Massive Edit - I'm confusing myself!!!

Yes, getting something similar.

Mani.


EDIT

Have you played with Q1 in Special Mode? I can get down to Q1=-1... that's 8 samples!... on an Atom machine!... ??? Are the hiFace drivers that good?

Mani.

Leo,

I installed 0.9z on my office machine this lunchtime and had the same issue(s). I just unticked the 'ask each time' box and pressed Run. As you said, nothing happens. I then pressed Cancel. I did this for the next 4-5 occurances of this.

When you then close and re-open XX, it works fine.

Mani.

4000 Jazz CDs? Wow.

Looking forward to seeing your list. I will compile a list of the hirez HDCD material that I'm aware of. I reckon it will be slightly smaller than your list...

Mani.

That looks like a list of 'official' HDCD releases. The ones I'm talking about are things like 'Steve Vai - The Ultra Zone', 'Dave Brubeck - Time Out' and 'Jacques Loussier - Satie', etc...

Without opening up a whole HDCD discussion, these may have the HDCD flag included in the LSB (hence why they're being detected as HDCDs), but may not necessarily be recorded with Peak Extension. There is a debate as to whether this is a good or bad thing.

Mani.

There are many CDs that are not identified as HDCD anywhere on their covers or inserts. E.g. the Steve Vai that I mentioned to Peter earlier.

But don't be disappointed with this - it just means that its been mastered using the best converter ever made

It interesting to see a small increase in HDCD CDs being released - e.g. the recently remastered series by Steve Hoffman.

Mani.

Peter, I don't know what you have done, but...

Special sounds totally diffferent from before. This is to be expected, right?

BUT...

It's Adaptive that's amazing me. What did you change? Anything? It's like you've read my mind - I wanted a combination of the old Special and old Adaptive... and to my ears, this is exactly what the new Adaptive brings.

Downsides with Adaptive? Well, the 'standing waves' in room seem to have shifted, so I'll now need to reassess my speaker and seating positions. I've just lost a bit of bottom end. But the top is beautifully sweet. I really don't think my DAC is 'struggling' in any way whatsoever.

I don't think Special is for me... with my current setup.

Mani.

The HDCD mystery is solved...

Even though 4x AP is selected, and the output is showing as 176000 in XX, this is NOT what is being actually being output. The output is 24/44.1. I had my DAC set to 24/176.4 (i.e. in dual-wire mode) instead of 24/44.1, so only one channel was working.

I got confused because of the 17600 output showing in XX - I thought the 24/44.1 file was being upsampled to 24/176.4. I know that at some point, XX will be able to upsample 24bit files, but I guess not yet!

EDIT

I think this will need to be changed. I played around with HDCD.exe and didn't really like the results. I preferred the HDCD filter in my DAC. But even moreso, I preferred HDCD files with QAP.

Mani.

Absolutely not placeboed by you.

Special sounds much drier. So much so that I think you should check the code - I reckon you may have got Adaptive and Special the wrong way around! The overall sound is totally the opposite of how I had it only earlier today - Special was the 'sparkly' one and Adaptive the 'organic' one. Now it's the other way around... although I'd call Special 'dry' and Adaptive... well, just 'perfect' actually. It is very, very listenable.

Mani.

Ah, slight misunderstanding I think.

The Q1 'knob' is set to 1, but the caption above says 'Q1 32'. So, I guess it's buffer=32 and Q1=32, right? If I take the knob down to Q1=0, then the caption reads 'Q1 16'... and I get distorted sound.

Sorry, my mistake.

Mani.

I have the following settings:

Special: Q1=1, buffer=32
Adaptive: Q1=1, buffer=32

Wow - Special sounds totally different to how it used to! It's drier... much drier than it used to be. My main criticism of the old Special was that it sounded a little too 'thin'. This is no longer the case.

Adaptive sounds... wonderful. Better than before? I'm not sure. But certainly as good. I likey, likey very muchy.

Mani.

Well, I don't know what's happening!

Over here:

- Engine#3 doesn't work at all - I mean for all files (HDCD, non-HDCD, all resolutions) for all buffers (set in soundcard, not XX) - I get 'XXEngine#3 has stopped working' error.
- Special doesn't work for 16.44.1 HDCDs - cursor/timer moves, but no sound.
- Adaptive's right channel doesn't work for 16/44.1 HDCDs.
- AP indicator switches off at resume UNLESS 'PeakExtend' is activated also.

Am I the only one with these errors?

Mani.

Just saw your image - you have the HDCD version. OK, let me try something...

Mani.

Hmm...

No, actually I meant the HDCD indicator in XX! (The indicator on my DAC definitely does NOT light up, as I'm using the vol control.) When playing a 16/44.1 HDCD, the HDCD indicator (in XX) goes off with AntiImage, and then plays as normal. But not for Linear or AP.

But it works for you? Strange. Maybe you have a non-HDCD version of The Ultra Zone?

One 'annoying' thing - the AP indicator keeps switching off when returning from Unattended or opening XX... This is more important, I think.

Mani.

It seems to be the HDCD processing.

For 4x Linear and AP, the HDCD indicator is lit up and I only get the left channel.

For 4x AntiImage, the HDCD is not lit, and the music plays.

Mani.

Try any 16/44.1 HDCD (i.e. as opposed to 24/88.2 or 24/176.4 HDCDs).

e.g.
Steve Vai - The Ultra Zone
Roxy Music - Avalon

I have literally tens, maybe hundreds, of HDCDs... and they're all doing the same thing:

I can set both Special and Adaptive to buffer=32 and Q1=1.
With Special, there is no sound at all in either channel.
With Adaptive, there is sound only in left channel.

I have tried increaing buffer/Q1 in Adaptive, but same thing remains - only sound in left channel.

In the scheme of things, this isn't a really big deal. I mean, I can play HDCDs with no AP, no problem...

Mani.