Hi, new user just started using RoPieee on a RPi5 Model B 4GB RAM. Only using Plexamp and Spotify. When playing DSD files it usually stops and the Play button on Plexamp phone interface spins for a few seconds before resuming playback. It can happen randomly and feels like it’s buffering. Higher bitrate/file size seems to make it worse. Also big 192/24 flacs shows the same issue. Not sure how to troubleshoot this, or what limitations to expect from hw. Connected to a Denafrips Ares 12th DAC. Plex server seems fine, but can see bandwidth going down when “buffering” occurs. The graph looks like endless McDonald’s Ms. Although the bandwidth is nowhere near maximum like when streaming a 4k movie. Also had frequent issues getting Spotify to play but seems to be resolved by activating Software Volume control. Connected via LAN cable. Any info/help is appreciated.
I don’t believe DSD is supported by PlexAmp so it will convert to PCM server side. This may be choking on your server. What are your running it on?
network speed for prefetch/caching might be too low for those high bitrate formats … default i think might be 5Mbps … try setting this higher using the plexamp web interface to see if it helps (setting it too high can sometimes cause other issues if you have a slow SD card)
I am not sure if DSD is converted on server, seems DSD id stream the original file to plexamp client and then it converted on the fly within the client
Streaming quality can be set to converting to opus when the file kbps is higher than the threshold. Then the DSD will not stream to client but converted to opus before sending out from server
Your are correct, I asked Elan on their forums and he said it’s client. So possibly pi is the issue in this regard. It only uses server if you chose it to be a different quality than max.
I am not sure if the issue was related to the older version of Plexamp back in 2024. I remember one of the old version plexamp (sorry too lazy to find the version number) had issue on streaming bandwidth limited to under 10mbps. It was fixed in late 2024 version and you should get it by updating your ropieee to the latest version.
Also worth a shot to check on plexamp webpage and go to setting>playback>cache>network speed and set it to 50mbps or higher.
For your reference, I am also using a pi5 on internal wifi which is no problem convert a DSD128 to PCM384khz/32bit on the fly.
Thanks for all replies. I will do some more testing. I saw on reddit about not supporting native dsd. I have 2 servers, one has higher CPU power but doesn’t make any difference which one I use. And CPU usage is low on both when playing. Tried playing on my phone and that worked great. Can’t see any irregular levels of CPU usage on the phone when playing. In the RoPieee I can only see CPU temp in GUI as there is no ssh access. I’ll try some settings suggested here and also another network cable and wifi to see if it makes any difference. Also gonna try Volumio for fun to test native DSD.
Adjusting cache seems to have done the trick! 
I didn’t know you could actually access the RoPieee Plexamp as a web player on port 32500. I only used the phone app and casting to the RoPieee. Thanks alot everyone for your help.