I had formerly been using Winamp as my Desktop player at work and it always handled everything. But Winamp is now been dead for a while and even with underground copies it does not handle 4k monitors very well.
Roon, Tidal etc. can't touch some of the files I wish to play that play perfectly on my Home Theater with Logitech Music Server. I want to use the same exact library at work.
I spent hours on JRiver, MusicBee, MediaMonkey and they all came up short.
Foobar2000 handles all formats correctly. Even though not as pretty and slick as some newer players.
I wrote a README for myself to Setup and Use, here it is.
Install foobar2000 >> Choose Album List + Properties >> Choose Grey Orange >> Choose Default Playlist
I HATE playlists. I think they push you into a corner and I like exposing myself to my whole library because my taste is always changing and evolving. Songs I hated years ago I love, and ones I used love I now hate. And I'd be chasing my tail with playlists.
Install foo_ac3 (works for AC3 embbeded in FLAC or AC3 files I think) Install foo_input_dts (works for DTS embedded in FLAC or DTS files I think) Install foo_input_sacd (Only installed to get file mappings, not used if DAC supports SACD) Install foo_out_asio
Start Foobar2000
Setup DSD external DAC >> Under File -> Preferences -> Components -> Playback -> Output >> Expand Output and set Device to DSD : ASIO : ASIO Chord >> Under File -> Preferences -> Tools -> SACD -> Output Mode -> DSD (Meridian Set PCM, Sample Rate to 96Khz)
Setup Mix Down (only needed for AC3 Multichannel) >> File -> Preferences -> Playback -> DSP Manager >> Add "Downmix channels to Stereo"
Add Library Folders. >> Library -> Configure -> Add Folder >> If Folder is already there try removing and adding again.
In Playback Menu >> Select Cursor Follows Playback
To Play >> Drag what ever you want from the Main Left Panel to the Play List (including the root node) >>>> You can also right click Enque Current >> In Playback Menu (optionally) choose Random
To switch to Album or artist Playing >> Click start of Album in Playlist View to Play that Album and Disable Random. >> Or Search for Arist or Album with Filter on Main Window and then Drag that Over to Play Lists. This was nice in WinAmp because I could right click on current Track for that.
To Wipe Playlist >> Click in Playlist and hit CTRL-A then CTRL-X.
Last edited by Fiddler; 2017-02-2220:37.
- Fiddler (IMHO)
If you think listening to music is fun, try learning an instrument. HT: G61RSL, 4x5K, 5.5KHC, 2xSC6000, Transporter, HD621, Philips BDP7501 4K, Tivo, 65" LG OLED 4K C6 Computer: Foobar2000, 5K, Mojo, HiFiMan HE1000 V2
I've been playing with foobar2000 and Winamp for years so I was familiar with most of it. Figuring out DSD pass through had me stumped for a bit.
Now that I have it written down and fresh in my head, a fresh install would take 10 minutes.
I also spent way more time trying to get the other apps to work and finally gave up on them.
- Fiddler (IMHO)
If you think listening to music is fun, try learning an instrument. HT: G61RSL, 4x5K, 5.5KHC, 2xSC6000, Transporter, HD621, Philips BDP7501 4K, Tivo, 65" LG OLED 4K C6 Computer: Foobar2000, 5K, Mojo, HiFiMan HE1000 V2
FYI, I had the DSD section wrong and updated opening post.
Also added comment on how to setup DSD to drive Meridian/DSP speakers.
- Fiddler (IMHO)
If you think listening to music is fun, try learning an instrument. HT: G61RSL, 4x5K, 5.5KHC, 2xSC6000, Transporter, HD621, Philips BDP7501 4K, Tivo, 65" LG OLED 4K C6 Computer: Foobar2000, 5K, Mojo, HiFiMan HE1000 V2
I'm a new user on foobar, how is the quality of it and hows the connection to your G61?
I just tried using a high res file but it sound horrible, "but" the funny thing was if I play some good quality files on YouTube, it seems not bad. They both output by HDMI to HD621 to my G68. That's weird ... any ideas?
At first, I did think foobar needs to convert FLAC to PCM before it send out, so maybe the computer wasn't a good decoder. So I did converted it to AAC or WAV and test again, the result was very similar.
I'm not hooking foobar to G61 I'm hooking it to a DAC/Amp via WASAPI or ASIO.
I've used the Explorer 2 , iFi iDSD BL and Chord Mojo and they all sounded fine and ran BitBerfect. I could tell they all ran bitperfect because the Mojo and iDSD could natively decode DSD and the Explorer 2 was Natively decoding MQA.
If your running an HTPC to HDMI out to HD621 that might involve a whole other set of expertise to set up correct.
Unless you have DTS and Dolby MUSIC files in your library I would not bother with Foobar2000. I'd use JRiver (if only needed DSD). If all PCM 2 channel FLAC I'd use MusicBee or MediaMonkey. And even if I didn't have DTS or Dolby in my music library I would have one DTS embedded FLAC file to confirm my setup is bitperfect to the preamp. Player doesn't need to know anything to play that. This confirms nothing is nucking with the data stream.
If you are watching movies from PC I'm not sure what the best solution is.
But I would confirm that you can play a Dolby Digital encoded movie and see your Preamp say AC3.2.1 to confirm you have a bitperfect setup. Not sure the how feasible lossless codecs are on a PC are (which primarily what an HD621 is for).
Once setup correctly I've never heard one app sound better than another nor one connection type sound better than another including optical out of a Mac Book.
- Fiddler (IMHO)
If you think listening to music is fun, try learning an instrument. HT: G61RSL, 4x5K, 5.5KHC, 2xSC6000, Transporter, HD621, Philips BDP7501 4K, Tivo, 65" LG OLED 4K C6 Computer: Foobar2000, 5K, Mojo, HiFiMan HE1000 V2
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