PlayWasapi - better sounding than Foobar!

Tyson · « **on:** 27 May 2009, 08:54 pm »

The PlayWasapi audio player
I was searching around for some more optimization settings for using WASAPI in Foobar when I stumbled across this wonderful little program called PlayWasapi:

http://andy-audioplayer.blogspot.com/2008/12/minimalist-wasapi-memory-player_23.html

Intrigued by the player's minimalism and audio-first purist approach I installed it and the latest flac.exe (so I could play all my lossless flac files).

Let me preface this by saying that I've run foobar fully optimized for a while now, and it's one of the best sounding players out there (IMHO), but the PlayWasapi player is an order of magnitude better sounding.

The drawback is that there is no user interface, so you can't "see" what songs are playing, or even see what's in the queue, and even skipping forward or backward to the next song is a bit clumsy (you have a "skip forward" and "skip backward" function in the Wasabi folder you have to execute to do these actions).

Regardless, the sound quality I'm getting more than makes up for the more awkward control. Amazing stuff, and free too (can't beat that!).

Installing PlayWasapi
Before you download it, go to your Program Files in Vista and create a new folder called "PlayWasapi". Then, download the program and extract it into that folder. It's zipped, so you'll need a zipfile program such as 7zip (free, and what I use). Extract both files into your "PlayWasapi" folder. Then simply double click the "InstallPlayWasapi.bat" file to get it added to your menu of options when you right-click on an audio file or folder.

One thing - I recommend going into the Vista User Control Panel and disabling the "User Account Control". That's the program that always gives you those stupid pop-ups "You must have administrative privileges to execute this command", etc....

If you don't want to do that, then at least when you click the InstallPlayWasapi.bat file, you should right click and "Run as Administrator".

EDIT - Next, if you have FLAC already installed on your PC, simply move the flac.exe file into the PlayWasapi folder. If you don't have flac installed, download it from here:

http://flac.sourceforge.net/

Another Recommended Audio Setting in Windows
Finally, one other recommended tweak - if you are mainly playing CD files, go into your soundcard and set it to 16/44 settings. It's probably set to 16/48 by default, and it negatively affects audio quality.

To do this, right click on the Volume Icon on the right side of your Task Bar at the bottom of your screen. Then select "Playback Devices". Your soundcard will be here along with any USB type devices you may (or may not) be using. Click on the the soundcard (it might be labeled as "Speakers" or some such), and click "Properties". On the properties window, select the "Advanced" tab. There will be all your options. Set it to 16/44.

Conclusion
There you go, I hope this brings as much satisfaction to others as it has me. I love this player, it's taken my USB-to-SPDIF-to-External-DAC listening to a much higher level than I ever thought possible.

Tyson · « **Reply #1 on:** 27 May 2009, 10:08 pm »

Foobar Optimization

If you must use a GUI based player, then Foobar is probably the best sounding one out there, as long as you set it to use Wasapi, which bypasses the awful windows audio programs. Check the link below for how to do it. If you use Vista, then you can use Wasapi. If you use XP, you have to set up ASIO4All, which is also included in the link below:

http://www.head-fi.org/forums/f46/eac-foobar-asio4all-wasapi-settings-pictorial-402765/

ted_b · « **Reply #2 on:** 27 May 2009, 11:22 pm »

Tyson,
I also like Foobar/Wasapi so was excited to know about a better sounding player. Did the install, moved a flac.exe (you didn't mention that) into the folder, but every time I try to play anything (FLAC) I get an error that says:
Error opening WAV file: "C:\Program Files\PlayWasapi\Temp.wav"
Error 2

it's almost as if it thinks it's looking for a wav file. Also, I can't find Playwasapi.ini.

Edit: tried a wav file and got a worse error window, talking about Visual C debugging, etc.

Tyson · « **Reply #3 on:** 27 May 2009, 11:23 pm »

Follow Up Comparisons of Foobar 9.6.7 and PlayWasapi

Actually, I'll follow up the above posts with a bit more comparisons. IMO, the 9.6.x version of foobar are a step up in sound quality over the version I was running previously. With the other optimization settings in place, it sounds very good indeed now. Much closer to PlayWasapi.

As for differences, IMO the Wasapi is much more dynamic, rhythmic, and focused. The Foobar 9.6.x player is more laid back. So, usually for high energy modern recordings I choose PlayWasabi to listen with. For older recordings or less than perfect modern recordings, I pick Foobar.

Tyson · « **Reply #4 on:** 27 May 2009, 11:28 pm »

Quote from: ted_b on 27 May 2009, 11:22 pm

Tyson,
I also like Foobar/Wasapi so was excited to know about a better sounding player. Did the install, moved a flac.exe (you didn't mention that) into the folder, but every time I try to play anything (FLAC) I get an error that says:
Error opening WAV file: "C:\Program Files\PlayWasapi\Temp.wav"
Error 2

it's almost as if it thinks it's looking for a wav file. Also, I can't find Playwasapi.ini.

Edit: tried a wav file and got a worse error window, talking about Visual C debugging, etc.

I got a bunch of Error 2's as well when I first set it up. First, make sure that you have the User Account Control turned off. Next, right click on your volume control, select "playback devices", and tell me what you see there. Finally, close out any apps that might be playing some audio. Windows media player, foobar, close them all.

ted_b · « **Reply #5 on:** 27 May 2009, 11:46 pm »

Use Account Control is off, all other audio systems are closed, and windows volume control shows my speakers via Realtek sound card working (at 16/44.1). I'm not new to pc audio (although this pc that i installed on is not my serious audiophile source), so I don't think I missed too much (1 TB ripped flac and wavpack stuff, etc.)...but you never know. Lemme know what you think. Thx
Ted

Tyson · « **Reply #6 on:** 27 May 2009, 11:50 pm »

Are you using a USB device to connect to your stereo? Or some other means such as optical or SPDIF output?

Also, I did have to reboot for a different reason, but it did start to work for me after the reboot.

ted_b · « **Reply #7 on:** 27 May 2009, 11:53 pm »

I have powered speakers running off the sound card via miniplug analog out (Audio Engine 5's). I rebooted more than once. Foobar w/Wasapi plays fine and sounds great. Nothing is different.

Nevermind, it just isn't worth it. For example, I need a GUI. Foobar is bad enough (no iTouch GUI) but sounds great and is bit perfect (HDCD lights up on Berkeley Alpha DAC to prove so).

Tyson · « **Reply #8 on:** 28 May 2009, 03:01 am »

Hmm, I can't get it to work with my soundcard either, only works via my USB converter. Odd.

Tyson · « **Reply #9 on:** 1 Jun 2009, 07:41 pm »

D@mn, the more I listen to playwasapi, the better it gets. You lose a lot in convenience with it (because there's no interface), but from a purely audio quality perspective, it smokes foobar at it's best.

Teerth · « **Reply #10 on:** 21 Nov 2009, 10:15 am »

I totally agree with Tyson about everything regarding this player. This a little gem of a player. I installed it two days ago on a Windows 7 Music computer optimized for playback(PlayWASAPI) incredible sound. Installation is easy.

And now there will cue file support.. here is the quote from the maker of the programmer
"I am currently looking into adding cue sheet support. Hopefully will be available in a week or so.

I am also going to rename my player, because PlayWasapi is not entirely correct, it plays ASIO as well. And the main feature is its GUI-lessness

.

Will rename it to StealthAudioPlayer. So be ready to see another shortcut name on your desktop.

Andy"

firedog · « **Reply #11 on:** 21 Nov 2009, 12:36 pm »

I also couldn't get it to work in Vista, got same error messages as poster above. Too bad, would have liked to try it.

Edit: got it to work, the problem was the FLAC install. Reinstalled FLAC and copied flac.exe to the PlayWasapi folder. After that, everything worked.

Sounds good. Not sure if it's better than Foobar, I'll have to do some more extensive listening.

Thanks for letting us know about this.

Housteau · « **Reply #12 on:** 21 Nov 2009, 02:48 pm »

I have not tried it yet, but the designer now seems to prefer Mac + standard Itunes. What are you thoughts on that?

Teerth · « **Reply #13 on:** 22 Nov 2009, 07:00 pm »

He is now working on cue file support for this player.
He has not tried it with windows 7 and I am really impressed with Windows 7 and this player combination.
I hope he keeps on developing this software.

Jon L · « **Reply #14 on:** 22 Nov 2009, 07:16 pm »

Quote from: Teerth on 22 Nov 2009, 07:00 pm

He is now working on cue file support for this player.
He has not tried it with windows 7 and I am really impressed with Windows 7 and this player combination.
I hope he keeps on developing this software.

I assume it doesn't support playlists?
If not, I hope the designer is working on it, possibly with ability to accept other pre-existing playlists, possibly in the m3u format...

Pez · « **Reply #15 on:** 22 Nov 2009, 09:25 pm »

The whole design of wasapi is 0 user interface. It loads all the data to ram and that's it. Therefore there is no play lists.

donunus · « **Reply #16 on:** 9 Dec 2009, 08:48 pm »

I was just wondering what version of the player you guys are using now? The new version is asio now. I wonder how the sound of that compares to the wasapi version?

http://andy-audioplayer.blogspot.com/2009/04/asio-support.html

donunus · « **Reply #17 on:** 9 Dec 2009, 08:58 pm »

Oh, how does it sound against kmplayer using reclock? I also noticed that kmp w/ reclock has a more focused sound than foobar like you describe with this wasapi player but whats really weird is that I seem to notice that foobar plays aac/alac better, and mp3s/flacs are better on kmplayer with reclock. Whats going on here? Im not sure if its just a level mismatch but kmplayer seems to have much less midbass than foobar with aacs. Then mp3s seem to be more dynamic on kmp w/ reclock... Anyone here know whats going on here?

Is this wasapi player a good decoder for any file type it currently supports unlike the two mentioned above which have inconsistent decoders from what I hear.

donunus · « **Reply #18 on:** 11 Dec 2009, 03:00 pm »

ooohh just discovered a nice player with a gui that is super lightweight and sounds great with wasapi and all effects turned off... XMplay! Nice

doctorcilantro · « **Reply #19 on:** 15 Dec 2009, 03:26 am »

Quote from: Pez on 22 Nov 2009, 09:25 pm

The whole design of wasapi is 0 user interface. It loads all the data to ram and that's it. Therefore there is no play lists.

J. River has the best gui, best features, great audio engine, wasapi, playback loaded into memory, cue support, and playlist support.

?