MQN

[wushuliu]

I installed the RAMDisk last night and first impression was woow..... less harshness and cleaner sound. When I copied MQn on the RAMDisk the effect doubled.
BUT,........ after 2-3 songs my ears start to bleed! The sound looks cleaner, but it's more flat, no bass and no air, very fatique! Going back to SSD was more relaxing and pleasant.
I never read anything bad about the RAMDisk and with its speed I expected improvement in the sound quality, but did not happen in my case!

It might be system dependent, or somebody else will like, in any case it's free and might be worth to try.

Just my two cents!

might depend on how much ram you have, how big the ram disk is and how much your music took up. sounds like your system was under stress. The O/S needs several GB of ram as well to be happy.

I have 8Gb of RAM and I used 4Gb for RAMDisk. I was thinking to try to use only 2Gb for RAMDisk, but again, isn't 4Gb enough for dedicated PC, where is nothing else on it?!
I only had 2-3 songs on the RAMDisk and two versions of MQn.

Interestingly enough I just replaced my AMD setup with Intel. Radeon Ramdisk does not sound as good with my Intel - it sounds more like Jkeny and you have said, rolled off, flat. On my AMD setup the Ramdisk sounded much better, the roll off was more like noise reduction and there was great intimacy and low level detail.

[jrling]

Reduced buffersize to 4 and then to 2.

Each step gave some more vibration in the sound. So now running a Timerresolution 2ms and Driver buffersize 2 ms.

Cheers

Aleg

I would be grateful if you could explain where these settings are in the Registry?

Thanks

[sebna]

J Irling just reminded me that the Pro Audio timer setting in the registry should be 23220 and not 46440 when using the 1024 versions, seems to work - a totally different beast with this setting.

Just as nice a sound, but clarity and detail much improved, hopefully that's it.

Does this mean that version 1024 will become your new base for future releases? What is the difference between v2 and 1024 versions?

Also where is the Pro Audio option in registry :) Thanks !

EDIT: ahh ok clock rate value in Pro Audio settings :) Got it.

[sima66]

Reduced buffersize to 4 and then to 2.

Each step gave some more vibration in the sound. So now running a Timerresolution 2ms and Driver buffersize 2 ms.

Cheers

Aleg

I would be grateful if you could explain where these settings are in the Registry?

Thanks

Excellent question Jrling.

What value should should be in the clock rate for the 23220 setting?

[cvrle59]

Reduced buffersize to 4 and then to 2.

Each step gave some more vibration in the sound. So now running a Timerresolution 2ms and Driver buffersize 2 ms.

Cheers

Aleg

I would be grateful if you could explain where these settings are in the Registry?

Thanks

Excellent question Jrling.

What value should should be in the clock rate for the 23220 setting?

5AB4

[Aleg]

[quote="jrling"][quote="Aleg"]Reduced buffersize to 4 and then to 2.

Each step gave some more vibration in the sound. So now running a Timerresolution 2ms and Driver buffersize 2 ms.

Cheers

Aleg[/quote]

I would be grateful if you could explain where these settings are in the Registry?

Thanks[/quote]

Only Clock rate can be found in the registry (that is the 23220 thingy) and that is here
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Multimedia\SystemProfile\Tasks\Pro Audio]
When opening the key, select the decimal bullet and you can enter 23220 and don't have to do a hexadecimal conversion. But be aware, by default it opens in hexadecimal mode.

Buffer size is something you set in the control panel of your DAC/DDC driver, some don't have a control panel and you can't change it, and some do have one.

TimerResolution is a 'hidden' setting that is not permanent. Windows starts with default 15.6 ms (expressed as 156000 100ths nanoseconds) and applications can ask for a higher resolution ( i.e. A smaller number).

This can only be set with a program and cannot be found in registry.
I compiled a small C# program I found on the internet which allows you to set this by hand as a console program (command line). This version doesn't work with 2012 in minimal server or core mode because it requires a taskbar from the GUI, which is no longer available in these two modes.
So I compiled another version with a fixed desired resolution, which can run as a Service and which obviously doesn't require a GUI and always runs so I can't forget.

Source code and explanation can be found here: http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?t=376458

Cheers
Aleg

[taggart]

Aleg,
do you know the differences between all the diffrent available timers (HPET, System Timer and System CMOS/realtime clock)?
I wonder if TimerResolution is valid for all these types!? And do you still have deactivated HPET and/or System Timer?

[Ryelands]

If you're a sex pistols fan then that is good news.

The spitting was audible all over the house: I don't think the Sex Pistols had the same range even at their peak. Not that I would have crossed the room to listen to them let alone get within range, you understand.

Anyway, thanks to all for the suggestions. I've fixed the problem - it seems to have been a compatability issue caused by a version of MQnPlay that I mislabelled - finger trouble, no more but a lot of time wasted with it.

[Aleg]

Aleg,
do you know the differences between all the diffrent available timers (HPET, System Timer and System CMOS/realtime clock)?
I wonder if TimerResolution is valid for all these types!? And do you still have deactivated HPET and/or System Timer?

Taggart

I know of the existence of all these timers, not which program uses which timer for what purpose.
I do indeed have HPET and System Timer disabled and only run on the CmOS/RealTime clock.

About the technical implications I admit I'm mostly blind, I just did a before / after comparison and went on from there.

Do you have further information that you would like to share to lighten my world of pc timers :-) ?

Cheers
Aleg

[jesuscheung]

Interestingly enough I just replaced my AMD setup with Intel. Radeon Ramdisk does not sound as good with my Intel - it sounds more like Jkeny and you have said, rolled off, flat. On my AMD setup the Ramdisk sounded much better, the roll off was more like noise reduction and there was great intimacy and low level detail.

when you use ramdisk, try using fat16, and <256MB. fat16 was designed to run very efficiently <256MB. e.g. try 128MB.
don't use ntfs. fat16 has no security feature and has bigger cluster size, so technically better.

try ramdisk again. see if SQ improves. it works very well for lekt player and other player which isn't entirely memory playback. still work for MQn i think.

i use intel cpu.