Build a dedicated Audio PC

[jkeny]

Just for some light relief & for those into heavy machinery & laser etching - have a look at this video of the making of one of these small boxes - it's fascinating (in a geek sort of way)
Now if only this geek could get a Youtube video link to appear here - what's the Youtube button for when writing a post?

Thanks Fran - sorted

[Fran]

OK,


Later on today I'm going to put together a google docs spreadsheet for all the alternatives and places to buy them.... I'll share this openly so that anyone can add to it.

Would act as a very handy resource for us all I reckon.

Fran

EDIT: if you're turned on by Johns video above, this cnc work has been the standard to beat for a good few years:



To link a youtube like this: go to the youtube page, and have a look at the URL in the browser window. Copy the bit to the right, after the "=", eg in the vid post above its "QsmiIeAkE-o". Just click on the youtube tags and paste in the "QsmiIeAkE-o" between them.

[jkeny]

Ohhh, the gyrating V8 engine block at the end was too much :)

[tony]

i like to get as much parts of the the same retailers to save on delivery cost if any and for fast delivery
komplett and scan are two of my favorites atm


the g860 is 70 euro well fit for the task and you can upgrade it in a year or two if its necessary

fran but together some good questions i don't think we will know until we get comparing these builds

nige[/quote]

Thanks Nige, This is where I get lost. You have identified corsair ram 16gb as opposed to the crucial 8gb for virtually the same price.Corsair €4 cheaper to be exact. The clock speed is slower on the corsair. Does that make a difference?
The streacom fc9 case is a good bit smaller than the FC10. I don't know if that matters.

Nige is completely right it needs comparing of completed builds.

BTW The zuma gets barely luke warm. I wouldn't like to be warming cold hands on it.

Listening tonight trying the zuma/ciunas and switching to laptop/jkdac32. Both SQ are really good. If one never heard the zuma/ciunas you would be very happy with the jkdac32/laptop streaming. The zuma/ciunas just has a beautiful extra dollop of texture. That combination just has more separation and larger soundstage. This is using the current version of Jplay rather than the new beta versions.
Briefly heard the new beta version(have the latest but do'nt want to instal it on the laptop setup and screw comparisons) on Johns laptop/ciunas and there was a very noticeable leap in soundstage from an already very nice place.

Connection allowing I am going to try the ciunas compared to the dac32 thru the zuma(probably take me 10hrs to get it to work!)

[jkeny]

heres the benchmark on the g860 has a score of 2,870
http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu_lookup. ... Hz&id=1117
i3 will be somewhere between 3000 and 4000 at almost twice the price
the g860 is 70 euro well fit for the task and you can upgrade it in a year or two if its necessary

This has raised an issue that causes me to pause about my NUC order - a poster on Jplay reported that his 2,382 benchmarked "i3-2310M (2.1GHz) can no longer manage Hibernate with JPLAY 5.0b (at any buffer setting)."

The NUC i3-3217U(1.8GHz) is benchmarked at 2,282. So if hibernate is not available with the latest versions of Jplay then there's no point in using/trying the current NUC configuration. There are other i5 & i7 NUC versions due later in the year which may be more suitable?

The problem is, what is the base configuration needed? Would the g860 CPU be able to handle hibernate? The Zuma's i7 3770S CPU benchmark of 9254 would seem to be capable (for a while anyway)

[tony]

This is the quandary around getting just enough to do the job.Before you know it you have to upgrade again and you find the mobo will not take the new chip. I firmly believe while accepting my lack of technical expertise that going for the i5-7 helps prolong the need to upgrade.

Having said that bit John I have seen various different posts on jplay where guys have zuma servers x2 and have issues of some sort or other.I would be surprised if the i3 is old hat already and not up to the job. You were using the new version with lower grade laptops and it worked fine. Check with Marcin. I spoke with him and he has only now upgraded to i7(amd equiv I think) but hasn't switched to it. His current processor is Amd Phenom X4.

Oh I managed to get the dac32/ciunas connected to zuma after a bit of hassle.Had to do the vitus audio driver again.
Brief listen the ciunas has the edge. Texture is the only word I can use.It just has more,more rounded warm analogue sound.I only played it low so can't post on whether soundstage is bigger. With the amanero driver being easier to instal and use it is a really nice upgrade from the dac32. BTW the dac32 was connected to the €400 sotm usb port. When I have a bit more time tomorrow evening will give both a good listen but switch the dac32 to normal usb port.

[jkeny]

This is the quandary around getting just enough to do the job.Before you know it you have to upgrade again and you find the mobo will not take the new chip. I firmly believe while accepting my lack of technical expertise that going for the i5-7 helps prolong the need to upgrade.

Yea, I agree but the future at Intel seems to be that all CPU chips will be soldered to the Mobo - no upgradability it would seem or have I got this wrong?

Having said that bit John I have seen various different posts on jplay where guys have zuma servers x2 and have issues of some sort or other.I would be surprised if the i3 is old hat already and not up to the job. You were using the new version with lower grade laptops and it worked fine. Check with Marcin. I spoke with him and he has only now upgraded to i7(amd equiv I think) but hasn't switched to it. His current processor is Amd Phenom X4.

I started a thread on Jplay a couple of days ago hoping to get some feedback on the NUC config & this is where I quoted from in my last post. I have emailed Marcin & will see what he has to say? The thing is that Jplay is changing so fast & the hardware needed to run it seem to be in flux even within the current 5.1 where that quote claimed that release candidate 5 could run hibernate but not RC 10. It's maybe the wrong time to be looking at hardware platforms until this software flux is sorted out? It's getting hard to tell if a base CPU benchmark of 2,000,or 3,000,or 4,000, etc is correct?

Oh I managed to get the dac32/ciunas connected to zuma after a bit of hassle.Had to do the vitus audio driver again.
Brief listen the ciunas has the edge. Texture is the only word I can use.It just has more,more rounded warm analogue sound.I only played it low so can't post on whether soundstage is bigger. With the amanero driver being easier to instal and use it is a really nice upgrade from the dac32. BTW the dac32 was connected to the €400 sotm usb port. When I have a bit more time tomorrow evening will give both a good listen but switch the dac32 to normal usb port.

Great, Tony, Thanks & Look forward to your further listening impressions.

[jkeny]

Yes, spoke to Marcin & stability is the keyword!
Now my thinking is this - a lower powered CPU (lets leave the mother board aside for the moment) will be pushed more than a more capable CPU. This will cause it's temp to vary more & maybe cause throttling back of it's processing or maybe just vary it's performance somewhat. I'm wondering if by cooling it & keeping it's operating temp relatively stable that we don't achieve the same effect as the more stable higher powered CPU?
The same applies to other chips on the mobo - SSD, RAM, Wifi card - all need to be kept as stable as possible & this usually means temperature stability.
So, I have a neat idea to perhaps deal with this cooling but I have to investigate it further.

PS. This makes sense with the Zuma as it has a huge heatsink reservoir which barely gets warm - keeping the CPU chip operating in a stable area. I don't know if the rest of the chips on it's mobo are cooled in any way?

[nige2000]

i like to get as much parts of the the same retailers to save on delivery cost if any and for fast delivery
komplett and scan are two of my favorites atm


the g860 is 70 euro well fit for the task and you can upgrade it in a year or two if its necessary

fran but together some good questions i don't think we will know until we get comparing these builds

nige

Thanks Nige, This is where I get lost. You have identified corsair ram 16gb as opposed to the crucial 8gb for virtually the same price.Corsair €4 cheaper to be exact. The clock speed is slower on the corsair. Does that make a difference?
The streacom fc9 case is a good bit smaller than the FC10. I don't know if that matters.

Nige is completely right it needs comparing of completed builds.

BTW The zuma gets barely luke warm. I wouldn't like to be warming cold hands on it.

Listening tonight trying the zuma/ciunas and switching to laptop/jkdac32. Both SQ are really good. If one never heard the zuma/ciunas you would be very happy with the jkdac32/laptop streaming. The zuma/ciunas just has a beautiful extra dollop of texture. That combination just has more separation and larger soundstage. This is using the current version of Jplay rather than the new beta versions.
Briefly heard the new beta version(have the latest but do'nt want to instal it on the laptop setup and screw comparisons) on Johns laptop/ciunas and there was a very noticeable leap in soundstage from an already very nice place.

Connection allowing I am going to try the ciunas compared to the dac32 thru the zuma(probably take me 10hrs to get it to work!)[/quote]

On the ram it's pretty much the same as everything else you don't need the tip tip top stuff
There will be no noticeable difference for this
these products are for people that just want the fastest thing out there

[nige2000]

This is the quandary around getting just enough to do the job.Before you know it you have to upgrade again and you find the mobo will not take the new chip. I firmly believe while accepting my lack of technical expertise that going for the i5-7 helps prolong the need to upgrade.

Yea, I agree but the future at Intel seems to be that all CPU chips will be soldered to the Mobo - no upgradability it would seem or have I got this wrong?

Having said that bit John I have seen various different posts on jplay where guys have zuma servers x2 and have issues of some sort or other.I would be surprised if the i3 is old hat already and not up to the job. You were using the new version with lower grade laptops and it worked fine. Check with Marcin. I spoke with him and he has only now upgraded to i7(amd equiv I think) but hasn't switched to it. His current processor is Amd Phenom X4.

I started a thread on Jplay a couple of days ago hoping to get some feedback on the NUC config & this is where I quoted from in my last post. I have emailed Marcin & will see what he has to say? The thing is that Jplay is changing so fast & the hardware needed to run it seem to be in flux even within the current 5.1 where that quote claimed that release candidate 5 could run hibernate but not RC 10. It's maybe the wrong time to be looking at hardware platforms until this software flux is sorted out? It's getting hard to tell if a base CPU benchmark of 2,000,or 3,000,or 4,000, etc is correct?

Oh I managed to get the dac32/ciunas connected to zuma after a bit of hassle.Had to do the vitus audio driver again.
Brief listen the ciunas has the edge. Texture is the only word I can use.It just has more,more rounded warm analogue sound.I only played it low so can't post on whether soundstage is bigger. With the amanero driver being easier to instal and use it is a really nice upgrade from the dac32. BTW the dac32 was connected to the €400 sotm usb port. When I have a bit more time tomorrow evening will give both a good listen but switch the dac32 to normal usb port.

Great, Tony, Thanks & Look forward to your further listening impressions.

Not that you can predict the future but I'd imagine there's more of these nuc type pc with soldered on ram and CPU going to come into the market
But it will be a long time before the upper mid range and above computer components will be no longer on the market especially for the high end stuff as a pc build can be 3-4 times cheaper than a premade pc tower such as a dell