Add silence to start of Album playback

[enjdee]

Hi, hope someone can help me.

I'm running MinimServer on a ReadyNAS Duo v2, mostly playing ripped or downloaded FLAC files. I'm using a Cambridge CXNv2 to render the music, feeding an Arcam AV950 processor.

My problem occurs when the CXN is connected via digital to the Arcam (my preferred setup, due to the Arcam's superior DAC circuitry) - if I queue up a track, the first half-second or so of the music is missing. If playing an album (which is what I do 99% of the time), only the first track is truncated, and all subsequent tracks play fine (and no gapless issues either).

If the Cambridge CXN is connected to the Arcam via analogue, there is no problem at all - it plays perfectly. Also, to rule out the Arcam struggling with other digital streams, if I play a CD into the same digital input to the AV950, again it plays perfectly.

I talked to Arcam and Cambridge - the conclusion is that over digital, the Arcam takes slightly too long to recognise the digital stream, and so misses the first fraction of a second of music. Given the relative age of the AV950, Arcam will never provide a firmware upgrade now, so I need to find another solution.

So, sorry about the long story - to my question. Is it possible to add a few milliseconds of silence to the start of an album via Minimserver? My hope is that by doing this it will "trigger" the Arcam, before the music itself actually starts.