My recent observations may help here.

I have, for a week or so, been experiencing intermittent shorts bursts of what sounded like a "stutter" ( from as short as perhaps 1/4 second to near one second or so in duration ). I had initially thought it isolated to XXHE playback, but then I occassionally heard it while watching TV ( I have a digital TV capture card in the PC ), and watching movies. I had also thought is was isolated to my general purpose partition (Vista) in which I run all manners of apps, rather than another partition dedicated purely for XXHE. Alas, the latter partition also exhibited these seemingly brief stutters.

Time warp back a few weeks ........

The motherboard in the PC has 6 main SATA ports onboard and these are all in use. I had need to add another temporary harddrive to juggle music data around, so I hooked this extra drive up to the secondary ( supplementary ) SATA controller , and all seemed to work as intended and I didn't give it a second thought.

A couple of days ago I had an epiphany that the use of the secondary controller may have been the cause of these random "stutters", so I disconnected it. Low and behold, the existence of the brief burst of "static" have ceased. Of course, being a PC, nothing is certain, but it's been clean an errorfree since that disconnection. I can only conclude that the other controller needed some routine polling of the drive, and if circumstances were right, it took precedence over the rest of the system to cause a pause during audio subroutines.

Hopefully this might help others here experiencing a similar fate.

Check your drive controllers and make sure you have latest drivers for the motherboard components. Try swapping the order of the drives within available SATA ports also.

Cheers all,

Russ

G'day Dan,

as you are running Win7 currently you will derive no benefit from going backwards to WinXP, as you will lose the ability to use Engine#3 in XXHE. It is the latter that currently brings a noticeable improvement over alternative applications. If I'm right in assumming you have only been using XXHE now for a few months, I would suggest you continue experimenting with different parameters, particularly the "Q" ones, to get a good feel for how XXHE performs currently on your hardware.

Once you are happy that you have eeked out the best that XXHE has to offer on your current system, then by all means consider trying Vista as a comparison, but be sure nothing changes in the way of hardware when doing that or it may cloud the judgement. Going from one OS to another is most easily done using multiple partitions and a boot manager.

In the meantime, those of us who have been around for longer can perhaps more readily distinguish the differences between Vista and Win7, which should make it easier for novices to chose which O/S to ultimately end up with.

It goes without saying though, if you are PC savvy, and this applies to all here, feedback to Peter will be greatly welcomed if you are able to compare the two OS'es side by side.

Cheers,

Russ

G'day Ivo and thanks for the link to CONEQ as I was not aware of its existence until you mentioned it.

From reading through their web site and watching the presentation video several times, it appears to me that the technology is aimed at correcting anomolies in monitors/speakers listened to in a near-field sense. In other words, before influences of room. This may be useful in mixing booths, but I imagine it may fall short when listening to speakers from a distance.

One comment I might make though regarding the graphs presented during the demo, was that they looked rather mediocre before correction! Maybe they picked some cheap monitors that demonstrated their correction filters more easily. I would be looking to correct any underlaying flaws in the crossovers etc of said monitors before thinking about external corrections. Kinda like trying to make a silk purse from a sow's ear, if you recall that phrase.

I am a strong advocate of a linear frequency response at the listening position, and to that end use the inbuilt parametric equalizer function of the receiver I use ( Integra DHC 9.9 ). Determining what values to set the equalizer to however is not necessarily easy, and it has taken some time to find a tool that allows this to be accomplished relatively easily and effectively. For some time now I have been using ETF ( http://www.etfacoustic.com/ ) to do this. The information and understanding of how things appear and measure from your listening position using a tool such as ETF is invaluable.

I have broached the subject of an inbuilt multiband equalizer with Peter, and is hopefully something this will see light of day at some stage, after he has incorporated all the features he wishes to complete. I think such a feature would be more valuable , and cheaper, than an external plugin of which he has no immediate control. The 140Euro i saw mentioned on one web site for the CONEQ plugin seems a little steep on the surface, compared to other solutions which appear to offer the same ultimate result.

Cheers,

Russ

I have noticed something similar.

My music server consists of essentially two Vista partitions. One is dedicated purely to XXHE and is very bare. This is the environment I use when listening in earnest.

The other partition is primarily set up for video playback and processing, to which I have added XXXHE. When using XXHE on this partition, I occasionally hear a chirp of mainly high frequency content that lasts for about 1/4 second I estimate. There seems to be a time element at play here though. I may not hear this chirp for an hour or so and it will happen again. Another period of ( lengthy ) time will pass and it will occur again. I haven't fathomed out exactly what is occuring in the system to cause this chirp , but i'm guessing there is some interupt happening (likely lan related ) causing this. If may not occur everyday either. I can't recall it happening on the partition dedicated solely to XXHE playback.

This has only started occurring in recent times though (maybe last few weeks or so ) so I'm guessing it is something on the system that has changed.

I don't believe it is something inherently caused by XXHE itself.

Cheers,

Russ

Thanks Peter and to all.

Hope the cholesterol levels didn't take too much of a beating today   

Russ

haha .. post #15 in that thread is a classis. I can tell you were somewhat peeved at the lack of Andrew's involvement is getting your issue resolved.

Sorry for going off topic here .. just wanted to say you put a smile on my face reading that.

Cheers,

Russ

A wonderful story Peter .. thanks for sharing.

The West Indies cricket team are touring downunder at the moment and they always come across as a fun loving group. I can imagine a nation filled with such individuals would be a great place to live.

Time to dig out a few Bob M albums I haven't listened to for quite some time, and enjoy the aussie equivalent of a Red Stripe or two.

Cheers,

Russ

I Agree !

I deliberately chose 6 months because I wanted you all to really think hard about who you would pick. I would think that most here would have a reasonably varied exposure to most genres, and could tolerate listening to each for a day or two at a stretch. It's when you have to extend that listening period that you begin to narrow down your choice of music and arrive at the type that you keep going back to regularly.

Bach is a fine choice, and his works are quite prolific I understand, so that 6 months wouldn't see a repeat of much of his work, if any. In all likelihood a few new compositions would be forthcoming.

My exposure to the "classics" has been a little limited. Primarily to the likes of 'The Grand Canyon Suite', '1812 Overture', etc. You know the ones .... the "popular" variants. I also now enjoy organ music, and probably came about as a result of buying Jean Guillou's rendition of Pictures At An Exhibition on the great organ in Tonwelle (I thing the town is called). "Pictures" was perhaps brought to the masses by Emerson Lake & Palmer in the early 70's , and it's quite likely if I hadn't heard that interpretation I would never have picked up Jean Guillou's recording. It may also have been the fact that there was a warning on the liner notes about very low notes from that Tonwelle organ 

A natural progression to the enjoyment of organs, are the prolific works of Jimmy Smith on the Hammond B3, who Peter mentioned. The fact that Jimmy Smith's work is predominantly jazz based ties in nicely to my second favourite genre .. jazz. It was a hard chose to decide which I enjoy more, and although I play more jazz nowadays, there isn't one artist that stands out amongst their peers, although it could be argued that Miles Davis would have front running if a poll was conducted. But listening to Miles for 6 months would be a task in itself given his reported mood swings!

Peter, Isao Tomita's interpretation's of classical pieces using synth's are really very clever and add a pleasant twist, but unlike Schulze's craft, they can be enjoyed as "background" music. Not to be construed as "elevator music" mind you. What I mean is, is that Schulze's works need to be enjoyed fully and understood by sitting still, closing your eyes, and allow him to take you on a music journey. Most of his work I feel is analogous to taking a walk down a broad path, with occassional pauses to look at something of interest, or move off the path briefly to explore something, but always returning to the path and continuing. There is usually an underlaying repeatative rhythm or beat in his music, and it lulls the subconscious into tranquility. I find it perfect music to relax to ... almost hypnotic sometimes. Listening to this type of music while preparing meals, housework or typing on forums  , negates, I feel, the way Schulze meant for his audience to listen to his work, and in those scenarios may be perceived as monotonous and boring. When listening to his work without distractions you readily pick up on all the subtle diversions he incorporates in his pieces.

Quite a number of Schulze's albums make good use of bass frequencies, and if you are able to resolve those, it helps reinforce the "hypnotic" effect I alluded to. I use twin subs in my setup and can produce meaningful amounts of clean musical output down to 14 to 15 Hz. The subs start rolling off at about 20Hz ( with the mains a few hertz higher at approx 23 to 24Hz ). Electronic music more than most other genres warrants good bass response, and it also results in better articulation of acoustic bass from the likes of Ray Brown.

Roy, thanks for the link to Schroeder's new release. It has been a number of years since i bought any of his music .. time to change that.

Russ

Thanks for the link Roy. I hadn't heard of his work prior to you mentioning it here.

Seems like he's been into the electronic scene since the very late 80's, and quite prolific of late. I've been listening to some of his samples from his site. Very nice.

Robert Schroeder is another of KS's contemporaries who I followed in the eighties and have quite a number of works of. His "Paradise" album is one that comes to mind as being very typical of his craft, and I play that every couple of years.

There were many fine German musicians starting up in the electronic scene all following in Schulze's footsteps.

Cheers,

Russ

As fate would have it, in the very near future you find yourself on a deserted tropical island. It's a friendly habitable island though, with no polar bears roaming around, nor black whispy smoke that terrorizes passers-by. No evidence of underground scientific bunkers either !

What it does have though, is an outdoor auditorium, which strangely enough, has an equipment room adjacent that contains every musical instrument, be it acoustic or electronic, devised by mankind.

Taking a moment to reflect on your good fortune to be in such a wonderous place, it suddenly dawns on you that  your own playing abilities are limited to squeaky woodwind recorder sessions in your primary school days! All these magnificent instruments ... strads, steinways, moogs, fenders etc ... are all there sitting idle.

Further exploring at the rear of the auditorium sees you entering a well proportioned room in green decor, with abundant comfortable lounges. In the corner is a refrigerator stocked with your favourite beverages and food, which, for some reason always stays full 

Sitting upon one of the lounges is a strange looking guy dressed in what looks like old flowing arabian clothes, and he is staring forlornly at a beaten up old brass object on a nearby table, that looks like one of those old spirit lamps that was used before the advent of electricity.

Asking him the reason for his long face, he explains to you that he wants to return home to his house in the lamp, but in order to do that he has to grant one more wish to a stranger. He also explains that the wish has a time element attached, and will stay in effect for 6 months.

You ponder his plight for a moment, and being a lover of fine music, you decide to make full use of your new surroundings and ask for your favourite musician to be summoned to play for you. You have a dilemma though. So many great artists to chose from over time. Classical music from the likes of Wagner, Beethoven etc, through all the fine jazz of the early 50's and 60's, the rock bands of those former years, heavy metal, punk, reggae .. the list of genres is mindboggling. But you realise that whoever you chose will define your main musical interests, and the opportunity to spend 6 months with your favourite artist is simply too great to pass up.

"Well my friend" you say to the guy, who you notice has a 'G' embroided on his tunic, "I can help get you home. I have a favourite musician I would like to get to know, and to understand how and why they create the music the way they do. Would you bring me ................"



Who or whom would you chose? Remember, you will be listening to that individual or group to the exclusion of all others for 6 months. If you chose a famous Philharmonic Orchestra be aware they only know how to play the works of one composer .. haha.

I'm hoping this thread will bring the opportunity to explore new artists we as individuals have not paid much attention to. There is a good chance whoever you chose will be at the forefront of their genre, and it's always fun to explore new pastures.

For myself, I have chosen an artist who I grew up listening to as a late teenager and had a huge influence on my listening for many years to come, before I branched out to other genres. I still follow this artists work with great delight. While the music from this artist has changed and developed over the years, the genre's definition can be traced right back to this artists beginnings. Often referred to as the Godfather of electronic music, he most usually is simply known as KS

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klaus_Schulze

Cheers,

Russ

Until Peter gets to the stage of creating an "install" process for XXHE, there will be some ergonomic limitations on how one can start the actual playback procedure. I surmise that once XXHE is at the stage where an actual installation occurs for each version release, and hense the file associations are created to allow the system to understand that XXHE can handle MP3's, WAV's, AIFF's and FLAC's, we would then likely have an explorer context menu that has a couple of options:

• Play with XXHighEnd
  

• Enqueue with XXHighEnd

The latter might be a little tricky to code if playing in unattended mode, but I enjoy throwing challenges to Peter 

When using the explorer context menu's, XXHE would start in the same manner as which it was last used, that being either attended or unattended mode.

Cheers,

Russ

G'day Coen ... and ... 

If it's any consolation, I also experience at least points 1) and 3) you mentioned, on my study PC running XP Pro SP2. As I only ever use XXHE on that system for checking coverart etc., I haven't been too bothered about the playback side of things on that PC. ( I use Foobar for that .. ssshhh! ... lol ). I've been meaning to raise the issue with Peter but it hasn't been a high priority for me.

Version 0.9w-7 worked OK , but from memory, any of the "X" and "Y" variants started to exhibit one problem or another.

I've found Vista to be quite reliable for the purposes of what I need on my HTPC, and can only suggest you give it a trial. The most important thing to do is turn off that awful UAC "feature"!.

I daresay Peter will be along soon after his morning coffee to figure out how to cure the XP woes.

Cheers,

Russ ( who surfaces every now and then from his listening chair following the release of 0.9y-4) 

Well that appears to have masked the issue and both tracks played OK.

I then tried again with Vol set at -1.5dB and track 11 started up fine, however track 13 still brought up the error. Dropping the Vol to -3dB saw track 13 also playing OK after that.

So we have a solution, but not the reason, why this album ( so far ) is unique in its data structure.

I'll leave the ball in your court on this one now 

Cheers,

Russ
 

Hi Peter,

While listening to Yellow's new album "Touch Yellow" earlier, tracks 11 & 13 tripped the "crack detect" coding when using AP with either Double or Quad resampling. Disabling Arc Prediction allowed those two tracks to play fine, even with plain Double or Quad. Perhaps your crack detect code needs different trigger criteria for when AP is used.

See attached screen grabs for when doubling and AP was used.

Cheers,

Russ

BTW ... I'd rate the new Yellow album at about 3 1/2 stars out of 5. There's the typical Yellow sound and instruments, but the whole album only has a couple of standout tracks. The bass is nice and tight though as you expect from them. They need a new trumpeter too !!