t-6.
• Edit Cracks may emerge with the Inverted Phase checkbox checked.
  Solved in 0.9lb.
• Edit At random a next track won't play (Engine#3) and a message "Engine#3 did not start within the expected time" may (!) follow.
  Solved in 0.9m-1.
• Edit Selected tracks in the Playlist Area are meant to be played as a subselection from the listed tracks. Currently as soon as the first (or a next) track starts playing, all the others are deselecetd.
  Solved in 0.9t-6.
• Edit It can happen (Engine#3) that a track with diacritical marks won't play because of a wrong internal format; the result is that from then on no tracks with diacritical marks will play (#3 engine stopped working).
  Solved in 0.9o.
• Edit FLAC and MP3 Albums and Tracks cannot be searched for in the Library Area.
  Solved in 0.9t-0.
• Edit When during playback another (bunch of) track(s) is loaded into the Playlist Area from the Library Area (so probably only when done like that) a message "No Track given" can occur when the next track should play from the Playlist.
  Solved in 0.9t-6.
• Edit The Next and Prev buttons can not be used in a fast manner at tracks which need conversion (like FLAC/MP3).
• Edit When the Library button is used during playback to get tracks into the Playlist Area, and the Open File Dialog is open at the moment a next track should start playing, it will not, and instead a message "No Track given" will be showed. (*)
• Edit Cue file tracks can't be put individually in a Galery. This is apparent in the Playlist Area and rightclick -> Add to Galery, resulting in the whole Cue Album being in the Galery.

(*) Probably won't be solved in the 1.00 version. It will be dealt with later.

---

Please note that I derived the above mainly from using Vista/Engine#3 and it has been many months since I used XP.
I'd like to urge you to go to Vista anyway, because it is so much better for SQ (with Engine#3) *and* it will be the platform for further developments.

Anyway, if you have bugs or otherwise of which you think it should prevent an official version, please add it below. I'll make the list up to date with them.
Note that upgrades will be free forever, unless a new major release pops up (like 2.xx). Currently this is not planned (hence no new features planned that would justify a new major release).

Thanks a bunch,
Peter

Oh yes, I do that each and every day for three hours at least. Always looking for the differences or what could be wrong(ish).

But please, don't look back at an older version, unless you think 0.9k is quite wrong. I mean, I would not know what to do anyway with further incorporating 0.9d's "quality".

Besides that, we had some very extensive testing (also with Foobar, CDPs), and I think we now can better nail down what was going on with 0.9d. Nothing for words, but when many various tracks are compared between all versions, Foobar, CDplayer, SPDIF/USB, you start to learn what is causing what. Or better, which "technicality" (audible by itself) causes what to your brain and other sensors. From that can be derived what would be wrong and right in absolute means.



Haha, and I bet you never met the man. But indeed that's how it works. The more this happens, the better it is. And since it happens not all the time, we're far from "the" end result, I think.


Were others (probably all) listen to the complete picture for judgement, I hardly do. I listen for technicalities in areas of which I know there is or might be a problem, and while listening to the one thing, I judge the other just the same (like, bass is more tight but how's the bells doing now). And further ... you know it, I don't listen at all. I play rather loud, proposed to be background music in relation to what I'm doing (e.g. cooking) but because all is rather loud, things disturb by itself. Not this album, then the other. If things stay good for a week, all must be fine. Something like that.
But there is fine and fine ...

This time, with 0.9k, I had an experience which was kind of new to me;
Never listening explicitly for the overall picture as said, it suddenly occurs to me that I am listening to an overall picture. Yeah, read again.
So without paying notice to it (like always) it just occurred to me I was now listening to balanced sound / music.


The fact that one single other person than me tells exactly the same (mind you, this "statement" of SeVeReD is relative to before experiences obviously), tells me that it is just true. His latter words about the lyrics I noticed at first glance the same, but I had it expressed a bit differently : all is now singing right into your face. It's more direct.


If I don't receive real complaints about the SQ, I want to leave SQ as it is for a while;
Many more things to do, and to my belief managing the albums, finding them etc., is more important in this stage. The "Library" tab.
Actually I already started with it ...

Peter

Hi Leo,

I read it all, and I must say that at least half of it I don't understand. Oh, I understand the marketing story for a $10,000 PC including a DAC and an amp, but it's about there where my understanding stops.

The stories are nice though, but I am afraid they were written 2 years or so too soon. I mean, 2 years ago probably many people would have bought the stories, but today ? today the story should be different.
It seems that what is written in there is not about knowledge but merely about fuzzyness "we" dig (or dug). Just too many things in there prove that what they say cannot be true (not according to my judgement anyway), like a 32 bit DAC which can be a delta-sigma only (IMHO not good at all) and opposed to that "no digital volume because we'd loose bits". Oh, but I can tell you that with 32 bits that's perfectly allowed *and* far better than an analogue volume.

When I see the outlays of contegeous memory etc. that makes me laugh a bit. Maybe it's true, but without the explanation how things go from there to the DAC, it's not.

But hey, did I tell what I am doing ? nope ...
No room for a commercial story in 72 euros ... hahaha.

Changes :

• For sound quality (Engine#3) this is a mix of version 0.9d and 0.9j.
  If you don't recognize the sound of either ... that's possible. If all is right it's for the better.
  
  
• At the low end 4 values of Q1 were added (those below 0). The other values remained unchanged for their effect.
  
  
• Cue File support for Engine#3;
  Only EAC created Cue Files were tested. Possibly more formats exist, and if they are not compatible with the output of EAC, they won't work.
  The large WAV file must be dragged onto the Playlist Area (so not the .cue file ! -> currently you can do it, but it gives error messages).
  If the large WAV is loaded via the Library button, it will just act as the large WAV as always.
  When the WAV is dragged as proposed, the individual tracks will show, and they can be selected for playback.
  Individual tracks can be dragged to the Delete button for removal from the Playlist Area (in fact as usual).
  When the contents of the Playlist Area is saved (Save button), the "Cue files" will re-appear at re-loading, as if they were individual tracks.
  Cue File tracks are allowed to be right in the middle of normal separate tracks.
  The literal contents of the large WAV is fed to the player, so not even one byte is extracted from the file or changed.
  Note that at pressing Play or Next etc. or at the use of any of the "real time changing" settings the whole large WAV has to be reloaded. At subsequent playing of the individual tracks in there this does not happen, and the file stays loaded.
  

Additional issues ? Possibly yes. Many things were changed in order to let the Cue Files work and testing of it can be endless.

Edit :

One thing was found anyway : When the Q1 slider is set to 0, at the next startup it will default to 14.

Bugfix :

• With a direct connected DAC (like with USB) the "real time" changeable settings would produce an error message at the first attempt because the DAC still being in use. This is fixed now.

G'night here ... I can't ...

I'm very sorry, but it's getting too hard to hit the right keys. More dead than alive.
The "thing" I wanted to do is a tad more difficult than I expected.
It will be "tomorrow" ...

I'll be having a new version somewhere today (your tomorrow Dave ). I hope you can forget about 0.9d then ...