Sign the petition! - An XS Series Streamer

I think that UPnP does have some advantages and I understand why Naim have gone down this route. The alternatives aren't perfect either and even having been an Apple user for decades I'm far from convinced that Airplay is the answer.

Apple are rather good at software but so far have shown little real interest in audiophile standard kit.

They can be used as the basis for some fantastic systems not the least from Gordon Rankin at Wavelength.

UPnP can doubtless be made to work but it will take time and rereading the Naim publicity materials I think there needs to be some honesty or caution about some of the claims that are being made for it. If Linn and Chorus DS can make progress then so can Naim.

Tog

But UPNP has another focus: it should support a seamless integration of different kind of media devices (especially from different companies) to operate together. So it is a agreement between different companies that their device work together. It also defines the way to control such devices through UPnP RenderingControl DCP. SMB/CIFS does not offer such things and we compare two different things.

If someone is not interested in such a interoperability than I agree that a simple network share is sufficient.

But if we are so far to question the use of upnp and suggest smb/cifs one can get one step further and question the use of a network. Instead one could extend the use of the usb port of the dac not only to accept usb sticks but also usb hard disks.

jerry

quote:

Originally posted by likesmusic:
Yep, start a petition for Airplay suppport. I'll sign that!

But Airplay is the same as UPNP except that it is defined by apple. It is sad that it is yet another standard. But in my view a standard makes only sense if it is widely used. Thus now you have to choose which standard you want and it is not a benefit for us.

jerry

quote:

I think you have hit the nail on the head

C'mon Naim - the future is Airplay.

I cant even keep iTunes (on a Mac) successfully connected to a Airport Express without dropouts, glitches, and connection issues. I would rather not use anything more complex from Apple.

At my buddies house WHILE music is playing, the Mac will completely "forget" about the external hard drive and it takes unplugging the drive then rebooting to make the Mac "find" it again. Ive never understood this about Macs and externals.
If it isn't this, then iTunes completely "forgets" that there is an Airport Express it is talking to. This usually requires much more effort to get working again. The "Speakers" in iTunes simply doesn't display the Airport. Typically a reset to factory settings on the Airport is the only way to fix this.

In any case "it just works" has NEVER really applied in my experience with Macs. Usually it is a "no one knows how to fix this, or why it happended" situation.

Why do Macs constantly "forget" about USB connected drives? Unplug, replug, nothing. Unplug power from drive reconnect, nothing. Reboot Mac, nothing. Reboot, unplug everything, still not working... Then later it "just works". Maybe that is what people are talking about.

-Patrick

Wasn't this once the "I would like an XS Streamer thread"? Seems like it's been hijacked by the UPNP brigade and the Airplay revolutionaries

quote:

Instead one could extend the use of the usb port of the dac not only to accept usb sticks but also usb hard disks.

Yeah.... it would be really easily to navigate an entire USB drive full of thousands of songs/WAVs.

it is as easy or complicated as browsing through a smb/cifs network share.

jerry

quote:

Originally posted by jerryct:
But UPNP has another focus: it should support a seamless integration of different kind of media devices (especially from different companies) to operate together. So it is a agreement between different companies that their device work together. It also defines the way to control such devices through UPnP RenderingControl DCP. SMB/CIFS does not offer such things and we compare two different things.

UPnP is a server that does NOT control the client.
Meaning, the only advantage is that any kind of client will be able to have the same folder hierarchy.

But exactly the same can be or rather is achieved by using SMB/CIFS.

And with UPnP the clients do not in any way communicate or work together. They can simply simultaniously connect to the same server and access the same files. Just like SMB/CIFS can.

I mentioned some of the problems with UPnP. And I have not yet seen any advantages that even come close to outweighing the disadvantages.

There is nothing simpler than sharing your USB drive via CIFS/SMB. And a big benefit is of course that any computer can access them without additional software. You can read and write to a SMB/CIFS drive whereas UPnP usually is read-only. Haven't seen a UPnP server program that allows you do delete or move the real files from the client.

Problem with Apple is of course that their software looks nice but usually is a)expensive and b)limited.
I personally prefer open standards. That way anybody can write software for it.

Of course I would also prefer it if Naim were to make their systems linux based and "open". But that of course is tricky in high-end-audio. So it would be best to support more than one sharing-system and if possible at least one, that does support real-time filesharing.

I once tried running a UPnP server on my FritzBox router (300MHz MIPS I think). It would have taken hours to read all the files of a 500GB HDD with movies. Imagine how long it would take for such a device to update a database of MP3s, especially if you have say 3TB of MP3s and videos.
I then simply shared my 4 HDDs (3TB) via SMB/CIFS and there was of course no wait times. HDDs are mounted immediately and all data is available instantly.

I am aware that a router is not a real deadicated server, but unlike a real server it consumes about 15W of energy, runs 24/7 anyway to allow for internet access, supplies LAN and WLAN devices and costs far less.

You also have to consider persistence when considering cataloguing and scanning media on a network sharepoint - there is a balance to be struck between real-time (but processor-intensive) availabilty of newly-added media files and comprehensively tagged and catalogued / groomed libraries.

What I would really like to see is a self-tagging UPnP server that verifies content tags or audio fingerprints against a wide variety of databases and presents this as a web-based GUI for dispatch to a UPnP renderer.

quote:

UPnP is a server that does NOT control the client.

I do not really agree totally. UPNP is a set of network protocols and it defines different components (for example a UPnP MediaServer which is the UPnP-server but also a UPnP RenderingControl).

quote:

I mentioned some of the problems with UPnP. And I have not yet seen any advantages that even come close to outweighing the disadvantages.

If you only attach a SMB share than the Media Renderer does not know that there is a music server so you have to configure manually the Media renderer to show up the music files. UPNP on the other hand describes a method for service discovery or "zero-configuration". UPNP also defines a Media Control so you can use for example Plugplayer to control every UPNP-labeled device.

But i do not really disagree with you that there are simpler solutions if you do not want this flexibility. All i want to say is that UPnP offers more than a simple network file system.

jerry

quote:

Originally posted by David Dever:

What I would really like to see is a self-tagging UPnP server that verifies content tags or audio fingerprints against a wide variety of databases and presents this as a web-based GUI for dispatch to a UPnP renderer.

+ showing additional infos like liner notes / booklet, etc saved

+ lyrics search (tabs?)

+ some customizable reporting

I'm managing now a csv list generated by mediainfo and using it then in my own written very simple UI to be able to see what nusic I have and to be able to search within it by genre / album / artist... ugly in these web 2.0 times :-(

quote:

+ showing additional infos like liner notes / booklet, etc saved

+ lyrics search (tabs?)

+ some customizable reporting

+ Bio View from LastFM (maybe scrobbling as well)
+ Artist background pictures from Google images and/or LastFM

Who is going to let you get free access to the data for this?
Even amazon have a strict policy on 3rd parties using their data.

Ah, I see what you guys mean.
Thing is, those things are not a problem with the protocol, they are a problem with the MediaPlayer-software used.

Let's see.

David, real-time (i.e. SMB/CIFS) is in fact far less processor-intensive. And media cataloguing, as mentioned before, can just as easily be achieved by using symlinks.

Of course this requires additional work, but most people use folder-structure anyway and the easiest way to sort and catalogue your files are PC programs.
I'll use TV-Shows for my example as that's what I use most these days for network streaming.

If you want to look at your TV-Shows, you will want them sorted by show title, then season, and then episode. All of that is easily done by just one freeware tool (not sure if I am allowed to say which).
If I want to, in addition to this system, have them sorted by genre, I would simply create symlinks. One folder for each genre and a symlink to each show.

Now, as to additional information. This is one of the parts why I personally prefer user-costumizable software.
UPnP does offer the support of cover-arts etc. but not all clients actually have that feature. So this is a feature that in fact is dependent on the client and is NOT a general feature of all UPnP devices.

However, as can be seen on PS3/XBox and enigma2-based satellite receivers, it is possible and common, to implement such features into MediaPlayer-applications on the client side, that actually offer this feature using SMB/CIFS and direct file access.

Pretty basic stuff really. As soon as you enter a folder, the media player/center will check if a file is present, say cover_art.png. If yes, it will be displayed as a background image.

In addition, there are numerous IMDB search tools. That way you can have your client do a simple IMDB search and you will get full TVShow and episode information on-the-fly. This is done by filename. So again, the sharing-protocol is irrelevant.

These are not UPnP features but actually client-implemented features. And imho the number of tools that download these information on your PC and store them locally are better than the UPnP server applications.

So if e.g. you rip your music, EACH song will contain the cover-art, artist, album, song etc. information all within that MP3. Any client can read that information without a server providing it. The inforamtion is in the file.

Lyrics can then be downloaded on the fly from lyrics-websites, just like the IMDB information for tvshows and movies mention above.

And online radio stations (let's be honest, they are NOT audiophile-material ) are basically M3U files. Again the client's software decides what it will display, not the server.

Some of you know the XBMC media center. Basically that can be altered to show you any information you want from any source. No need for a central server to supply that information locally.

And that kind of tool is available on numerous devices.

quote:

Who is going to let you get free access to the data for this?
Even amazon have a strict policy on 3rd parties using their data.

uh Google and LastFM can be accessed for free.

Most lyrics databases are free.

Wikipedia is free.

I dont think there are issues using information on those sites.

Amazon advertises, and allows use of art etc, even on illegal file sharing sites for what that is worth.

Greenalex,

No one is stopping you from using any streaming method, codec, or media player you would like to use. That is why many people (including myself) like a PC/Mac fronting things rather than a purpose built solution from a hifi manufacturer. If you dont like UPnP, simply dont use it!

This is one of the brilliant aspects of the nDAC. Given it is spdif input only, you can do anything you want in front of it.

-Patrick

Amazon has limited the cover-art download for external programs to, I think, 1000/hour.

Other databases like IMDB for movies/TV are free. As are many, many other websites.
And, a bonus of course, if you use your private computer to download this information rather than have your client-hardware do it, it is a matter of personal use and therefor non-commercial and you can use even more websites

@Patrick:
Of course, everyone can use whatever they want. My point was simply, that it would be best to have devices be as versatile as possible and not limited to one protocol.
And I wanted to have an open discussion about it listing pros and cons

nDac is, of course, not a client. You need, as you said, something in front of it.

I think I will start a petition for a Naim streamer that streams audio and video and is run on a linux based system with open source software and has a built in 7.1 decoder *drool*

quote:

These are not UPnP features but actually client-implemented features. And imho the number of tools that download these information on your PC and store them locally are better than the UPnP server applications.

...a server / aggregator / tagger / control point, actually, which should be independent of renderer. Select a file from disc, have the tagger identify it, add it to the pool of available files, and push it to the renderer. Offer up all UPnP-relevant metadata to other players / control points for use elsewhere in other zones.

quote:

Originally posted by totemphile:
Wasn't this once the "I would like an XS Streamer thread"? Seems like it's been hijacked by the UPNP brigade and the Airplay revolutionaries

Your right - I'm up for an XS streamer as long as it supports Airplay and is free from Microsoftisms - not much to ask.

quote:

Originally posted by pcstockton:

quote:

Instead one could extend the use of the usb port of the dac not only to accept usb sticks but also usb hard disks.

Yeah.... it would be really easily to navigate an entire USB drive full of thousands of songs/WAVs.

I'm not convinced, but I'd like to plug my MacBook straight in to the nDAC without having to use an intermediate device. Of course if nDAC2 supports BT APT-X or Airplay I'll be there.

quote:

I'm not convinced,

Neither am I.... my sarcasm did not shine through apparently.

a USB DAC is a cool idea, and if it sounded as good as spdif I am guessing Naim would have included it.

I dont mind having a DAC that will be viable for decades.

regarding usb hard disk it is not so absurd.

naim seems to have such a feature with the ndx: "...USB socket and, via the same socket, it can play audio files stored on USB memory sticks and drives."

One disadvantage with the dac is that it has no user interface to handle as you say the "thousands of songs".

But in terms of convenience (maybe not sound quality) it should not matter whether you use a Computer to a dac where the computer is your user interface to your music files or you connect a hard disk directly to a dac or ndx where these devices must offer a sufficient user interface. In both cases you have to solve the "problem" with the user interface (and also with a smb/cifs share you have not solved this problem because you are also confronted with thousand of files). It is apparently that a computer is more flexible but if a sufficient user interface in a dac or ndx is feasible why should i bother to have an extra component like a computer for music replay?

jerry

quote:

Originally posted by pcstockton:

a USB DAC is a cool idea, and if it sounded as good as spdif I am guessing Naim would have included it.

I dont mind having a DAC that will be viable for decades.

For two decades, according to Naim, s/pdif was the work of the devil. Now it's the basis for decades of product life! Hmmmm ...

quote:

Originally posted by nap-ster:
Who is going to let you get free access to the data for this?
Even amazon have a strict policy on 3rd parties using their data.

I'm talking about the items, you already have lurking on your HDD with the purchases from the online stores or scanned by yourself. And I agree that this should be integrated into the file format specification and this should be served by a dedicated server for the most interoperability. Of course, the standard should be followed by the organisations selling online content - otherwise this is not very meaningful. I'm talking of purchases with this info already integrated in the media - imagine a software able to stream the media to a renderer allowing some kind of client to be able to browse the cd booklet like a real "booklet" with all additional data, missing in the media files at the moment like recording location, all the additional musicians, produces etc... For example in a iBooks similar interface (I'm not apple infected, but the interface makes sense here IMO). Let's face it - currently we have some bits of music (even in hi res), but very little of the info available on a CD for example. This must be generally improved.

quote:

Originally posted by likesmusic:
For two decades, according to Naim, s/pdif was the work of the devil. Now it's the basis for decades of product life! Hmmmm ...

It's called progress.

-
aleg