Audiophile Servers 

There are three components in a streaming system, the server, renderer and controller. The server connects the renderer with the file at the instructions of the controller,. and the renderer plays it.

Of course it’s a server. It’s serving it’s purpose to keep the audio clean.

@@Paulmcgowanpsaudio Interesting. Quite a bit different terminology usage compared to the computer world.

@@thetwin314 Apparently. Like yourself I learned that the server /client relationship is that the data lives on the server and is delivered to the client which is typically the desktop application. This is as described by the OSI model. I think that as computer audio matured that relationship may have changed.

Nucleus makes no sense to me, it is just a 7 Gen NUC on a different chassis. A stock NUC upgraded with a linear PSU could sound better for 1/3 the price of a nucleus possibly.

You are correct. That’s also a galvanic isolation. The good thing is that when it’s placed correctly in the chain it’s removing the noise from multiple components. You have to pay attention on the optical receiver part as that also needs a power supply !

@@hansbogaert4582 Thank you. Follow-up question, the RF receptor also needs a power supply right?

@@mardak2871 spot on. That’s why it has an isolated power supply

@@stevenp3176 Optical does transmit RF as that is the common technology used in the cable space ( look it up, AM fiber ) But that has nothing to do with Audio. The question raised by Mardak was driven about the content talked about by paul in the video and the question is answered in line with that.

@@stevenp3176 yes we are talking about the data going through RF or Optical not RF itself.

Well the low frequency can be explained easily, besides hearing you can literally feel it through your body. For the higher frequency, many people can hear above 20khz. I don't and i'm not focused on frequency ranges but more on how something makes mee feel. Music is about emotions imo.

@@the_dude182 yes you are right music is emotional thing for consumers but it is technical thing for musicians and producers besides emotions

@Douglas Blake hmm you mean that in producing process of amps or speakers pruducers accually can not specify or determine the output's frequency interval? Because of the undetermined physical reasons the goods will be pruduced in larger frequecy interval? Or in order to give hearable frequecies they product the goods for larger interval.?

@Douglas Blake i see 👍🏻 thank you so much

Is very simple explanation. Just like 200 watt amps ...most of the playing happens around 10 watts at the most. It is not that you will play at 200 watt but the curve of the sound makes it improve sound at lower levels with higher wattage of the same topology.

@Douglas Blake I know and agree. At the same time it's Paul claiming that jitter will degrade the digital file/stream and their "audiophile" server will be designed in which the digital signal path will be totally galvanically isolated. I'm for sure not convinced there will be any measurable improvement in the resulting analogue audio with such an architecture. But hey, it's High End, it's not about measuring, it's the "golden ears" BS.

Yeah, an optical connection is IMO best. I had issues with audio on my PC with power supply noise (you could actually hear when the graphics card got stressed). Now I have an optical connection to an external DAC/headphone amplifier. No more noise, and the amplifier is better at driving my headphones. He is of course correct about the network not having any influence on sound, and "audiophile switches/network cables" are BS. The streamed data is buffered in the RAM of your PC anyway (that is, the 5 minute music file you want to play is probably transmitted to your PC within a couple seconds and then just sitting there in memory while being played), so the network only has an influence on the sound if it is so problematic that data does not arrive at all. But that is not really a "sound quality issue", that is more like wanting to play music and not finding the CD you want to play :-) The only possible actual sound issues are within the DAC/in the analog output.

​@@freibier spot on.

probably inflatable. She has to be silent because of the noise floor.

A person who listen to music without doing anything else while listening.

Literal meaning is someone who derives pleasure from sounds. Colloquial meaning seems to be people who pursues a specific/certain music listening experience using a variety of audio components (sources, converters, amps, steamers, phonos, speakers, headphones, etc.).

A person who thinks he is listening to the most faithful reproduction of his music on an overrated cheap or expensive 2 channel audio system built by people who know all or little about music...

An individual who knows so much about music, they can name that tune in one note.

To the audiophile: a person who enjoys good audio. To the general public: a person who is ridiculously obsessive about audio. To the marketing department: a wide open wallet.

I still use Windows 95 on my computer, because Windows 10 is not audiophile enough.

Funny thing is that several times when switching from Windows to Linux on a computer I've noted better sound from it!

@@sharg0 well, this COULD be explained by the quality of the sound driver, wich COULD be better on Linux, and the kernel scheduler wich is better on Linux for sure. Of course this is purely speculative, without further investigation and proper mesurements. (disclaimer: i'm a software engineer)

He’s not in IT, he’s more into marketing and old school engineering.

@@gilgalaad80 LOL Yes!!!!!!!!

it don't on the ethernet layer

@Douglas Blake and why did you think I need ethernet explained? i am software developer and system administrator with the knowledge how tcp/ip works in detail and just supported your statement frankly, i get tired of audiophile idiots talking about digital stuff but still living in an analog world

@Douglas Blake i responded to "why would the power in our homes differ?" with "it don't on the ethernet layer"

No, "Marketing". I would not call Paul a clown in every aspect, there are quite some interesting topics he addresses in this channel and giving good analysis. This howeve, is not a technically sound claim in my view.

@@ewoutbuhler5217 Even if we take away the fact that he is marketing his products on every single video, a lot of the “information” he gives is totally wrong. I would encourage you to view one of his latest videos, if you haven’t done already, about open baffle speakers, where he states that out of phase on the tweeter does not matter because high frequencies have shorter wavelengths an they do not interfere with each other. If you do not know what comb filtering is I would also encourage you to get some info on the subject on when it occurs, why and the effects of it and tell me if the “information” he gives you is correct.

And the impact of blue ice falling from the heavens and impacting your prize bull can have an impact on your breeding business.

😂 true!!!

I am in my 50s and using a test tone can hear 14,000hz. I don't think that is very special, but my 14yo son can only hear 15,000hz, so not sure what hearing loss outcomes you are tuning into

Why would I trust anything a failed Microsoft VP would say?

Bluesound node 2i for the win

@@idray986 i have Bluesound Node 2. Can not be beaten. Superb sound with my Emotiva XPA2 and pair of floor standing, full range electrostatics.

@@geoff37s38 I disagree. I did a back to back with a Bluesound Node 2 I borrowed from my local shop and my Antipodes Audio CX/EX combination. The Bluesound was signficantly worse to listen to, thinner and more brittle. Big difference in price, yes, but worth it

@@tfj100 I cannot really comment on your experience as I do not know your source or speakers but it is not my experience that the Bluesound sounds thin and brittle. I have tried a number of DACs but find audible differences trivial compared to differences between different loudspeakers. Sometimes I think it is difficult to conclude one sound is better over another sound and it can take hours of listening to draw any firm conclusion.

@John RussellThat's not the point. If a file residing on a server is requested by a client it will be transported to that client over the network. To make that possible some protocols like for example the TCP/IP stack are in play. If a file is healthy it will stay that way as long as no errors occur during transport that are outside the capability of the error correction used to keep that transport in check. In that sense it does not matter if it's an audio file or something else. That has nothing to do with the error correction of the CD.

@John Russell I am not debating a "so called perfect CD player" (though I have one that is not bad to say the least). But that has nothing to do with the server my files are stored on. And I am pretty sure that my file server adds next to nothing to the noise in my clients while serving out the Flac files what ever their origin is.

@Douglas Blake I couldn't agree more ! 😂😂

A PS audio PS for the PC... a great idea!!!

@@graxjpg Right?? Theres a few companies making full on "Audiophile" PC's, but the price & design is overkill! A PS Audio universal 5-12v PSU would also make alot of sense for Raz-Pi, and similar devices.

@@AllboroLCD I’ve seen people use raz-pi’s for all sorts of crazy artsy stuff. I think a PS Audio power supply would be awesome, in my mind it’s all futuristic and can power things like guitar pedals and breadboard circuits haha.

@John Russell I wasnt aware of the IFI, ive read/heard they make a decent DAC though.

@@graxjpg Not much you CANT do with a Pi really. Im specifically talking about the Pi as a DAC/Server/Streamer. It be cool as all hell to see a Hi-end brand develop an "audiophile" grade case for the Pi with isolated PSU & DAC built in and maybe inputs for a CD transport!

Think of it as "server marketed towards audiophiles". Audiophiles have shown to be willing to significantly overpay for marginal improvements, so of course they are provide a fertile target for the repacking of generic solutions in costly packaging.

@@Ascania Yes, but in this case what would even be possible as "marginal improvements" to audio fidelity from a Wifi connected "audiophile server"? LOL, it's silly talk. It's like saying that a particular server will make your photos or movies look better. Data is data and it just needs to be without errors and arrive in time for the audio decoder not to get starved.

@Lassi Kinnunen 81 Well, there is a real potential issue with noise from digital electronics leaking into analog circuits of an audio system. A switch mode power supply of a computer can also cause noise into your analog gear. Thus a battery powered laptop could be less noisy. That's why you don't want to power your external DAC via the USB cable from the computer but rather use a dedicated power supply for the DAC. But I agree with your point and some companies are trying to scam people with audiophile this and that where it makes zero difference. BTW, ages ago I had a DIY computer and one day I was playing some game on it and suddenly a guy showed up in my room with RF scanning equipment. I was using headphones and he had tried to get in using my door bells and dared just walk into my house as I didn't respond (I had not locked the door). He was a some official government person (Denmark) who was scanning the area for RF signals as the neighbor had problems with his antenna reception of TV signals and filed some complaint as every evening his TV stations dropped out. I didn't know it, but my neighbor have had several repairmen trying to fix it several times. Seriously, my computer power supply yielded noise in a TV antenna that was in a completely detached house (neighbor house around 20 meters away). The guy's scanner pinpointed my computer as the culprit and when I turned it off, the neighbor could watch TV again. I replaced the power supply and the problem got solved.

@@ThinkingBetter you tend to provide more insight than Paul when high tech subjects like this are concerned. I’m not being sarcastic when I say thanks for being so smart, you nerd! That story about the noisy power supply was hilarious.

@@Ascania A dedicated server is worth investing in, and they can be purchased for a pretty fair price. Small Green Computer sells a fanless i5 server for about $1K, and it would cost me about $700.00 to source the parts and build the same thing myself. I consider that a very fair price all things considered. In my experience, it is difficult to get good audio out of a general purpose computer. There are work arounds, but it easier to just get or build a dedicated rig, stick in the corner and forget about it.

@Douglas Blake No streaming and download isn't automatically the same. When you download a file the integrity of the file is often most important, if some packets arrive later or has to be re-sent doesn't matter since the receiving end puts all the pieces in their correct order. On the other hand a pure stream is very time sensitive but a lost packet here doesn't matter much (a sudden large block in the video or a small glitch in the audio). That said most streaming services operate in a hybrid way unless it's real time communication like a phone or video call. There are also technologies available to ease the load on the sender by letting the routers keep track of which users are "listening" and duplicating the traffic as needed....

@Douglas Blake Or UDP/IP

@@sharg0 It theory you are right, but audio streams are not very demanding to modern day IT insfrastructure. And as streams are not realtime, have some buffering to make sure that packets that are not received in the proper order are re-organized well before D/A conversion. Only with a large drop, the sound will click or stop all together. Other than that, the stream of 1's and 0's will be an identical copy of that just after A to D conversion in the studio.

@John Russell this is where mqa fixes alot of that

So?

@@ecowavepowerelectricityfro128 So? So good😁

If someone is streaming porn over the same LAN that the PS Audio audiophile server is serving audio files on does that degrade the sound?