Media Players 101: Why use a Media Player? (Pros and Cons)

[gorman]

Where do these screenshot come from? What app are you using on the iPad?

 

[Kal Rubinson]

Unfortunately this is a HUGE con (as Donald would say) because finding an older ps3 with the correct firmware is getting very difficult because these same ps3's suffered from a hardware problem that causes a part of the circuit board to burn out over time and most are old enough right now that they are all virtually burning out, the only solution is a soldering iron and a steady hand which counts out most people.

I have two of them which have been retired because it is easier to use Oppos. However, they are running just fine........................if anyone is interested.

So how do you listen to your SACD'S thru your media player?

Yup and in multichannel: NAS via wired LAN to JRiver/PC-based server (Baetis Prodigy-X) to DAC (exaSound e38) via USB.

 

[dr. simple]

Where do these screenshot come from? What app are you using on the iPad?

Here is the app you need. I use it all the time:

 

[HomerJAU]

Where do these screenshot come from? What app are you using on the iPad?

I use the Kodi Music Remote Pro app. It's fantastic (and very cheap):

http://kodimusicremote.com

Here's a demo I created a while back using the app:
https://reva.blob.core.windows.net/demos/kodi/MusicRemoteForKodi.mp4

 

[gorman]

Many thanks for your reply. Looks quite good, I have to admit. I have an iPad Pro 12.9" coming in a few days... hmmmm...

 

[dabl]

I use the Kodi Music Remote Pro app. It's fantastic (and very cheap):

http://kodimusicremote.com

Here's a demo I created a while back using the app:
https://reva.blob.core.windows.net/demos/kodi/MusicRemoteForKodi.mp4

Can anyone recommend the best equivalent for an Android tablet?

 

[HomerJAU]

Can anyone recommend the best equivalent for an Android tablet?

There isn't one that I know of. I started coding something about a year ago but never finished it. I may give it another go later this year (I posted screen shots from my Surface Pro here on QQ - I was planning on supporting Android, IOS, Windows 10 and MAC).

The free official Kodi remote named Kore is quite a good Kodi remote but doesn't have the same music features as the Kodi Music Remote Pro for iOS

 

[Ninecats]

ps3's don't play dvd-audio for example

media players play everything, once ripped (<-- that's the key)

So, when ripping say dvd audio multichannel or SACD multichannel, what is the preferred lossless format that media players can handle?

 

[dr. simple]

So, when ripping say dvd audio multichannel or SACD multichannel, what is the preferred lossless format that media players can handle?

flac

 

[Kal Rubinson]

So, when ripping say dvd audio multichannel or SACD multichannel, what is the preferred lossless format that media players can handle?

In the case of JRiver, any format you have. For DVD-A, I store the files in FLAC and, for SACD, I store them as DSF. Playback depends on how I choose to play them.

 

[Ninecats]

So going FLAC with audio content from SACD, dvd audio and bluray audio is actually going slight lossy? I can live with that I suppose.

That makes it a lot easier to set up a sevrver and play back multichannel in an easy way. But playing lossless hi res in multichannel seems real tricky.

 

[himey]

So going FLAC with audio content from SACD, dvd audio and bluray audio is actually going slight lossy? I can live with that I suppose.

That makes it a lot easier to set up a sevrver and play back multichannel in an easy way. But playing lossless hi res in multichannel seems real tricky.

DVD-AUDIO and Blu-ray conversion to multichannel FLAC files isn't lossy. Only SACD to FLAC is a "slight lossy". Those that use bass management and/or room correction must make the conversion from DSD (SACD) to PCM (FLAC) anyway, somewhere in the chain.

I wouldn't label hi res multichannel playback as "real tricky" in 2018! Yes it is less compatible than DTS or Dolby Digital but very doable in this day and age.

 

[LuvMyQuad]

Those that use bass management and/or room correction must make the conversion from DSD (SACD) to PCM (FLAC) anyway, somewhere in the chain.

Is that the case? I thought there were AVRs that can take a direct DSD stream over HDMI and employ bass management as well. No?

 

[himey]

Is that the case? I thought there were AVRs that can take a direct DSD stream over HDMI and employ bass management as well. No?

No, they convert to PCM on the fly to do bass management. Some don't do DSD directly.

 

[Ninecats]

DVD-AUDIO and Blu-ray conversion to multichannel FLAC files isn't lossy. Only SACD to FLAC is a "slight lossy". Those that use bass management and/or room correction must make the conversion from DSD (SACD) to PCM (FLAC) anyway, somewhere in the chain.

I wouldn't label hi res multichannel playback as "real tricky" in 2018! Yes it is less compatible than DTS or Dolby Digital but very doable in this day and age.

Sounds promising, I always thought FLAC equalled CD (16/44)? I have a lot to learn here

 

[dr. simple]

Sounds promising, I always thought FLAC equalled CD (16/44)? I have a lot to learn here

Although there are different levels of flac compression (differences in speed to encode vs. resulting file size), the result is always a lossless, compressed file of the original, whatever the bit rate and sample rate may be.

 

[Ninecats]

Many thanks for bearing with me.

So finding a server that can spit out multichannel flac, set the AVR to pick this up and I should be good to go?

 

[LuvMyQuad]

Many thanks for bearing with me.

So finding a server that can spit out multichannel flac, set the AVR to pick this up and I should be good to go?

Pretty much. You would want the server to have HDMI. The servers output becomes an input to the AVR via HDMI, just as if you were connecting a disk player. You would just select it as a source.

The file storage drives, if not part of the server, also need to be addressed.

 

[himey]

Many thanks for bearing with me.

So finding a server that can spit out multichannel flac, set the AVR to pick this up and I should be good to go?

The server is just the storage part of the equation. It can be separate or in the same box as the playback device and media software. If you don't play videogames, you can get away with a very small form factor. Play around with Kodi, Foobar2000, Musicbee and jRiver to see which one fits you best. All work very well but none are perfect. I set up Kodi to work with my Harmony remote on my Windows 10 PC, so I use that the most. HDMI of PC connects to an Oppo HDMI input and goes analog to a multichannel preamp then out to multiple stereo amps. I have a simple server using Asset and it goes LAN to Oppo, but I prefer using HDMI and going directly to my media. Server's and LAN connections are overrated by some. Yes it can be functional but it also complicates things needlessly.

 

[Ninecats]

Again thank you.

I have learned that my AVR doesn’t support multichannel in FLAC streaming (very strange), but I suppose I can use my AVR as a transport, eg doing the PCM-output pre AVR?