Amarra_Support

Time to jump in here, been very busy, a couple of things to pass along. - We have new versions of Amarra 4/Amarra 4 Luxe for both Mac and WIndows that we are very close to releasing to the public. There may be a few more fixes, but you're welcome to test it out from the links below: Mac: https://downloads.sonicstudio.com/Amarra4Luxe/Amarra_4_Installer.4.2.427.zip Windows: https://downloads.sonicstudio.com/Amarra4Luxe/Amarra_Setup_4.2.427.exe - DSD via DoP is still being worked on, very sorry for the delays but we've had to shift some priorities around a little bit and had to focus on some critical issues. - Using Browser Mode - the reason for Browser mode is to offload Amarra from many activities. The Amarra app is still responsible for playback, however in the background the browser can do our library management and other activites. It's an effort to provide better performance and sound. - The EQ is not going away. The quality of the EQ is not in question, most of the best mastering houses around the world have been using Sonic Studio Mastering EQ for many years. We trust folks like Universal Studios, Warner Music Group, Other Shoe Productions (Neil Young), Abbey Road Studios and so many others to determine what's really needed in a world-class EQ. The EQ in Amarra is a lite version of SSMEQ. We've tried to make the EQ relatively easy to use with a minimum of choices for things like Dithering. The majority of folks don't understand what Dithering is and why they would use it. For those that need additional EQ features such as choice of Dithering, we would recommend using Amarra sQ+ as an Audio Enhancer you can apply to any audio stream. - Amarra Play available on your iOS app store is a great partner to Amarra Luxe. It's free on the App store and when used with Amarra Luxe can stream your Luxe library to your mobile device (no DSD streaming). You can also download tracks from your Amarra Luxe library to your mobile device for offline use. In addition, when using stand-alone, you'll have access to your iTunes library on your mobile device and have your music up-sampled and overall improvement of quality. We'd recommend everyone give it a try, it's very cool. - When using iTunes mode, we have had reports of iTunes crashing randomly. We are aware of this and are working to isolate what the cause may be. If you run into this and have a repeatable recipe, please pass is along. - If you're having issues with artwork in Amarra, it may be that the artwork is not attached to the file you are importing. A fairly simple method of adding artwork to your music can be found at: https://app.teamsupport.com/?TicketNumber=22043 It uses kid3, a free audio tagger and has the ability to go out and search several sites for artwork and attache them to your music. Save when done and then re-scan. You should get much better results. That's all for now, happy Saturday! Ralph

Note this article is in our knowledge base at: https://app.teamsupport.com/?TicketNumber=22011

We are aware of the this issue and have asked Dirac on many occasions for an update, still waiting on that. In the meantime, we do have customers that are successfully using iRC with Amarra 4 Luxe. Please try the following steps. Start from a clear slate. - Use IRC 1.2.4 to create new filters - Install Amarra Luxe - Select EQ to display the EQ window - Select the word Advanced next to the iRC logo - Add a filter - Turn it on - Close IRC window - Quit Amarra Luxe - Re-boot - Re-launch Amarra Luxe - Scan library - Test IRC If issue still exists - Quit and re-launch Amarra Luxe and should be fine.

Hi All, Just wanted to jump in and provide an update on the discussions above about product mix and where we are headed. In the past we've tried to provide a unique solution for each group of users, ending up with Amarra Hifi, Amarra, Amarra Symphony, Amarra for TIDAL and Amarra sQ. The level of confusion was exhausting and customers were not happy that they couldn't use one tool for everything. Our goal is to simplify the number of product we have, not to expand that number. We're focused on a 2 key products - Amarra 4 Luxe, our player and Amarra sQ+, our Audio Stream Enhancer. Quick Note: Regarding iTunes integration, this is expected to be available on Mac only for engineering reasons. Very sorry for any mis-information previously provided. The vision for Amarra 4 Luxe is to be a one stop player to be used for local file playback and playback from some streaming services such as TIDAL. We have a few other vendors on the list for future releases. - iTunes integration for Mac, FLAC file support, DSD support, MQA unfolding or Passthrough to support any DAC. - Within Amarra 4 Luxe, you'll have a choice to select tracks from your iTunes library via the iTunes interface (Mac only) or to select tracks by scanning local music folders for those tracks that are not supported by iTunes including FLAC and DSD files. The vision for Amarra sQ+ is to continue to lead as a general purpose, audio stream enhancer - a series of professional grade tools that can be applied to almost any audio stream to improve the overall sound. It includes lite versions of Sonic Studio Mastering EQ and Broadband noise reduction, pro grade volume control, metering and dithering, and an option for IRC Room Correction. The Amarra Remote works with both Amarra sQ+ and Amarra 4 Luxe. We know there is work to do on both A4 Luxe and the Amarra Remote and we are busy taking care of many open issues. If you haven't done so yet, please update your Amarra Remote to v1.3 on the app store. There are some additional features that are being added to the remote including the ability for local playback on your iDevice. More to come on this soon best Ralph

Hi All, Thought I'd jump in here again. As you all well know, there have been many issues with Amarra 4 that we've been trying to address. The biggest was getting to a point where you can scan your library without Amarra crashing. There were many challenges in this area on both Mac and Windows platforms, but we do believe they've been addressed. The next key area was finishing up the MQA integration on both Mac and Windows platforms. We have several very high priority items that we need to address, the biggest of the 2 are making sure your scanned library imports into the correct albums and artists, the other is the tracks being listed and playing in the correct order. Not all of you see these issues, depending on what you listen to. We know Artwork is an issue, however scanning a complete library and having tracks in the correct locations are a bit higher in priority for us. In the meantime, we are working on a solution including iTunes, more information will be available in the coming weeks. best Ralph

Hi All, Sorry for the delay, got a bit backed up over the holiday with the Black Friday sale. I wanted to give an update regarding iTunes integration with Amarra 4. We are now looking into this and doing some initial testing. If all works well, we'd provide a platform to use iTunes to select and manage your library and Amarra will be the playback engine. It's still early, I don't have any other details other than we are looking at it now. For those that were wondering why we were even looking into this, the answer is really two-fold. - First is a sound quality issue. iTunes is a jack-of-all-trades, master-of-none player. It uses Core Audio for playback which is used by just about every other function on the Mac to make noise. The result is that using iTunes for playback does not provide the best sound available, what we feel is the holy grail. For those of you that use Amarra 3, compare iTunes mode with Amarra Playlist mode and I think you'll hear improvements when only using Amarra Playlists. The same is true for Amarra 4, it was purpose built to playback music, doesn't use core audio and the result is the great sound. - The second part is that we needed to do this so we can support some future projects including the Remote, MQA support, DSD support and some other goodies that are coming in the future. We're still making more improvements and appreciate your continued feedback. Fyi, if you're using the remote and haven't updated recently, there's a new version on the App Store, v1.3. best Ralph

A link to the new iRC Measure.app v1.2.4 can be found at: http://downloads.sonicstudio.com/iRC/iRC_Measure_1.2.4.zip We're in process of updating the website, very sorry for the inconvenience. best Ralph

Oversight on our part as we were having issues with the IRC. If you are already licensed, the window comes up. We are fixing this for the next build. In the meantime, you can use either Amarra Symphony or Amarra sQ+ to license IRC and then you will see the iRC window show up in A4Luxe. Please write to me at [email protected] if you need more details.

Thanks for all the comments, there is still more work to be done and more to come. - Regarding the meters, we are going to stick with the colored meters for 2 reasons - they provide more information to set the correct output volume (you don't want the meters in the red) and they are more in line with our other products like the EQ in Amarra sQ+. That said, I can pass along the request and we can review for potential integration in the future. - We understand the saving duration is an issue and we are looking at ways of improving that, especially if only making a small change to the library. - We are reviewing adding in a limit for upsampling and expect to have something implemented in an updated build. Still more to come best Ralph

Hello to all, I been a bit of time but I wanted to reach out to all of you with an update on where we are with Amarra 4 and Amarra 4 Luxe. As a quick note first, I wanted the forum to know that we do monitor your feedback, it's very valuable to us. Your comments regarding bugs and feature requests are reviewed along with the feedback we get from many other sources in order to prioritize activities. We all want products that sound great and provide the usability needed to be effective, we are always moving towards this goal. To that end, we do have a new release out for both Mac and Windows, v4.1.364. Install links are below: Mac Installer: http://downloads.sonicstudio.com/Amarra4Luxe/Amarra_4_Installer.4.1.364.zip Windows Installer: http://downloads.sonicstudio.com/Amarra4Luxe/Amarra_Setup_4.1.364.exe We recommend an uninstall and fresh install to ensure a clean slate. There are enough changes that you'll want to re-scan your library. There are a few updates and known issues to pass along as well. - MQA support is available on Mac, will be available on Windows shortly -There was a note in this thread about using Launch in Browser having some issues on Mac. This function is going to be replaced by a new underlying structure that will provide the same functionality. In the meantime, Launch in Browser mode is really designed to be used with Chrome rather than Firefox or Safari - Depending on the size of your library, scanning and saving your library can take some time. - Libraries up to about 25k-30k work well. As your library grows, it may be more impacted by available space and memory on your computer, other applications that may be running and background processes that may 'wake up' during playback. That all said, we do have customers that have libraries upwards to 100K tracks and they are successfully using Amarra every day. - The Remote still needs work and a new release of it will be available shortly. - Windows environments seems to be more susceptible issues from an overloaded CPU such as static and stuttering. Reseting the device can help. Quit and Re-launch to re-initialize your device. - We recommend Windows Audio (Exclusive Mode) or ASIO for the Windows Device Type when possible. - When Upsampling on the Mac, the counter values are larger than expected. They are multiplied by the amount the track is upsampled by - 2x or 4x - EQ Curves are off set when using Upsampling - Nodes and values are correct. We are aware of several other areas that need addressing and are busy working on those improvements. Please continue to provide feedback, it helps to make a better product! best Ralph

All of our Amarra products provide a free 14 day trial, available at our website. We'd recommend using Amarra 4 Luxe. It provides playback for your local library and access to your TIDAL library. The current test build to use is at the link below: http://downloads.sonicstudio.com/Amarra4Luxe/Amarra_Setup_4.1.360.exe

Just a quick update to all, we are actively looking into this. Our first investigation using Little Snitch and other tools is that we did not see any unusual network access. We are continuing our investigation and will let you know if we see anything out of the ordinary. best Ralph

Thanks for all of your comments, we do read them and appreciate all of your feedback. We weigh that feedback with other business drivers that may arise and make decisions accordingly. Sometimes that puts a suggestion out to a new release, very sorry for any inconvenience. We are continuing to work on Library Management, MQA integration, DSD via DoP, artwork issues and overall ease of use. More to be available shortly. In addition, we are continuing to work on improving overall performance on large scale libraries. best Ralph

Yes, we do, Amarra caches 2 or 4 tracks depending on local library or TIDAL use. This is not selectable at this time, under consideration for future builds.

Try the updated build of Amarra 4 for the larger files, you should be able to load the Garcia&Grisman track without issue in v233. best Ralph