Dean358

Um, excuse me? With all do respect the Sonic equalizer is one of the best sounding digital equalizers out there in both pro and consumer gear. I tend to use it more for SQ+ than Amarra -- one or two dB of low frequency shelf boost goes a long way to helping bad streaming sources, e.g. 80's music videos on YouTube. If you're not into it no worries, don't use it -- but please don't encourage Sonic, a company with with limited resources, to "throw it away."

For many of us iTunes integration is actually critically important, as described up thread. Regarding sound quality, IMHO based on running Amarra, SQ+, Audio Nirvana + and Roon, Amarra produces the best sound quality hands down. Using my Trinnov room processor as an ethernet Roon output node is next best. But Amarra is the only player with that "damn, it's 2:00 AM but just need to listen to one more song" quality. So Ralph and Sonic team, tnx for upgrading A4 to integrate iTunes -- looking forward to it!

With all due respect I completely disagree. For many of us iTunes integration is actually essential. And as DancingSea points out, if the option is there you can always chose not to use it.

Fantastic news, thanks Ralph! Godspeed.

Huh?? Apologies if I haven't been reading these forums carefully enough but for me the connection to iTunes is an absolutely essential attribute for any music playback software. Not having it is a deal breaker and preventing me from upgrading to A4 :-(

Exactly!

Hi All, Having just gone through all 31 pages of this forum I must say, it's been a depressing read. I started building Mac based computer music playback systems around 2003 as a way of not having to carry CDs between our weekday and weekend residences. That has since evolved into much more essential part of every day's music listening. Never having stored anything in a compressed format, my iTunes library now has about 29K tracks and takes up a little under 2 TBytes. I remember how thrilling discovering an early release of Ammara was. IRRC it cost around $950 US dollars at the time for the license. It was and still is IMHO the most musical, analog sounding of all the software players. And while I can't speak to the value of Ammara's iRC (I use Trinnov room correction) the Sonic Mastering EQ is really lovely. As many in this forum have pointed out, Ammara has never been the most bug free software. But Ralph always did / still does a great job of single handily supporting a large user base and helping solve problems. Typing this while listening to playback via Ammara Symphony 3.0.3 -- I'd certainly love to try A4 Luxe, but I can't. Why? Because in the 14+ years I've been building my iTunes library I've been adding my own metadata into the "comment" section of individual song files. These are various flags defining the music e.g., Space, Morning, Exercise, Dinner, Piano, Test, etc., etc. As the comment section is part of the Redbook CD spec this metadata becomes part of the music files and is carried across wherever a file is coped. By using smart playlists, e.g.," look for the dinner music flag," a library too large to memorize can easily be explored and enjoyed on any machine using iTunes. Combine this with years of custom playlists and it's just insane to think of throwing all that away. So to Ralph and the good folks at Sonic Solutions: PLEASE make a version of A4 that works with iTunes! Pretty much everyone posting on this forum agrees on how great your software sounds but is frustrated and disappointed with your file management. Why reinvent the wheel? Short of integrating with Tidal, iTunes already has file management that is highly functional and rock solid. You can even increase the price if you feel the audience is too small for an audiophile product that works with iTunes. (Given what Audiophile playback systems typically cost a few hundred dollars for playback software is not a deal breaker.) But please don't give up on iTunes as that will force many of us to abandon Ammara. Best Regards, Dean

Jesus: tnx for answering SandyK’s question. Being the Mac-centrtic fellah that I am I wouldn’t have known. SandyK: any suggestions / feedback on improving the vinyl setup would be most welcome (I won’t be offended, promise :-) Please do try and listen to at lest one of the PC-1 files, though. This cartridge seems to be the clear favorite of most listeners. This very well might be a function of it being set up better or simply that the PC-1 is more tolerant of set up errors. One last note: these track selections were not chosen for their audiophile sound quality. They were merely representative of what I was listening to that week, which seemed like it would generate more valid data.

As you mentioned, I have not tried this approach because my Pass Xono preamp does not allow me to bypass its RIAA equalizer. In general though, I believe there has to be a demonstrable advantage to working with audio in the digital domain instead of in its natural analog goodness. Music servers and room eq clearly meet that requirement. Doing a simple RIAA curve? Not sure, but if you’re able to PLEASE post the results both ways for all of us to hear! BTW, when you listen to the files I posted you’ll hear a slight bit of hum. I’ve since gotten rid of that by physically separating the power supply and signal chassis of the Xono (they were sitting right on top of each other when these files were recorded.) Cheers, Dean P.S. - One other factor to consider if you do the RIAA curve digitally -- you must be able to apply it in real time in order to listen to turntable playback.

That must have been a really tough e-mail for HDTRACKS to send out. Yes, they deserve our support. Over the course of my career I’ve had the privilege and frustration of working for a couple of “mad genius entrepreneur” types. The same characteristics that make people like that take on “impossible” tasks can sometimes give them blind spots to problems. Particularly when those problems threaten the operation. I’ve never met the Cheskys, but based on the fact that they’re taken on the task of improving the music world by selling a product that’s SO far ahead of the curve, I’m guessing they fit that description. Was HDTRACKS a victim here? Yes, it seems that way. Was this a real problem for a bunch of their customers, including me? It certainly appears to be the case. Did they communicate with their customers in the best possible way? No, not in my opinion. But, are they trying to make things right now? You bet, so now we need to help them grow their business and get past this episode. I believe the issue now is restoring the trust we placed in them when we purchased products from them. As I recall, when I used their download program it called up a dialogue box on my Mac that said something like: “HDTRACKS download program wants to take control of your computer. Is this OK?” Would you now answer “yes” to that? What happened to all of our personal data on their server and back up media? May we delete it? So all of you Internet mavens and comp. sci. geeks: what practicable, affordable suggestions can we offer to help HDTRACKS? What ‘s the best way to solve the trust issues? If the HDTRACKS folks are reading this I hope you won’t think it presumptuous of us to be offering these suggestions. Clearly you’ve got a community of people who truly believe in what you’re doing and we want you to succeed. But even the best product in the world (did I mention how great the hi rez downloads are?) won’t survive if customers don’t feel they can trust the company selling it. Lets please not let that happen here.

I am sorry if my language offended people. I felt we had reached the point where the house was burning, no action was being taken and if someone didn’t yell FIRE more people would get hurt. I’m aware that the owners of the site have made great contributions to our industry. Which is why when I realized what had happened I immediately contacted them directly so they could fix the problem (remember, I wanted to purchase more files!) That didn’t work. Then I started the URGENT! CREDIT CARD FRAUD thread, where I tried to be both respectful and constructive – that didn’t work. So, I felt it necessary to start this thread. You should also be aware that I received an e-mail from another, well-respected “industry icon” who requested anonymity. It read: “Hi Dean - …….I actually had my credit card info stolen through HDtracks last December and I notified them at that time…….. If a company sets up a web site that takes your credit card information in exchange for a product or service they are 100% responsible for the security of that data. But, we live in the real world and stuff happens. A reasonable response is therefore to address the problem in a timely fashion and, of course, apologize to those affected. On the other hand, if after being notified of this type of problem the company, for whatever reason, takes no action and allows the fraud to continue, they become complicit in the crime, i.e., they are stealing the data too. That people who have contributed so much to our industry would allow their company to behave this way is tragic. I don’t even know the right word: offensive? Sad? Stupefying?

The problem is they were alerted to the problem with their site days ago and are not doing anything about it. As recently as a few hours ago another persons credit card info was "compromised." I would post to 30 more forums if it would get HDTRACKS to at least take down the credit card processing part of their site and take responsibility for the problem.

The problem is they were alerted to the problem with the site days ago and are not doing anything about it. As recently as a few hours ago another persons credit card info was "compromised." At a very minimum, HDTRACKS needs to take down the credit card processing part of their site and take responsibility for the problem.

Please look at the URGENT! CREDIT CARD FRAUD thread. The HDTRACKS.COM site is stealing credit card info from it's users. HDTRACKS has not responded to repeated requests to deal with the situation. That means they either don't care or are part of the fraud -- either way that's not my definition of "A Class Act."

There have now been 12 reported cases of users who appear to have had their credit card info stolen after using the HDTRACKS.COM site. Please see the URGENT! CERDIT CARD FRAUD thread in the Audiophile Downloads forum for complete details: www.computeraudiophile.com/content/URGENT-CREDIT-CARD-FRAUD I am cross posting this topic here to warn everyone. DO NOT GIVE THEM YOUR CREDIT CARD INFO !!! If they have your info on file, I recommend you contact your credit card company and cancel the card immediately. When you contact your credit card company please give them this information regarding the operator of the site: HDTRACKS.COM LLC Direct Mktg Misc Doing Business As: HD TRACKS.COM 355 West 52nd Street, Floor 6 New York, NY 10019 (212) 586-1558