[Sasha]

James,

Since you have 3 PC platforms to play with, one of them being MAC, why not try the Amarra player (free download available) in an all Bryston rig and let us know if in your opinion all the fuss about it is warranted, or it is just a well designed player that sounds better than iTunes which is not that great to begin with, so Amarra sounds very good in comparison to iTunes alone?

[James Tanner]

Hi Sasha,

I am not all that familiar with Amarra - can you give me some background.  I know it is a software program but are you saying it can be loaded on the MAC and replace itunes as the music server?

james

[Sasha]

James,

It does not replace iTunes entirely, but rather the core signal processing engine of iTunes if you will, what matters for reproduction, while GUI remains, that is my understanding anyway.
So you use iTunes play lists and what not, but it is Amarra that does playback.
I am intrigued by it because some good engineers had a peak at it and apparently liked it.
Apparently MACs with 8GB (min 4GB) are required for good performance.
I do not know much about Amarra, I see it on every forum where PC audio is being discussed, for example on Audio Asylum.
Can be downloaded from Sonic Studio site: http://www.sonicstudio.com/amarra/index.html

[James Tanner]

Hi Sasha,

Ok - looks interesting - I will look into it.

It would be great if I could get 192/24 playback through the MAC optical out?

james

I assume it will not work on windows operating system?

[srb]

There is an 8 page (so far) thread here on AudioCircle called Amarra testing...
 
http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=68494.0
 
Steve

[Sasha]

I assume it will not work on windows operating system?

Nope, MAC only for foreseeable future, and I am not eager on spending on MAC HW just to try it, I invested a lot into PC based one.

[Crimson]

I'm currently running it on a machine with 2GB of ram and it plays 24/96 files with no issues.

[James Tanner]

Yes my Mac Pro Laptop only has 2M and the claim you need a minimum of 4M.

james

[Sasha]

Here is an interesting piece of info on Amarra, quote:
?Just an FYI, iTunes is not a 'player' in the sense that it does not have it's own audio engine. It's strictly a file management system that uses Core Audio (although it does have its own separate SRC capability), as are all the other available players for OS X. It's a matter of semantics, I know, but saying Amarra improves upon iTunes is incorrect for this reason.
What's happening is Amarra is utilizing iTunes' library management functions and front end, and is then using it's own audio engine, or back end, for decoding. In this way, Amarra is the first of its kind.?.

So it would seem that Amarra is praised because all other MAC/OS X ?players? are dependent on Core Audio, which Amarra replaces. My conclusion is that after all MAC/OS X is not such a great platform for audio purpose, in fact never was, and a product that replaces Core Audio was needed to make MAC/OS a decent platform.

[James Tanner]

Here is an interesting piece of info on Amarra, quote:
?Just an FYI, iTunes is not a 'player' in the sense that it does not have it's own audio engine. It's strictly a file management system that uses Core Audio (although it does have its own separate SRC capability), as are all the other available players for OS X. It's a matter of semantics, I know, but saying Amarra improves upon iTunes is incorrect for this reason.
What's happening is Amarra is utilizing iTunes' library management functions and front end, and is then using it's own audio engine, or back end, for decoding. In this way, Amarra is the first of its kind.?.

So it would seem that Amarra is praised because all other MAC/OS X ?players? are dependent on Core Audio, which Amarra replaces. My conclusion is that after all MAC/OS X is not such a great platform for audio purpose, in fact never was, and a product that replaces Core Audio was needed to make MAC/OS a decent platform.

Hi Sasha,

Very interesting - I wonder why MAC is so popular at the Studio and Recording end of the business?

james

[Sasha]

Here is an interesting piece of info on Amarra, quote:
?Just an FYI, iTunes is not a 'player' in the sense that it does not have it's own audio engine. It's strictly a file management system that uses Core Audio (although it does have its own separate SRC capability), as are all the other available players for OS X. It's a matter of semantics, I know, but saying Amarra improves upon iTunes is incorrect for this reason.
What's happening is Amarra is utilizing iTunes' library management functions and front end, and is then using it's own audio engine, or back end, for decoding. In this way, Amarra is the first of its kind.?.

So it would seem that Amarra is praised because all other MAC/OS X ?players? are dependent on Core Audio, which Amarra replaces. My conclusion is that after all MAC/OS X is not such a great platform for audio purpose, in fact never was, and a product that replaces Core Audio was needed to make MAC/OS a decent platform.

Hi Sasha,

Very interesting - I wonder why MAC is so popular at the Studio and Recording end of the business?

james

I guess performance is not always the main factor that influences popularity, Yamaha NS10 is probably the most popular monitor that you see on almost every console, yet it is certainly not that great pair of speakers.
And I am not so sure that MAC is more popular than PC in this business, there are certainly more related and excellent applications written for PC platform. I find Steinberg?s WaveLab superior to any of the commonly mentioned players (it is not just a player, no playlists and such, I am mentioning it from the performance point of view).
This is of course true on properly built dedicated PC, using ASIO, good soundcard. Throwing it all on a PC you buy at a store will not yield good performance what is in my opinion the main reason why people complain about PC. Not knowing what to do does not translate to bad platform.
And no matter how much effort and money you put into it, PC (or MAC) based transports still do not match best optical players, this has been my experience and experience of many others who tried to take it to the extreme and achieve performance that would better optical transports. Not happening.
Based on what I have read about Amarra, I would guess that they achieved on MAC platform what has been achieved on well implemented PC platforms. PC analogy of their achievements could be let?s say bypass of Windows components detrimental to the performance and use of natively supported ASIO with good software, till you hear it you do not know what such platform is capable of.

[James Tanner]

Hi Sasha,

I have asked our US Pro Vice President in LA to call a few of the top recording engineers he knows and see if we can get some feedback as to the choices they make and why.

james

[James Tanner]

Hi James,

None of the recording is done in the Mac or a PC, it is only a control surface to run the editing software. Macs have always been the choice for music and film production work as most engineers preferred the Mac user interface, that in turn caused most if not all of the software manufacturers to develop programs for music editing mainly for the Mac, there isn't much editing/compiling software out there for a PC.

The recording is done in the drives of the Pro Tools system using their hardware, drives, and dacs. Some customers use outboard dacs (BDA-1) as an upgrade to the Pro Tools dacs.

Yes, the multi channel mix down is mixed to 2 channels for cd to hard drive but that again isn't done on the computer drive or utilizing any of the computer sound cards. That is all done at the Avid or Pro Tools level which is MUCH higher audio level than a sound card in a Mac or PC, the comparison would be 28B's to a Denon reciever.

Now, using a PC or Mac as a server controller for audio playback is an entirely different story. The audio quality for the most part would come down to the audio cards and compression ratios being used, either computer system would be about the same quality if they were using comparable cards and drives on both computers. The only difference at the actual computer level would be which interface do you like to use ?

In film and music recording/editing consider the computer as the control unit which controls the Pro Tools system which is actually the recorder and dacs.

I use Pro Tools as a generic term for digital recorders, there are other disk base recorders out there but 90% of the industry uses Pro Tools mainly because it works.

Regarding the NS-10's--they are not a great sounding monitor for stereo playback but in the Pro recording world they are a great reference tool.

Wavelab is a nice editing system and is written for Mac but it is not an industry standard. Most guys I know are using Pro Tools M, M Audio, Wave, and Cakewalk.

Hope that helps,

Craig
V/P Bryston

[Sasha]

I do not know where this information comes from, but there are some glaring errors in it.
For example, there is no Wavelab for MAC, it is PC application.
Steinberg also wrote ASIO, it is the facto standard.
A peak at related discussions on Gearslutz forum would be enough to see how popular Wavelab is, and how hard it is, if not impossible, to do the same tasks with the same ease on MAC platform using MAC SW. There is no equivalent to Wavelab in MAC world.
Another popular SW is Adobe Audition, that one exists for both platforms.
As far as playback only goes, it is very incorrect to say that the only difference at the actual computer level would be which interface you like to use.
There are enormous differences in performance that are directly correlated to different HW and that way HW and related SW it implemented.

[Crimson]

Here is an interesting piece of info on Amarra, quote:
?Just an FYI, iTunes is not a 'player' in the sense that it does not have it's own audio engine. It's strictly a file management system that uses Core Audio (although it does have its own separate SRC capability), as are all the other available players for OS X. It's a matter of semantics, I know, but saying Amarra improves upon iTunes is incorrect for this reason.
What's happening is Amarra is utilizing iTunes' library management functions and front end, and is then using it's own audio engine, or back end, for decoding. In this way, Amarra is the first of its kind.?.

So it would seem that Amarra is praised because all other MAC/OS X ?players? are dependent on Core Audio, which Amarra replaces. My conclusion is that after all MAC/OS X is not such a great platform for audio purpose, in fact never was, and a product that replaces Core Audio was needed to make MAC/OS a decent platform.

Thanks for quoting me. 

I wouldn't go so far to say that "MAC/OS X is not such a great platform for audio purpose, in fact never was". Prior to purchasing Amarra, I used iTunes (on a Mac) exclusively with fabulous results. As they say, ignorance is bliss.

[Sasha]

Here is an interesting piece of info on Amarra, quote:
?Just an FYI, iTunes is not a 'player' in the sense that it does not have it's own audio engine. It's strictly a file management system that uses Core Audio (although it does have its own separate SRC capability), as are all the other available players for OS X. It's a matter of semantics, I know, but saying Amarra improves upon iTunes is incorrect for this reason.
What's happening is Amarra is utilizing iTunes' library management functions and front end, and is then using it's own audio engine, or back end, for decoding. In this way, Amarra is the first of its kind.?.

So it would seem that Amarra is praised because all other MAC/OS X ?players? are dependent on Core Audio, which Amarra replaces. My conclusion is that after all MAC/OS X is not such a great platform for audio purpose, in fact never was, and a product that replaces Core Audio was needed to make MAC/OS a decent platform.

Thanks for quoting me. 

I wouldn't go so far to say that "MAC/OS X is not such a great platform for audio purpose, in fact never was". Prior to purchasing Amarra, I used iTunes (on a Mac) exclusively with fabulous results. As they say, ignorance is bliss.

Now that we got your attention.... 
Have you ever compared your MAC/Amarra to a very good CDP in your rig?
And have you compared it to optimally configured PC?
I am wondering where what you describe as ?fabulous results? ranks, and how much further Amarra took it?

[Crimson]

What's a very good CDP rig? 

My CD setup used to be a Reimyo DAP777 fed by a CEC TL51. Excellent combo. I sold them early last year, replaced by Mac/iTunes feeding Wavelength, RME, and Apogee dacs. I still have a Sony 777 for SACD playback.

The last time I used a PC for audio was in 2004.

[Sasha]

So I guess your CEC was transport only? If you had CEC TL51XR player that would qualify as very good CDP.
I did my comparisons with Wadia 581i SE (with digital I/O board) and my conclusions were based on performance of optical drive versa same material ripped and fed from PC/Lynx and other sources.
How did you have your CEC connected to Reimyo?
And what was the evolution of your system? It seems to me that you could not do a fair comparison between that rig and your present one, entirely different DACs with different protocols, so if your present rig sounds better to you, how do you know why, you are listening to an entirely different DAC, you do not know what ?improvement? your new transport being MAC brought into it.
That is the problem I see with majority of those statements about superiority of this over that, there is no any kind of real comparison, no methodology.
I did my comparison in a way where the only variable was the transport (internal optical tray, versa PC/many other via SPDIF, versa PC via AES/EBU, versa PC/many other via TosLink.
My conclusion was that tray is on the top, followed by PC via AES/EBU or SPDIF.
Anything TosLink was plain horrible in my book.
And anything USB so far was not even a close match.

[srb]

I agree with Craig's explanation of studio audio RECORDING with Pro Tools, and that the TDM hardware modules are simply being controlled by either a MAC or PC, and in this case, is only a matter of interface preference, as neither platform's hardware is involved in the recording process.  However,
 
"The recording is done in the drives of the Pro Tools system using their hardware, drives, and dacs.  Some customers use outboard dacs (BDA-1) as an upgrade to the Pro Tools dacs"
 
DACs are used in the PLAYBACK process.  ADCs are used for recording.  Bryston does not make any A/D converters (that I know of).
 
For playback, there is no reason that a MAC or PC cannot be used to control external audio playback hardware, reaping the benefits of front end library software over a stand-alone CD player.
 
Is the CD Player approach an "easier" solution to digital audio?  Absolutely.  But many of us are unwilling to give up the additional features provided by computer front ends and hard drive storage.
 
I know several people who are willing to go through a 5 minute process (including cleaning) to listen to just one cut off an LP.  That's fine, it's just not for me.
 
Steve
 
 

[Sasha]

Steve,
Thanks for clarification, I understand now the meaning of software control and the interface preference being the only relevant thing.
You say there is no reason that a MAC or PC cannot be used to control external audio playback hardware.
My question is what is such solution?
Which solution will not sent jittery digital signal in any form out of PC or MAC to an external DAC, but out of something else being controlled by PC or MAC?