Kodi on Raspberry PI 3 (pi3) for multichannel flac

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I have installed Max2Play and Kodi on an pi3. It is working pretty well for streaming videos from my NAS (wired connection), but it is having trouble playing 5.1 flac files. They simply don't play reliably. They tend to cut out every 10-15 seconds or so. It doesn't seem to matter if they files are 48k or 96k.

Does anyone have this working reliably? My research as shown this is not an uncommon problem, but I have yet to find a solution. If this won't work reliably, perhaps I should invest in another solution.

Is Max2Play the problem? I used Max2Play because I am a squeezebox user, and Max2Play comes with a squeezebox server/player capabilities, although I have not yet enabled those.

Any help is much appreciated!
 
I have installed Max2Play and Kodi on an pi3. It is working pretty well for streaming videos from my NAS (wired connection), but it is having trouble playing 5.1 flac files. They simply don't play reliably. They tend to cut out every 10-15 seconds or so. It doesn't seem to matter if they files are 48k or 96k.

Does anyone have this working reliably? My research as shown this is not an uncommon problem, but I have yet to find a solution. If this won't work reliably, perhaps I should invest in another solution.

Is Max2Play the problem? I used Max2Play because I am a squeezebox user, and Max2Play comes with a squeezebox server/player capabilities, although I have not yet enabled those.

Any help is much appreciated!

This is my build. Exactly the same size as a standard atx power supply. https://pcpartpicker.com/list/Vgg8gL
 
Cool!!
OK, I must admit I am a TOTAL IGNORANT regarding Rapsberry PIs, the only thing I knew was that they were "small PCs" (more or less...)

Can anyone shed some light on this for me?

A friend gave me one and it says Rapsberry PI (c) 2011,12 on the main card.
It has an ethernet in, 2 USBs and an HDMI out, a 10 GB SD card , a jack that looks like a phones out and an yellow RCA jack (video out?)...

Are these any good for MCH playback?

¡Gracias!
 
This is my build. Exactly the same size as a standard atx power supply. https://pcpartpicker.com/list/Vgg8gL

Cool! Does it work for you for multichannel playback?

If video works, with a DTS soundtrack, you'd think multichannel flac would be easy.

What file transfer protocol are you using from your NAS? I am using SMB, and have read that may take more resources on the pi3. I am trying to get NFS working, but so far no luck. Perhaps a setting in my NAS.
 
Cool!!
OK, I must admit I am a TOTAL IGNORANT regarding Rapsberry PIs, the only thing I knew was that they were "small PCs" (more or less...)

Can anyone shed some light on this for me?

A friend gave me one and it says Rapsberry PI (c) 2011,12 on the main card.
It has an ethernet in, 2 USBs and an HDMI out, a 10 GB SD card , a jack that looks like a phones out and an yellow RCA jack (video out?)...

Are these any good for MCH playback?

¡Gracias!

They are indeed small, low power, computers. All have USB, HDMI and ethernet connections. The pi3 includes wifi and bluetooth too. They run linux quite well, and since Kodi runs on linux, it is able to run Kodi. But, really the applications are limitless. I built a retro gaming machine for my kids with one. (google retropi).

Do they work for MCH playback? .... I'll let you know. So far, it is unreliable, which is why I started this thread ;)
 
I have installed Max2Play and Kodi on an pi3. It is working pretty well for streaming videos from my NAS (wired connection), but it is having trouble playing 5.1 flac files. They simply don't play reliably. They tend to cut out every 10-15 seconds or so. It doesn't seem to matter if they files are 48k or 96k.

Does anyone have this working reliably? My research as shown this is not an uncommon problem, but I have yet to find a solution. If this won't work reliably, perhaps I should invest in another solution.

Is Max2Play the problem? I used Max2Play because I am a squeezebox user, and Max2Play comes with a squeezebox server/player capabilities, although I have not yet enabled those.

Any help is much appreciated!

Hey! I have been running Ubuntu on powerful desktop and laptop PCs since 2009 (and I mean, high-end gaming powerful). My current desktop PC has an i7-4790K CPU and 32 GB RAM. And still, I sometimes get these dropouts in FLAC files. I think PulseAudio simply has trouble handling them. The problem seems to be worse when playing back 96 KHz files, which is why I sampled all my FLACs down to 24/48 (I can't tell the difference in sound anyway, no matter how hard I try). Now, I only get dropouts very rarely. But I have not found a way to eliminate them completely.

My setup is, HDMI cable from NVidia graphics card to Yamaha RX-V661 home theatre receiver. Another HDMI from receiver to screen. 5.1 and 7.1 surround sound works from both laptop and desktop PC.

I posted about this problem in a thread on OMG! Ubuntu a while back, and somebody suggested I check out two other forums. I haven't gotten around to it, but let me dig that up for you. I will post back here.

In the meantime: I don't think your playback software is the issue. Over the years, I've used VLC, Parole Media Player, Kodi and currently, my main music player is SMPlayer. The dropouts happen no more or less regardless of the player.
 
They are indeed small, low power, computers. All have USB, HDMI and ethernet connections. The pi3 includes wifi and bluetooth too. They run linux quite well, and since Kodi runs on linux, it is able to run Kodi. But, really the applications are limitless. I built a retro gaming machine for my kids with one. (google retropi).

Do they work for MCH playback? .... I'll let you know. So far, it is unreliable, which is why I started this thread ;)

Ive seen others that play 5.1 FLAC on RPI3. Do you have the Kodi settings for audio set to HDMI Passthrough? Also, you can setup a memory cache to help when streaming data over the network by creating/editing a file named 'advancedsettings.xml' in your Kodi 'userdata' folder.

http://kodi.wiki/view/Advancedsettings.xml
 
Does anyone have this working reliably? My research as shown this is not an uncommon problem, but I have yet to find a solution. If this won't work reliably, perhaps I should invest in another solution.

Is Max2Play the problem? I used Max2Play because I am a squeezebox user, and Max2Play comes with a squeezebox server/player capabilities, although I have not yet enabled those.

I have found the Raspberry Pi boxes to be fantastic Squeezebox replacements with the addition of HifiBerry cards, but I've never had any consistent luck with 5.1 FLAC via the built-in HDMI. But both of my receivers are Onkyos and the last time I looked it seemed like other people complaining about problems are also feeding Onkyos.

Since the Oppo 103 will play multichannel FLAC and DSD over the network, I've just given up on the Pi for now. The downside to the Oppo is that the only way to get truly gapless playback is to create whole-album files with cue sheets, but I can live with that even if it's not my first choice.
 
Hey! I have been running Ubuntu on powerful desktop and laptop PCs since 2009 (and I mean, high-end gaming powerful). My current desktop PC has an i7-4790K CPU and 32 GB RAM. And still, I sometimes get these dropouts in FLAC files. I think PulseAudio simply has trouble handling them. The problem seems to be worse when playing back 96 KHz files, which is why I sampled all my FLACs down to 24/48 (I can't tell the difference in sound anyway, no matter how hard I try). Now, I only get dropouts very rarely. But I have not found a way to eliminate them completely.

My setup is, HDMI cable from NVidia graphics card to Yamaha RX-V661 home theatre receiver. Another HDMI from receiver to screen. 5.1 and 7.1 surround sound works from both laptop and desktop PC.

I posted about this problem in a thread on OMG! Ubuntu a while back, and somebody suggested I check out two other forums. I haven't gotten around to it, but let me dig that up for you. I will post back here.

In the meantime: I don't think your playback software is the issue. Over the years, I've used VLC, Parole Media Player, Kodi and currently, my main music player is SMPlayer. The dropouts happen no more or less regardless of the player.

Follow-up: the forum that was suggested to me to address was https://www.computeraudiophile.com. Might be of interest if you can't find a solution to the choppy playback!
 
You could also try installing LibreElec for RPi3: https://libreelec.tv/downloads/

This will work with free Kodi remote control apps for IOS or Android tablets and smartphones

Homer,

Thanks for this suggestion. I found time to install LibreElec yesterday on my RPI3. This works MUCH better. Installation was a piece of cake. The version of Kodi looks the same as what I was using previously, but it works far better. 5.1 Flac files play flawlessly now. I've been listening for an hour without a glitch. I watched a couple 1080p TV show last night, and those also worked perfectly.

Even 5.1 flac 24bit/192k seems to work fine. Although, my Emotiva XMC-1 displays 96k, so perhaps Kodi is down-sampling. I can experiment with that, but 192k is a bit ridiculous anyways.

So far, so good.

One other thing I noticed is that I can even play files headless using the Yatse app on android. I didn't expect that to be possible, but it is a great feature, because I am not crazy about turning on my projector and burning bulb life if I'm only listening to music.

Loving this so far. :banana: Thanks for the help!

Now I just need to invest in a bluray drive for my computer so I can rip bluray audio. I've never had a need for one before.
 
Homer,

Thanks for this suggestion. I found time to install LibreElec yesterday on my RPI3. This works MUCH better. Installation was a piece of cake. The version of Kodi looks the same as what I was using previously, but it works far better. 5.1 Flac files play flawlessly now. I've been listening for an hour without a glitch. I watched a couple 1080p TV show last night, and those also worked perfectly.

Even 5.1 flac 24bit/192k seems to work fine. Although, my Emotiva XMC-1 displays 96k, so perhaps Kodi is down-sampling. I can experiment with that, but 192k is a bit ridiculous anyways.

So far, so good.

One other thing I noticed is that I can even play files headless using the Yatse app on android. I didn't expect that to be possible, but it is a great feature, because I am not crazy about turning on my projector and burning bulb life if I'm only listening to music.

Loving this so far. :banana: Thanks for the help!

Now I just need to invest in a bluray drive for my computer so I can rip bluray audio. I've never had a need for one before.

Great to hear of your success (and ease of install)!

You'll definitely want to get all your optical media into Kodi once you get the taste for instant file access! You'll definitely need a BD drive if you have BDAs, and Kodi does a great job of music videos/concerts too. You are going to be very busy!

You also may want to find a Kodi skin that supports the Artist SlideShow add-on (downloads and displays Artist images while playing audio). I love it! But you'll need a screen/TV to view of course.
 
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