The DSD-Over-PCM Standard Thanks to the major computer operating systems, Microsoft Windows and Apple OSX, there is no established audio playback system except PCM. So to play back a DSD file without converting it to PCM, a group of experts devised a way to fool the computer’s PCM playback system into playing DSD files in their native format. This group called their solution DSD over PCM, which was quickly reduced to the acronym DoP. To play DSD files in their native format (i.e., not converted to PCM), you need a suitably equipped DAC and server. The rendering part of the server must read DSD files from storage and produce a DoP-encoded signal to send to the DAC. The DAC must recognize the DoP signal and convert it to an analog output the rest of your audio system can handle. This should all be transparent to users, who should only have to create a playlist for the server, just as they now do for PCM files.
DSD Playback Equipment Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Similar questions have been asked about DSD files. Which would come first: DSD-recorded music files, or hardware capable of playing back DSD files? Practically speaking, the hardware came first, and continues to come at a steady pace. Actual music files have been slower in becoming available.
Free DSD64, DSD128 and DSD256 session tracks (stereo, multi and binaural)! This is the kind of thing that will get people engaged in DSD music. Here's to hoping that my Mac/Dac/and Audirvana make it easy for a goofball like me. Very well done native recordings on the Korg at DSD128! Share this post. Link to post Share on.
(I’m talking about actual commercial availability, not the availability of sample files.). A couple of paragraphs earlier, I addressed conceptually the components needed to play DoP. Actual hardware may take the form of a separate renderer, with music files stored on an attached network; a full server, with files stored on an internal or external hard drive and internal server software; or a digital playback component, which combines the renderer or server with a DAC in a single box. The last device has the advantage of taking up the least space, and requiring the least tuning from the user. There are many different ways the basic components of a DSD-capable playback system can be configured.
The LUMIN Audiophile Network Music Player, for example, combines a renderer and a DAC in a single cabinet, with server software and music files stored on a NAS drive attached via a network. Others, like the Wyred4Sound’s MS-1 and MS-2, store their music files on internal hard drives and use an external DAC. Yet others, like Auraliti’s PK100 and PK90-USB, store their music files on external drives, either universal serial bus (USB) drives plugged directly into the players or network-attached storage (NAS) drives connected to the player via a network.
The PK100 has an internal DAC, while the PK90-USB uses an external USB DAC. Personal computers running appropriate playback software can function as the renderer and server. For the Macintosh platform, Audivana Plus, Channel D Pure Music, HQPlayer, and JRiver Media Center can playback DSD files in native format. For the Windows platform, there’s Foobar2000, JRiver Media Center, JPLAY, the Teac HR Audio Player, and HQPlayer.
And for the Linux platform, there’s HQPlayer, Minimserver, and MPD (Music Player Daemon). At the end of this article I've included a table of DSD-capable DACs, servers, and players available at press time. When I say DSD-capable, I’m referring to equipment capable of playing DSD files without converting them to PCM first. (Apologies to manufacturers who were inadvertently omitted.) Setting Up To Play DSD Files To be sure that my findings weren’t source-dependent, I used two separate sources to play DSD files. The first source was my laptop computer running appropriate server software to read and play back the DSD files.
Since I’m a Windows user, I set up both of the server programs I use, Foobar 2000 and JRiver Media Center version 18, to play DSD files. Foobar 2000 needed a couple of add-ons copied to its Components folder, while JRiver 18 will play DSD files without any additional add-ons. I was fortunate to have on-hand for a review MSB Technology’s Analog DAC, which will play both DSD64 and DSD128 files (very nicely, too). JRiver needed a little tweaking to play DSD over PCM, but I figured that out. Source number two was my dedicated Auraliti PK100 file player/server, which recently received a software upgrade that permits it to play DSD files over both SPDIF and USB. The SPDIF connection will only play DSD64 files, while the USB connection will also play DSD128.
All the files I have available are DSD64, so I used the SPDIF connection. Fortunately, the MSB Analog DAC will play DSD over SPDIF; many DACs only play it over USB. A really nice feature of the Auraliti was that it required absolutely no setup; it was truly plug and play. That’s extremely rare. I didn’t compare how the two sources sounded—that’s beyond the scope of this article.
But I did verify they sounded consistent on all the files, both DSD and PCM, I played. Finding DSD Files To Download So far, the only way to acquire DSD files, other than recording them yourself, is by downloading them. When you first download a DSD album, you will realize that the size of a download is huge, especially if you want a multichannel version. The download sites I list below provided DSD albums as of October 2013; there may be others by the time you read this.
Blue Coast Records. Operated by renowned recording engineer Cookie Marenco, whose aggressive advocacy of DSD recording has made her a recognized spokesperson for the DSD recording system, Blue Coast Records features Marenco’s own outstanding recordings. She says of her work: “Our own recordings are more ‘chamber jazz’ and ‘coffeehouse acoustic.’” Some of the releases on Blue Coast Records are very short, containing only a few songs, and are described as Special Events rather than full albums.
They are priced accordingly; you don’t have to pay for an album if you only get a few songs. The recordings are offered in 44.1/16 WAV files, 96/24 WAV files, DSD64 files in DFF or DSF formats, and some are offered on a gold CD.
Prices for a full album are $20.00 for 44.1/16, $40.00 for 96/24, and $50.00 for DSD64 in either DSD or DFF. Gold CDs cost $40.00. If these prices seem rather high, let me just say that the site offers lots of sales. I decided to download Special Event 19, a collection of ten solo guitar pieces played by Alex de Grassi. To my disappointment, after I had paid for the release, I discovered that I had to download each song separately. Seems like it wouldn’t have been that hard to include all the songs in a single zip file that I could download as a single file. Every other download site I use lets you download an entire album in a single operation.
There didn’t seem to be any liner notes or cover art, either. Since each song was a separate zip file, that meant I had to extract each one separately—not hard, just time-consuming. I went through the steps necessary to extract the DFF files and load them onto my server. Then I cued up the first piece, “Shortening Bread.” Holy cow—what a fantastic recording! It’s probably the best recording of guitar I’ve heard, with amazing detail but still sounding so lifelike.
If I quibble at all, it would be that the guitar seemed to lack a little body. That’s a quibble, not a complaint. I also noted that both cover art and track data were present on JRiver, something I can’t say about some other DSD downloads. Well done, Cookie! And Alex de Grassi, of course.
Jet Audio Player Free Download
There has been a lot of buzz lately generated by show demonstrations of DSD recordings played directly from files and as the opportunity to download DSD files is. The reactions of our writers have ranged from ',' to an ',' to my own delight reported in the upcoming May issue of Stereophile. The hardware used has been mostly professional (Sonoma workstation) or semi-professional (Mytek Stereo 192-DSD) or, at the very least, costly enough for the unconvinced to hesitate. Now, in one fell swoop, Oppo has made this possible at no cost at all for those of us who own an Oppo BDP-103 or BDP-105.
Oppo has just offered ' firmware that provides a plethora of new features and fixes, most of which are addressed to audio matters. The players will now support AIFF files, exFat drives, and have enhanced support for CUE files and playlists.
Most important, since it is at the top of the change list, is 'support for Direct Stream Digital (DSD) file playback from local storage. The DSD files can be either stereo or multi-channel. Both the DFF and the DSF formats are supported.'
A review of these Oppo players will appear soon in the May 'Music in the Round' and I will be following up with a report on my experiences with multichannel DSD playback. However, I have been using this new feature for a month now and it is too important to hold back. One simply plugs a USB drive (formatted FAT32 or, now, exFat) with DSF or DFF files into the front or back USB 'A' jack on the Oppo and select it as source.
The DSD files will appear on the track/album/artist lists on the video display (above). Just click and play as with the more familiar WAV, FLAC, etc. Now, here's the really good news. The Oppo will play multichannel as well as stereo DSD and that makes the Oppo the least expensive multichannel DSD-file player by a wide, wide margin. I have been enjoying glorious multichannel downloads from Channel Classics' website as well as a couple of their spectacular 'live' session files (Mahler Symphony 1 and #) made at the recording and without edits. Wow is all I can say. Here are the caveats.
Oppo warns that it 'is not possible to revert back to any previous official or beta firmware releases once this version is installed on the player. There will be no problem upgrading to any future official or beta firmware releases.'
They add that 'due to the extensive changes in this major firmware update, it is required that the user performs a 'Reset Factory Defaults' operation after the firmware is installed. You may experience stability issues if this step is not performed.' Also, streaming DSD files from a server is not yet possible. But this is a big deal. So, at the moment, it is your move but an official release is undoubtedly just on the horizon. The revivial of DSD as a distribution format is dubious at best.
The same noise shaping process is required in any 1-bit recording.something a simple spectral analysis will confirm. To keep the audio band clean, all of the noise is moved above 30 kHz. And few fail to realize that many if not most DSD recordings have been processed using high definition PCM during the post production and mastering stages.
Even after more than 10 years after the introduction of the SACD format, there are no tools for doing DSD mixing or mastering in the DSD format. And there are not likely to be. Record labels, including Morten's 2L company, do not record using DSD.he uses DXD, which is a high sample rate and longer word length version of PCM.
I had the chance to compare a native DSD, HD PCM and analog tape recording of the same ensemble a couple of weeks ago at a beautiful studio in Montana. The results were very interesting. I'll be posting them on the real HD-Audio blog very soon.
I not saying that DSD cannot sound terrific! I have heard some tremendous recording that were done natively in DSD but they weren't 'closer to analog' (whatever that means) or anything of the sort. In fact, they weren't any better than a 96 kHz/24-bit PCM recording done with care.
The formats available to interested audiophiles have different attributes.some positive and some negative.but that all have a 'sound'. For me, I want to avoid the distortion and limited frequency response associated with DSD.and that means I will continue to record and deliver my projects in HD-Audio using PCM.