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Best raspberry pi dac

renaudrenaud

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Most of the time the system offers some plug-in. I cannot remember for Volumio, but with LMS you have plug-in for quobuz, tidal etc... And also you have the Radio Paradise app for streaming FLAC.
 

somebodyelse

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This is all good. But .. How to listen to streaming music (through a browser)? Without loss of quality. bit perfect. ?
Download time for a USB flash drive or hdd has passed. Why download if everything is in the cloud?
Is there such an option on raspberry? raspberry - external DAC (via usb)
There are many streaming options, depending on your exact requirements and detailed in assorted Pi-related threads on this site. If you're more specific we may even be able to point you to the details.
 

maltux

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Select a DAC you can plug in the usb port. Hat cards are inferior, in term of measurement.

I have had no issues with my HifiBerry DAC Pro hat. It runs rune (arch linux based) and get music from my FreeNAS server via wifi and controlled by my phone. You could add a linear power supply directly to the hat but I really have found no need for such an implementation. It is connected to my primary 2 channel stereo setup. It is a small and inexpensive and produces great sound.

IMG_20200104_094732272.jpeg
.
Screenshot_20200104-094816.jpeg


Just my 2 cents,


Cheers!
 
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I am currently running a Rasp 3b+ with Allo Boss DAC and Ropiee as a Roon End Point. Works great.

I havent considered my Pi out to USB DAC as I believe the USB to not be suitable as the Pi4, not sure if anyone can confirm.
 
OP
R

Ras Pi

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I have had no issues with my HifiBerry DAC Pro hat. It runs rune (arch linux based) and get music from my FreeNAS server via wifi and controlled by my phone. You could add a linear power supply directly to the hat but I really have found no need for such an implementation. It is connected to my primary 2 channel stereo setup. It is a small and inexpensive and produces great sound.

View attachment 44935 . View attachment 44936

Just my 2 cents,


Cheers!

Beautiful setup?
 

maltux

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Beautiful setup?

Not sure I know what you mean with the'?'. Rune is older software and has not been updated since 2016. It was designed for the HifiBerry Dac in mind. It is just a small black box that plays music well from my Music files stored on my server. I will admit the hardest part was setting up a Music share on my FreeNas as it is not commercial but open source software.

Cheers!
 
OP
R

Ras Pi

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Oops, apologies I mean “!”

thank you for sharing. I did try with roon but it’s not recognising my DAC +pro HAT and will try with Volumio.
BW
 

maltux

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I think you are out of luck.

Screen Shot 2020-01-07 at 10.39.47 AM.png

Looks like Rune only supports what is in my screenshot. I am curious if the other players are any better. Good Luck!
 
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OP
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Ras Pi

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I try and keep updated here...basically I want very lean OS that can start very quickly.
 
OP
R

Ras Pi

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How come a stereo receiver can boot and present OS so quickly.

Do you guys know any OS that boot very quickly? I don’t need all those feature that Volumio has.

Thank you.
 

somebodyelse

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I am currently running a Rasp 3b+ with Allo Boss DAC and Ropiee as a Roon End Point. Works great.

I havent considered my Pi out to USB DAC as I believe the USB to not be suitable as the Pi4, not sure if anyone can confirm.
With the 3b+ you may or may not get glitches with USB audio, depending on many things. I've never had them with PiCorePlayer, so Ropieee may be fine too. I can repeatably reproduce them with Volumio and Raspbian when using BruteFIR, but they stop if I pin the BruteFIR processes to a single cpu core. Others report them on Volumio without using BruteFIR though. Increased USB traffic due to higher bitrate, or using the wired ethernet make it more likely to occur. For me it's quiet background pops and clicks similar to vinyl surface noise, but that too seems to vary, possibly depending on DAC. I have been unable to reproduce it with the Pi 4.
 

somebodyelse

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How come a stereo receiver can boot and present OS so quickly.

Do you guys know any OS that boot very quickly? I don’t need all those feature that Volumio has.

Thank you.
PiCorePlayer is pretty quick. It's using TinyCoreLinux as a base, so you can modify it if it doesn't do exactly what you want.
 
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With the 3b+ you may or may not get glitches with USB audio, depending on many things. I've never had them with PiCorePlayer, so Ropieee may be fine too. I can repeatably reproduce them with Volumio and Raspbian when using BruteFIR, but they stop if I pin the BruteFIR processes to a single cpu core. Others report them on Volumio without using BruteFIR though. Increased USB traffic due to higher bitrate, or using the wired ethernet make it more likely to occur. For me it's quiet background pops and clicks similar to vinyl surface noise, but that too seems to vary, possibly depending on DAC. I have been unable to reproduce it with the Pi 4.


Thanks, was toying with getting a Pi4, but may just get myself a NUC and run Roon Core ROCK on it to the DAC ( to be decided on ) via USB
 

m8o

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I only stream from my own network share and sometimes soundcloud or mixcloud via airplay. I guess you need Roon if you want to stream Qobuz or Tidal for lossless.
Yes. Roon also has internet radio now. So the options are endless. (I dont subscribe to tidal or qoboz)

RoonBridge on a RPi has been my best friend since I discovered Roon and made the plunge & investment in it. I have 4 RPi based devices now; three of them run RooPieee, one is a RPI4 that I use for USB out to a M9xx DAC directly (no HAT). (HATs I have are the ApplePi, Boss, and DigiOne) I run 5 of these SoC devices actually for streaming if you count the non-RPi NanoPi NEO2 I experimented with and now use as a sub-woofer streamer.

To the OP, check the master index and click all the streamer reviews. Katana and ApplePi are the tops. A few others, not far off. A few, I would avoid. But point being, use those reviews in conjunction with the board's cost to decide what's best for you. I.e. this:
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/.../master-index-of-audio-hardware-reviews.8184/
And scroll down to "Bareboard DACs/Streamers".
 
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somebodyelse

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Thanks much for the feedback. I will try this OS.
You could also look at OpenWRT for rolling your own - all Pi versions are supported targets. It's mostly aimed at devices like wifi routers, but you can (or could when I used it some years back) add a wide variety of packages including multimedia ones. It was also more conventional to configure than TinyCore, but I guess that depends on your background and experience. Have fun!
 
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