danish

I guess with 7.1 you will have enough channels for Atmos 5.1.2. The problem is that there is no consumer software that can render object based formats, and there will probably not be any for a long time due to licensing. Your only option for Atmos currently is to pass the bit-stream to an Atmos capable surround processor or receiver with HDMI.

Is there any particular reason that you stayed with MC22? I also tried Emotion, but I find MC22 way more user friendly.

I'm using the the AFI1 word sync out into the D-05 and it works flawlessly. There is no manual change of sample rates using Amarra software. What would be the idea of doing it the other way around by using the word sync input of the firewire interface?

Clay wrote: For the record, I have listened to the Amarra demo, and just recently downloaded the latest version for another shot. It did not 'rock my world' when I demoed it earlier. Given that Amarra apparently does make a significant difference (by most reports), I'm willing to try again, and am even trying to optimize my system to give Amarra the best possible chance to shine, although I will still not have a system with 4Gb of memory in place by the deadline. I haven't read many reports on the Amarra sound, but I can contribute to this seemingly endless;-) discussion with my own impressions. Having lived with the full version for some months I have come to the conclusion that I cannot hear any noticable difference between Itunes and Amarra on 16/44.1 files. Being an ex-musician I consider myself as a fairly trained listener, even though my hearing is not as good as 20 years ago. There have been other professional (classical) musicians (being hifi-affectionados themselves) over in my house, and we made several blind tests by switching back an forth between Itunes and Amarra. We came to the conclusion that neither of us could determine which player was active and all the time it seemed to be a matter of guesswork. One of the pieces we used was Stravinsky "Soldiers Tale" from Reference Recordings with Chicago Pro Musica. It is a wonderful recording where every single attack, intonation and sound characteristics of the different instruments are crystal clear. Still without knowing which player was active we just couldn't tell the difference between Itunes and Amarra. I would like to stress very clearly that I'm not claiming that there is no audible difference just because I can't hear any. In many aspects of this hobby there seem to be no absolute truth. Even though I can't hear the difference between Amarra and Itunes on standard resolution tracks I would not like to live without it. It is still nice that I can play all sample rates without having to change it manually. Besides, if you want to control the volume in software I'd say that there is no other option than Amarra (compared to Itunes) for the highest quality. Yes, it is incredible expensive for an automatic sample rate recognition, and there are still a couple of quirks and bugs to be fixed, but right now it seems to be the best solution and it works quite well with the range of Weiss firewire interfaces. If only Sonic Studio could remove the annoying delay before every track...

audiozorro wrote: I have not heard about problems with Amarra having silence between tracks of certain recordings. Please provide details such as which recordings and tracks so others with Amarra or Sonic Studio may confirm and support a resolution to the problems. I have problems with this silence between tracks on certain albums. For example: Brittens "Young Persons Guide to The Orchestra" from Telarc is divided into several small tracks but the symphony is played as one piece with seamless transitions between every movement. Using Amarra there is this 1 second delay between each track, and it is just unbearable to listen to. With this album I just have to turn Amarra off. Very often I experience that Amarra cuts off a small piece of the next track on "regular" albums. Not much but enough to be very disturbing and annoying. The reply from Sonic Studios was that they've put in a delay before each track because of networking support. They also said that they plan to add a the possibility to fine tune this delay. I REALLY hope they come up with a solution to this very soon. It seems rediculous that a free Itunes can playback all tracks without delays bewteen tracks but a $1000-1500 piece of software cannot.

Danish - I would contact your dealer. Sonic is my dealer.

Are you setting the external clock manually? For example telling the AFI1 to output 176.4k to the word clock input of the D-05. Or is Amarra changing the sample rate of the AFI1 which then sends the proper word clock signal to the D-05? Hi Chris, I don't have to set anything manually. The AFI1 is connected to the mac mini via firewire. It picks up the sample rate from Amarra and sends the signal to the D-05. The D-05 gets the clock signal via BNC from the AFI1 and the change of sample rate happens automatically in the dac.

This drop outs or silences are part of the demo software, and are intentional. You only have a problem if you paid for the full version. @machinehead I had tried the demo software before I purchased the full version and there are interruptions every 20 seconds or so. This is a problem between tracks only. Have you have some music with several tracks where it is supposed to be a seamless transition between them?

The dropouts - do you notice if you loose lock on your D-05 as it changes track? Good thinking but there is no sign of lost synchronization when Amarra changes to the next track. I just tried to turn off the incoming clock sync but it is excactly the same. Listening to Britten's "Young persons guide to the Orchestra" from Telarc is almost like listening to a demo version of Amarra ..:-|

Hi Danish - I am a big fan of external clocking but it doesn't really work with Amarra. Did I read your post correctly that you are using an external clock and Amarra? Yes, I'm using the word clock out of the AFI1 and into the dac. There is a small click from the DAC when it synchronizes to the incoming clock signal.

@Chris I already sent two mails where I mentioned this issue but no reply at all. At least it's good to know that some users don't have this issue, so it might be hardware related.

If this is inevitable I can't see how Amarra can possibly be the player of choice with certain kind of music or albums. Anyway it should not cut off the beginning of the next track.

Just wanted to tell other D-05 owners out there, that the clock word sync from the Weiss AFI1 to D-05 clock input works absolutely flawlessly. Another thing is that the AFI1 outputs 176.4 and 192 khz through single wire AES into the D-05, which I didn't think was possible. With Amarra playing there is no more buttons to press and no mouse clicks when changing between tracks with different sample rates. Just press play..

Do any of you have problems with a slight interruption between every track with Amarra? I find it tremendously annoying, first of all with albums with classical music where it is supposed to be a seamless transition between every movement. Secondly it very often cuts 1-2 seconds off the beginning of the next track. I wonder if this is due to unsufficient hardware configuration of my mac mini. It is the latest model with 2GB memory.

I see where this metaphor is relevant but I also think this is highly dependent on music genre. The painting analogy is (or should) be less relevant when recording classical music (all acoustic instruments) in a studio. In this case the role of the recording engineer is the same or at least should be very similar to recording a live concert. In both cases the engineer is reproducing the sound produced by the orchestra, singer, or ensemble. Most electronic music is heavily processed and in this case the studio and the recording engineers play a big role in producing the "right" sound.