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Is Digi bit-perfect?

hifi

August 17, 2014 05:03

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I believe the digital world is much more deterministic
than analog one. If device has one number in input and
the same number in output this is bit-perfect to me. Is
Digi bit-perfect device?

The software also plays important role in bit-perfectness.
Is it valid to say that only in combination with Volumio
Digi is really bit-perfect? For example in combination with
XBMC it's not bit-perfect as the later has a mixer.

Thanks!

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8 comments

• 0
  
  HiFiBerry team August 17, 2014 08:26

  Hi,
  
  the output is bit-perfect. However many software is doing some kind of post-processing. Even Volumio might modify the data stream depending on the setting (e.g. re-sampling). Just having a mixer does not mean you can't output bit-perfect. If the mixer is set to 0dB change, the output will still be unmodified.
  
  Best regards
  
  Daniel
• 0
  
  hifi August 17, 2014 15:17

  Thank you Daniel,
  You mentioned several settings which can modify output.
  Is there anything else? It would be great to list them
  here for different Linux distros based on XBMC and MPD
  (e.g. OpenElec, Volumio etc).
  
  Thanks.
• 0
  
  HiFiBerry team August 17, 2014 19:20

  There is no easy way to test this. Therefore we cannot say. However sometimes the post processing might improve sound quality. Upsampling 44.1kHz to to 96 or 192kHz might even improve the performance of some DACs as clock recovery might be better. Therefore there might be situations where bit-perfect is not the best solution.
  
  Best regards
  Daniel
• 0
  
  hifi August 17, 2014 20:57

  That reminds me digital zoom in photo cameras. Yes it can
  be good but... optical is better :)
• 0
  
  nattaphoomd December 15, 2014 07:14

  Does anybody know?
  How to set Volumio enable re-sample 44.1kHz to 96kHz ?
  
  I'm looking for the way to improve sound quality from 44.1kHz
  
  Thank for your reply.
• 0
  
  HiFiBerry team December 15, 2014 08:21

  Is far as I remember, resampling can be enabled from the GUI somewhere in the settings.
  
  Best regards
  Daniel
• 0
  
  Marti Mcfly March 01, 2017 01:43

  In the same regiaster of discussion... 

  Looking at picture, in OUTPUT/DEVICE, I choose direct hardware device without any conversion.  This means it is bit perfect, in essence?  I can still control volume in software (VLC)

   

  

• 0
  
  HiFiBerry team March 01, 2017 05:51

  HI,

  this is how VLC works. VLC will modify the digital sound data if you change the volume. I would not really recommend VLC for music playback. Check out our software page, you can find music-optimized distributions there:

  https://www.hifiberry.com/build/software-selection/

  Best regards,
  Daniel