Donkeyshins

Correction - Xbox 360S and BDP-S390. -D

Home theater (separate from stereo system which is in the living room) - 5.1 for now but wired for 7.1: Sources: - Xbox 360E + HD-DVD - Sony BDP-S590 Blu-ray player - Media Center 8.1 HTPC (multi-channel cablecard tuning) Preamplifier / Processor: - Anthem AVM 30 Amplification: - Fisher 30A (left amplifier) - Fisher 30A (center amplifier) - Fisher 30A (right amplifier - Parasound ZAmp 1.0 (surround channels) Speakers: - Klipsch KP250 (left, right, center) - Orb 1 (surround) - Hsu VTF2 MK3 (subwoofer) Display: - Pioneer Elite Pro 1130HD -D

David - the problem you are seeing might be related to using a USB D/A converter. Give the Hifiberry DAC+ or Digi (if you want to use a separate D/A converter) a try as they use I2S and are therefore not resource restricted as the USB bus is. I use my Raspberry Pi B + Hifiberry DAC (running Raspian Wheezy and Squeezelite) with WMA lossless / FLAC files and have never had a dropout. Also, it appears that using wireless via USB dongle results in less CPU overhead than the onboard wired NIC (which apparently shares the USB bus as well). I have a Raspberry Pi 2 sitting on my desk, but haven't tried using it for audio playback as I'm trying out Windows 10 IoT at the moment on it. However, given the hardware specs, you would be less CPU bound with the Pi 2, but still dealing with USB contention as they did not change the USB architecture for the 2 AFAIK. Best of luck! -D

Um...nope. Why bother as it is neutered out of the box. I use a Windows 7 Media Center HTPC with a Ceton InfiniTV4 CableCard tuner for all my home theater needs. -D

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_troll

Per Chris' comments, using a laptop - as long as it is one that doesn't sound like a Boeing 767 - is a good choice with a USB DAC and an external drive. If you are going the Windows + laptop route, then you might want to consider using a Windows Home Server (now that they fixed the corruption bug) as your storage server and map a UNC drive to your laptop / music server. It's pretty easy to roll your own (the hardware requirements are nearly Linux-level) and you can add storage on the fly without having to repartition, etc. -D

I just picked up a whole bunch of parts from Digi-Key and Mouser and some Riken Ohm resistors from various sources that I am going to use to rebuild my ST-35 tube amplifier... Does that count? I also picked up 'No Sleep 'til Hammersmith' (new) and 'Freedom of Choice' (used) by Motorhead & Devo respectively on LP. -D

http://www.mini-box.com/Intel-D945GCLF-Mini-ITX-Motherboard<br /> <br /> Intel D945GCLF motherboard running the new Atom 230 CPU. TDP of < 4W (that's the CPU next to the penny). Reports indicate that it runs Vista with ease (as long as you're running a decent amount of RAM). With a street price of < $90, it could be a great choice for a Windows-based music server. You'll probably want to put a better northbridge heatsink on it and pair it with a PICO PSU.

<cite><br /> unless you are using something like XXHighEnd, which is still in beta, supports only .WAV files<br /> <br /> plus FLAC and MP3 (and DTS passthrough) at all common sample rates and bit depths.<br /> Why provide wrong information ?<br /> <br /> :-)<br /> </cite><br /> <br /> My mistake, Peter. I thought you had said at one point that XXHighEnd only supported .WAV. My information must be outdated. My apologies. :-(

Good point. I was under the (mistaken) assumption that Vista had bit-perfect output, but evidently this is not the case (unless you are using something like XXHighEnd, which is still in beta, supports only .WAV files and costs 72 Euros). My apologies.<br /> <br /> On the other hand, from a purely subjective standpoint, how easy is it to tell bit-perfect from non-bit-perfect output? Personally I have no experience so I can't answer this question, but perhaps you can?<br /> <br /> Thanks!

You can install FLAC support into Windows Media Player and Media Center (see http://flac.sourceforge.net/documentation_tasks.html for how-to). I've done it and it works well - it allows for bit-perfect copies in Windows. Plus, if you use Vista Home Premium, you can use the built-in Media Center functionality (and a suitable MCE remote) to remotely control your system (provided you have an monitor).

Some of us out in the world don't like Apple products. Any chance you could do a PC (Windows or Linux) version?<br /> <br /> Perhaps something like this (Windows):<br /> <br /> High-end PC:<br /> - AOpen MP945-D (http://minipc.aopen.com/Global/spec_945D.htm) - $280<br /> - 2GB PC4200 SODIMM (2x1GB) - $40<br /> - Celeron 430 (since you don't need much CPU for a music server) - $52<br /> - 160GB WD Scorpio 2.5" SATA HDD - $90<br /> - Windows XP or Windows Vista (OEM) - $100<br /> - Windows Media Player - FREE<br /> <br /> Alternately, if you want to go cheaper:<br /> - D201GLY2 motherboard + CPU ($75)<br /> - mini-ITX case ($80 - $150 depending on what you want)<br /> - 2GB PC4200 DIMM (single stick) - $40<br /> - 160GB WD Scorpio 2.5" SATA HDD - $90<br /> - Windows XP or Windows Vista (OEM) - $100<br /> - Windows Media Player - FREE<br /> <br /> All other components could remain the same.<br />