[Crimson]

I'll load it on a few of my other machines to see how it performs before I put it on a music machine.

As far as the music machines go, if they're not broke why fix them?

[simon wagstaff]

I wouldn't give Lion a second thought for a music server machine; in fact I would probably rule it out entirely and opt for an earlier OSX version, or one of the lighter weight Linuxes for that matter.

Not quite sure why but several of the recent music playback applications available seem to require 10.6 so I think this is as far back as one could go.

[Bemopti123]

Something simple to ask the OSX gurus here....If I have standard Leopard without the possibility of getting the App store etc....  how do I upgrade to the Lion? 

[simon wagstaff]

When I bought my version of 10.6 at Best Buy the Apple guy said i would have to have 10.6 before I could upgrade to Lion. I don't know why you couldn't just buy Lion. Maybe there will be a full version that will install on anything (with at least a dual core intel processor) and a cheaper upgrade version/

I like 10.6 though, it does seem to make Safari run faster and for some reason I got a bunch of hard drive space back. Very happy with it.

[dB Cooper]

The reason you got a bunch of hard drive space back is that Snow Leopard is the first version which is intel only; what you get back is space occupied by the power pc processor code previously. This takes up HD space as both sets of code install even though a given machine has only one or the other processor. Better performance is largely due to a similar phenomenon: When you launch an app, all the code for that app loads in RAM, including the code for the processor that isn't in your machine.

There is a neat little app called XSlimmer which exploits this by determining which machine you have and eliminating superfluous code and language support (I don't expect to need Tagalog). Makes a big difference; some apps shrink by 60% which is the equivalent of having 60% more RAM. Makes a diff, especially on PPC machines with weaker CPUs and smaller HDs.

The reason you need 10.6 is that Lion is going to be available only as a download from the Mac App Store, a feature only available in Snow Leopard.

[WC]

Remember that Lion will only run on Core 2 Duo processors or higher, so many who are using single core processors don't really have to make that decision.

You can install Lion from Leopard, but only if you were able to download the installer for Lion from the Mac App Store on another computer which has Snow Leopard on it and transfer it to the computer with Leopard on it.

[Robert57]

I have a couple of Squeezboxen (SB2's) connected by wire to a 2009 Mac Mini (Core 2 Duo), currently running OSX Leopard. Since the SB's each have a buffer before the DAC to reassemble and feed the bits from ethernet in the streamed playback, would these be vulnerable to the same background OSX processes (pre-streamlining) that have caused SQ problems with direct USB- or SPDIF-connected DAC's? Maybe the added complexities and background processes in Lion won't affect the buffered DAC's in a SB?

[teros1]

Unlike most respondents on this thread, I have listened to music for weeks on a high-end system running Lion.

I can hear no deleterious effects from "background processes" or anything else associated with Lion -- and I had established a very solid reference on Snow Leopard.

In fact, if anything, my initial impression was that Lion sounded *better* than Snow Leopard. But I will readily admit that these perceived improvements were very slight (resembling those I would associate with jitter reduction) and therefore would consider them suspect (and possibly due to placebo effects).

So I think that rejecting Lion out of hand is a mistake, especially given the many other improvements that the OS brings.

Now, the obligatory system details and other caveats:

• Hardware: 4-core Xeon Mac Pro->Firewire->Prism Orpheus->Goldmund monoblocks->Tonian Classics or eFicion F300s
• Software: Pure Music (primary); Decibel, Audirvana, Fidelia, Bidule, FabFilters
• I typically 'renice' Pure Music at -10
• I usually run active digital crossovers (want to talk background processes?) and bi-amp or tri-amp (all Goldmund)

BTW, I have heard 'minimalist PCs' sound fabulous (the reference Auraliti unit) and mediocre. I can say the same for 'normal PCs.' I have not yet heard a Mach2 unit.

In time, we may all learn that Lion is sonically inferior to Snow Leopard. But that has not been my experience thus far.

Cheers,

Bob Walters
http://baasnotes.com/

[wgscott]

Thanks Bob, for posting that reality check.  The idea that unix background processes, apart from spotlight indexing, will necessarily impact sonic quality always struck me as fatuous.

[teros1]

Yep, it's difficult for me to load my machine with enough processes to affect sound quality, even at 24/192.

But I'm running a fairly high-end Mac.

Bob

[wgscott]

On a mac mini, I can max both processors out with a molecular dynamics calculation, which also has a ton of disc i/o, and it doesn't impact sound quality in any audible way.

[teros1]

On a mac mini, I can max both processors out with a molecular dynamics calculation, which also has a ton of disc i/o, and it doesn't impact sound quality in any audible way.

LOL. Right on...

Bob

[dmccombs]

Interesting...  Most people with a resolving systems can hear a difference in sound quality with just shutting off Spotlight.

We've seen very noticeable sound improvements in turning off background processes.  Granted, some help more than others, but overall, they do.  Also turning off unused things like network adapters, bluetooth, picking an unused USB port for your DAC, all make a difference.

I'm not arguing your findings, just passing ours on.   

We will of course do extensive testing with Lion once the final release is available.

Darrell
www.mach2music.com

[dmccombs]

On a mac mini, I can max both processors out with a molecular dynamics calculation, which also has a ton of disc i/o, and it doesn't impact sound quality in any audible way.

May I ask what sort of audio system you are doing these tests on?  If I read correctly on another forum, you have the B&W CM7.  I am very familiar with the B&W line living 5 minutes from the B&W dealer, and having owned 703s, 804s, 803s, 802D, and 801D speakers. 

I used to have a setup with B&W 703 speakers and comparable electronics and I couldn't hear differences between a stock power cord and a Purist Audio Dominus cord.  The system wasn't resolving enough to hear such differences.

Later when I had improved the setup of my gear and the gear itself, I could not only hear the difference between a stock power cord and a Purist Audio Dominus cord, but I could hear the difference between different aftermarket power cords.

Its ok to say you don't hear a difference in your system, but its not ok to say that software mods don't make a difference because you don't hear it in your system.

We have A/B tested Mac Minis with the same hardware.  One had the stock OS, and the other have the software mods.  The sonic difference were quite noticeable.  One such test was at RMAF in one of the show rooms.  They asked us to let them use the Mach2 for the rest of the show because they could hear the difference between their Mac Mini and ours.

Darrell
www.mach2music.com

[wgscott]

Interesting...  Most people with a resolving systems can hear a difference in sound quality with just shutting off Spotlight.

You will notice that Spotlight was the one exception I made.  The mdutil background processes really do degrade things noticeably.

We've seen very noticeable sound improvements in turning off background processes.  Granted, some help more than others, but overall, they do.  Also turning off unused things like network adapters, bluetooth, picking an unused USB port for your DAC, all make a difference.

I'm not arguing your findings, just passing ours on.   

We've been through this before, elsewhere.  But briefly, OS X (and all unix flavors for that matter) don't do "background processes" the same way Windows apparently does.  With Launchd, as I am sure you are aware, these processes don't run for the most part except on startup (i.e., before the user even logs in, let alone plays music) or on demand. 

But I guess if you are selling a set of modifications for OS X, you can't discuss how we can test to see if your claims are objectively real or not.

We will of course do extensive testing with Lion once the final release is available.

Darrell
www.mach2music.com

So will Apple.

The nice thing about not relying upon third-party commercial OS tweaking services is that I can update my computer when I feel like it, and I don't have to choose between installing a security update and the integrity of a modified OS.  I tweak the mail server on one of my machines, and security updates undo my changes.  But at least I know what changes I have made, so I can address such issues myself.

[wgscott]

Its ok to say you don't hear a difference in your system, but its not ok to say that software mods don't make a difference because you don't hear it in your system.

So how much money do you have to spend to get a system good enough to resolve the differences that your OS X modifications provide?  What's the cutoff?

[Mike Nomad]

Some of my work machines will go to 10.7: Full DNS Support. Hopefully, they will also fix the degrade to 1080P playback in QT that came with 10.6.

[jrebman]

wgscott, and others who have not heard the mach2 modified mini and who thus assert that these mods make no differrence in sound quality and are trying to "prove it" with anecdotal exxperience from your own systems, the only really valid, quasi scientific proof would be if you had said modified mac mini and a/b'ed it with your current source.  Really, all the rest is just speculaion.

If you don't hear it, you don't hear it, but given the use of dsp and other issues with higher levels of system noise (such as a mac pro vs a mid 2010 mini), power, etc. I pretty much don't doubt that you don't hear much difference in going from SL to Liion.

Now, when and if you have a chance to compare apples to apples, per se, then your results will be more pertinent to th issue of modified os vs non-modified os, and then and only then can we talk about differences between two non-modified OSs.  Make sense?

Disclaimer:  I've been working with computers for 40 years, am an EE/CE, and was Mach2s first paying customer.  It was a calculaated leap of faith, but the differences are so obvious and so profound that it would be hard to imagine anybody not being able to tell them apart and with almost any kind of system.

So, comparing snow leopard and Lion is not even remotely close to comparing snow leopard stock vs snow leopard modified.

And for the record, I can hear the difference in playback on my system when I turn off the IR receiver, blue tooth, ethernet, wireless and even a slight difference when I disable voiceover.  And turning off the dithered volume control in PureMusic, which has a reputation of being one of the most transparent in the business, is also clearly audible on my fairly modest system.

[dmccombs]

So how much money do you have to spend to get a system good enough to resolve the differences that your OS X modifications provide?  What's the cutoff?

There's no cutoff. People with all lots of types of systems see the benefits of removing as much crap from OSX as possible.

You seem to think that if YOU don't hear the effects of a change in your system, that no one else will in their system.   

I think its great that you do your own mods and have found what works (and doesn't) with your system.  You are able to try something and if it makes you happy you go with it.

When I look at changes though, I have think about more than making one person/system happy.  I have to think of hundreds.  So, I do lots of testing, on various systems, and we get lots of feedback from our customers.  In short, we make the best build possible so we can make as many people smile as humanly possible.

The reason for me posting here is not to sell any body a system, but more to help the do it yourself folks.  Kill /Turn Off everything you can that isn't music related. It will improve your sound.   

This relates to Lion in that Lion has a lot more stuff running.  Some can be turned off, some we won't.  So far, we haven't heard about any good CoreAudio changes.  There may be some that are unannounced.  In short, Lion needs to be tested as a Music Server OS.  It may end up sounding better than 10.6.x, but I think it is a mistake if people blindly upgrade their music server to Lion, without testing.

You and Teros1 are testing Lion to decide for yourselves if its a positive change.  That's great.  I hope others do too.  The more people that test and post thier impressions of Lion, the better.

Darrell
www.mach2music.com

[nathanm]

I find that changing the System Alert sound to "Magic Bell" makes JPEG images of snow have smoother tonality in the highlights.