HDX vs dbpoweramp rips - new findings and a question.

good but our rip and our drive choice usually outperforms"

So I am pretty consistent I will try to test again at the weekend as see if my feelings have changed, as I said its a solution thing!!!

I did suggest that I heard a difference–I did not claim, however, that this was directly related to the file headers–this was suggested by others on the same thread (and other threads). Please re-read–"a flaw in the header information in dBpoweramp rips, if that is the sole reason for the difference (which I also doubt)". Translated: I doubt that a flaw in the WAV header information is the sole reason for any difference in performance, if it is (in fact) a factor (at all) or (at a basic level) a flaw anyway.

I can hear differences between some retailers' rips using dBpoweramp, served up via Twonky on a NAS and the same disc ripped and served using a UnitiServe–this may be related to the ripping drive on the retailers' PC in the specific cases; it may also be related to other factors, including but not limited to the manner in which the drive handles worn or scratched discs, etc.

That said–would it be agreed by all on this thread that care taken during the ripping process in both the software and hardware configuration will reap performance benefits? Limiting the chaos as best as possible is probably a pretty good approach.

That's the wriggliest reply since James Murdoch yesterday!

A simple person like me would conclude that those dealers can't use dBpoweramp competently. 

Or are they deliberately screwing it up in order to cast aspersions on dBpoweramp?

How about producing one such alleged inferrior dBpoweramp rip and the corresponding Naim rip and letting people compare them?

Strange–some of those retailers also carry digital streaming products from a competing manufacturer with their own user forum–perhaps you've got an interesting conspiracy theory as to why they'd (un)intentionally hamper the performance of their other product lines?

My guess, which is borne out by experience in visiting a variety of retailers of different stripes, brand allegiances, etc., is that people just wanna drop in a disc, (rip it) and play it, without divining rods, compression levels, tag editing, all of that–just like iTunes–and do it once. This casts no aspersions upon similar ways of achieving good-sounding rips, file types, tagging methods, etc., but rather upon the relative ease of use, sound quality, and reliability of the process.

[Frankly, even if I worked for a competing manufacturer, I'd still recommend the Naim UPnP servers on that basis.]

Just produce one of these allegedly inferior rips so that folk can subject it and your claims to some critical scrutiny.

Go on!

Hi Likesmusic

I am not sure why you seemed to have turned this into some sort of crusade, but I don’t understand why. We are all quite able to make a comparison ourselves it we are really that hung up on this issue. I can only assume that you have done the comparison and disagree, well that’s fine. I’m sure that many of us would disagree on many conclusions arrived at here by others, that doesn’t mean that their conclusions are wrong, only that we don’t agree.

Dbpoweranp is excellent; I use it all the time. We are off to Heathrow next month to take advantage of seeing/hearing the Naim range all in one place. If we think that a server product is right for us, we will buy one. If we buy a server and it’s rip sound better than the one’s we have GREAT. I will have no idea if that will mean that the rips are superior or if buying a complete solution from one manufacture manages to wring a little more across the whole replay chain; I really won’t care that much.

Regards

Peter

This is a bit of a shame as I spent some effort to analyze the differences at the engineering level between dBPoweramp and Naim rip and posted them on thhis forum. Both use the extended header type as opposed to canonical - this in theory might have invoked a different replay algorithm in the wav replay engine if they had been different

The only differences were

a) The Naim header in its rip had a byte or two bytes of undefined padding containing 0s in the header.

b) The dBpoweramp contained additional Chunks after the PCM chunk for ID3 tags and album art.

The PCM in both was idenitical to the bit.

The work flow of Naim to dBpoweramp was different somewhat - especially for correcting meta data etc, but having used both; UnitiServe as a ripper and dBPoweramp ripping  running on a modest wondows PC, both were extremely easy to use, and yes in dBpoweramp I had a few more options to setup - such as which were my preferred meta data providers, and how I wnated damaged discs to be handled - where as with Naim I didn't edit these parameters and it wasn't clear how I could even I wanted to

Simon

I have followed this discussion pretty much from the beginning and all along my reading and understanding of comments made by Naim were that rips done by either a HDX or US tend to sound better when played back on these and through a full Naim system. There was always an emphasis on the rips being played back on a full Naim solution (as a side note, it would be interesting to know what level of kit was used because maybe any difference is only audible from a certain level onwards). My recollection is not that Naim actually came out saying that their rips are superior or better sounding in comparison to other rips or that they sound better on all streaming solutions.

You have been banging on about inferior and superior when these were not the terms used by Naim in the initial discussion or their statements and to be honest some of your comments bordered on the offensive at times. It is getting boring mate! Nor do I understand what you are trying to prove, even if Naim made rips available and you or other people could not hear a difference on your system this would have no relevance whatsoever because equally there may be others who can hear a difference on their system. And that's all that counts. As David has said, go down to a dealer and do the test there with the appropriate set up. If you can't hear a difference great, you just saved yourself some money. If you can hear a difference, that's great too, you can then have a think about whether it is worth spending some money or not. If not, great again, you saved yourself some money.

Hi Simon

Your efforts were appreciated by many of us I am sure. We should also remember that Allen posted a pair of files for us to compare, so we have had (for a short time) the opportunity to make a comparison; it’s surely for each to decide for themselves.

Personally I could not hear any difference, I expected that, but would not deny that others may find differently.

As I suggested above, I would expect that if I could hear a difference using a totally Naim ripping/playing solution that it would be as likely that their total solution works better together than my ad-hoc PC/NAS combination. I’m not expecting that I would hear this myself, but would welcome it if I could.

Regards

Peter    

Has anybody noticed if you rip with iTunes in the evening when there is a full moon and leave the rip to mature on a Seagate hard disk for a month that it sounds better? 

I too think  this thread has gone in a strange direction.

I have had my ns01 in about a month and ripped over 700 cd’s and found the following.

Almost everything you throw at it or put into the ns01 comes out with no ripping problems. When I had the HDX a few years ago I had 1 disk that the HDX, and now also the NS01 simply does not want to rip. This happens on  a few disks, I would say about 10 disks in my collection and always with burnt disks, often disks that are about 8 to 10 years old. These disks could be played on my cd S3, so they are readable.

I have not taken the time to try and rip the disks with EAc on my windows 7 machine, but I i could be fun sometimes when I have too much time.

I have 1 disk that are so badly damaged that I can feel the damaged place on the surface. My cd s3gave up on 2 tracks on the disk, but it has been ripped perfectly.

One thing I have noted about the Naim ripping is that the speed is low. When a rip takes 5 to 6 minutes, it must be as low as 6 or 8 speed, no match for the default 24 or higher ripping speed that is the default in drives used in computer these days.

Another thing is that if it gives up on a disk, and the ripping monitor says that no ripping is going on the ns01 keeps the disk inside. At some time I think this should be corrected so the disks is ejected as soon as the software decides that a rip cannot be performed.correctly

Dbpoweramp may be simple to use, but as I recall earlier threads you have to pay for it. But that was before I bought my Mac Mini so I really did not read very carefully.

> Almost everything you throw at it or put into the ns01 comes out with no ripping problems.

Just like iTunes then - most of the time all these software packages and hardware solutions produce perfect rips - if a disk is damaged then that is another matter. I must be lucky as I haven't got any disks so badly damaged that XLD or iTunes couldn't rip it. All of these programs must be to some extent at the mercy of the CD drives ability to get the stuff off the disk in the first place. 

I don't dispute the US, NS01, HDX are good products - never have, just feel you can get the same rip (in terms of PCM) using lots of other packages - assuming you click the correct settings. Rendering is an entirely different matter, of course. 

As much as detest Windoze, I have to admit that dBPowerAmp is a superb piece of software.