Taiko Audio SGM Extreme : the Crème de la Crème

[Taiko Audio]

i have asked that in the past, and was told that the installation does not impact SQ on xdms

Installation on disk doesn’t, but executing it does, and that continues for a while after you stop it too.

 

[cat6man]

can we have a big "do not use" button optionally placed over the roon selection tab?

 

[Taiko Audio]

I agree.
I was very surprised this has such a deep and positive effect.
This is to the point I cant listen with defult setting now.

We have very talented Taiko Team to look under this stone.
Everyone has very good trained ears here so I trust Everyone can contribute something including me.

It takes a Kris to even find something like this

 

[wil]

I'm trying to figure out the take-away on this:

-- Do Roon settings have any audible effect on XDMS? (and if so, is it just temporary after toggling between the two players?) I can't tell if Kris is talking about only the effect he hears in Roon when "Discovery/Alternative" is selected. Or if he hears a sonic improvement in XDMS as well?

And, speaking of the "Alternative" Sound Profile? I tried to look at it, but on my XDMS, it's inoperable.

 

[nenon]

@Kris - how about you do a soft restart of the Extreme? How does that affect the sound in your system?
I find a soft restart every now and then to have a positive effect. The above comments from the Taiko team may offer an explanation as to why that is.

I usually restart my Extreme when I do A/B comparisons (once before the A and another time before the B). IMO, the proper way to assess those software changes would be:
- restart
- listen
- make the software change in Roon or XDMS
- restart
- listen again
- repeat

@wil - Roon settings should not have an audible effect on XDMS and vice versa. However, it seems like if you have sensitive ears like Kris, any changes in software may have a temporary impact (as they write to memory). Emile is suggesting that those changes are just temporary and will fade over time. I think if you hear that in your system, a simple soft reboot, either from a VNC connection or from the power button on the front, should normalize everything. Most people may not even be that sensitive and not hear any difference.

 

[RUIN*ish]

don't say never...........there is a not yet functionable item in the setup menu of the xdms app related to 'airable'.

i'm not certain but i think airable is an api that permits streaming/radio

Crossing fingers....

 

[cat6man]

Crossing fingers....

i guess there are 2 possibilities

airable.radio

…is our worldwide live radio technology and extensive catalogue. Integrate airable.radio into your products, app or software and grant your customers access t

www.airablenow.com

or

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/airable-portable-neck-fan-for-cooler-outdoor-life#/

 

[Kris]

Why not just uninstall Roon if you don’t use it anyway? I assume it’s easy enough to reinstall if needed?

Sooner or later I will uninstall.
As of now I am still in testing / experimenting phase .

For proper testing Roon / no Roon I would love to have 2 separate Extremes.

 

[Kris]

i have asked that in the past, and was told that the installation does not impact SQ on xdms

3 years ago I was told Extreme is totally immune to the network quality.
Now we have Taiko Swich , Taiko Net card and soon Taiko Router.

I am extreme happy the Taiko Team listens to their customers like no one else
and executes their findings in a 10x better way .
This is a reason I am here .

 

[Kris]

There is an effect lingering in time, like @EuroDriver mentioned it has something to do with memory management. So if you switch between Roon / XDMS, change settings etc, it has an effect for an X amount of time. It’s astonishing what our ears can actually pick up.

I belive everyone here has well trained ears , but not everyone wants to experiment.
Those things are easy to pic up Once you are trained for experimenting changes,
It takes 10 - 15 expetiments every day for few years and you will be always able to tell exactly what has changed.

I know it is time consuming and it looks like paranoia,
but I am trying to get to perfection so I never stop.

But I believe Taiko Router + DC splitter+ BPS + NSM will be the cure for my „experimental disease”

 

[Kris]

It takes a Kris to even find something like this

You made my day !

I have the bigest respect to your ability to keep checking all the options and being able to decide quikly what will work what will not.
I need tons of time sometimes to find a perfect setting.

 

[Kris]

@Kris - how about you do a soft restart of the Extreme? How does that affect the sound in your system?
I find a soft restart every now and then to have a positive effect. The above comments from the Taiko team may offer an explanation as to why that is.

I usually restart my Extreme when I do A/B comparisons (once before the A and another time before the B). IMO, the proper way to assess those software changes would be:
- restart
- listen
- make the software change in Roon or XDMS
- restart
- listen again
- repeat

@wil - Roon settings should not have an audible effect on XDMS and vice versa. However, it seems like if you have sensitive ears like Kris, any changes in software may have a temporary impact (as they write to memory). Emile is suggesting that those changes are just temporary and will fade over time. I think if you hear that in your system, a simple soft reboot, either from a VNC connection or from the power button on the front, should normalize everything. Most people may not even be that sensitive and not hear any difference.

I aways restart at the beginning of the session.
Booting is starting XDMS . Roon is off .
So you always will have a XDMS with alternative SQ FIRST.
Than you need to switch to Roon manually.
Again You always will have XDMS on first.

I was not testing reboot in between but will do.
I agree the reboot has positive effect on cleaning the memory and elevating SQ,
especially after long listening session.

 

[Christiaan Punter]

Can you do this if you are running XDMS?

I honestly don't know. I recall Ed mentioning that it was not recommended to run Roon and XDMS at the same time, however that was some time ago. I inferred at the time that this was due to sound quality considerations and not that one of the two programs would break the other if run simultaneously.

In principle, why wouldn't it work? The requests to Roon for information not stored locally with Roon Core and requests via XDMS for information not stored with XDMS (music streaming services) are being routed via the same path. The Taiko router doesn't care what program the requests are coming from or going to.

I would suspect that you would have to go to the desktop of your Extreme and start Roon from there with XDMS already running (or vice versa), since the present XDMS control app only provides a toggle between XDMS and Roon.

Steve Z

While it is technically possible to run XDMS as well as Roon and I have done this during XDMS testing, we have found that the negative impact this has on XDMS is such that warrants removing the option. Hence, we have now a toggle switch in XDMS to use one or the other. Even if Roon runs on another core, this will have an audible effect on the Extreme Server. Of course, once the Extreme Router and Switch are connected in between and the Exrtreme is on its isolated network, the impact of using an external Roon server will be minimal or even negligible.

 

[Christiaan Punter]

Sooner or later I will uninstall.
As of now I am still in testing / experimenting phase .

For proper testing Roon / no Roon I would love to have 2 separate Extremes.

For now, Roon is what the Extreme Server comes with as standard and XDMS is still Alpha software. We'll transition to Beta at some point in the near future, but still, that is not the final build. At least while XDMS is in development, and maybe also thereafter (time will tell), we advise keeping the server standard with all the software that it comes with from the factory and with no other software added.

 

[cat6man]

For now, Roon is what the Extreme Server comes with as standard and XDMS is still Alpha software. We'll transition to Beta at some point in the near future, but still, that is not the final build. At least while XDMS is in development, and maybe also thereafter (time will tell), we advise keeping the server standard with all the software that it comes with from the factory and with no other software added.

The phrase "near future" has been happily noted in the same sentence as "beta"

 

[Steve Williams]

The phrase "near future" has been happily noted in the same sentence as "beta"

And NSM as well

 

[Christiaan Punter]

And NSM as well

Indeed, we hope to release NSM in the "near future" as well

 

[austinpop]

I aways restart at the beginning of the session.
Booting is starting XDMS . Roon is off .
So you always will have a XDMS with alternative SQ FIRST.
Than you need to switch to Roon manually.
Again You always will have XDMS on first.

I was not testing reboot in between but will do.
I agree the reboot has positive effect on cleaning the memory and elevating SQ,
especially after long listening session.

Kudos to you for your meticulous testing! I agree with @nenon that reboots should fix any lingering effects from the other player software, but you are right: currently, XDMS is set to start on every reboot.

However, if you remember the early days of XDMS, it is a fairly simple matter to change the XDMS server and player services to not start automatically on boot. That way, you can reboot to a state with no music sofware running. Then you can start either Roon or XDMS, without any previous state from the other.

So the steps:
- disable auto start of XDMS server and XDMS player in services
- reboot
- start XDMS server and player services
- do listening test
- reboot
- start TaikoRoon service
- do listening test

I would be surprised if you still hear XDMS and Roon affecting each other, but I'll keep an open mind.

 

[Kris]

Kudos to you for your meticulous testing! I agree with @nenon that reboots should fix any lingering effects from the other player software, but you are right: currently, XDMS is set to start on every reboot.

However, if you remember the early days of XDMS, it is a fairly simple matter to change the XDMS server and player services to not start automatically on boot. That way, you can reboot to a state with no music sofware running. Then you can start either Roon or XDMS, without any previous state from the other.

So the steps:
- disable auto start of XDMS server and XDMS player in services
- reboot
- start XDMS server and player services
- do listening test
- reboot
- start TaikoRoon service
- do listening test

I would be surprised if you still hear XDMS and Roon affecting each other, but I'll keep an open mind.

Great idea !
Will test it just to remember how the clean Roon sounds like and how the clean XDMS is performing.
Unfotunate I suspect that will be very dissapointing for Roon as this progam benefits from XDMS settings mostly.
XDMS is rather „poluted” with Roon settings ( filters, volume control, background activities, MQA).
I believe Emile or Taiko Team know exactly how much Roon affects XDMS and other way around.

 

[RUIN*ish]

Great idea !
Will test it just to remember how the clean Roon sounds like and how the clean XDMS is performing.
Unfotunate I suspect that will be very dissapointing for Roon as this progam benefits from XDMS settings mostly.
XDMS is rather „poluted” with Roon settings ( filters, volume control, background activities, MQA).
I believe Emile or Taiko Team know exactly how much Roon affects XDMS and other way around.

This is interesting.
I normally start with Roon/Radio Paradise and switch to XDMS/local files an hour or so later.
I would hear "noise" for about 15 minutes. Thought it was just the local file hardware warming up.

Another reason to eventually rid this malware from my E...