SuperUniti will not reliably play Apple Lossless iTunes rips

hello. I'm very suprised at your statement it wont play. Naim tested the final release with over 1.5GB of reference ALAC files ripped in dBpoweramp and iTunes (10.2 - 10.4) and all work fine - i just rechecked these files.

We tested For reference from both dBpoweramp and ITunes:

 Gapless test files and metadata variation files

44/16

44/24

48/16

48/24

88/16

88/24

96/16

96/24

+ deliberately damaged ALAC files, truncated files, falsely named files

Naim shall be investigating this further today. I've re-ripped files with iTunes 10.5 (CD rip to 44/16) and it superuniti has played ok using USB. i shall be investigating further today with playback etc.

Andrew - i beleive you contacted Naim Support over this, steve.hopkins will be contacting you directly, as i need some of these issue files.

i'll keep you posted.

Trevor

See my original post - I haven't tried AIFF, but the same album can be played perfectly OK if I rip to Wav.

I can try AIFF as well if you like.

Andrew

hi again

just tried 10.5 iTunes ripped ALAC to production superuniti using playback and its working a treat. i must be missing something if your having trouble. can you contact Naim support directly so we get this resolved asap for you

Trevor, that would be great. I have done some further investigation and have found that another iMac of a slightly earlier generation that will rip the files in ALAC to produce playable copies. Both iMacs seem to play the offending ALAC albums perfectly well over AirPlay and both play them OK through iTunes, so it is hard to figure out what the problem is - but the trouble either seems to affect every track in an album or none of them and it only hits scattered albums. In other words, at least 95% of the time, the ALAC rips work without a problem.

I have the non-working ALAC rips easily to hand, so it won't be a problem providing samples.

This is such a great system by the way. I feel like kneeling in front of it every time I turn it on. Many thanks for the response - I look forward to carrying on by email.

Andrew

Andrew and Trevor

I have also had this problem will a small number of ripped files (ALAC). When I re-ripped them they played ok. There does not seem to be any reason why a particular file will not play but it is the entire album. Also running Lion, latest iTunes and Playback.

I will try some of those that didn't play again (not had the SU long so not played my entire catalogue yet!). Could it be something to do with the version of iTunes that it was ripped with? All were ripped from Leopard onward (date stamp).

Andrew, agree, the SU is very, very good.

Regards

Neil 

I assume you mean 16/48 or 16/44.1, if not that is your problem there.

Hello all

Andrew provided files earilier today. we're investigating still. it appeasrs to be linked to certain embedded artwork files in the ALAC file itself, but we are still checking. i shall update once we have a clear answer

One of the files that would not work last night was fine when I tried it earlier this evening. Very strange......

Finger trouble again...

Andrew

Hi, I've also had problems playing some apple lossless files.  I used a newish windows pc for the ripping.  My problem seems to be narrowed down to albums I ripped in apple lossless using DB Poweramp. These same files have been working fine on Sonos for months and still work using that system.  I've tried around 3 or 4 different albums and all have the same problem - "Can't play, Unsupported file format".   Today I did more tests and re-ripped an album and got the same problem...for info apple lossless rips of the same album done from itunes and FLAC files ripped in DB Poweramp work without issues.

I bought my SU from a dealer last weekend and they had the same issue with the files I took in on a memory stick...FLAC worked and Apple Lossless from DBPA didn't.  They couldn't understand it so I put it down to something I'd done when copying files.  I'll be getting back to them tomorrow (Sat).

Most probably something I've done.

David

The very wonderful support team at Naim are on the case and have identified the cause of my problem, which is that for some reason the SuperUniti isn't reading some tracks with manually added artwork - the tracks play fine if I re-rip them and don't add any artwork. This only affects some tracks with added artwork, so it was a very fine piece of detective work on Naim's part. I should add that I was getting emails from them about their investigations at nine o'clock at night, which shows a phenomenal devotion to customer service.

I have no experience of using DBPoweramp, because I have a Mac - I believe the app only runs on Windows. On a Mac I have used XLD to rip FLAC and Roxio Toast to rip other formats, including (for what it is worth) protected CDs from Hyperion and Gimell records into iTunes. However, whichever app I use, if I drag in artwork later, there is a percentage chance that the SU will say no thanks. If you have added any artwork to the tracks, then I would suggest re-ripping them and not adding any. Just deleting the artwork doesn't work in my experience - you actually have to delete the tracks and then re-rip the CD from scratch.

Andrew

Thanks Andrew, that's exactly it.  I re-ripped an album in ALAC and checked that it still didn't work, then repeated the process this time not adding artwork and hey presto, it worked.  Thanks for the reply, I look forward to the chaps at Naim fixing the problem. 

Any progress with this issue? Joss Stone - 'The Soul Sessions' would not stream this morning....

Thanks

Neil

Wow - a software bug with musical taste!

Sorry... I'll get my coat...

Deleted album art and then attached again. Plays fine now.

Pev - the first album is rather good before so spoilt it all (like a beautiful girl who doesn't know that she is beautiful and then becomes aware. The beauty is now gone... Oh, Catherine Rees....) 

Neil

hi all,

So i think an update is in order. Things we have found

1. mac iTunes 10.5.1 had a weird bug in it. when added artwork to a ALAC file ripped on the mac, say a 100K filethe overal file size of the ALAC increased by 400K. various reasons for this but caused us some headaches. NOTE PC version of iTunes 10.5.1 did not have this issue. This appears resolved in 10.5.2

2. some of the files that have been unable to play were copyprotected - iTunes 10.5.1 again had trouble with these (fixed in 10.5.2 we understand).

3. files ripped using Roxio toast (especially copy protected files) have a really weired ALAC Atom in them, which is not as the iTunes ALAC - Naim are following iTunes on the ALAC headers here so no plans to change away from supporting iTunes.

those who have had this issue, can you contact Steve.hopkins@naimaudio.com directly please for further instructions.

I thought I would update this thread, just in case anyone comes along later and thinks there is still a problem!

Thanks to Trevor at Naim, the problem is now fixed and the SuperUniti will play anything I throw at it. Just to reiterate, I am streaming from an iMac using Yazsoft's Playback uPnP server (which is slightly flaky, but fundamentally solid). iTunes 10.5.2 has dug me out of a hole, because this version will reliably rip copy protected CDs (you know, the ones with the awful chainsaw noise on them). Prior to 10.5.2 I was ripping copy protected stuff using dBpoweramp running on a Windows 7 laptop - great app by the way.

FWIW I use XLD (from the app store) to convert FLAC to ALAC and used this to convert the excellent Meet Me in London Naim Label album to ALAC - using our Billion mains network I can stream this at 24bit and 1500 kps without running into any buffering problems... must get around to running some ethernet to the SU.

So I can thoroughly recommend a SuperUniti to anyone with a Mac - if you have any problems just reply to this thread and I will try and help in return for all the other help that people here have given me.

Andrew

Hi everyone, 

Need to ask your expertise regarding streaming audio. (Newbie here)

Here's the scenario:

I already have a NAS which I think has the uPnP capability.

I have an iMac but it is in a different room.

I am planning to venture into naim streaming solutions, (using streamer and integrated amp) 

My question is how can I control my playlists if only the NAS is turned on? Is this possible to use my iphone to access music from my server (NAS) into streamer then to the amp? I've read that I need to install a uPNP software for it to be seen in my network but how do I control it? 

And lastly what is the best solution for this? 

1.) NAS--->ND5 XS ----> SN

2.) NAS--->SUNITI

3.) NAS--->NDX--->SN

assuming I can squeeze an nDAC into options 1 and 2, which one would you choose?

Thanks you and sorry for my stupid questions.

2) or

If you have money available for a DAC, budget would be better spent for:

NDX 202 200

Thank you Manu,

So you mean even if choosing options 1 and 2 plus adding an NDAC into the chain,

NDX 202 200 would still be the better option? I thought that ND5XS into nDAC is superior to NDX?

Care to elaborate? 

Thanks

OT - but, have you heard Joss Stone singing on the Superheavy album?

Good if you like reggae. I'm dont especially, but really like this album.