Crackles with Devialet Air (ethernet)

I have now connected the Devialet and the computer to the same switch with ethernet cables.

I can confirm that it works better in this way but still I have heard clicks and crackles couple of times.

Could someone from @support or perhaps @danny help on this?

Hi @Petri ----- Thank you for the report and the continued feedback. Apologies for the slow response here.

Moving forward, I am glad that you saw Brian’s post on the other thread addressing this same behavior. Indeed, some VERY good feedback there.

In terms of identifying the “culprit” here, my recommendation ALWAYS for anyone who is trying to troubleshoot potential networking issues is to always shorten the “chain of communication” to the bare minimum and see how things behave. If the issue is not present with the reconfiguration, then it’s time to start adding complexity back in and seeing where it breaks.

I noticed that you mentioned you have a switch in play. I checkout the provided link (thank you) and cannot seem to be able to identify if this switch is “managed” or “unmanaged”. My assumption is that it is “unmanaged” but can you please verify that information for me.

-Eric

Just to be clear, the presence of NAK trace is not in and of itself a problem. Packet re-transmission is part of normal operation for any protocol that uses UDP–since UDP does not guarantee packet delivery. All that NAK means is that a packet needed to be resent. The NAK trace helps our technical teams put issues in context–it is not really meant to be interpreted by end users.

@support will follow up on troubleshooting any actual symptoms–but NAKs in the log are not something that needs to be fixed all by themselves.

Hi @Eric, thank you for the reply.

It is just a plug and play, 8-port gigabit switch.

I have tried earlier connecting the Apple Airport Express directly to the Devialet and I had a bit similar kind of crackles back then when streaming any high res music. There were many other issues as well. All this was happening before the Roon-AIR integration was released, so I used the Devialet AIR virtual soundcard back then.

Hello,
I have found a very interesting article here : https://helpdesk.flexradio.com/hc/en-us/articles/202118518-Optimizing-Ethernet-Adapter-Settings-for-Maximum-Performance
Having changed my PC configuration recently, I forgot to change the settings of my ethernet adapter and this article helped me a lot.
I went back to buffer = 50 ms (very aggressive but very useful to do tests because problems occur quickly!).
With default settings of the Ethernet adapter, I always had dropouts in less than 5 minutes. Using Windows task manager and looking to the Ethernet perfomance, the dropouts can be seen easily : flow drops to 0 Mbit/s and then takes its normal value again (about 8 Mbit/s with a 192kHz 24 bit audio file).
I changed some basic settings of the Internet Adapter : not allowing Windows to power off the network adapter, disabling Green Ethernet, etc.)
After these changes, no more dropouts (the flow curve never dropped as before), but still some noises from time to time (buffer = 50 ms).
I tried buffer = 100 ms and played a whole album 24 bit 192 kHz without problem.(no noise, neither NAK pattern in the log file).
It would be nice if Roon technical team could tell us how to optimize the ethenet adapter settings for a connection between PC and Devialet. Clearly, it is important!
I suppose these settings are close to the recommendations I have read in the article I mentionned above, but I don’t have all the elements to be sure of it.
Have a nice day,
Sylvain

Hi @Petri ---- Thank you for the touching base with me, very appreciated!

You’ve mentioned the following in regard to your network topology:

Roon Server on my Windows 10 desktop computer (i7 6700K, 16GB RAM, 256GB SSD for OS, and 1TB SSD for music). This computer is connected to the Apple Airport Extreme by an ethernet cable.

Then the Devialet 1000 Pro is connected to a switch (AQ-Switch-8) in an another room. Also Apple Airport Express is connected to the same switch. The Airport Express is showing following information on WIFI connection quality: speed: 300 Mb/s, RSSI: -60 dBm.

If possible, I would highly recommend testing with the Devialet 100 Pro removed from the switch and with a direct connection to the Apple Airport Extreme. As mentioned in my previous post, whenever we are troubleshooting these types of issues it is always best to use trial and error (i.e shortening the chain of communication and adding your links back in).

I also think it is important to note that we have seen numerous issues with the Apple products in the past. Brian wrote up a very in depth post about where users can potentially get into “trouble” with certain configurations and mentioned the following:

“Poor quality or underpowered routers. The Apple AirPort Extreme is extremely bad (they seem to be exiting that business and paying little attention to the issues…I wouldn’t want one in my life). Some “cable company specials” are not great either. This technology moves over time–a first-generation 802.11n router will underperform compared to something more current, simply because the newer ones have more CPU/RAM. If at all possible, make sure your router does 802.11ac. Even if your endpoints are n-only, the bandwidth hungry phones/tablets/laptops are more likely to have ac support, which will get them out of the way a little bit.”

Let me know how it goes!
-Eric

Hi Brian

Does the 1000mb to 100mb thing suggest that trying a 100mb switch might help? If you have a dedicated Roon computer and only connect that and the Devialet it shouldn’t have a negative performance impact I guess? Alternatively, what about a second Ethernet adaptor directly to the Devialet?

Cheers

Chris

FWIW I use two switches between Roon Core and my Devialet. Roon (on NUC with Debian) uses one of two Gig ports on the main switch. The other Gig port connects my NAS. A 100mb port on the main switch connects to an unmanaged 100mb switch and the Devialet is connected to this with a 7m Cat5e. Both switches are HP Pro Curve.
RoonAIR has been faultless since the start. No crackles or other errors. Default buffer settings in Roon. I guess that when 1000 to 100 is handled on the same switch back plane it is optimized to work well.
As the ethernet port on the Devialet is only 100mb (I think) it might be useful to connect it to a 100mb port (or disable gigabit handshaking if the switch is manageable)

No, I don’t think so. I was reminded after mentioning the 1000->100 thing that all AIR devices are already 100mbit, so there is going to be a transition almost always. An extra switch just for the sake of it probably makes things worse, not better.

I think the next step is to figure out what makes the 3 (I think) people in this thread different from the hundreds of others using this without issue. If we can figure out the common factor, maybe we can isolate/reproduce the problem and find out what’s going on.

(@support)

If you’re stable at 100ms, your system is working great.

I don’t think there is any guarantee that 50ms will be stable. It’s a really tight time constraint to meet.

We included the option purely so we could match Devialet’s options in the driver, but it is really not the best setting for audio playback–it’s there for people who are worried about lip-sync when playing video files, which doesn’t really apply to Roon. For music bigger buffers are almost always better, up until the point where they interrupt the user experience by creating delays.

Not sure if I was counted or not, but I’m pretty sure mine was an isolated one-off. It never occurred before or since, and as it only lasted an hour or so and I restarted the Core around this time, I wonder if something had just got sticky somewhere. Will keep an eye on it but so far so good.

To second what has been said before, I noticed, in my configuration, that:

  • AIR has never been stable using Airport Extreme or Airport Express. I tried both and could never reach a crackle free reproduction
  • switching to my internet provider router gave me better results
  • powering this router with a LPSU improves the reliability in my setup
  • in Wifi mode, adjusting the position of the router vis a vis the Devialet WiFI board so that signal/noise ratio reaches a level > -35db/-40db (visible from Devialet AIR settings) provides for a very reliable streaming, up to 24/192 without crackles.
    The only crackles I have faced since Roon/AIR was released were related to a situation when a terminal (iPhone) tried to access the same WiFI router from a position where the signal was very weak and significantly perturbed the audio streaming.

Purely as a data point.

My configuration of NUC 6i5 connected to D LINK DGS-1008G 8-Port Gigabit Unmanaged Desktop Switch, Synology NAS connected to same switch, and Devialet 440 Pro connected to same switch has worked flawlessly running RoonServer on the NUC under either ROCK OS or Windows 10 Pro OS that I optimized by eliminating certain processes ( including Windows updates). So all three devices are connected via ethernet. The switch in turn has an ethernet run to my ASUS RT 1900 router. There is about 25-50 feet in wall CAT5e cabling between each of these devices, with final connection via CAT6 cable.

I do not run any other applications on my NUC.

Prior to Roon supporting AIR, I ran the Devialet AIR driver with RoonServer on the Windows 10 Pro NUC, or a Mac Mini, AIR3 was fairly reliable in both instances, never any white noise, no crackles, occasionally slight/brief dropout or pause, usually because of something untoward happening on the Windows 10 Pro machine (Windows doing other stuff in background).

As I said, just a data point if it helps to narrow things down. I have spend a good amount of time optimizing the network setup in router for general usage, and do give my Devialet, NAS, and NUC fixed/static IP addresses, a practice I extend to most all of my networked devices at home.

Hello,
I did a lot of tests and after that I will try to explain what happens on my system.
First point : I am sure there is nothing on my computer (program or service) to interfere with Roon. Roon works well with Windows 10 safe mode with networking, and using this mode, I have the same results.
Second point, I first believed I had dropoutS or noiseS, in fact I have only ONE dropout (or noise) after more or less 3 minutes after the beginning of the play. After that, no more problem.
I start Roon, I wait until there is no more CPU or disk activity and I play a 192 kHz 24 bit album.
With task manager, I see memory = more or less 1200 Mb for RoonAppliance and after 1 min, it comes down to 1000 Mb.
The dropout or noise ALWAYS occurs when Roon goes from 1000 Mb to 760 Mb (after 3 or 4 minutes).
What does Roon at that moment???
If I start Roon and wait before playing the album, I can see RoonAppliance memory decrease once. If I start playing the album after that, I will always have a dropout or noise when RoonAppliance memory decreases during play (after more or less 2,5 minutes).
These tests were done with buffer = 100 ms. Sometimes (rarely) I have no noise or dropout during the second memory decrease.
With a big buffer (3000 ms for instance) I have no dropout or noise, the memory values are different.
If I don’t stop and restart Roon, no problem (I had to stop it to see the logfile!).
I hope I was clear and could help everybody,
Best regards,
Sylvain

I would like to give other détails to complete my previous message. The important decrease of memory (the second one, about 250 Mb) which results in a dropout on my system after 3 or 4 minutes of play is due to the size of the library (more than 80 000 tracks). If I reduce the size of this library to 10 000 tracks for instance, the decrease of memory is much smaller ( from 650 Mb to 600Mb, 50 Mb) and in that case, I have no dropout or noise.
Best regards,
Sylvain

Hi @Eric

I have now replaced the Apple Airport Extreme & Express with Orbi. Now, I don’t seem to get “NAK” messages anymore to the log files but still I heard crackles couple times this morning. Also I noticed that left / right channel got muted for a while (~1 second) few times. It was like one of the channels dropped out for a while. I tried different buffer sizes but those didn’t help. Right now I’m using 3s buffer.

Then I tried also connecting Devialet directly to the Orbi router with an Ethernet cable. I listening for an hour and didn’t notice any crackles. The only problem was that still one of the channels got randomly muted / dropped out for a second.

That sounds like the devialet over voltage bug, they are going to fix via firmware. Check your last error on the amp.

Thanks Kevin. There are no errors on the master amp, but the companion is showing “Last Fault A 4098 Over Voltage”.

Today I noticed again that one of the channels got dropped out for a second when streaming to my Devialet 1000 Pro. I checked that this happened at 18:10.

I checked the Roon Server log files and noticed that are LOTS of things happening at 18:10. Obviously the client got disconnected first and then there are about 1100 rows showing only following warn & debug rows exactly at 18:10:25.

08/09 18:10:25 Info: [brokerserver] Client disconnected: 192.168.1.8:53233
08/09 18:10:25 Debug: [remoting] firing request callback with null because of dispose
08/09 18:10:25 Trace: [push] restarting connection (Unable to read data from the transport connection: A blocking operation was interrupted by a call to WSACancelBlockingCall.)
08/09 18:10:25 Trace: [push] retrying connection in 95819ms
08/09 18:10:25 Warn: posting to shutdown SynchronizationContextThread
08/09 18:10:25 Debug: [remoting] firing request callback with null because of dispose
08/09 18:10:25 Warn: posting to shutdown SynchronizationContextThread
08/09 18:10:25 Debug: [remoting] firing request callback with null because of dispose
08/09 18:10:25 Warn: posting to shutdown SynchronizationContextThread
08/09 18:10:25 Debug: [remoting] firing request callback with null because of dispose
08/09 18:10:25 Warn: posting to shutdown SynchronizationContextThread
08/09 18:10:25 Debug: [remoting] firing request callback with null because of dispose
08/09 18:10:25 Warn: posting to shutdown SynchronizationContextThread
08/09 18:10:25 Debug: [remoting] firing request callback with null because of dispose
08/09 18:10:25 Warn: posting to shutdown SynchronizationContextThread

Finally I checked my Devialet and now the master device was showing the error “Last Fault A 4098 Over Voltage”. Unfortunately there is no datetime information available when exactly this Over Voltage happened.

So is this dropout problem caused by the Over Voltage issue? @support any ideas?

I don’t think this is going to be related to Roon – have you spoken with Devialet support yet?

That’s probably the best place to start for this error, but let us know if your stuck or if you have reason to believe this is related to Roon and we can take a look.