I have been coming here every other day thinking there might be something new.
We have learned that maintenance has an expanded meaning when it comes to frd and his exemplary player.
Will soon know for sure.
THANKS for keeping at it and I wish more people were willing to do without nonsense in exchange for great sound but that is just how it is.
We have learned that maintenance has an expanded meaning when it comes to frd and his exemplary player.
Will soon know for sure.
THANKS for keeping at it and I wish more people were willing to do without nonsense in exchange for great sound but that is just how it is.
Found the problem.
i have always used the UBUNTU disk restore to write WTFPLAY to an SD disk.
For some reason this does not work with this version. I used this to make another disk of 7.5 to be sure that it had worked before and it did.
When I would use the terminal command it said I did not have permission to write to the disk. I tried to change permissions on the disk in PROPERTIES but it would not allow any changes.
I then put sudo in front of the command and all seems to be fine.
All of the attempts were made with SD disks with music files. I re-formatted them before beginning the installations.
For those who know even less than I do about LINUX it might be a good idea to add sudo in the installation guide.
Now to hear if I can hear a difference.
i have always used the UBUNTU disk restore to write WTFPLAY to an SD disk.
For some reason this does not work with this version. I used this to make another disk of 7.5 to be sure that it had worked before and it did.
When I would use the terminal command it said I did not have permission to write to the disk. I tried to change permissions on the disk in PROPERTIES but it would not allow any changes.
I then put sudo in front of the command and all seems to be fine.
All of the attempts were made with SD disks with music files. I re-formatted them before beginning the installations.
For those who know even less than I do about LINUX it might be a good idea to add sudo in the installation guide.
Now to hear if I can hear a difference.
So it works and as long as it plays a track I do think it has a sonic edge. Sadly after about two minutes there is a squeal and the next track is played.
At startup - the first three lines are error messages concerning the CPU - but then this appears with the previous version - I never noticed that before. But the old version plays fine.
Does this sound like a motherboard problem? I am using an ASROCK with integrated INTEL MB - I certainly do not hear any problems other than it not wanting to play a whole track.
This would be fine if my listening was confined to Jay Reatard and The Residents COMMERCIAL ALBUM but those are not frequent additions to the playlist.
Any idea of what is going wrong?
At startup - the first three lines are error messages concerning the CPU - but then this appears with the previous version - I never noticed that before. But the old version plays fine.
Does this sound like a motherboard problem? I am using an ASROCK with integrated INTEL MB - I certainly do not hear any problems other than it not wanting to play a whole track.
This would be fine if my listening was confined to Jay Reatard and The Residents COMMERCIAL ALBUM but those are not frequent additions to the playlist.
Any idea of what is going wrong?
Hi,
Re the squeel/noise at the end of track: thank you for the reporting. Another user has reported this issue as well. I will look into it.
From what I understand this is limited WAV files only and FLAC files work OK. Can you confirm that?
Re boot mesages: the amount of boot messages should be more or less the same (there are a couple of new ones, but nothing significantly larger).
F
Re the squeel/noise at the end of track: thank you for the reporting. Another user has reported this issue as well. I will look into it.
From what I understand this is limited WAV files only and FLAC files work OK. Can you confirm that?
Re boot mesages: the amount of boot messages should be more or less the same (there are a couple of new ones, but nothing significantly larger).
F
I am getting the squeal about two minutes into the track and then it jumps to the next track.
I never play flac files - all are wav. I have wav set in wtfsetup. I have not tried any other.
The boot messages with my install of 8.0 is very abbreviated - about half way down the screen whereas 7.5 is approx. one and one-half screens - for lack of a better way to express this.
I think something is wrong with my install since you say there should be a few more lines of the boot message. I have made many attempts at installing onto various SD disks and all result in the same result.
I have been using SD disks that I used to use with the SDTRANS player. I will try an USB drive tonight. I have a feeling that might solve the problem.
THANKS, frd
I never play flac files - all are wav. I have wav set in wtfsetup. I have not tried any other.
The boot messages with my install of 8.0 is very abbreviated - about half way down the screen whereas 7.5 is approx. one and one-half screens - for lack of a better way to express this.
I think something is wrong with my install since you say there should be a few more lines of the boot message. I have made many attempts at installing onto various SD disks and all result in the same result.
I have been using SD disks that I used to use with the SDTRANS player. I will try an USB drive tonight. I have a feeling that might solve the problem.
THANKS, frd
I do get the same CPU messages with 7,5 though it works very well. I have nothing to compare it with, of course.
I am starting the think this is a conflict with my motherboard.
Placing WTF on an USB disk made no difference.
I am going to get an inexpensive MB that can use a Intel Comet Lake CPU which can use AVX since I hve wondered if that would make any sonic difference.
I am starting the think this is a conflict with my motherboard.
Placing WTF on an USB disk made no difference.
I am going to get an inexpensive MB that can use a Intel Comet Lake CPU which can use AVX since I hve wondered if that would make any sonic difference.
I figure you got it to work or you would not have released it. Along with the fellow at TIR NA who got it to work. I did get a new board and Comet Lake CPU and will see if it works with a much newer CPU. I think this is a conflict with older CPUs and motherboards.
Did not realize until the MB was delivered that I had to get an adapter for my old monitor to plug into HDMI which is the only choice with this new MB.
The new board has lots of BIOS adjustability unlike the board I will compare it to. Whether that makes any difference remains to be heard. I am not expecting the new board to make the sound any better but would not mind if it did. If the old board sounds better I will use this set up elsewhere. And wait for 8.1!
Did not realize until the MB was delivered that I had to get an adapter for my old monitor to plug into HDMI which is the only choice with this new MB.
The new board has lots of BIOS adjustability unlike the board I will compare it to. Whether that makes any difference remains to be heard. I am not expecting the new board to make the sound any better but would not mind if it did. If the old board sounds better I will use this set up elsewhere. And wait for 8.1!
Having made a move to an I5 CPU and an ASUS MB with 43 pages of BIOS instructions - I was using 7.5 and feel confident I heard an improvement with the fancier CPU and MB than my all-in-one Asrock board which was welcomed.
I am using a CPU without video so I had to get the lowest power video card I could find which was 30 watts maximum - no way anywhere near that is being used since the fanless hear sink gets warm at best. The video card is also ASUS.
This was something suggested by Serge in the old cMP days and I do think there is some advantage to taking any load away from the CPU that you can.
Running memory at 800 mHz and everything that can be turned off is turned off except hyperthreading. You are supposed to be able to disable spread spectrum with this board but undoubtedly the CPU does not allow this. Using four cores, will try three and two to hear if there is any difference.
Much to my surprise this more complicated setup is much quieter - I can turn up the Celestion axiperiodic drivers two dB and it still sounds mellow - more spikiness than I would have ever guessed from the old board which did sound good but this sounds superior.
From what I can hear the avx instructions version does sound better.
I cannot say I am hearing any improvement from 7.5 - I was listening to 7.5 avx for about a week.
I think with the high level of sonic performance from 7.5 getting significantly better sound is simply not possible. Though I would love to be proved wrong.
One neat thing with the video card is that the letters and numbers on the monitor are larger. Obviously no way to control the video card in wtf and I do not need to be able to control it.
Why so many people need more features than this is a mystery to me. Either their system will not resolve the better performance or they simply do not care about getting the most they can from their systems. I would be willing to bet there are plenty of folks with thousands of dollars in interconnect cable that opt for more feature laden software for playing music.
Sometimes it is an advantage to be cheap and to be cheap because one does not have any other choice.
I am using a CPU without video so I had to get the lowest power video card I could find which was 30 watts maximum - no way anywhere near that is being used since the fanless hear sink gets warm at best. The video card is also ASUS.
This was something suggested by Serge in the old cMP days and I do think there is some advantage to taking any load away from the CPU that you can.
Running memory at 800 mHz and everything that can be turned off is turned off except hyperthreading. You are supposed to be able to disable spread spectrum with this board but undoubtedly the CPU does not allow this. Using four cores, will try three and two to hear if there is any difference.
Much to my surprise this more complicated setup is much quieter - I can turn up the Celestion axiperiodic drivers two dB and it still sounds mellow - more spikiness than I would have ever guessed from the old board which did sound good but this sounds superior.
From what I can hear the avx instructions version does sound better.
I cannot say I am hearing any improvement from 7.5 - I was listening to 7.5 avx for about a week.
I think with the high level of sonic performance from 7.5 getting significantly better sound is simply not possible. Though I would love to be proved wrong.
One neat thing with the video card is that the letters and numbers on the monitor are larger. Obviously no way to control the video card in wtf and I do not need to be able to control it.
Why so many people need more features than this is a mystery to me. Either their system will not resolve the better performance or they simply do not care about getting the most they can from their systems. I would be willing to bet there are plenty of folks with thousands of dollars in interconnect cable that opt for more feature laden software for playing music.
Sometimes it is an advantage to be cheap and to be cheap because one does not have any other choice.
Release 0.8.2 is now available. It fixes another bug that caused incomplete loads of WAV files greater than 2GB.
Release notes: http://wtfplay-project.org/rnotes.html
Enjoy,
F
Release notes: http://wtfplay-project.org/rnotes.html
Enjoy,
F
Re: Polarity Inversion Was there any further action on this since your post? Like you, I was an adopter of cMP/cPlay. Still am, in fact; at least with cMP as wrapper for a Foobar2K install in a music dedicated box (yup, a thin WinXP and allPolarity Inversion for wtfplay ?
Hi Frd
A small request (which I hope requires a small code change): is it possible to assign a key command to invert the polarity of the signal coming from wtfplay ?
Back in the Olden Days (ie: cPlay), I found some of my albums sounded "better" when the polarity was inverted (often referred to as shifting phase by 180 degrees). Toggling between the two during playback could bring some surprises.
It would be oh-so-fine if that ability came to wtfplay. I could drive myself batty with renaming WAV files that benefit from the change !
I suppose there is the practical issue of how to indicate which polarity is in effect (0- or 180-degrees). The header in the wtfcui panel has room for an indicator, but command line playback is a little trickier.
Thanks again for The Tiny Miracle...
Grant
largely because cPlay couln't handle DSD. However, this did not happen until I found a way for FB2K to invert polarity. Some albums sound best this way. While not unhappy with this setup, one needs to explore further. So, I am checking out the potential for WTFPLAY to replace the current setup down the line, with perhaps Hysolid being another alternative.
No doubt that would be a good addition if it did not harm the goodness of the player.
I can change polarity after the computer and there is no question there is always a best setting
It is a good guide to the "goodness" of your system. The easier it is to tell the difference the closer you are getting.
As a old cMP fellow - I had an 18 Mb Windows installation and ti was good for the time but WTFPLAY is so far beyond it. It is, aesthetically. the new cMP. Extremely lightweight.
Only thing I have wondered is would it be better if it loaded files like cMP did. WTFPLAY must stop and load the next file so unless you merge files, albums where the songs are interconnected are going to have a pause between them. The quality of the storage you are using will determine the pause.
You are in for a treat.
I can change polarity after the computer and there is no question there is always a best setting
It is a good guide to the "goodness" of your system. The easier it is to tell the difference the closer you are getting.
As a old cMP fellow - I had an 18 Mb Windows installation and ti was good for the time but WTFPLAY is so far beyond it. It is, aesthetically. the new cMP. Extremely lightweight.
Only thing I have wondered is would it be better if it loaded files like cMP did. WTFPLAY must stop and load the next file so unless you merge files, albums where the songs are interconnected are going to have a pause between them. The quality of the storage you are using will determine the pause.
You are in for a treat.
Thanks! Sadly, for now, I crashed and burned after the first attempts to install WTFPLAY. It appears its code base does not get along with AMD CPUs made before the Bulldozer family. The PC's that I can devote to this are all Phenom II BE -based -- just shy of the mark, it seems I tried a few installation files to no avail. While I may test on my more current PCs, this will have to wait. Meanwhile, I am still waiting for a software validation email from Hysolid and wondering if XXhighend should be considered, after all.
LOL, the "goodness " of the system is not necessarily a factor in my case. Most Maggies can accentuate the effect, and the ones I first heard this on were the lowly Magnepan MMG's. Ironically, by the time I finished tweaking them to the hilt, pretty much everything improved magnanimously...except the effect with polarity inversion, which became more noticeable. I took it in stride until, at first cPlay, and later FB2K, allowed my to easily switch.
Interesting, cPlay, to a certain extent, did have lags while loading to memory, if I remember well. To be sure, it happened with large hi-res files. Yet, this is hardly the case with FB2K running under cMP. In fact, though I don't prefer its sound, JRiver is also fast enough under cMP. To be sure, I not only spent much time optimizing FB2K for use under cMP but, even before every listening session, I also spend several minutes manually turning off what remaining WinXP services I can.
Nothing is perfect for us, right? Luckily, it is fun pursuing it anyway.