I don’t have the time or (more importantly) the acuity to make my own PC.
At the moment I’m using a NUC that can manage DSD 256 in Roon and my music is the best its ever sounded.
So I’d be obliged if anyone can direct me to a suitable PC that would allow DSD512 upsampling in HQP to an ultraRendu.
I’m in Ireland so a European recommendation would be best.
Thanks in advance.
.sjb
Can the workhorse PC stand in another room?
If yes, you can pick any off the shelf PC with good specs but it depends mostly on what filter you would like to use.
An i7 7700k with 16 GB RAM should give you almost all options except for the non -2 xtr filters.
8 Gig of RAM runs RoonServer and HQP fine for me. I can upsample to DSD 512 with all filters (except non 2s xtr) with an i7 7700. I have found the CUDA graphics GTX 970 doesn’t make a difference to what I can actually do in HQP, it just lowers CPU a bit, so I’d suggest just an i7 to start with and add CUDA later if wanted.
Thanks for the replies guys.
I suppose I’d like to future proof this a bit and would like to be able to manage all the upsampling available currently. (I’m the sport of guy where it would always be at the back of my head that better sound is only a click away if only my PC had the grunt.
The PC will go in another room.
I wondering if a fan will have a negative effect on sound, should I go for water cooled.
I’m looking at a gaming computer site here in Dublin that seem to offer a lot of options to build a PC.
I think I saw mentioned somewhere about 8 cores (which I presume is an advance on quad core) but really don’t know any more.
**
I suppose my question is if you could build a no holds barred system for HQP, what spec would it have?
**
thanks,
.sjb
A fan won’t affect the sound if its in another room but I’d suggest an AIO (All in One) fluid cooling solution because they keep your CPU happier. I used the DeepCool Captain with push-pull fans on the radiator but there are others you can get, especially in a large form factor case.
I like the i7 7700 for a server rather than the 7700K because the relatively lower power consumption and heat make it less of an issue to keep on for extended periods. I don’t believe there is anything anyone can do in HQP with a 7700K that can’t be done equally capably with a 7700.
Save some $ by getting only 8G RAM (you can add more if you ever want to) and no graphics card (unless you’re going to use it for games). Spend those saved $ on SSD music storage.
As the i7 7700 was mentioned:
I would recommend a Ryzen CPU instead: Offers twice the amount of cores and costs “only” 50 bucks more.
edit: check his comment on this
I think the i7 7700 can do closed form to 512DSD without CUDA assist. I’ll check and report back.
Nope. Stutters with closed-form but can do closed-form-fast without CUDA to DSD512, which is the same as reported for the Ryzen.
With CUDA (GTX970) it can do closed-form DSD512 so there is one functional difference for CUDA with an i7 7700.
@jussi_laako has posted some pics of his I think fanless machine. Maybe copy him, and use Linux or the embedded version.
Here another guy trying to accomplish same as you I think, but fanless
https://silentpc.com/fanless-pcs/fc10-fanless-heatpipe-pc
Or ask @agillis to build you something better than this:
https://www.smallgreencomputer.com/collections/audio-server/products/sonictransporter-i7-for-roon-dsp?variant=35324041615
Already answered BTW:
Thanks Andy and others,
I see Dell have a 14% Valentines day sale,so I’d appreciate opinions on these options
or a bigger drive?
There are quite a few options for video card also, are there advantages to moving along this scale?
.sjb
What a beast !
You only need 8GB of RAM to run Windows 10, Roon and HQP (takes about 6 GB) so if you can downgrade to save $ there then I would. RAM above 8GB gives no performance improvement.
Similarly I prefer to store music on separate drives to Windows and the Roon Core, so I’d keep the 256 GB SSD (even go down to 128 GB if they’ll let you) as the C: drive and get a 1 or 2 TB SSD for the music files.
I would choose the 460W PSU Liquid Cooled chassis, unless going for the Dual SLI cards.
I believe only NVIDIA support CUDA so that rules out the AMD Radeon video options. The included GTX 1080 is a better CUDA GPU than I’ve got so you will definitely be able to do DSD512 closed form and DSD512 xtr 2s with it.
What I don’t know is whether any of the more expensive NVIDIA options would enable you to do DSD512 with xtr (non 2s) filters. My guess is that moving from 8GB to 11 GB GDDR5X wouldn’t make that difference.
Dual SLI CUDA with a 6 core 8700 ? I just don’t know. It might but the only way to know for sure would be to try it out.
What I can say, however, is that the sonic difference between DSD512 xtr 2s and DSD512 xtr would not be worth an extra 550 quid imo (you’d have to upgrade the PSU also with twin GPU). I’d spend that money on more SSD music storage, physical room treatment or Home Audio Fidelity custom built room EQ files to convolve in HQP.
So you would go for SDD internal storage for music, rather than NAS or USB?
.sjb
Yeah, I have done. I’ve never had a NAS and cant think of a reason to add a further computer when the music server can do it. Internal is easy to copy to as a network shared folder from my desktop computer where I rip and neater than USB.
Did you snap up the Valentines Day special ?
Yeah, I should be asking all sorts of questions about filters from the end of February!
Thanks for the guidance.
.sjb
Congrats on that mean maschine 
What config to what price did you order?
What a beast for a seemingly fair price 
I would have chosen that exact same config you did
And the TPD is “only” 65 Watt, same as the i7 6700 in my former roon-HQP workhorse.
My current Lampizator SuperKomputer has an i7 6700K with TPD 91 Watts and runs rather hot 
When will you get your new “toy”?
I’m curious about the temperatures you will see with that watercooling 
They say end of Feb early March, Dell are usually quite reliable with delivery times.
The 14% off was nice as I was in the market anyway, so about €280 off.
Don’t worry on past history the forum will be seeing quite a bit of me with many’s the question.
.sjb
I have a kind of good experience now on this subject.
Regarding your purchase, the GPU 1080 with the Intel i7 8700 is good but you will not be able run DSD512 and all non 2s filters. Also be careful from Alienware fan noise issue.
I build recently a desktop and I can run everything HQPlayer is capable of. Super PC.
I am running water cooling. The PC is super silent sitting on my desk connected to my Chord Dave and up scaling to DSD 512 using Poly-sync-xtr-mp. With the WA5 Woo audio and Focal Utopia, there is nothing left but the music.
So, as your purchase might be a good choice, keep an eye on fan fan noise; and if there is still a chance check a similar PC like mine. You need around $4000 in total as a budget.
Regards,
Imad
So what’s the verdict SJB ?
