do linux or mac play music better than windows?

[DVDdoug]

ASIO is mostly for audio production. Most consumer applications don't support it. (foobar2000 DOES have an ASIO add-on or plug-in.)

It was developed for low latency (low delay). Low latency is desirable when you are recording while monitoring yourself with headphones where a noticeable delay makes it hard to perform.

A few milliseconds of latency not too important when you're playing a 60-year old Beatles recording or something you recorded a minute ago.

It also doesn't allow re-sampling (at least not normally or easily) That's an advantage if you want bit perfect* audio. It's a disadvantage if you want to play a 24-bit/192kHz file on a cheap soundcard that only plays 16/44.1. (The regular Windows drivers will take care of any conversions without telling you.)

ASIO4ALL "adapts" regular Windows hardware (soundcards & audio interfaces with regular Windows drivers) to work with ASIO applications. But if you have hardware with only ASIO drivers (very rare) it doesn't work the other way to adapt your ASIO hardware to work with a regular Windows application.









* To me bit-perfect audio is more like "insurance". If you have a bit-perfect setup, you know the audio isn't getting altered digitally in any way. (That's assuming no dropouts or "glitches".) Normally you can re-sample (within reason) and it sounds the same to the human ear. I don't worry about the digital audio being bit-perfect... I worry about the analog & acoustic side.

 

[tw99]

Cheked the calendar, yes it is 2024 indeed. Debates about difference in sound quality between OS sounds so very much 2010.
All OS do have their options to bypass the OS audio. Be is WASAPI/Exclusive, hogmode, HWx, etc.
As they all can be configured to deliver bit perfect output, they all sound the same

Totally agree with you.

Sadly there are still many sites out there promoting imagined differences such as the "organic, natural sound" of Apple compared to "brittle, overly transparent" Windows, or whatever.

 

[Berwhale]

Cheked the calendar, yes it is 2024 indeed. Debates about difference in sound quality between OS sounds so very much 2010.
All OS do have their options to bypass the OS audio. Be is WASAPI/Exclusive, hogmode, HWx, etc.
As they all can be configured to deliver bit perfect output, they all sound the same

Indeed, and once you understand what happens when a transducer (speaker, headphone, etc.) gets hold of your 'perfect bits', you might wonder what the point in chasing them was in the first place.

Also see Circle of Confusion

 

[wwenze]

ASIO is for playing music/rhythm games

 

[Ron Texas]

What?

 

[Audiofire]

ASIO is for any audio and necessary for DSD, but not all programs are coded to use ASIO.

 

[Keith_W]

Sadly there are still many sites out there promoting imagined differences such as the "organic, natural sound" of Apple compared to "brittle, overly transparent" Windows, or whatever.

I would have thought it would be "crunchy, sweet, slightly tart, with the occasional worm" sound of Apple vs. "glassy, transparent, brittle, and shattering" sound of Windows. At least with Windows you can lift veils and marvel at the inky blackness?

 

[Audiofire]

Palpable sense of imaging in the sound!

 

[Mantra]

hi
have you tried Flexasio and FlexASIO UII ?

A flexible universal ASIO driver that uses the PortAudio sound I/O library. Supports WASAPI (shared and exclusive), KS, DirectSound and MME.

a friend of mine told me about it , since he works with ableton and should work with audio software player for windows

 

[Sokel]

You can use foobar and:
ASIO+DSD plug in along with SACD plug in to play everything
SoX mod1 and mod2 to resample anything if you want to keep it to the family (44.1 or 48Khz)
Mathaudio for EQ which strangely supports all the above (no DSD though)

No messing with windows needed,plays anything in it's rate (if not engage it's resampler) ,etc.

All gathered in one place and simple.

 

[pseudoid]

Does/Should the motherboard hardware be discussed as an adjunct to the audio workload the OS is doing?

Checked the calendar, yes it is 2024 indeed.

Audio Features [e.g. 2023 motherboard]:
Realtek S1220A 7.1 Surround Sound High Definition Audio CODEC*
- Impedance sense for front and rear headphone outputs
- Internal audio Amplifier to enhance the highest quality sound for headphone and speakers
- Supports: Jack-detection, Multi-streaming, Front Panel Jack-retasking
- High quality 120 dB SNR stereo playback output and 113 dB SNR recording input (Line-in)
- Supports up to 32-Bit/192 kHz playback*
Audio Features
- Premium audio capacitors
- Dedicated audio PCB layers
- Audio cover
- Unique de-pop circuit
* Due to limitations in HDA bandwidth, 32-Bit/192 kHz is not supported for 7.1 Surround Sound audio.
** A chassis with an HD audio module in the front panel is required to support 7.1 Surround Sound audio output.

 

[valerianf]

The original post does not says if the hardware platform is a laptop or a desktop.
I do not think that any laptop can beat a desktop with an additional sound card (professional if needed).
Apple is quite non existing in the desktop market.
The real issue is not bringing the desktop emitted noise to the external amplifier.
HDMI or optical fiber can be used successfully.
If I remember well Amir was using a computer with a HDMI output to generate the audio signal for his tests.

 

[DWPress]

Audio Features [e.g. 2023 motherboard]:

I think most people here would gravitate towards an external DAC making all this unused.

 

[somebodyelse]

Does/Should the motherboard hardware be discussed as an adjunct to the audio workload the OS is doing?

Perhaps if we had more measurements of motherboard audio performance. I have yet to see a manufacturer publish the sort of measurements you see here. Instead they publish datasheet figures for the chipset instead of measured performance of their implementation, and talk about 'premium audio capacitors' which play well to the uninformed but make little to no difference to performance.

 

[somebodyelse]

I do not think that any laptop can beat a desktop with an additional sound card (professional if needed).

The additional sound card is usually attached via USB, making desktop or laptop irrelevant. Compact desktops often don't have internal expansion either.

The real issue is not bringing the desktop emitted noise to the external amplifier.
HDMI or optical fiber can be used successfully.

HDMI offers no protection against ground noise. USB isolators do, and inexpensive isolators with USB 2.0 high speed capability are now available. Optical connections are isolated. Coax digital connections may or may not be transformer isolated - look for the transformer or test for ground continuity. Balanced analog connections should be immune to ground noise, but sadly there are still devices with a 'Pin 1 Problem' so it's not a guarantee.

 

[Keith_W]

Archimago did a couple of measurements of on-board motherboard audio a few years ago.

MSI X370. Inexpensive low end motherboard. The measurements were good. The performance is comparable to dedicated outboard DAC's.

Gigabyte Z170X. Expensive motherboard for the time, marketing claimed superior audio performance with "high end" Nichicon capacitors. The measurements were terrible. Non linear DAC, rolls off the bottom end starting from 200Hz and is -7dB at 20Hz, rolls off the top end from 10kHz up. Looks like power supply noise was creeping into the spectrum with a 60Hz spike in the jitter test. Overall high IMD+N.

When I say "terrible", I mean "so bad that it you should easily be able to hear it in a blind test". I am pretty sure I would be able to hear a -7dB bass roll-off like that.

So the take-home message about motherboard audio is: YMMV. Boards that are marketed with claims of superior audio may not deliver on their claims. At the same time there are dozens of motherboards, and product lines are refreshed every few months. It is not worth keeping a review database of motherboard audio, since very few people actually use motherboard audio for serious audio applications. It's fine for gaming, fine for watching Youtube, fine for making Windows notification bleeps.

 

[valerianf]

@somebodyelse let us talk seriously about hardware (EE) and not marketing or false pretense.
A PCIE audio card in a desktop has the advantage to remove the USB protocol that can have many side effects when carrying audio.
With large area for the Pcb, any EE will tell you that there is no match between the design of a PCI audio card and a USB dongle that is fully integrated.
Without any doubt the multiple components of the PCI audio card can achieve far better audio performances.

Regarding HDMI carrying audio is transmitted in digital at 37 Mbits/second when using eARC.
It is embedded in the video transmission.
Differential pairs are assuring that the ground noise is avoided.

Could you imagined a 4K UHD video with ground noise?
You need to believe in technology.

For my modest usage HDMI is transmitting Amazon music HD to my AVR (home theater and music), and at the desktop level I am using the onboard audio THX optical link (multichannel without any USB involvment) between the Pc and the class D amplifier (gaming and podcast application).

 

[somebodyelse]

A PCIE audio card in a desktop has the advantage to remove the USB protocol that can have many side effects when carrying audio.

That depends on the PCIe card. Some, such as the EVGA Nu Audio cards, have an onboard USB host controller followed by an onboard USB audio device.
What side effects of the USB protocol do you think need to be avoided? Please provide measurements, not just hand waving.

With large area for the Pcb, any EE will tell you that there is no match between the design of a PCI audio card and a USB dongle that is fully integrated.
Without any doubt the multiple components of the PCI audio card can achieve far better audio performances.

Plenty of USB audio interfaces have a board area comparable to or greater than PCIe cards, so that argument falls flat. Having said that, look at the measurements from the top performing dongles. They aren't far behind desktop interfaces. I'm not aware of a significant difference in performance between the best PCIe and best USB audio interfaces. Please provide examples of the 'far better audio performance' you claim.

Regarding HDMI carrying audio is transmitted in digital at 37 Mbits/second when using eARC.
It is embedded in the video transmission.
Differential pairs are assuring that the ground noise is avoided.

Could you imagined a 4K UHD video with ground noise?
You need to believe in technology.

You need to understand technology, not believe in it. Differential pairs keep ground noise out of the digital signal in HDMI, just as they do in USB, and similarly in balanced audio interconnects the ground noise is kept out of the analog audio signal. And just like USB, HDMI has a ground connection. That makes it no better at isolating ground noise than USB is.

 

[Berwhale]

Perhaps if we had more measurements of motherboard audio performance. I have yet to see a manufacturer publish the sort of measurements you see here. Instead they publish datasheet figures for the chipset instead of measured performance of their implementation, and talk about 'premium audio capacitors' which play well to the uninformed but make little to no difference to performance.

The problem here is that motherboards don't make music, they require a bunch of other components, wires, etc. to do that.

 

[valerianf]

As I said before, there are some know problems with mother board audio that can be avoided.
1) Audio transmission using USB
USB is not well suited to handle an audio stream
1.1) USB generate some drops in the audio delivery
Let us take two common audio ICs from the same manufacturer.
From Realtek there are the ALC1220 that is I2S connected to the processor and the ALC4080 that is USB connected.
Just Google "ALC4080 random static noise" and it will be obvious that the ALC4080 USB connected needs to be avoided.

https://www.reddit.com/r/buildapc/comments/131rxml/should_i_avoid_mobo_with_alc4080

Here are Amir measurements of the ALC1220 that do not have such a parasitic noise:
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/realtek-alc1220-a-look-on-pc-sound.24019/

USB connection

HD audio connection

1.2) USB generates audio noise due to its protocol.
As we are listening audio, we could guess that professionals are using USB connected audio microphones to make recording.
Yes, sometime, but it is adding a characteristic UBS audio noise around 1 and 2 khz.
USB audio chirping noise.
https://www.akustik-messen.de/index...rophones/chirping-noises-with-usb-microphones

https://www.reddit.com/r/audio/comments/xsnfxb/chirping_electrical_audio_noise_in_mic_help_needed

In conclusion, USB is very easy to use but needs to be avoided for high quality audio transport.
Better use analog signals, SPDIF (optical/coax) or HDMI when available.