TOPIC: USBstreamer B + miniDSP 4x10 HD + Linux.

Greetings,

I'm attempting to play music off my laptop -> usbstreamer b -> miniDSP 4x10 HD -> amps -> speakers. I know the miniDSP 4x10 -> . . . -> speakers setup is working fine. The streamer b unit is the new element, and I'm having trouble setting it up. I installed the I2S-Toslink firmware with my wife's windows box. When I connect the usbstreamer B unit to my Ubuntu 16.04 laptop, it recognizes the unit and I can configure Ubuntu to play music through it . . . only no sound appears.

It's like the miniDSP 4x10 unit does not appear to know about the optical input. After I set "source" to toslink, it still behaves as if the source is the analogue input -- the analogue input is still being sent to the speakers. I must be missing something quite basic. I take it the analogue input is always "live" for the 4x10 HD unit? If so, I suspect this means my laptop is not sending the correct signal to the usbstreamer.

Any idea what might be the problem?

Hi, you need to have your routing tab set up to route the digital input.

Are you talking about the routing tab in the 4x10 HD configuration software? Yes, that's set up correctly.

The only thing of interest I notice is that even if I set "clock source" to "internal" in the UAC2 Control Panel (on my wife's windows box), if I plug the usbstreamer into my linux laptop, it gets turned back to the toslink clock.

You didnt say that before. Is there level on the input meters?

Nope, nothing. Well, the monitors give -120.4 which I suspect is basically nothing . Certainly there's nothing visible.

I can mute the analogue input from this menu, that helps...

Hm. I would suggest confirming that its not 4x10 issue by connecting another optical source.

Earlier you said you configured on Windows but played audio on Linux? Can you pkay audio through the setup on Windows? If so, that would isolate to a linux issue.

Thanks.

Unfortunately I don't have another optical source.

Will try driving it through Windows. . . I'm not certain what the most reliable method to test it using Windows might be. But I've tried setting the speaker device in Windows Media Player to "USBStreamer Multi-Channels" and with this setting, playing a movie, no signal is being sent to the 4x10 unit.

Is there a test with less room for errors than Windows Media Player? Apologies, I don't know much about Windows.

I found the "Control Panel -> Hardware and Sound -> Sound" menu which allowed me to send some test sounds to the USBStreamer and nothing was coming through on the 4x10 monitor. So it seems I can't get the usbstreamer device to work in Windows, either.

I am running Firmware 5.3 on the usbstreamer.

Most DVD/Bluray players will have an optical out, as may your TV? Anyway, it was a thought to help isolate the problem.

Sorry, I don't think I know anything more about Windows audio playback than you do. If still no luck then maybe a support ticket might be the best thing to do.

Thanks, I checked the back of one of our TVs and found a digital audio out. The 4x10 unit registers the signal on its monitor.

So it appears either 1) Both my windows and Linux computers can not communicate with the usbstreamer b or 2) the usbstreamer b is not producing a valid toslink signal.

Yes. And (1) seems unlikely. I don't remember off-hand how to check exactly which firmware version is loaded into a USBStreamer. (Not home at present either.) All I can think of is reload the TOSLINK firmware to be sure. But grasping at straws now. Sorry I couldn't help Support ticket? -> minidsp.desk.com

I have the toslink 5.3 firmware loaded. There's a little windows firmware-loading app available on the minidsp website. Okay, will try requesting support.

You have been very helpful. These are things I might have thought to try eventually, but the audio world is such a departure for me it might have taken weeks... Right now my head is into mathematics, and home renovations.

Is there a convenient software package out there where I can experiment sending different types of signals (on different channels) to the usbstreamer unit? Windows would be fine. Linux would be great.

Woot! Some progress.

I've been running through the audio troubleshooting page and I'm starting to make some progress:

help.ubuntu.com/community/SoundTroubleshootingProcedure

If I run the "aplay -l" command in linux:

I can fire off a wav file to the streamer with this command:

And *sometimes* it plays. Often the command return with

But I'm making progress. I also used the pavucontrol utility and the alsamixer utility. I've fiddled around with them some and at present I'm not certain if this has been relevant to any changes!

But I'm feeling much better now. I know the streamer b works, in linux too, I just don't know how to make it work reliably yet.

Alsamixer controls the volume on the output to the streamer, at least, when you output through the aplay utility.

So ALSA is okay with the streamer, I just need to figure out how to get a more general music player comfortable with it.

I have *not* been able to get stereo .wav files to play through aplay, only mono.

Finally, I'm playing music with mplayer, from my linux laptop to my speakers, via the usbstreamer and minidsp 4x10hd unit.

The key thing I did not understand is it's better not to use pulseaudio with high-end speakers. . . and the Linux community figured that out long ago. So they developed a distinct audio interface, called Jack.

I haven't figured out all the quirks yet, but the "Jack audio connection kit" has a nice GUI for setting up the audio interface. mplayer will stream straight to jack.

So all my music appears to play fine, now. The downside is I'll have to rip all my music at a higher sample rate . . . Glad I haven't thrown out all my cds yet!

Once I have everything working smoothly I'll post something that is hopefully easier to follow.

Awesome Glad I could help a bit!

[This forum needs a thumbs up icon -> :thumbsup: ]

@ Rybu

Great update indeed and glad to hear that you figured out!
The USBStreamer is running as a 10x10 interface where it's indeed 8first channel I2S and 9&10 for TOSLINK.
We do have a custom firmware doing stereo only on ch1&2. I think that it could help your setup.

Please feel free to ask for it from our team in a tech support ticket, and we'll just send it your way.

DevTeam