Playback DSD (natively) with a PC

[Sal1950]

Makes no difference if it's Linux or Windows. It's already established that (AFAIK) a pc won't pass DSD over HDMI.

Your correct, I never much thought about it till you mentioned it.
I did a bit of homework and it appears as the HDMI transmitter/receiver drivers were never
developed for DSD. There's no doubt that HDMI can handle the band width. A lot of the
discussion I saw rapidly went over my head but I'd bet there's licensing and $ politics
at the heart of it somewhere. LOL

 

[mandrix]

Your correct, I never much thought about it till you mentioned it.
I did a bit of homework and it appears as the HDMI transmitter/receiver drivers were never
developed for DSD. There's no doubt that HDMI can handle the band width. A lot of the
discussion I saw rapidly went over my head but I'd bet there's licensing and $ politics
at the heart of it somewhere. LOL

Yeah, you got to pay to play, I reckon, mobo and gpu makers don't seem much interested in it, if at all.

 

[ManWhoCan]

I guess your Marantz NA6006 network audio player is fine for finding and playing 'stereo' files including DSD, located on network storage devices. However, a lot of us here require players (or AVR's) that a capable of finding and playing 'multi-channel' audio files.

Thankfully, my 'unhacked' OPPO UDP-203 is able to find and play 'multi-channel' DSD files with either an .dsf or .dff file extension. And according to page 59 of its user manual: "DSD data is converted into an analog signal directly by the internal DAC" (rather than converting to PCM first).

Currently, the biggest issue I have with SACD.iso files is that my 'unhacked' OPPO UDP-203 can't play them. And when I unpack the DSD data from an SACD.iso file into an .dff stream, their file sizes are huge! However, re-encoding a 'multi-channel' DSD.dff stream to a 'multi-channel' 88.2kHz 24-bit FLAC file greatly reduces the file size by around 60%!

Anyway... We all do what we do given the playback devices we have and prefer to use. So there's always a "trade-off" somewhere

To save file size and preserve DSD as DSD rather than PCM you could convert all your SACD.iso to WavPack. It reduces files sizes a bit more efficiently than flac.

 

[ManWhoCan]

I'd be interested to know what devices people are using to decode 'multi-channel' DSD audio streams. Are there any AVR's that can do this via a network connection?

Topping has a few affordable Mch DSD DACs, (Topping DM7 8-Channel DAC Review) but you might have to use XLR. There is also the Octo DAC Pro

 

[ssully]

I guess your Marantz NA6006 network audio player is fine for finding and playing 'stereo' files including DSD, located on network storage devices. However, a lot of us here require players (or AVR's) that a capable of finding and playing 'multi-channel' audio files.

Thankfully, my 'unhacked' OPPO UDP-203 is able to find and play 'multi-channel' DSD files with either an .dsf or .dff file extension. And according to page 59 of its user manual: "DSD data is converted into an analog signal directly by the internal DAC" (rather than converting to PCM first).

Are you then using the 6 RCA outputs to send the analog signal to the receiver?

 

[par4ken]

Are you then using the 6 RCA outputs to send the analog signal to the receiver?

Why wouldn't he?

 

[SeeMoreDigital]

To save file size and preserve DSD as DSD rather than PCM you could convert all your SACD.iso to WavPack. It reduces files sizes a bit more efficiently than flac.

Sounds interesting... How do you do this?

Are you then using the 6 RCA outputs to send the analog signal to the receiver?

In my case yes. When accessing and playing native DSD bitstreams using my OPPO UDP-203, the player is set-up to transcode DSD bitstreams directly to the analogue outputs, rather than DSD -> PCM -> the analogue outputs. I have multiple stereo amplifiers, not an AVR.

 

[ManWhoCan]

Sounds interesting... How do you do this?

https://www.wavpack.com/

 

[SeeMoreDigital]

Thanks @ManWhoCan,

Are there any downloadable sample files? I need to know if my OPPO is able to recognise and play them!

Cheers

 

[ManWhoCan]

Thanks @ManWhoCan,

Are there any downloadable sample files? I need to know if my OPPO is able to recognise and play them!

Cheers

Ask oppo or simply make your own WV files fom any DSD you have. WavPack is free just download & install it. I don't use any transports like the oppo I use a PC & Foobar to play any WV/DSD files I have.

 

[ssully]

Why wouldn't he?

I wouldn't because I like to apply DSP to the signal, which used to be (AFAIK, still is) a rare option for 6 channel analog input.

I also asked because the issue of HDMI transmission of DSD audio arose here.

(I avoid the whole issue by not bothering with DSD at all; I rip and and convert to PCM. If I still used my universal player, I'd just set it to do that internally and then use the HDMI output, easy peasy, and I'm very confident there'd be NO audible impact; it is not 'problematical'.)

 

[Mr. Afternoon]

I had a guide for DSD to WV posted somewhere around here...I had it set up for batch processing too.

I'm not sure if the Oppo would support it because it got implemented pretty late in WV's history.

 

[SeeMoreDigital]

Ask oppo or simply make your own WV files fom any DSD you have. WavPack is free just download & install it. I don't use any transports like the oppo I use a PC & Foobar to play any WV/DSD files I have.

Sadly, OPPO's player side of their business have ceased trading.

I've just downloaded the 'WavPack frontend' (Simple GUI) and the 'WavPack Win64 (for 64-bit Windows)' software but it wont run on my Windows 10 (64-bit) PC....

 

[SeeMoreDigital]

I'm not sure if the Oppo would support it because it got implemented pretty late in WV's history.

Bummer... Do you have a short duration test sample you can upload somewhere?

 

[ManWhoCan]

Sadly, OPPO's player side of their business have ceased trading.

I've just downloaded the 'WavPack frontend' (Simple GUI) and the 'WavPack Win64 (for 64-bit Windows)' software but it wont run on my Windows 10 (64-bit) PC....

Sorry to hear that. It should run OK unless something like your anti-virus is in the way. Does this help at all? WavPack User Documentation

 

[SeeMoreDigital]

Does this help at all? WavPack User Documentation

Oh wow... That's way beyond my skill-set.

 

[Mr. Afternoon]

Oh wow... That's way beyond my skill-set.

Use BatchEncoder. It'll work with your skillset. God I wish I could find my WavPack QQ Thread!

Edit: How to Losslessly Compress DSD without converting to FLAC and why you should do it.

 

[jimfisheye]

Are you trying to make wavpack files play on a hardware player via its USB input? (And one that didn't support that out of the box?)
Sounds challenging!

Otherwise VOX.app player plays wavpack. It even plays the 12 channel Atmos files I rip to wavpack.

 

[SeeMoreDigital]

Use BatchEncoder. It'll work with your skillset. God I wish I could find my WavPack QQ Thread!

Edit: How to Losslessly Compress DSD without converting to FLAC and why you should do it.

Oh wow, that's much easier. I'm converting a 6-ch dsd.dff file right now

 

[SeeMoreDigital]

Are you trying to make wavpack files play on a hardware player via its USB input? (And one that didn't support that out of the box?)
Sounds challenging!

Me no. I want to see if my OPPO can access and play .wv files.