existentialhero

falcongate's reply mostly covered the ground I meant to. I'll just add a couple of things: DLNA support isn't built into MPD, but I believe there are mechanisms for doing it through ALSA, the sound infrastructure/backend used in most modern Linux distributions. This would not be a beginner-level hack, but it may be possible. If you're running a machine comparable to the CAPS, you might look into VortexBox as a more fully-featured alternative to Voyage. Voyage is great as an ultra-lightweight setup, but to maintain its svelte figure it omits a lot of goodies that might be useful in a more powerful machine. Relatedly, if you decide to try Voyage, you won't need anything like twenty gigabytes of hard drive capacity. You won't even need one. My Alix ran Voyage quite happily off what I believe was a 256MB CF card. Good luck, and feel free to post back here or to PM me if you run into problems!

Voyage keeps most of the filesystem read-only by default, so you won't be able to do any apt operations. You need to run: remountrw before doing anything that will modify the dist, including the "apt-get update"/"apt-get upgrade" sequence above. Afterwards, you can run: remountro to put it back. In practice, however, I find that the upgrade process often makes this impossible (you'll get an error to the effect of "/ is busy" if this is the case); if this happens, you just need to reboot.

Stock configuration for MPD should do just fine; most of the available options are for wacky corner cases and have sane defaults. Depending on how you're connecting MPD to your music, you might want to turn on auto_update so you don't have to manually update the database every time you add music.

"apt-get --just-print upgrade" will do what you want. You can also shorten it to "apt-get -s upgrade", where -s is short for --simulate, an equivalent option to --just-print. Note that in either case you still need to do "apt-get update" first so your packages lists are up-to-date.

It would be relatively easy to configure a Linux-based player to output the left and right channels of a stream to separate devices, so you could use two DACs in the way you describe. Doing it with some sort of outboard hardware PCM demuxer would be massive overkill; ALSA is definitely up to the task, and even the Alix boxes have two USB ports. However, timing issues can creep in quickly with this sort of setup, and bonding the clocks of the DACs to prevent them would be a lot of work.

You say you're looking for recommendations for HP amp, Headphones, DAC, Computer and interconnect There's a lot to think about here! Going in (mostly) reverse order: Interconnects aren't my specialty, but at the least should be left until you've picked the components they're connecting. Come back to this one. Since you say you're looking for a computer, I assume you're building a whole listening setup for a room that currently doesn't have a computer. (If there is a computer in the room where you want to listen, I'd recommend starting by using it, then moving to a dedicated rig later if you decide you need it. This will allow you to experiment before you invest.) The decision of what sort of computer to use hinges on a few considerations: Do you have an existing library of music files stored on another computer in your house? If so, you should consider a setup that allows you to access the files over the network. If not, you need a listening computer with enough storage to hold all your music. Do you have a preference for operating system? Many folks around here are enthusiastic about Apple's OSX, for its tight integration with the popular iTunes software and relatively good access to the hardware. Others use setups based on Windows, like the C.A.P.S. favored by Chris Connaker, our host. I personally prefer Linux-based systems, since it allows me to run powerful music-playback software on very low-end hardware, but I'm already a Linux guy. If you're already familiar with one of these, using the same operating system on your listening machine will give you a familiar environment. Do you have a preference for computer->DAC interface hardware? If you're planning to use USB, any of these operating systems and just about any hardware will do (although there are of course lots of tweaks and upgrades available). If you're hoping to use S/PDIF, you're again probably fine with anything, but you should be sure that either your computer includes an appropriate output or that you purchase and can install a card that has it. If you're hoping to use something more exotic like I²S, however, you'll need to consider your options carefully. Once you've thought out details like these, there are lots of knowledgeable folks around here who will be glad to help you put something together that suits your needs. [*]DAC selection is the subject of endless discussion and debate around here. Opinions differ wildly as to what features are important, what is the best computer->DAC interface, and what models have the best sound. My personal feeling is that, for a headphones-based system and assuming basic standards of quality are met, choice of DAC is more important than choice of headamp but much less important than choice of headphones, much the same way that speakers are the most telling component of a conventional system. Others will, of course, disagree. Without getting too deeply embroiled in this, I'll say that you should carefully consider whether you want a combined headamp/DAC or two separate units. Separates will allow you to tweak the selection of the two components separately and to upgrade either independently, but an integrated unit will give a cleaner signal path and may save you some money — although, with your budget, this may not be an issue. [*]Headphone amplifiers are a wild and confusing world. The most important consideration (other than basic standards of quality, of course) is that the amplifier has sufficient power to drive the headphones you choose; closely following this in significance is impedance matching. This is a complex topic, so I'll just refer you to an extensive blog post on the subject. If you're planning to go to the extreme high end of the headphone world, you may also want to look for a truly balanced headamp, although this will only matter if you have balanced headphones. Any pair of headphones can be recabled for balanced operation, however, if you're a DIY type. Just as with hi-fi amplification, you also need to consider whether you want solid-state or tube gear, which offer roughly the same characteristics in the headphone world. [*]Finally, and most importantly (in my book), comes the selection of headphones. In practice, your headphones choice will drive your headamp choice, which in turn may affect your DAC choice as well, so you should start here. As I mentioned above, the impedance of the headphones you select is critical, as it determines how much juice your amplifier needs to provide to drive them. If you select a pair with impedance in the tens of ohms, any commercial amplifier will have no trouble at all, and in fact you could probably drive such cans satisfactorily from a portable player. The Beyerdynamic cans you mention, however, have an impedance of 600?, which is high enough that it would be an important consideration. Most commercial amplifiers will be fine with such impedances, but certainly not all. In broad terms, modern external headphones (in-ear monitors or 'earbuds' are a whole other subject which I'm less familiar with) are divided into two classes, open and closed, based on whether the back of the earcup is acoustically opaque or transparent. Open cans are often praised for their faster response, more transparent sound, and bass clarify, but often have reducecd bass response compared to closed cans and, critically, do not isolate sound in either direction. Open headphones, therefore, are not suitable for noisy listening environments or for quiet shared spaces, since you can heard external sounds and everyone else can hear your music. Closed headphones, meanwhile, are able to isolate (some more than others, of course), typically offer improved bass response, tend to have a 'fuller' sound, and often have more perceived soundstaging, but these frequently come at the cost of some bass muddiness and a 'closed-in' quality to the sound. Lower-end closed headphones can sometimes even develop a 'singing-in-the-shower' quality as earcup resonances become excited. Of course, some models in each category break these molds. Discussion on sites like head-fi.org and head-case.org can help you get a sense of the characteristics of any given model. And it seems that I've written a book. Sorry for the long read. I'll close with a few personal recommendations from my (admittedly extremely limited experience). I've been extremely happy with my current setup: Grado SR-80i headphones with an NFB-12 DAC/headamp from Chinese bespoke builder Audio-GD fed over USB. I do hope to upgrade the headphones to a higher-end Grado model sometime in the future, as mine tend to 'fill up' a bit with complex harmonic content like a Rachmaninoff piano prelude, but the overall sound of this setup is quite pleasing, and the NFB-12 has lots of power to spare and a sound that would work in headphones far higher up the ladder. Audio-GD's equipment is known for its overall neutrality, making it a good match for headphones whose sound signature already matches your preferences. Some reviewers suggest that, for example, the Beyerdynamic Teslas you mention when paired with Audio-GD equipment produce a sound slightly too analytic and cold for their tastes. Of course, tastes vary. With your budget, you might consider picking up some entry-level phones from the big players like Grado, Audio Technica, AKG, or Sennheiser to start putting sounds to words. Listen to the phones, then read reviews, and see how what you like and don't like lines up with what people say. Diving into the top of the market without headphone experience is going to be a bit of a crap-shoot if you can't audition, but this would at least let you do a bit of an 'audition lite', and at the end you can probably get back most of what you spend on the used market, especially if you buy used phones to start (which has the added benefit of allowing you to avoid the break-in period and get straight to the real sound). Of course, things will be different once you have an amplifier, but most entry-level hi-fi phones have sufficiently low impedance to be driven by a decent portable source or computer sound card. Also, I'm sure you've heard it plenty already, but if it's at all possible for you to audition gear live, even if you have to drive a hundred miles to do it, you really should. You don't want to regret a $6000 investment. Good luck!

Voyage, by default uses a pretty conservative repository, lenny on the system I'm looking at (which translates into version 5). If you just submitted a new patch it would be in "sid" or "wheezy" or "experimental". Of course, you're quite right. My bs2b-ladspa and libbs2b0 packages have so far only made it down to testing/'wheeze'. Thanks for the catch. If any Voyage-MPD users do want to try bs2b, feel free to PM me for support. Pulling packages from a later version isn't too hard, and testing is pretty safe.

Ah, okay, so it is pulling packages from the main Debian repositories. You (and anyone else using Voyage) should, then, be able to install the bs2b-ladspa package I was talking about before. To your other point, about how Voyage glues together the Voyage team's work with basic Debian: in the /etc/apt/sources.list.d directory, you should find another file which has a Voyage repository. The apt package-management system will look through both repositories for any package you search for and install the one with the highest version number. For the few packages Voyage and Debian repositories both contain, the Voyage team should just set the version number on their package higher, and apt will take care of the rest. Kernels are not automatically upgraded, so nothing gets changed there unless you specify it. The Voyage team's kernels can be identified easily enough, though, as their version numbers end in -voyage (the current default, for example, is linux-image-2.6.38-voyage, while the current kernel in Debian for an Alix would be linux-image-3.0.0-1-486). As an aside, if you're not in Hong Kong, you can speed up your package updates by changing the line deb http://ftp.hk.debian.org/debian/ squeeze main contrib non-free to replace 'hk' with the two-letter code for your country ('us' for the US, for example). This will automatically pick a server in your country. Of course, a Voyage system uses so few packages that it's unlikely to make a whole lot of difference. Thanks for the update, and good luck with your Alix setup!

I'm not a Mac guy, so I can't say for sure, but I'd be very surprised if inadequate CPU power is the problem here. Many of us are running with great success on machines with far less juice than your laptops, such as the Alix embedded board discussed over on the Voyage MPD thread. Perhaps the USB hardware is flaky?

Since OSX has a real Unix behind the scenes, you have all the power of the shell at your disposal. A tool like sox can take care of the conversions, and a quick shell command can take care of the batch process. For example: find /path/to/music -name *.aiff -execdir sox '{}' `basename '{}' .aiff`.wav; I know that probably looks like voodoo, but it will do exactly what you want. To dissect: The 'find' command searches /path/to/music for files ending in .aiff (the * is just a wildcard to indicate that we don't care what comes before .aiff). For each matching file, the command "sox '{}' `basename '{}' .aiff`.wav" is executed, replacing {} with the filename found. The "`basename '{}' .aiff`.wav" bit removes the file extension .aiff from {} and replaces it with .wav. Sox then is executed with a command like "sox song.aiff song.wav" and knows what to do.

Does Voyage automatically track Debian packages? I've just gotten a LADSPA plugin for the bs2b headphone crossfeed plugin into unstable, and folks using Voyage MPD to drive a headphone rig might like to check it out. It can be hooked directly into your ALSA chain; an example asound.conf is included in the package.

On a different note, if the drive is still labelled from the manufacturer, you should be able to RMA it directly through them. All the major manufacturers that I've worked with warranty their drives for three to five years and only ask for serial numbers. Going this route should lead to getting your drive replaced with a refurbished unit of the same model with a couple of weeks' delay.

Accessing the data over Ethernet has one major advantage: galvanic isolation. Hard drives are electrically noisy, which can have serious implications for SQ if it happens inside your music server. Using an Ethernet-based NAS also makes it easier to share the files among multiple computers, which may or may not be useful in your setup.

Given what you've described about your system, the amplification is probably the weakest link — receivers aren't known for their audiophile-grade amplifier sections. If your receiver has line-level outputs, you could pick up an entry-level two-channel amplifier for two to three hundred dollars, wire your speakers to that, and probably reap significant gains in all measures of sound quality. If you use the receiver for home theater and have more than just the two speakers, you can get a five- or seven-channel amplifier of respectable quality for something in the range of five hundred dollars (especially if you go used), or use an upgraded two-channel amp for your stereo speakers and let the receiver's amps handle the rest. My intuition would be that the DAC in your receiver, while also worth upgrading at some point, is probably not as much of a hindrance to SQ as the amplification. Most folks around here tend to focus on bitperfection in their playback chains, so DSP enhancements are mostly out. I'd recommend at least trying any new gear you buy with a neutral, bit-perfect playback chain first, since you may well find that the EQ was necessary only to compensate for deficiencies in your old equipment. At the end of the day, though, all of this should be about getting the sound that you enjoy the most, so use the EQ if you like it! Can you say anything more specific about what you find lacking in your current setup or what you hope to improve? There's definitely room to move up-market on all of your gear, but how much bang you get for your buck will depend on the extent to which what you buy makes the changes you need to get the sound you want.

I'm with the previous — if you're not satisfied with the bass response of your system, it's probably because you're just using two small bookshelf speakers. Adding a discrete subwoofer or moving to full-range stereo speakers (like the B&W 683's in the same series) would add a lot of body to the sound you're getting. If you opt for a subwoofer, your receiver should have no problem handling the crossover, sending low frequencies to the sub and higher frequencies to the speakers. Given the equipment you're using, I'd say this is the component most likely have a large effect on the deficiencies in your sound. A center speaker is essential for home theater applications, since it's used for dialogue in film soundtrack mixes. I'm sure it's also used in surround music mixes, but those are pretty rare. My opinion would be that a center really doesn't need to enter the picture until you move to a full surround set; if you take the previous commenter's advice to upgrade to full-range front speakers and move your 685's to the rear, though, you'll be in that position. A discrete DAC could be a good addition to your stereo music-listening setup as well, but it won't solve your bass woes. It may help with the 'harsh' quality you perceive in the music, but it's also possible that this is caused by the amplifier in your receiver rather than your DAC. If you can lay hands on a high-quality analog source (either a DAC or a disc player with a good internal DAC like the Oppo Blu-Ray players), even just to audition, you can test this quickly—if the high-quality analog source makes your system sound better, your DAC is to blame, and if it doesn't, you should look instead at the amplification. A dedicated stereo amplifier might be a worthwhile investment in this case; an entry-level music amp like those from Emotiva would only cost a few hundred dollars. Note, however, than an external DAC of the sort discussed on these forums generally will be for stereo only. If you want to listen to multichannel audio (whether for movie soundtracks or multichannel music), you're going to need different hardware. You could upgrade to a higher-grade home theater processor and feed it from your computer over HDMI, or you could use an audiophile-grade internal sound card's multichannel analog outputs. My personal preference and recommendation is for the former, since computers are really bloody noisy places to put analog audio processing equipment, but many people have done the latter successfully.