mpdPup - Simplified MPD Music Server/Jukebox - v0.9.3

For talk and support relating specifically to Puppy derivatives
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Mark van de Pas
Posts: 5
Joined: Thu 14 Feb 2013, 13:08

sound quality mpd + Puppy <-> mpd + Tiny Core

#406 Post by Mark van de Pas »

Hi Idolse,

Through your mpdPup-project I learned how good puppy-linux can sound compared too regular mainstream Linux distro’s like Ubuntu Studio etc.
Info on my setup: mpdPup -> ESI-juli@ digital part (separately linear powered) -> Van den Hull optocoupler -> Lavry Black DA10 -> Vovox Direct S -> Klein & Hummel O300.

The very good sound quality coming from mpdPup made me curious what sound quality other puppy’s would deliver.
So I tried various other puppy’s, finally stumbling upon Tiny Core Linux.

Quite too my surprise: Tiny Core Linux + cifs- utils + alsa-dev + DeadBeef (with GAIN + re-& alsa up-sampling disabled) is another significant step-up in sound quality from mpdPup.
Audacity2 sounds equally superb on Tiny Core.
So may be better sound quality might be there because Tiny Core is used.

I know I should compare: mpdPup <-> Tiny Core + mpd.
But being a linux newbie I cant’t manage too setup a working mpd in Tiny Core.
There is a mpd.tcz, but configuring mpd in Tiny core is way too complicated for me.

So here’s my question:
* Have you (or any other inmates) ever tried mpd on Tiny Core?
Just too compare sound quality coming from: mpd + tiny core <-> mpd + puppy ?

Mark

NB I used the words “significant step-up in sound quality

Supersurfer
Posts: 13
Joined: Sat 02 Mar 2013, 12:10

empty folders in mpad

#407 Post by Supersurfer »

Dear Idolse,

in Mpad I have a lot of empty albums showing in album mode. I can not get rid of them in Mpad, they seem to be in the mpdpup database.
These empty albums were left after I had moved music files to other folders (there are no empty folders on the NAS)

Is there an elegant way of deleting/removing the database or removing these empty folders one by one?


Kind regards,

Douwe01nl
Posts: 17
Joined: Thu 14 Jun 2012, 20:32

Tiny Core

#408 Post by Douwe01nl »

Hi Mark,
Great post!!
unfortunately , the coming period will be very busy and i doubt if i can find the time to try your suggestions and to fiddle with Tiny Core and mpd.
If i get somewhere i will let you know.
If possible, coud you post a small manual of how to create your setup?
Many thanks!
Douwe

ps since i use mpdpup (in stead of cmp2) i spend a lot more time listening to music (in stead of tweaking and repairing the very unstable cmp2)

Dynobot
Posts: 44
Joined: Wed 05 Dec 2012, 12:04

#409 Post by Dynobot »

Well I spent some time playing with TinyCore Linux. Got Deadbeef to work, sounds great, did not do any critical listening/comparison between mpdpup though.

Also MPD does not work with TInyCore at the moment with the current rev and mpd. The packages are out of sync. Furthermore I can not compile mpd on TinyCore from scratch.

I also tried to install the Real-time Kernel on TinyCore per instructions dated 2011. That too is out of date with the current rev.

I went back to mpdpup and poked around looking at various process and discovered that about 10 processes not audio related are 'reniced' to the highest priority. These processes like kpsmoused might be great for a standard install because it speeds things up like responsiveness of the mouse etc. but for mpdpup having the highest priority is a waist. So I promptly reduced the processes of everything to 0 except audio related processes.

I really really REALLY do hope that mpdpup will not become your standard abandoned Linux project.

On another note, for anyone interested and has a Nexus 7 or 10 or probably anything with the Android OS that can run JB 4.2.x. There is a new ROM out that enables USB audio and it works with just about every Dac I have tried and have on hand which includes XMOS, VIA [Audiogd], Tenor and a few iBrasso headphone usb-dac-amps. This means that any of the above can be turned into a Squeezebox Touch. I currently have my Nexus 7 assigned to such duties right now. This means for about $140 bucks anyone can go to their nearest Walmart and buy any tablet that runs Android, install the ROM and instantly have a Squeezebox Touch.

Enjoy!

ldolse
Posts: 367
Joined: Fri 23 Oct 2009, 16:33

#410 Post by ldolse »

Dynobot wrote:I went back to mpdpup and poked around looking at various process and discovered that about 10 processes not audio related are 'reniced' to the highest priority. These processes like kpsmoused might be great for a standard install because it speeds things up like responsiveness of the mouse etc. but for mpdpup having the highest priority is a waist. So I promptly reduced the processes of everything to 0 except audio related processes.

I really really REALLY do hope that mpdpup will not become your standard abandoned Linux project.
It's not abandoned, no worries, but it's on hiatus for a while, too much real life in the way. But I maintain it for my own usage too, and don't have any plans to continue using anything but this. I had loftier goals of trying to rebuild the kernel but maybe another release with bug fixes and some of these audio priority tweaks would be sufficient.

@RoxGsm - no idea why you can't play hi-rez audio files. Everything up to 96Khz works out of the box for all sound devices. On some sound devices (my own included) you need to unplug/replug the USB device after the system has fully booted to get 176/192Khz working. Other users report no problems with any bitrates from the start.

@DenisP, I'm not really sure why you needed to put empcd in rc.local - the starting with '&' is a bit weird as to being required. Unfortunately I'm a bit loathe to use this as a fix because I used to start some other process with an ampersand and I seem to recall it caused some users problems. Anyway you should be able to tweak the empcd init script to use the ampersand, and it already has the logic to sleep until mpd is alive. /etc/init.d/30.empcd.

I will follow up on email as requested.

@Supersurfer - I have that same problem for a few albums on mPad, no idea what causes it - guessing it's either a subtle flaw in the MPD database that it displays, or purely a bug in mPad - either way it's something to take up with the mPad author - he seems to be fairly responsive to well described problems.
Last edited by ldolse on Sat 22 Jun 2013, 14:55, edited 1 time in total.

Supersurfer
Posts: 13
Joined: Sat 02 Mar 2013, 12:10

#411 Post by Supersurfer »

Hi Idolse,

I adressed this problem to the mpad developer first but he directed me to you.
It does not seem to be a problem with mpad.
Is there a way I can rebuild the database, maybe that helps?

Regards,

ldolse
Posts: 367
Joined: Fri 23 Oct 2009, 16:33

#412 Post by ldolse »

If the mPad author pushed it back to me that would mean he views it as a bug in mpd. The MPD devs are a bit more stringent about bug descriptions though, so unless you can figure out the exact cause and effect deleting the database is probably your best bet.

To delete your database and rebuild it you just need to stop mpd and then delete the database file - it's located at /mnt/home/mpd/database. When you re-start mpd it will build a new one. I'm not convinced this will fix the problem - I seem to recall that I still see it for an album here or there with a fresh database, but it may be related to folder renaming - I never dug into it too much.

Mark van de Pas
Posts: 5
Joined: Thu 14 Feb 2013, 13:08

#413 Post by Mark van de Pas »

Hi Douwe,

Same here. Since I use mpdpup (instead of cmp2) I spent more time listening too music. Mpdpup not only sounds very good but the remote control through smartphone apps also makes it really comfortable.

Although I must give Cics cmp2 project much credits for guidance and introduction into ‘computer music’. Also the XP OS-slimming operations introduced by dedicated followers of the cmp-project were an eye opener for me.

Having learned from the cmp2 project, I immediately recognized the potential of Idols’ mpdpup project. Using a slimmed OS (puppy Linux), no video usage, ect. So the same core ingredients resulting in superb sound quality come from mpdpup but still with a very user friendly GUI (through use of a client for remote control).

I don’t think we should discus installing Tiny Core Linux on Idols mpdpup project pages. I did not post it for that reason.
I brought the Tiny Core distribution too Idols attention, so he could have a look at it and see if Tiny Core contains any idea’s and improvements Idolse could use for his mpdpup project.

Idolse already showed to be open for suggestions. See Idols implementation of: ‘wisdom of the crowd optimazations’. So looking at Tiny Core might inspire Idolse for other optimizations, IF THERE ARE ANY IN TINY CORE. But I don’t know that. May be it is just deadbeef sounding appealing to me. Or that there is mistakenly running some upsampling in the background which I happen to like.

So that’s why I asked if Idolse ever heard mpd on tiny core. May be Idolse and/or other users with linux skills are not impressed at all with mpd on Tiny Core. So there would be no reason for having a closer look at Tiny Core and too check if there are any optimizations in Tiny Core which also could be implemented in mpdpup.

Since Idolse is kept bussy in real life, Dynobot already tried. Which resulted in discovering 10 not-audio-related processes running in high priority mode. (Thank you Dynobot !) So see, it’s always good too have a look around and see if there are new ideas which could improve the sound quality coming from mpdpup.


Mark

NB. I could email you a short description on how I installed tiny core on the cmp-hardware too test drive Tiny Core + Deadbeef. That is real easy on cmp-hardware because the esi-juli@ card is supported by ALSA.

Dynobot
Posts: 44
Joined: Wed 05 Dec 2012, 12:04

#414 Post by Dynobot »

Hi Idolse

I understand about being too busy in real life....I was extremely busy until recently hence by absence.

Now I am looking at about 6 months down time and will spend more time here to discuss MPDPUP. I forgot to post that I also increased the priority of MPD via the file in init.d. Just uncomment the line that has nice 15 and change it to nice -1. This gave the sound a nice low end lushness to balance out the very good detail gained by decreasing the other priorities to 0.

In the coming weeks I will be trying to figure out how to work with the devx file. I would really appreciate if you could help me get off the ground with it. I could do some testing and experimenting while you are busy.

I see there is one other person willing to contribute to writing manuals etc. Idolse please feel free to email / PM me to discuss how I can contribute. Having tried just about everything available I really do think MpdPup is the best thing since sliced bread. The concept is perfect and the OS is nearly dialed in to perfection too.

wlowes
Posts: 49
Joined: Fri 08 Jun 2012, 02:30
Location: Toronto, Canada

mpd nice -1

#415 Post by wlowes »

Dynobot wrote:Hi Idolse

I understand about being too busy in real life....I was extremely busy until recently hence by absence.

Now I am looking at about 6 months down time and will spend more time here to discuss MPDPUP. I forgot to post that I also increased the priority of MPD via the file in init.d. Just uncomment the line that has nice 15 and change it to nice -1. This gave the sound a nice low end lushness to balance out the very good detail gained by decreasing the other priorities to 0.


Dynobot
Great tip! Can you either repost directions to decrease the other priorities to or point me to a post? I have put in a bunch of your tweaks. all good, thanks

Want to make sure I have not missed these

the Nice -1 on MPD removed a nagging concern I had with the sound of an ALIX board running MPDPUP. While very good detail, it had a slightly mechanical sound compared to a well tuned CICS2 machine on slim XP. This added the lush almost magical fulness of sound that had hitherto been missing. Strongly recommended for all with a well resolved sound system.
Walter

Douwe01nl
Posts: 17
Joined: Thu 14 Jun 2012, 20:32

renice

#416 Post by Douwe01nl »

hi all, i found out a way to renice some processes, but for one time use only (see edit 2)

command:
ps axl

and look for the PID nr of the process you want to renice, for example kpsmoused has PID 36 and you want to renice to 19 (very low priority)

then type
renice 19 36

done!
check with
ps axl

you could put it in a script like jrling did
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... &start=120
although i could not figure out how

Thanks Dynobot and jrling!

@Mark: you are right, i asked about TinyCore for learning purposes, and i know Idolse is open for suggestions (i proudly contributed to the crowd sourced settings). Since Dynobot confirmed mpd does not match with TinyCore i decided not tot try it.
In stead i tried the priority settings, with very good results!
i LOVE this puppy!

Douwe

edit: Dynobot's comman d to find out the PID of audio-related processes:
ps -eLo pid,cls,rtprio,pri,nice,cmd | grep -i "irq"

edit 2:
I found out that at each startup PID nrs change, so the renice commands change. hmm, not a real solution...
startup sequence is for me rather complicated, could not find where priorities are set. Any suggestions?

bonalux
Posts: 22
Joined: Wed 20 Jun 2012, 11:02

Re: mpd nice -1

#417 Post by bonalux »

wlowes wrote:
Dynobot
Great tip! Can you either repost directions to decrease the other priorities to or point me to a post? I have put in a bunch of your tweaks. all good, thanks

Want to make sure I have not missed these

the Nice -1 on MPD removed a nagging concern I had with the sound of an ALIX board running MPDPUP. While very good detail, it had a slightly mechanical sound compared to a well tuned CICS2 machine on slim XP. This added the lush almost magical fulness of sound that had hitherto been missing. Strongly recommended for all with a well resolved sound system.
Walter
Forgive my ignorance, but, I cannot find the init.d file you were talking, in the init.d directory can't find the file to define the priorities, can you please give me the path?

Thank you.

Dynobot
Posts: 44
Joined: Wed 05 Dec 2012, 12:04

Re: mpd nice -1

#418 Post by Dynobot »

bonalux wrote:
wlowes wrote:
Dynobot
Great tip! Can you either repost directions to decrease the other priorities to or point me to a post? I have put in a bunch of your tweaks. all good, thanks

Want to make sure I have not missed these

the Nice -1 on MPD removed a nagging concern I had with the sound of an ALIX board running MPDPUP. While very good detail, it had a slightly mechanical sound compared to a well tuned CICS2 machine on slim XP. This added the lush almost magical fulness of sound that had hitherto been missing. Strongly recommended for all with a well resolved sound system.
Walter
Forgive my ignorance, but, I cannot find the init.d file you were talking, in the init.d directory can't find the file to define the priorities, can you please give me the path?

Thank you.
look in the /etc directory you will see another directory called init.d, within it you will se a file with mpd in the name, open it and on line 30 uncomment the line for nice

wlowes
Posts: 49
Joined: Fri 08 Jun 2012, 02:30
Location: Toronto, Canada

What's running in an optimized system

#419 Post by wlowes »

Dynobot
could you show the results of
ps axl
for your system?

Might give me some ideas for what to kill and where priorities should be
thx

wlowes
Posts: 49
Joined: Fri 08 Jun 2012, 02:30
Location: Toronto, Canada

#420 Post by wlowes »

Mark van de Pas wrote:Hi Douwe,

Same here. Since I use mpdpup (instead of cmp2) I spent more time listening too music. Mpdpup not only sounds very good but the remote control through smartphone apps also makes it really comfortable.
Hi Mark
I took similar CMP2 route and concur. Spend a lot more time listening now and love the smart phone client. XP slimming led me to the ALIX board with MPDPUP. I had not done the full Julie linear PS deal on CICS so ALIX was kind of a natural.
Walter

willemoes
Posts: 12
Joined: Thu 08 Nov 2012, 09:16

Re: mpd nice -1

#421 Post by willemoes »

Dynobot wrote:
bonalux wrote:
Forgive my ignorance, but, I cannot find the init.d file you were talking, in the init.d directory can't find the file to define the priorities, can you please give me the path?

Thank you.
look in the /etc directory you will see another directory called init.d, within it you will se a file with mpd in the name, open it and on line 30 uncomment the line for nice
Hi, being on an Alix Board and unable to use startX/XWindow I´d like to hopefully get confirmation, I´m doing this right:

Via Putty I followed Idolse´s instructions in an earlier post (in the old Mpdpup thread) to get to the line for nice:

".....for some reason some hardware doesn't like 'nice' which I've been using to give MPD higher system priority. If this is the case type this command at the CLI:

Code:
nano /etc/init.d/20.mpd

Find the line that says:

Code:
nice -n 15 mpd..." (I found this by typing "Ctrl + V" to get to the next page of the file).

- I uncommented by deleting the "#" in the beginning of the line
- deleted "15" and replaced with "-1"
- ending up with a "nice" line saying: nice -n -1 mpd
(saving and exiting Nano by typing "ctrl-X to exit" and 'Y' to save the change)

Is this correct?

On a sidenote, do any of the Alix and/or usb-powered Dac users use optimized power-supplies replacing wall-wart/usb-power (regulated or battery power)?

Finally thanks to Idolse and the contributors of this thread. MpdPup is for me the best sounding, most versatile and (after initial reading and trial/error) trouble free Pc-based music player (not to mention free too!)

regards, Finn
Last edited by willemoes on Thu 27 Jun 2013, 09:40, edited 1 time in total.

Supersurfer
Posts: 13
Joined: Sat 02 Mar 2013, 12:10

#422 Post by Supersurfer »

Hi Idolse,

I have found the issue with empty folders in Mpad.

The fault is in the meta data of the files.
When you put the albums in separate folders and use the " group by directory" setting, it displays the albums by folder.
But when the album tag in one folder is not the same for all music files mpad will create a separate folder for the file with the differing name, but the file itself resides in te other album. This creates empty albums in mpad.

I once again would like to thank you for a very nice player! I am intrueged by the nice settings discussion above and will try it myself.

Regards,

Dynobot
Posts: 44
Joined: Wed 05 Dec 2012, 12:04

#423 Post by Dynobot »

I understand that Puppy Linux does not have a security/limits.conf file.

However the limits can be seen using the ulimit -a command.

They can be set to new values with the ulimit command as well, bad thing is I can't figure out which file to add the command in to set it at boot.

I would like someone to try these two ulimit commands, listen for awhile and post back and difference in sound.

ulimit -l unlimited
ulimit -s unlimited


http://www.linuxhowtos.org/Tips%20and%2 ... ulimit.htm

wlowes
Posts: 49
Joined: Fri 08 Jun 2012, 02:30
Location: Toronto, Canada

nice

#424 Post by wlowes »

Fin
You have made the correct change. You can go back in with nano and see what you now have. You can alternatively use the command less instead of nano to simply list the contents of the file.
I always save in nano by using cntrl O then confirm the file then exit. I did not realize you can just exit and get prompted to save. thanks

wlowes
Posts: 49
Joined: Fri 08 Jun 2012, 02:30
Location: Toronto, Canada

#425 Post by wlowes »

Dynobot wrote:...
I would like someone to try these two ulimit commands, listen for awhile and post back and difference in sound.

ulimit -l unlimited
ulimit -s unlimited

http://www.linuxhowtos.org/Tips%20and%2 ... ulimit.htm
I have listened to a few of my favorite test songs, and have toggled back and forth on both these settings.

The effect is there, but very subtle. Default on my machine for -l was 64. When set to unlimited there is a change and I'd say for the better. In my case it takes away a bit of ringing and harshness on the highest registers.

Default on my machine for -s was 8192. Unlimited had a smaller effect that -l but it is there. Perhaps a little more ring removed or more likely a softened edge to all transients. Not sure if I like it. Have toggled a fair bit and then tried going to 4096. Liked that less. then back to 8192, better. Tried 16384. Maybe the best. It has more detail than unlimited, but less edge/ring than 8192.

For the record, I run the audio_buffer_size setting in MPD.CONF at 320 and buffer_before_play 12%. This is about the lowest I can go without dropouts. As I go lower, I believe I get better detail and transperancy at the expense of a tendency to inject ringing on highest hz. These limits seem to be a good buffer against that tendency.
Walter

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