Thanks for the reminder about microRendu. I was pretty excited about it when it first came out, but getting caught up in pressing life stuff, forgot about it. Conceptually very intelligent; put together by smart folks with good ears; liked a lot by many customers who have long been computer audio folks….it seems quite good. And ultraRendu sounds even better!
I am from the dark ages too and have no network or need for one. All the acronyms in these threads are mind bending. But finally, looking at diagrams, it looks pretty straight forward, and it looks like this tech may be good enough to figure it out for music even without any need for networking. Looking around today, while suffering through the many disorganized sets of posts, I had a hard time finding more essential information around the best setup parameters and limitations. It about bent my mind and wore me out, so I sympathize with your "learning curve" concerns!
Then I ran across a thread where a thoughtful and valiant soul made an index of useful posts to help the rest of us to get what he found as best quality audio:
https://www.computeraudiophile.com/forums/topic/30376-a-novel-way-to-massively-i...I have just begun it, but it looks useful for learning.
Mac Mini:
I got into using a Mini pretty easily having used Macs from the my early days with computers. Then, much later, wanting to use a computer for audio, the Mini was getting a lot of attention. The small size easy to fit in; heavy aluminum case good for EMI/RFI rejection and vibration; Macs using careful design considerations in many areas that are not strictly bottom line dependent; associated, the small size of a Mini required better parts to avoid too much heat and the fan running, noisy fans not fitting with the Apple aesthetic….and inefficiency and noise create heat, so conceptually it was inadvertently quieter for audio than many; no screen/monitor like laptops with associated extra electronics (noise); intuitive software design objectives from the start primary for Apple development; associated, Apple attracted many early computer music and graphics folks....less-linear minded people were attracted to Apple, including creative software designers ...and more...but you get the idea.
When I got my first Mini, I did some basics, enough RAM, carefully separating the power supply, using some passive noise filters, stripping down system activity, and got player software that ran from memory and further optimized systems. But before doing this, I compared it to my wife’s Macbook pro, and with iTunes only, the Mini sounded better to me than the laptop, a good verification.
Then came power refinement, software optimization, better cables, vibration management, damping, separation of music files from the computer and from the DAC buss….
A lot of this learning for me was from Eric Hider, one of the dbAudioLabs guys, the Tranquility DAC developers. When checking out the DAC, I was impressed with Eric’s creative thought process and intelligence. I conceptually agreed with everything I heard from him over many conversations, so I trusted their intensive listening research and findings.
They were devoted to good tech, but serious listening defined the Tranquility choices (and the Mini setup), many conclusions not expected...like finding an old NOS DAC chip to give the best sound for them. Or a relatively inexpensive cap sounding better in the output than more popular audiophile caps of the time…not being able to beat the synergistic simplicity of their NOS Tranquility with much of the recent tech for matching references of great analog masters and good vinyl on many systems. Trying hard to find ultimate (and affordable) quality with hi-res, upsampling, async and other things most designers were focussed on at the time, but finding the simple 44k NOS DAC to sound more like music to them….at least more than many popular DACs up to maybe several times as much money.
With extensive work to make a good DAC that made digital files sound like music....their research, listening and experimentation also left them with optimized Minis being a really good choice for feeding the very simple Tranquility.
In this process, over many years, they (and others) discovered loads of ways to make the Mini good for audio. Last I spoke with Eric (maybe 6 months ago?), they had created/written a highly stripped down operating system specifically for the Mini as an audio server, and he thought it made really important improvements. Along with better drives, memory, power, cables, etc, (all tested for sound) he was still making killer music servers out of Minis last I checked. This tells me that the optimized Mini is not dead yet.
And Eric is one of many who have devoted a lot of attention to Minis as servers, including the Uptone Regen guys who have contributed to microRendu, and loads of users who have been experimenting and describing ways of improving sound using a Mini. A call Eric to get his take on all this could be pretty intersting and useful. And perhaps his variations of solutions may as good or better and good value.
But the main reason I have not been looking past the Mini is that I love the sound I am getting. The wild thing is that each change I make makes the musical experience better! When it is this good, how can it get much better? But then I will refine some software adjustment, EQ....or amp connectors, or caps or something, and WOW.
So it would not surprise me if micro, or ultraRendu, and all that has been figured out to make it work best so far, could be very good here! I have just been so content listening and playing with refining all my system and room....at the same time as refining the Mini, that I stopped looking around. With Audrivana 2 playing in the tuned up Mini, and into my modded Gustard DAC, the source is just really, really good! So good I could not quite agree with Audirvana 3 as the great improvement most find it to be, which is interesting.
Trying 3 with minor software adjustments, I found it a bit overstated, too dense, too clean, maybe implying I had already gotten a lot of what 3 offered from tuning my system and version 2 ??? I still figure 3 may well be better overall, likely just needing to adjust some player parameters, dither settings, etc, to bring it out for me, but 2 was sounding better to me at the end of the 3 trial period. Also I was having a couple quirky things with 3 I did not take the time to solve while upsampling my 44K files (everything I have is Rebook) to 352.8 PCM in Audirvana, as PCM playback allows live EQ adjustments in the app, a great tool for fine-tuning system room. Probably not a big deal, but a hassle with 2 sounding so good anyway.
Interestingly, for years it seems everyone focussed on reducing computer processing, minimizing noise. But now, using Audirvana to resample to DSD 11.2 uses a whopping 32% of my processor while loading files to memory, whereas, 16/44 files without up-sampling took maybe 1.5 – 2%! Also with DSD resampling the fan runs more as the computer works more...Got me, but this creates amazing sound quality so I am guessing software development has come a long way, and that my noise is relatively under control.
Re-sampling in the computer as opposed to in-DAC is interesting, the theory I gather being that a powerful computer may be better able to do complex sampling than a lot of resampling hardware used, supporting really good sounding alternatives to quality re-sampling DACs. My DAC with the mods I did was around $1000 and sounds incredible being fed 11.2 DSD resampled from 16/44 PCM with Audirvana’s very good software sampling and powerful user adjustability.
So though I am still using an older version, Audirvana is really a big player in my music, and I would have to find out how well ultraRendu does with sampling to DSD, software adjustments, and internal EQ, things that massively improve my system. But exploration is fun for me, so the Mini has stayed and keeps getting better. If playing with adjustments, cables, damping and all were not fun, I may have moved to more current tech by now.
My sound is truly beautiful though, so when I run across posts saying Minis are not great, I wonder….is it not great, or are some folks not using it well, or maybe some of both???
I also suspect some comments may be clouded by general computer dislikes, or perhaps in part by Mac neurosis remnants from the Windows campaign started way back in the day that was pretty successful in discrediting the creative competition. While Windows continuously “utilized” Apple development ideas, there was a lot of suspicion in the press and public about Apple, in part for good reason when the market share was so low and Jobs so determined for quality and quality experience over quantity...Would they survive? But even after the iMac, Mini, and powerbooks started to take off, and lots of music and graphics pros using Macpros....and even when the iPhone and iPads came along, the bias was still strong enough to remain today for many. Personally, it is all sort of daunting today with supper complex software and all, but Apple’s skill in tech has sure been useful and worth it for me!
When we first started considering computers we asked folks: How do you like your computer? This was in like 89 and 90, and the Mac people ALL said something like “I really like my computer,” whereas, the Windows people typically said something defensive like: “you should get a real computer (Windows)” or “Windows are just as good as Macs” and the like. Never did we hear affection from the Windows folks. So for us, there was no choice.
Now it seems you can get great sound from either with careful attention to avoiding or solving known problems with hardware and software, and as you are finding, there are many other choices specifically made for music as well. So I would say this is a good time to join in computer audio for sure. A point of the above though, to me, web research has really amazing potential, but can get tricky and confusing, often requiring "feelers" for the depth of knowledge, experience, hearing sophistication, and possible biases of the presenter.
That said, from my minimal research, MicroRendu sounds very compelling to me. And they are working with the Uptone Regen folks too, also very serious and innovative small audio tech enthusiasts. And as the growing community of users experiment and interact with developers, things appear to be getting really good fast...lots of folks helping each other find better solutions.Another thing that has set me back in terms of moving into this exciting new digital music tech, is restricted internet bandwidth. Where we live we use a Verizon Jetpack...no DSL, cable or fiber. So the trends of high bandwidth internet interaction create challenges for me and I seriously avoid streaming even from utube and have to think about my system upgrades more toward the end of the month cycle to be sure we don’t go over into big bucks per MB. Downloading hi-res files (or even 600MB CDs) is a big deal with monthly limitations, and more-so streaming, making very useful seeming stuff like streaming and networking the home not possible or necessary.
So I have stayed in the dark ages too. But maybe this network/super tuned computer tech will bring me into today a little!
Since it is mostly new to you, I will tell you some things I will be looking for if I were to go further in this direction aside from all the noise abatement and Sound Quality work this tech has uncovered:
1. Can I use all of Audirvana’s powerful tuning tools I have come to need?
2. Would using my Mini, avoiding buying a dedicated server, work well for sound?
3. I like a good visual interface, now a 19” monitor hidden in my cabinet. I don’t care so much about a remote, liking standing up and changing records or amp settings as I have since the 60’s. But as far as I can tell, this setup seems to require a controller separate from the computer. Not having a smart phone, and liking a bigger interface anyway, I guess I would have to look into getting an iPad, something I may like but don’t need at this point.
4. My computer audio system is very reliable, and its quirks easy to figure out and fix. Is this network thing more complication prone? And if so, what are reliable ways to set them up?
5. What is the bottom line with server, power supplies, routers, switches, cables, interface, and ultraRendu?
Long story short, I think you are on to something. There seem to be a lot of good ideas and methods combined in this tech, and it is being developed by computer-music-heads working hard to make digital music better. I did not look at the sms-200 you mentioned, not because I think microRendu is necessarily better. I just liked the smallgreencomputer approach and was familiar with them already, so I focussed more on microRendu in this initial research.
I look forward to further insights from you and others. If there is more interest in this, maybe we need an audio devoted computer thread, or more specifically, a microRendu thread?
Thanks for the tip!