Guida a Logitech Media Server, Squeezelite e derivati.

[bibo01]

Further from the user...

I had a couple of exchanges with Piero today. Even with the non-R2 version of squeezelite, I was getting the same failure case. On the console, I was seeing a very peculiar error:

USB 1-1.2.3: clock source 40 is not valid, cannot use

Piero suggested I play around with squeezelite settings to limit the rates, etc. Then I had a sudden brain wave. Since my Zenith SE's built in player is also squeezelite (except it boots into a different Linux), I mounted the boot ssd and poked around. I finally discovered they use the following options with squeezelite:

-n -s localhost -m ,mac address. -o hw:CARD=Interface -a 16:4:: -D

I duplicated these settings and voila! It now works. I think the key is the -a and the -D setting.

Wow, that was not obvious!! But I am happy.

[marcoc1712]

Further from the user...

I had a couple of exchanges with Piero today. Even with the non-R2 version of squeezelite, I was getting the same failure case. On the console, I was seeing a very peculiar error:

USB 1-1.2.3: clock source 40 is not valid, cannot use

Piero suggested I play around with squeezelite settings to limit the rates, etc. Then I had a sudden brain wave. Since my Zenith SE's built in player is also squeezelite (except it boots into a different Linux), I mounted the boot ssd and poked around. I finally discovered they use the following options with squeezelite:

-n <player-name> -s localhost -m ,mac address. -o hw:CARD=Interface -a 16:4:: -D

I duplicated these settings and voila! It now works. I think the key is the -a and the -D setting.

Wow, that was not obvious!! But I am happy.

mmmh....


I do believe the difference is mostly here:-o hw:CARD=Interface. That means direct access to the device. I'll try that before any other.

that said,

-D = use DOP for DSD, it was playing flac, is not taking place here.
-a 16:4:: are alsa buffer,period size, format and mmap. 16 is a very little buffer, default is 40:4::, that with that card in audiolinux results in 40:4:S32_LE:1

We should look at your log to see what alsa parameters (format and mmap) it uses, but they are depending on the OS and the card.

There is a (little) chance that the last one (mmap) could beinvolved in the problem, but only if audiolinux (or alsa in audiolinux) is compiled without the mmap support, in that case you should add -a 40:4::0 to the command line (to use same defaults values) and NO mmap, if you are not sure, 0 is safe, so try to use it first.


Then you could play with other settings.

this is the line I currently use, when not using DSD.

-n squeezelite-R2-o hw:CARD=J20 -x -m 00:e0:4c:68:ce:78 -r 44100-768000 -c aif,wav,pcm -b 1048576:1048576 -a 499:3::0 -f /var/log/squeezelite-R2/squeezelite-R2.log

-b is the input/output buffer, should be equals when using uncompressed pcm, the out should be 1/0.75 the imput when using flac for best results, but it does not really matter with so little alsa buffers (< 200). In this case is 2GB, that way the song is almost always in RAM, the network inactive and CPU get 400/16 fewer interrupts from memory, but be sure to have enough RAM or decrease them.

[bibo01]

Utente estero...

Quick question - will removing the C-3PO plugin disable upsampling/conversion of the original files ? I have few DSD256 content but my DAC supports only DSD128. How do I down-sample in this case ?

[marcoc1712]

Utente estero...

Quick question - will removing the C-3PO plugin disable upsampling/conversion of the original files ? I have few DSD256 content but my DAC supports only DSD128. How do I down-sample in this case ?

In C-3PO just disable DSD256 as supported rate.

[austinpop]

mmmh....


I do believe the difference is mostly here:-o hw:CARD=Interface. That means direct access to the device. I'll try that before any other.

that said,

-D = use DOP for DSD, it was playing flac, is not taking place here.
-a 16:4:: are alsa buffer,period size, format and mmap. 16 is a very little buffer, default is 40:4::, that with that card in audiolinux results in 40:4:S32_LE:1

We should look at your log to see what alsa parameters (format and mmap) it uses, but they are depending on the OS and the card.

There is a (little) chance that the last one (mmap) could beinvolved in the problem, but only if audiolinux (or alsa in audiolinux) is compiled without the mmap support, in that case you should add -a 40:4::0 to the command line (to use same defaults values) and NO mmap, if you are not sure, 0 is safe, so try to use it first.


Then you could play with other settings.

this is the line I currently use, when not using DSD.

-n squeezelite-R2-o hw:CARD=J20 -x -m 00:e0:4c:68:ce:78 -r 44100-768000 -c aif,wav,pcm -b 1048576:1048576 -a 499:3::0 -f /var/log/squeezelite-R2/squeezelite-R2.log

-b is the input/output buffer, should be equals when using uncompressed pcm, the out should be 1/0.75 the imput when using flac for best results, but it does not really matter with so little alsa buffers (< 200). In this case is 2GB, that way the song is almost always in RAM, the network inactive and CPU get 400/16 fewer interrupts from memory, but be sure to have enough RAM or decrease them.

Thanks for helping me to understand squeezelite better. I will post followup questions here directly, if you don't mind my doing so in English!

I now have squeezelite/LMS working perfectly, and I also have it working with Roon. This is my preferred configuration, since I want the Roon experience, with the sound quality of squeezelite, which is significantly better with the -b option. I am currently using:
OPTIONS="-n zenith-se-player -s localhost -m ac:1f:6b:26:ed:32 -o hw:CARD=Interface -b 1572864:1572864 -a 16:4:: -D"

However, with Roon as the server, I am getting random skipping of tracks, sometimes in the middle of the current track. Is this a known problem? It seems to be Roon's LMS emulator to blame, as LMS doesn't have any issue. I tried playing with the first -a setting, going all the way up to 499. 499 changed the sound signature a bit, but it didn't solve the problem.

Open to suggestions.

[bibo01]

...

Welcome

[marcoc1712]

Thanks for helping me to understand squeezelite better. I will post followup questions here directly, if you don't mind my doing so in English!

I now have squeezelite/LMS working perfectly, and I also have it working with Roon. This is my preferred configuration, since I want the Roon experience, with the sound quality of squeezelite, which is significantly better with the -b option. I am currently using:
OPTIONS="-n zenith-se-player -s localhost -m ac:1f:6b:26:ed:32 -o hw:CARD=Interface -b 1572864:1572864 -a 16:4:: -D"

However, with Roon as the server, I am getting random skipping of tracks, sometimes in the middle of the current track. Is this a known problem? It seems to be Roon's LMS emulator to blame, as LMS doesn't have any issue. I tried playing with the first -a setting, going all the way up to 499. 499 changed the sound signature a bit, but it didn't solve the problem.

Open to suggestions.

You are welcome!

Too bad I'm not an expert in ROON, so I can't really help you in this matter. Some time ago we had problems with PCM/WAV files longer than x minutes, where x where depending on bitrate, almost 20 at 384KHz/32bit, but C-3PO and Squeezelite-R2 solved the problem. It seldom happens, listening to Qobuz, that the track skips to next, but I believe is due to Qobuz, not LMS, I've never investigated. What I would do is trying to verify if it always skips at a precise position in the length of the track, if so I'd open a ticket with ROON.

[hifi25nl]

Maybe is not related to this, but take a look here: REALTIME PRIORITY
If you don't play/upsample with Roon, but you are using Roon only as control point, it will not need an high realtime priority.
-----

2) RTAPP configuration

Please read first the readme at /usr/share/doc/rtapp/readme.txt

The default configuration file is /etc/rtapp/rtapp.conf

APPLICATIONS="jackd mpd hqplayer hqplayerd RoonAppliance RoonBridge sox mediacenter24 networkaudiod deadbeef a2jmidid ardour-5.12.0 rosegarden audacity"

MAX_PRIORITY="85"

MODE="autodec"

In general you don't need to modify the list of applications, but if you are using Roon as control point for HQPlayer, the real player would be the last one, so we suggest to remove RoonAppliance from that list. This is true in general if you are using one of the applications in the list only as a control point.

[austinpop]

Maybe is not related to this, but take a look here: REALTIME PRIORITY
If you don't play/upsample with Roon, but you are using Roon only as control point, it will not need an high realtime priority.
-----

2) RTAPP configuration

Please read first the readme at /usr/share/doc/rtapp/readme.txt

The default configuration file is /etc/rtapp/rtapp.conf

APPLICATIONS="jackd mpd hqplayer hqplayerd RoonAppliance RoonBridge sox mediacenter24 networkaudiod deadbeef a2jmidid ardour-5.12.0 rosegarden audacity"

MAX_PRIORITY="85"

MODE="autodec"

In general you don't need to modify the list of applications, but if you are using Roon as control point for HQPlayer, the real player would be the last one, so we suggest to remove RoonAppliance from that list. This is true in general if you are using one of the applications in the list only as a control point.

Hi Piero,

I am confused between this tuning, and selecting AudioLinux Extreme at boot time. How are these 2 related? Does switching between BFQ and Extreme at boot cause new different values to be used in the rtirq.conf and rtapp.conf files?

I will take a look at my config. Are you saying I should add "squeezelite" to the APPLICATIONS list?

[hifi25nl]

They are completely different:
Extreme at boot time set the CPU to never sleep for the best potential latency.
Extreme in configuration Menu set priority of irqs and applications.

In your case, if Roon is only a control point (no sound play or processing) I would add squeezelite and remove RoonAppliance (and remove applications not used). For example:
APPLICATIONS="mpd hqplayer hqplayerd squeezelite RoonBridge sox networkaudiod"