Since there are a number of users (including me) who are using HQplayer with Roon, it would be nice to have a troubleshooting guide as a sticky. I have been using HQplayer for about 3 months and Roon + HQplayer for about 2 months. I have come across a range of issues each requiring a different solution. Both Roon forum and CA forum has been very helpful, but it requires a lot of asking and searching. I am listing the issues I faced and how I solved them, YMMV.
As a first step, see if the settings you want work with just HQplayer, without Roon or NAA. Then add NAA and finally add Roon. This would help to isolate the source of the problem.
I am running both Roon Core and HQplayer on MBP 2014, i7 2.5GHz, 16G RAM, Yosimite -> NAA (Audiolinux) ->iFi iDSD or Hugo TT
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HQplayer goes to sleep: Symptom: Playback halts usually in a few minutes, but starts when you bring HQplayer to the foreground or in focus. This has nothing to do with Roon, it is a energy/perfomance optimization āfeatureā of Yosemite (donāt know about El Captain). Proof: Keep activity monitor in the foreground, when the playback stops look at the Energy tab and App nap column for HQplayer would say Yes. Solution: Disable App nap for HQplayer. However, you cannot right click and use the checkbox option as HQplayer does not have this feature exposed. Instead you can open terminal and disable App nap. You can either do a system wide disable of App nap (I would not recommend it unless the Mac is used purely for music playback). You could disable App nap for HQplayer alone using the following command:
defaults write -app HQPlayerDesktop NSAppSleepDisabled -bool YES. - Playback stutters: Symptom: Playback stutters, stops/starts and may sound scratchy. More likely to occur when using poly-sinc filters of HQplayer or if using some of the filters that need a lot of resource (Ex: closed-form without CUDA). Solution: Try switching to less resource intensive filters or lower rate. poly-sinc-2s-* works well or use closed-form with CUDA if available. Another solution (that worked for me) is when using poly-sinc, uncheck both cuda and pipeline SDM, then restart HQplayer. This is counter-intutive, but it worked.
- Playback drops: Symptom: Playback drops but it continues without the need to do anything, generally not scratchy or noisy, music does not come to a halt. Solution: This is very likely either a buffer issue or a network issue. If you are using ASIO drivers, make sure you increase the buffer time to 100 or 250 ms in HQPlayer settings. This could also be a network issue. If on wireless network, try to switch to the band (on a dual band router) or try a different channel. While a poor network connection may not be obvious during browsing, it is very audible when trying to play DSD or DXD. The drop-outs went away for me once I switched to a different band or when I used the Thuderbolt-Ethernet adapter to make it hard-wired on my Mac.
- DSD plays only noise: If you have a DoP only DAC/driver, make sure 'āSDM packā is set to 'DoP in HQPlayer settings.
- DSD64 does not upconvert: Check if file->DSDIFF/DSF->DirectSDM is unchecked.
Sorry in advance for the long post. I hope it saves someone a lot of time.