Native DSD support. Where does the native DSD patch need to be. In the server, or the endpoint?

Hi guys,

Does the native DSD patch need to be applied to the OS running Roonserver, or Roonbridge? In the past patching the OS running Roonbridge with the native DSD patch enabled native DSD support no matter if the OS running Roonserver was or not.

For example, say someone has a Microrendu that was patched for native DSD with a specific DAC. However ROCK wasn’t. Would the patch on the Microrendu end allow native DSD support?

What “native DSD patch” are you referring to? I’ve been playing native DSD with a number of players using ROON and other software and never had to deal with such.

Many DAC’s don’t support native DSD with Linux without a special patch to the OS. ROCK for example, being Linux based, can’t do native DSD with a number of DAC’s since they haven’t implemented the patches into the OS. Some DAC’s can’t do native DSD at all with Linux as there simply isn’t any patches.

The bridge :slight_smile:

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To clarify what “native DSD” means in this application is referring to how the DSD is being sent to the DAC’s USB interface. When sent natively, it stays in pure DSD from the server/streamer to the DAC’s USB interface. The other method is called DoP. What that means is the DSD is encoded into a PCM format for the transmission to the DAC’s USB interface. Then inside the DAC’s USB interface it’s decoded back to pure DSD.

Although this method of DSD transmission is lossless, it requires double the bandwidth to transmit. And what’s often overlooked is the decoding process in the USB interface ramps up the CPU load in the USB interface processor. As a result additional noise is created that adds jitter to the clocking section. So native DSD transmission is always the best way to do it.

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That’s what I thought. But doesn’t seem to work that way anymore.

For example is there any ROCK/Holo spring DAC owners who added a Microrendu and it enabled native DSD for them?

The list of DAC’s that currently won’t do native DSD with ROCK, but could with the addition of any of Sonore’s streamer products (if the patch only needs to be applied to the bridge) can be found here:

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@MiveraAudio

Would it be possible that we can manually add in the DACs parameters by ourselves using available tools compilers? I know this sound crazy but have anyone attempt this on linux based OS?

I have my Linux patched with all of those DAC’s. In the past patching the OS running the bridge used to do the trick. With MSB DAC’s this stopped working. I haven’t tried others on that list. However if I run Roonserver on the exact same OS the native DSD works fine with the MSB.

If Roon wants to implement the patches in ROCK, it’s something they’ll need to do. Daphile for example has their OS patched with all of the DAC’s on the list. A new one pops up and Kimmo from Daphile has it patched within a couple days.

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Reading this thread it looks to me like the Microrendu can’t do native DSD with MSB DAC’s.

[quote=“MiveraAudio, post:3, topic:29507”]
Many DAC’s don’t support native DSD with Linux without a special patch to the OS.
[/quote]Ah. You did not make any reference to Linux, just to “OS,” in your original post.

Since I posted in the ROCK category I didn’t think it was necessary.

Got me. I just surf among the new posts and read the ones that seem of interest, taking no note of where they come from.

Yes and as a NADAC owner, this certainly isn’t an issue for you. Not sure if they have the Ravenna VSC going in ROCK yet though. Have you tried yet?

Edit: I just realized Greg already confirmed DSD 256 support via ROCK with his NADAC here:

This is out – just visit Settings -> About in Roon.

how to patch into the OS? any possible link of tutorial?

You can patch other Linux distributions, but not ROCK.

In case you’re a Lumin user, you can send a link to the patch to me, then I’ll see if I can patch it into Lumin.