Entrypoints, the audio entrance to Roon, made the move to HiRes!

[Jan_Koudijs]

Hi @Pim_Seuren,

The icecast.xml file is indeed included in the Entrypoint Gateway image. The burst function is disabled, here is the specific part of the xml file:

    <limits>
        <clients>100</clients>
        <sources>2</sources>
        <queue-size>524288</queue-size>
        <client-timeout>30</client-timeout>
        <header-timeout>15</header-timeout>
        <source-timeout>10</source-timeout>
        <!-- If enabled, this will provide a burst of data when a client
             first connects, thereby significantly reducing the startup
             time for listeners that do substantial buffering. However,
             it also significantly increases latency between the source
             client and listening client.  For low-latency setups, you
             might want to disable this. -->
        <burst-on-connect>0</burst-on-connect>
        <!-- same as burst-on-connect, but this allows for being more
             specific on how much to burst. Most people won't need to
             change from the default 64k. Applies to all mountpoints  -->
        <burst-size>0</burst-size>
    </limits>

[Pim_Seuren]

Thanks Jan for your super-fast reply . Really appreciated. Good to know burst values are 0, so 5 seconds will be the lowest latency I can get I guess. No big deal, but there’s always this urge to make things even better… Happy regardless!

[Jan_Koudijs]

@Pim_Seuren

there’s always this urge to make things even better…

Totally agree, if a way to reduce latency pops up I will definitely apply it!

[Pim_Seuren]

Will keep an eye on this thread. For now I’m superhappy I got this to work

[Jan_Koudijs]

@Tim_Rhodes

I was using 64 bit as my RPi4 has 4GB RAM. Oh well, back to the drawing board!

Hi @Tim_Rhodes,

If you upgrade to Extension Manager 1.0 then you can run the Entrypoints extensions on arm64!

Roon Extension Manager v1.0 beta program

In another thread I announced my plans for the Extension Manager: This thread is all about the beta version that is now available. The purpose is to get user feedback and allow extension developers to convert their extensions to Docker images and get them included again. Prerequisites Version 1.0 requires Docker for Linux. You can run it on a Linux PC, on a Raspberry Pi running e.g. DietPi, in a Linux VM or on a NAS that supports Docker. In general, if you already run version 0.x with the …

[Tim_Rhodes]

Thank you! I will give it a try

[ogs]

Has anyone used USB from a device (like the Rega Fono mini for example) to a rpi and made it work with Entrypoints?

@Jan_Koudijs how does the signal path look? Would it be possible to pipe the stream via sox before it is sent on?

[Brad_Burnside]

Now you have me dreaming that hi-res SPDIF could be a source via RPi4 and miniDSP USBStreamer B.

[ogs]

@ogs

Has anyone used USB from a device (like the Rega Fono mini for example) to a rpi and made it work with Entrypoints?

@Jan_Koudijs how does the signal path look? Would it be possible to pipe the stream via sox before it is sent on?

My USB question is answered earlier in the thread. When the USB sound card is recognised by ALSA it should work (ref. the Behringer UFO 202 USB device).

For sox I still do not know. May require use of ALSA loopback which I understand is difficult to get working.

[Jan_Koudijs]

You are right, Linux ALSA support is what you need for USB sound cards.

Regarding adding sox to the signal path. The sound card that is selected in the extension Settings is directly used to create the web stream, so any additional actions have to be done upfront.

If I had to give it a try, I would check if sox can get input from an ALSA device, do its thing and then output to another ALSA device. This output device can then be a loopback of which the other end can be the input for the Audio Entrypoint. I don’t give support on this level of tinkering, don’t know if it can be done, but maybe this helps while Googling.

BTW I have used the loopback device successfully on DietPi, see post 139 of this thread.

[Brad_Burnside]

Those of us who do not code Linux are just confused by Mr. Pugalia’s tutorial.

It sounds as though a Raspberry Pi could receive high resolution PCM via USB from a device like the miniDSP USBStreamer and then play it from any Roon endpoint on the network. Correct?

Telling us civilians to try it, and see for ourselves, doesn’t help.

[Jan_Koudijs]

@Brad_Burnside

Those of us who do not code Linux are just confused by Mr. Pugalia’s tutorial

The only tutorial I know about is the Wiki to which I linked in the first post of this thread. Can you provide a link to “Mr. Pugalia’s tutorial”?

[Brad_Burnside]

Here.

[Jan_Koudijs]

Hi @Brad_Burnside,

I shared that link for users who want to experiment, just a pointer to create functionality that is not provided “out of the box”.

If you are not tech savvy I suggest that you read the Entrypoints Wiki and if you are interested use hardware that is reported to work. You haven’t been very specific on what you try to achieve, but if you want to stream the optical output of e.g. a CD player you need something different then the USBStreamer, as that provides an optical output and what you need is an optical input. What I used for testing is the HiFiBerry Digi+ I/O, it provides an optical input and the Audio Entrypoint can convert that into a web-radio stream (24 bit input signal is truncated to 16 bit).

I hope this helps.

[Brad_Burnside]

Thanks for going over this ground again, which I do remember.

My latest outburst resulted from my misconception that a loopback, as described, might allow a high resolution SPDIF source to avoid the conversion to a truncated web-radio stream. I would like to feed the output of a Meridian disc player through Roon’s convolution engine for quality room correction using filters from HAF.

BTW miniDSP does describe their device as “bidirectional”, allowing Toslink in to USB out.

[Sloop_John_B (John B)]

I can’t seem to get the bluetooth to work either.

I’ve got the CD replay working so the general roon piece seems okay.

I just don’t have a bluetooth device showing up on either my iphone, android phone or Win10PC.

I’ve tried a few times, turning off and unmasking and turning on and masking again, with the same result.

I have so little knowledge though that I may just be doing something silly.

(It is an old Pi I took down from the attic so perhaps the bluetooth is dodgy on it?)

.sjb

[Jan_Koudijs]

Please restart the bluetooth extension with logging, you then let it run for a while and try to discover it on your Android phone. If you can provide me the log I will have a look.

Is it a Pi 3 or 4?

[Steve_Gore-Smith]

Hi Jan, I have the same issue with bluetooth. I’ve installed the BT entrypoint on the same Pi that’s running an audio entrypoint. It appears to be running and BT appears to be on when I look at Dietpi config>advanced. However, searching for the bluetooth device from an android phone doesn’t show the Pi. Like the poster earlier, I tried mask/unmask/mask and removed/restored bluetooth from Dietpi>config.
I’ve logged the extension as suggested, but can’t how to attach it to this message… so have linked to it here.
Thanks

[Jan_Koudijs]

I will have a look and get back to you.

[Steve_Gore-Smith]

Many thanks Jan… btw the audio entrypoint works flawlessly thanks. I decided not to go with the loopback idea as I wanted the LMS Pi to be on a separate VPN network, so use a TOSLINK connection between the two - this TOSLINK SPDIF USB capture dongle works great in case anyone needs something similar.