MinimServer2 : Best audio transcoder/resampler and transcode options

[adhara]

Hi,

I'm new in MinimServer customers :-)
I finished to install MinimServer2/MinimStreamer on my Synology NAS (1618+ / intel cpu), MinimWatch on my Windows PC.
I use BubleUpnP or Lumin client from my Android smartphone. Audio files (mostly flac 16bits or 24 bits) are stored on my NAS, I also use Qobuz Premium.
My receiver is Chromecast plugged into WISA Hub receiver (Axiim Q unit).

At the moment, I only tested ffmpeg trancoder with Sox.
I'm looking for the best audio quality possible for my audio system.
The best I can deal with is 24 bits/ 96 Khz

What do you think about settings below ? Is there something else I can do (modification) for sound improvement ?

stream.options : convOut=-af aresample=resampler=soxr:precision=33:cheby=1:dither_method=triangular

stream.transcode: flac(16;44):wav24;88, flac(24;44):wav24;88, flac(24;48):wav24;96, flac(24;88):wav24;88, flac(24;96):wav24;96, flac(24;176):wav24;88, flac(24;192):wav24;96, mp3:wav24, dsf:wav24;96, wav:wav24;96, mp4:wav24;96

Maybe there is another transcoder/resampler, more efficiency and offer a better sound quality than ffmpeg/sox ?

Thanks

[simoncn]

This depends on what input suits your DAC best. The only way to be sure is to listen. For example, you are transcoding dsf to wav24;96 but it might sound better with wav24;88 (an exact ratio of the native frequency of 352.8 kHz). Also, upsampling all wav and mp4 to 96 kHz might not be optimal.

It is possible that there could be another transcoder/resampler that provides better quality than FFmpeg/SoX but you might not be able to use it in combination with MinimServer/MinimStreamer. Instead, you might need to convert/resample your files offline.

It would be good to hear what experiences other users have had with transcoding/resampling settings.

[adhara]

(24-12-2020 21:10)simoncn Wrote:  This depends on what input suits your DAC best. The only way to be sure is to listen. For example, you are transcoding dsf to wav24;96 but it might sound better with wav24;88 (an exact ratio of the native frequency of 352.8 kHz). Also, upsampling all wav and mp4 to 96 kHz might not be optimal.

It is possible that there could be another transcoder/resampler that provides better quality than FFmpeg/SoX but you might not be able to use it in combination with MinimServer/MinimStreamer. Instead, you might need to convert/resample your files offline.

It would be good to hear what experiences other users have had with transcoding/resampling settings.

Thanks Simon for your reply.
I'll change my transcode option even if my audio files are Flac for 99%.

Regarding stream.options, some use precision=28 (I use 33) and cutoff=0.995 (I use cheby=1). Not heard differences with different settings here.
But few customers use dither_method ... By default it set to off.

I'm interested too in any recommandations here.

So, I tested:

convOut=-af aresample=resampler=soxr:precision=33:cutoff=0.995:dither_method=triangular

AND

convOut=-af aresample=resampler=soxr:precision=33:cheby=1:dither_method=triangular

[adhara]

Looks like preBuffer option is not compatible anymore ???

I tried preBuffer=5 but Minimserver raised an error when applying it.

[Alandbush]

(28-12-2020 10:34)adhara Wrote:  Looks like preBuffer option is not compatible anymore ???

I tried preBuffer=5 but Minimserver raised an error when applying it.

I applied this option to the stream.options property without error both before and after a convOut option. In each case, I separated the options using the prescribed comma.

I could invoke an error if I omitted the comma separator.

[lafuente]

Hi,

I tried sox on my minim server too (debian). From my ffmpeg conf I have libsoxr :

Code:

ffmpeg -version
ffmpeg version 4.1.6-1~deb10u1 Copyright (c) 2000-2020 the FFmpeg developers
built with gcc 8 (Debian 8.3.0-6)
configuration: --prefix=/usr --extra-version='1~deb10u1' --toolchain=hardened --libdir=/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu --incdir=/usr/include/x86_64-linux-gnu --arch=amd64 --enable-gpl --disable-stripping --enable-avresample --disable-filter=resample --enable-avisynth --enable-gnutls --enable-ladspa --enable-libaom --enable-libass --enable-libbluray --enable-libbs2b --enable-libcaca --enable-libcdio --enable-libcodec2 --enable-libflite --enable-libfontconfig --enable-libfreetype --enable-libfribidi --enable-libgme --enable-libgsm --enable-libjack --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libmysofa --enable-libopenjpeg --enable-libopenmpt --enable-libopus --enable-libpulse --enable-librsvg --enable-librubberband --enable-libshine --enable-libsnappy --enable-libsoxr --enable-libspeex --enable-libssh --enable-libtheora --enable-libtwolame --enable-libvidstab --enable-libvorbis --enable-libvpx --enable-libwavpack --enable-libwebp --enable-libx265 --enable-libxml2 --enable-libxvid --enable-libzmq --enable-libzvbi --enable-lv2 --enable-omx --enable-openal --enable-opengl --enable-sdl2 --enable-libdc1394 --enable-libdrm --enable-libiec61883 --enable-chromaprint --enable-frei0r --enable-libx264 --enable-shared

My question is : should I install SoX or libsoxr.so is suffisant ?

Thank you.
Manu

[simoncn]

If you have a static ffmpeg with libsoxr (the static part is important), you don't need SoX as well. This is because the necessary code from SoX is included in the static executable.