Raspberry PI and NDX

Simon,

Yes, it's only the first beta release and so I'm sure these little issues will be resolved. I'm pretty encouraged that this will be an ideal solution for my particular needs.

Chris

Is the feature set the same, or is anything missing?

Richard

Hi Richard

It's exactly the same as far as I can see (and hear!).

Chris

Richard, the current beta version is cut down. The menu and navigation customisation feature is absent. There are a few bugs as mentioned above, but it is first beta.

Certainly sounds rather good with Naim renderers.

Simon

Thanks Simon.

It sounds very interesting, but I'm not in a rush so will wait to see how this develops as I like the feature that is missing. Need to get a pi first.

Currently using a tiny Dell Zino Atom based PC running Windows Foundation Server 2012 just for Asset, Airprint, and as a printer server.  I bought it new, barebones for £60 and had the bits spare to complete it.  It works really well and 2012 Foundation Server is very lightweight.  I took Asset off our business server as I became fed up with being without music when it was rebooted as it takes ages, being a VM host with 2 VM servers running on it and reboots tend to be done in the evening as customers connect to it during the day.

Richard

New beta for Asset on the Pi due Monday - fingers crossed

@Simon:

What TCP parameters would you enable while running Asset on a windows machine?

MM, I would check (at layer 2) you are running duplex and 100mbits/s, but with TCP at layer 3 I would leave it default.

I haven't looked at the Pi connection using Wireshark so I can't confirm what the PI defaults to.. The one thing I can think of is Windows can use very large window sizes (for internet performance)

Simon

New Asset beta available for the Pi, based on 4.2. Folder.jpg album art bug resolved. Working well with the NDX and Nstream, serving about 750Gbytes of music mounted on a Netgear NAS share. It really does sound so good. I need to look into why the Pi sounds better than my HP Windows PC over the network.

Simon

Simon

Excellent news. I've just ordered a Pi to play with. Like you I run  Asset on Windows and am looking forward to comparing to Asset on Pi. 

The only difference is I use a  KDS rather than a Naim streamer. 

Graham 

Simon,

I found the same results when I tested the first build. Same setup as yours I guess, Readynas duo v2 with 2 x WD Green drives but with a Unitilite instead of the NDX. I noticed that it sounded a lot cleaner than my PC did, it's a great little platform!

Hi Simon,

I am following your post with interest.

I run a Netgear ReadyNAS Duo (the older Sparc based one), which contains my music files, on 2TB disks, in FLAC, some ALAC, AAC and MP3, streaming to a ND5-XS with NP5-XS.

I initially tried the Netgear 'built in' ReadyDLNA UPnP server and Logitech LMS with UPnP plugin (as I migrated from a SB3/SB Touch previously). However what I found is that the AlbumArt wasn't displayed nicely on n-Stream running on an iPad Mini. It was downscaled, so all grainy.

So I am currently using Twonky 6.0.38, which does allow you to select the endpoints to disable any AlbumArt scaling, so it displayed properly in n-Stream, in the original resolution. In fact I have created a 'NAIM Streamer' end-point descriptor in the devices list, plus have solved the Folder order display issue (if anyone else wants copies of these files, I'm happy to share them).

As such, I have gone through and ensured that all my tracks have high-quality AlbumArt embedded in each file (thank you PerfectTunes), plus the AlbumArtist field is set correctly and the Compilation flag is used for Compilations.

I use dBPowerAmp, PerfectTunes and mp3tag to manage all the Metadata tagging.

However Twonky's default view doesn't sort by AlbumArtist, just Artist for each Album, and doesn't arrange the Compilations in a separate folder either. Now I can look at the XML descriptors for the views and figure out custom views for these (as per the custom trees on the Linn forum), but if there is an alternative and better UPnP Server just for Music, I am interested.

I don't want a Windows based solution, but a dedicated UPnP server running on a Rasberry PI would be ideal. I have a Linksys NSLU2 as my backup NAS with USB disks, with automated backups running from the ReadyNAS to the NSLU2 daily.

So can I ask the following about Asset's behaviour:

1. Does it serve high-resolution AlbumArt to n-Stream, without any scaling?

2. Does the image file embedded in the ID3 header take priority over the presence of folder.jpg in the folder. I have Compilation albums with different artwork for each Artist in the same folder, but a generic folder.jpg for the 'top-level'.

3. Does it handle the AlbumArtist field?

4. Does it group Compilations together based on the Compilation field?

5. Could you provide screenshot or a list of the top level menus presented in n-Stream?

Now any idea why a Linux based UPnP Server sounds different to a Windows based one?

Would the underlying architecture also influence the sound, as this would be a different build of Linux - Raspberry PI is ARM, ReadyNAS Duo v1 is Sparc, ReadyNAS Duo v2 is ARM, other Linux based NAS are Intel?

Thanks,

Simon (in-Dublin)

Hi Simon, I think Spoon has answered yes to your questions over on his forum.

As far as sound quality, only theories, as I haven't looked at Wireshark yet, but it might be to do with MTU size or similar. The parameters are more likely determined by the TCP/IP stack of the upnp server OS rather than the CPU architecture.

Simon

Cool - I see that.

I like the look of the following, which are not provided out-of-the-box by Twonky. LMS had some of them.

Artist & Album Handling modes
Artist Sort Handling and Display in Sort and Non-Sort Locations
Combine Duplicate and Similar Artists
Multi-Disc Albums handling
UpStream Artwork
A to Z Selection Grouping
Hide Main View Albums

Plus I would like to try the forced WAV transcoding to my ND5.

So I'm off to get a Raseberry Pi as a dedicated UPnP server, now.

I was thinking that this a Product opportunity for Naim - a media-less UPnP Server, using the work that have done for the UnitiServer, but without any disks, CD reader or the ripping technology. Just a configurable UPnP Server dedicated for music, with good metadata handling or enhancement, with great Artwork support to n-Stream.

Many thanks,
Simon.

Hi, I guess the margins for such a device would be limited, and there are many very cost effective solutions available - including the Pi at £25.

If you want to go with Naim serving, you need to buy into the Naim ripping method with Naim's metadata solution - and this of course is the UnitiServe / HDX.

Naim could have released their software for use on customer provided hardware - which is rather common in the software manufacturer world, but Naim thus far have declined to enter that particular market.

Simon

Yes, but I don't want or need any dedicated storage or media ripping. Most of my new music now comes from downloads rather than physical sources anyway. So if they took out the HDD/SDD & controller and CD transport from a UnitiServer, plus disabled the ripping software, you have a disk-less dedicated UPnP server. The on-board PSU wouldn't need to as big, with nothing to spin.

I imagine if that was priced competitvely, it would do quite well.

Anyway looking at some of the Raspberry packages on eBay - Model B board, PSU, Case and OS on a SD card, for a dedicated UPnP server.

Thanks,

Simon (in Dublin)

Simon

Is it necessary to completely remove the old installation or can the new beta be installed "on top"?

Chris

I deleted the .dBpoweramp directory in - and then extracted the new build over the old in  /usr/bin/asset/bin/

Then when you first run, AssetUPnP it recreates the .dBpoweramp directory. You need to reapply settings and it will rebuild the database.

Just a word of warning, the team from dbpoweramp advise against running as root and so they have errors on their crontab installation guide. If you want to auto-start at boot using crontab, when you edit the crontab to setup, when logged in as pi, type 'crontab -e' and not 'sudo crontab-e' as shown on their site.

You can check AssetUPnP is running with owner pi, by typing 'ps aux | grep Asset' and you should see owner and group of pi against the running Asset processes.

Simon

Can Raspberry Pi stream internet radio streams?

Bobby

You should be able to stream radio using Asset on the Pi but this feature doesn't appear to work on the 1st beta version. You can still stream radio using a Naim streamer directly from the web because it doesn't need the server for this, of course.

chris

New Asset UPnP beta available for the Pi from the 11/12/13. This is much improved using CIFS network shares and debug now works. For those that are interested you can clearly see the summary of the info sent to the NStream and Naim Network player if you wish In the debug.

i installed this version over the old version and the previous database was used without requiring a re scan. BTW scans are hugely speeded up when using CIFS shares.

it continues to sound amazing with Naim.

Simon

Hi Simon

i've installed the new beta also and agree with the benefits you report. 

I think this will be a good choice for many people who don't want a computer in their listening room. I know it is one but I'm sure you know what I mean!

Chris

Chris, I agree the Pi is so small and unobtrusive it easily sits on top of the LAN switch or NAS, and has a tiny power consumption.. really a no brainier.... and if you get a good crust can look quite funky too.

Simon

Simon,

have you discovered yet whether reinstalling the beta restarts the three day trial period?

Chris

No I'd didn't reset for me, but then I installed over the previous build.

Simon