If you search some of threads here and on other sites, you can find a lot answers and objective data.
Regarding pricing, HQPlayer is cheaper than Roon… And certainly bargain compared for example to D90SE.
1 Like
double post
I think you might be a bit biased, now that I’ve taken note of your titles 
Nevertheless since we’re on a Roon forum I was specifically referring to the implementation of HQPlayer as an adjunct to Roon, not as a free-standing option. I can clearly see the degree of sophistication and expertise that went into its design, and I’ve heard many positive experiences from folks I trust about its merits. My post was specifically in response to the point of the OP, which was in support of purchasing the HQPlayer plugin to use in lieu of the DSP engine we’re already paying for with our Roon subscription, nothing more.
I already purchased your software platform and would be happy to reassess it as a free-standing solution. I just didn’t find the suggestion that all the folks on here already paying for a Roon subscription were missing out on something essential by not paying more for this add on, particularly for those who lack the expertise required to knowledgeably implement all those granular features. Peace!
Did you read and understand one of the earlier posts in this thread @Steven_Klemow ?
It didn’t even mention that I can make difference room/headphone correction/convolution “profiles” (say different bass profiles) and change such while music is still playing - not possible with Roon…
I did read it yes, and I’m not denying that it has some handy features or benefits. I was specifically referring to the somewhat hyperbolic suggestions that its DSP engine is on another level than Roon’s, from an audible, practical standpoint. Please note that this is a Roon forum, not a Sygnalist forum, and I made the decision to purchase and invest considerable time assessing whether this extra expense and effort was indeed superior to the DSP features I was already paying for. And I decided that from an audible perspective, it wasn’t. Am I not allowed to offer feedback on a strongly-worded suggestion made on here that I chose to follow?
This is where you’re risking getting yourself into trouble on this thread, sir. Yours is anything but an objective perspective—you have a direct financial stake in the game here. You produced a valuable and highly-regarded high resolution software solution for the audiophile community, and I’m now one of your paying customers. Please consider some restraint when denigrating my feedback—it’s not a good look for an industry player on these forums. Thanks.
1 Like
First of all, that was not response to you, so you are taking it out of context.
It was about design principles of HQPlayer. For example for the past couple of days I’ve been working on the DSP algorithms which means a lot of math and objective numerical analysis.
In the end, it is always testing through tens of different DACs on my measurement rig to check the results from the DAC analog outputs.
I’ve been doing this since I started the project in 1998. It is all the time constant ongoing development.
3 Likes
I think we all need to take a step back and a deep breath here please.
There are some very good points made by all but I would hate to see this thread slide into the mire.
Thank you kindly!
3 Likes
I never mentioned what you could or couldn’t do.
All opinions and experiences welcomed (obviously).
I’m going to go ahead and make a peace and no offense-intended offering and a gesture of admiration for the designer(s) of HQPlayer, for giving us such a full-featured and thoughtfully constructed software solution for all dedicated audiophiles. I am not regretful of having made the purchase. Thanks!
1 Like
If you believe that DACs and associated built-in algorithms have reached a point where no meaningful differences can be heard, why would you buy HQPlayer in the first place? Strongly worded suggestion or not?
There are just too many listeners out there that have experienced what HQPlayer can offer and sing its praises for it to be anything other than real. Products that do nothing don’t last 25 years…
1 Like
But HQPlayer does things that a bare DAC doesn’t do (DRC and other signal processing).
After that processing, feeding that same signal to modern, competently built DACs will produce output that… well, maybe Amir’s measuring rig would be able to distinguish between them. Humans will not. They *believe they do (because spending a lot of money on a box with big colored lights makes you want to believe that it sounds better), but really they don’t.
1 Like
Humans can hear things that can’t be measured without very specialised equipment. In particular we are unreasonably good at frequency selectivity or hearing differences between sounds.
I would caution against rejecting the possibility that people are hearing differences because those differences aren’t well explained by theory or readily measured with test equipment.
Remember Cosmology ? Everyone thought we knew what the Universe was made of. Now we’ve realised we don’t know what makes up 90% of the total matter and energy.
So I’m careful to keep an open mind about what people hear. You’ll notice that Jussi never strays into describing sounds, he restricts his comments to what the filters and modulators do to the signal.
1 Like
This is a popular explanation by sellers of $800 USB cables 
IF there were something those things were doing differently (and presumably it was put there by design, too) those people would not be selling trinkets to a niche market of audiophiles, they’d be collecting Nobel, Field, and Turing awards left and right. Somehow they do not. They also never agree to proper blind testing either.
Sure, human hearing can not be boiled down to a single number. Even a complete chart from Amir’s measurements will not completely describe how something sounds. But it will give an idea and show whether differences are within the range where humans can distinguish them. And what humans can distinguish has been measured pretty well.
Once someone provides results of blind ABX tests showing that there are noticeable differences, great, we’ve advaned science, and can have better-sounding music, too. But all we get is stories from people (same people who buy “audiophile” ethernet cables) who had heard one system, in one location, 2 weeks ago, an another system, with different speakers, in a different room, yesterday, and they “know” how individual components of both systems differ.
2 Likes
It is about something slightly (or not so slightly) different though.
If it weren’t, manufacturers of $50K power cables and audiophile ethernet switches would be willing (eager, really) to submit their devices to ABX testing. They never do.
I’d like there to be something interesting and special and superior to any machine about people, but I also know how science works… Human can listen to music, machines can not (not in the same sense, anyway, it’s all just sound to them). Resolving minute frequency or phase or timing differences though, machines could do better for many and many years.
2 Likes
Wow. You had better do some research into the Holo Audio May DAC and how it measures. Look at what was published in Stereophile in August, 2020:
Oh, it’s an R2R Ladder DAC…
1 Like
There’s a free trial for HQP and you can audition it as long as you like before making a purchase decision. I did for almost two months before I eventually bought the license. The difference HQP makes in sound quality vs Roon DSP upsampling is obvious right away. The difference different settings make is also obvious to me (for example PCM vs DSD upsampling or different filters and modulators). I won’t even start with the difference DACs make, even though they would all measure perfectly.
I was speaking of R2R ladder DACs in general, and there are always caveats. Nevertheless the Holo May still doesn’t measure as well as a Topping d90se or d70 or an SMSL SU-9 Pro, each at a fraction of the cost. There was a time (quite a while back now) when delta sigma DACs were nowhere near as advanced as they are now, and costly R2R ladder DACs were considered a “premium”, innovative option. Now they are largely the equivalent of paying high dollar for a ten year old tower PC—they are outdated and unnecessarily costly tech, no matter how elegantly they may be put out.
That doesn’t mean that they sound bad—they sound fantastic, like most pure DACs do these days. Again, we’ve achieved the technological limit of what is audible from the DA conversion process, so our ears can’t discern them. They just don’t sound any better than the mostly Chinese delta sigma DACs that can be produced on a mass market basis for less than $500 today.
Please do keep in mind that the measure of an excellent DAC is how closely it reproduces the sound of the original master, as it was before it was sampled into a digital file. If the DAC has a “sound” other than what the master sounded like as it was intended, it isn’t doing its job properly. It should perform its computational duties with the least distortion, least noise, and widest dynamic range possible, nothing else.
All of these endpoints can be easily measured on the bench, and the most honest players in the market will publish their own internal measurements to the public, which can be confirmed by others on their own instruments for validation. The manufacturers who don’t release their own measurements yet charge a fortune for their wares (Chord is a glaring example) are the ones who should be considered suspect.
However, they don’t really need to for the reasons I’ve put forth—their DACs sound every bit as great as their cheaper competitors, because all they need to achieve is a dynamic range over 96 db (the limits of most people’s hearing capacity). They can define their gear’s eminence by the price points they choose, and can count on a reliable set of consumers who persist in believing the myth that cost defines quality. When you’ve invested $14 grand in one piece of gear, of course it’s going to sound “better” than the DACs that mere plebes “settled for” from Amazon on the cheap.
There is no other market with more arbitrary price points than the audiophile industry. What do you think is justifying the cost of the eight year old DAVE, which has long-since recouped its R&D investments? Material costs? Licensing fees? Labor? No way on all three. They’re charging what the market will bear—which is the very definition of the word “Snake Oil” that has become a cliche on these forums.
If Topping, Gustard, Matrix and SMSL can turn a handy profit right from launch for gear that consistently outperforms the ritzy shops’ wares time after time for the past five or six years, then that should be telling about what you’re paying for for the “elite” options out there. And since most of them utilize Chinese labor to produce and assemble their components, the ones that do can’t even invoke that excuse.
Note that my point only applies to DACs and streamers—devices that solely exist in the digital realm. I do not contend that cost has no bearing on quality for amplifiers and headphones, although in many cases those components are feloniously priced as well. But that’s a different discussion altogether—there is no defined limit to the technology of analog audio reproduction, or at least it isn’t as easily definable.
1 Like
That does not sound right. And the inverse also does not sound right. Of course both exist and have people endorsing this attitude. But to me does not sound right.
It is like talking about the colour of the shoes and not if they are comfortable
1 Like