iFi iDAC2 and DietPi

Hmmm, maybe there is something to mR and SMS-200, et. al. after all.

@Tech_Whisky_Lab, don’t you have an mR or SMS-200, or something similar. Also, you are having these problems with an iFi USB manipulating device?

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I actually don’t own one. I only know what he is talking about because I here concerto/classical music on my my Pi3 without my USB3 and I could here the pops using ropiee. I was trying to imitate his setup. Funny though that with moode and with my iFi USB3, I cant hear them… Still I am not convinced that is a Pi issue cause my others setup without USB3/USB2 dont have this issue.

/face palm

@dabassgoesboomboom -

RPi 3/DietPi -> iFi Micro USB2 -> double headed USB cable -> iPurifier -> iDAC2

As it turns out I don’t have many DSD256 files, I usually upsample to that. I did try a DSD256 album. The first movement of Tchaikovsky’s 6th is very quiet. Playing it, my system is stone silent.

If you want, send me a copy of a file that plays pops and crackles and I’ll try it on my system. Dunno if you can do this thru a PM or not.

If do you do send a file, no music about vegamite sandwiches.:slightly_smiling_face:

Hehe but that’s half of my collection! Actually I don’t own any DSD256 music. Everything gets up-sampled in Roon.

OK, upsampling. That’s mostly whatl I do and all my music is stone silent in the quiet passages.

Damn mysterious, must be environment. Buffers, maybe?

Don’t know. If you can’t hear them then you are luckier than me.

I’ve moved on from the RPi3 for the iDAC2 setup - the C2 is way better (to my ears)

I still will use RPi3’s for dad’s <192k music setups, no issues with that of course.

I probably could have left the old fella with the iDAC2 and Moode and with his music he wouldn’t have noticed a thing… but I just couldn’t do that to him lol. It would be buggin me even though I’m 40km’s away.

@dabassgoesboomboom

So it works on Odroid c2 with kernel 3.9 ? Probably they have patched the kernel for DAC DSD native playback ?

yes it’s also patched with the RPi3 and the latest DietPi, 4.9.41

The difference between the RPi3 and Odroid C2 is with Odroid C2 the ethernet is wired directly to the SoC - no shared bus with USB. Odroid C2 is running DietPi also.

Which makes me think USBridge would perform better than the RPi3 also, especially with very high sample rates. I’d be happy to test for you :slight_smile:

I actually ordered a USBridge last week and then cancelled before it shipped, because this is the exact and only problem I was concerned about. I didn’t want pops/crackles like the RPi3. Happy to discuss via PM @allo.com

I just want to make sure…on the Odroid C2 (not RPI) the kernel (without cracks) is 3.9 ?

Yes correct. That’s the latest DietPi version Dan has for the Odroid C2.

And its DSD native …

Yes native DSD256. Btw the pops discussed here are not the loud pops heard with DSD/PCM transitions at the start of tracks. These are pops/crackles throughout a track.

Yeap got it. I am wondering if @Dan_Knight has applied the patch for DSD native to C2 (for ifi DAC)

He must have - it’s working great :slight_smile:

Not a single pop/crackle for over 2 weeks with the C2.

With the RPi3 it wouldn’t even last 2 minutes until a pop/crackle is heard.

Good to hear. I will talk to Dan

Working fine as in reliably, but sound quality is no different to plugging into a PC of course, so average.

I’ll wait to hear more field reports about DSD256 with the USBridge.

Seems the following patch was merged into the Odroid C2 kernel by default:

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I figure as much. Thanks @Dan_Knight

Ok I know the problem and the soluton.

For bus powered DACs like the iDAC2, the Pi3 is a no go with high sample rates like DSD256 here, due to shared bus and ethernet.

Slim and Fernando don’t have this issue because their Pi3 isn’t powering the iDAC2 - their iUSB3.0 was providing nice clean power to the iDAC2 and the Pi3 doesn’t have to.

When fernando tried without the iUSB3.0 as above, he got the same pops I had.

So I just tested my old man’s same setup that’s been having all the issues above but this time with an Uptone ISO REGEN powering the iDAC2. And voila the Pi3 is fine with native DSD256 since it doesn’t have to power the Regen or iDAC2 and therefore the shared bus and ethernet is not an issue.

Sounds phenomenal.

Even a generic powered USB hub which disconnects power from the Pi3 will do and will power the iDAC2 from whatever external PSU you want. Don’t need a fancy Uptone or iFi hub to do the same thing, although they do other things of course also

Good detective work. Makes perfect sense once you realize it.

BTW - I have several iUSB devices. On eBay, there are double-headed USB cables like the iFi Gemini, but only $50. If you ever succumb to a iUSB device, I think these are worth it, for the dark side.