Show your audio system

[drivedesigned]

The system is running on an underclocked RPi 3a+ (previously with a Pi Zero W, but I wanted a little bit more performance)

I've been thinking of upgrading from my Pi Zero W too, how significant would you say the performance boost was?

Better post a quick (and terrible quality sorry ) of my little setup too:



The Pi Zero W normally sits just behind the TV with a PhatDAC sitting on top, but its currently inside being upgraded to v6.1

Amp is a JVC JA-S11G, Speakers are DALI Zensor 1's on DIY stands, Sub is a Jenson QX-80.

[Tim Curtis]

You should experience a substantial performance improvement with the 3A+ due to it's 4-core CPU, faster RAM, 5GHz WiFi etc.

The 3A+ is my fav for audio :-)

[drivedesigned]

You should experience a substantial performance improvement with the 3A+ due to it's 4-core CPU, faster RAM etc.

The 3A+ is my fav for audio :-)

Well that's good to know, is that because it offers everything you need at a lower price point than the B models or is there something special about it?

I was already considering upgrading my PhatDAC to an Allo miniBOSS but they seem hard to get in Australia. Maybe I can upgrade the Pi for now instead and open up my DAC options even more for later...

[Tim Curtis]

The cost of Raspberry Pi is not an issue as far I know. In fact it's dramatically lowering the cost and increasing the accessibility of "computing" in general :-)

My Audio usage scenario is 5GHz WiFi and NAS and so the 3A+ is the ideal board for that. The 3B/4B boards with their Ethernet circuits etc would end up being unused in my environment.

YMMV :-)

[TheOldPresbyope]

I've come to a similar conclusion. 

The performance of the 3A+ running moOde is fine, whether I'm driving an I2S DAC HAT or a USB DAC. The 5GHz WiFi on the 3A+ works well pretty much everywhere in my 4-floor townhouse save one room where I'll soon place a WiFi bridge because the WiFi interfaces of my laptop and mobile devices don't work well there either. My music directory is on a NAS, which in my case hangs on the Ethernet backbone of my LAN in order better to service all its clients.  The 3A+ does have only 1/2GB of RAM, which can an issue if trying to compile largish programs.

The one big attraction for me of the new 4B is its redesigned I/O subsystem including two USB3 ports. With its somewhat faster CPU and much larger RAM I can see me using one 4B as a "master" moOde player hosting the music library on a USB3-connected SSD, serving both itself and a couple of satellite moOde players in the house. The satellites will be 3A+s. My existing NAS can be dedicated to other uses (including backing up the music library).

Like the man said, "YMMV".

Regards,
Kent

[drivedesigned]

The cost of Raspberry Pi is not an issue as far I know. In fact it's dramatically lowering the cost and increasing the accessibility of "computing" in general :-)

My Audio usage scenario is 5GHz WiFi and NAS and so the 3A+ is the ideal board for that. The 3B/4B boards with their Ethernet circuits etc would end up being unused in my environment.

YMMV :-)

I know all Pis are cheap, but the 3A+ is even moreso than the 3B/4B boards.

The way you specified "for audio" made me wonder if there was more to it than simply not paying for features you don't need - I'm no expert on the Pi lineup so its not beyond my imagination to think it would be possible that one Pi might have some unique design advantage over another... but if they're all equally capable of producing good audio with the right DAC attached that's good to know.

[hjheins]

I've come to a similar conclusion. 

The performance of the 3A+ running moOde is fine, whether I'm driving an I2S DAC HAT or a USB DAC. The 5GHz WiFi on the 3A+ works well pretty much everywhere in my 4-floor townhouse save one room where I'll soon place a WiFi bridge because the WiFi interfaces of my laptop and mobile devices don't work well there either. My music directory is on a NAS, which in my case hangs on the Ethernet backbone of my LAN in order better to service all its clients.  The 3A+ does have only 1/2GB of RAM, which can an issue if trying to compile largish programs.

The one big attraction for me of the new 4B is its redesigned I/O subsystem including two USB3 ports. With its somewhat faster CPU and much larger RAM I can see me using one 4B as a "master" moOde player hosting the music library on a USB3-connected SSD, serving both itself and a couple of satellite moOde players in the house. The satellites will be 3A+s. My existing NAS can be dedicated to other uses (including backing up the music library).

Like the man said, "YMMV".

Regards,
Kent

I like your idea here. In fact, I went in a very similar direction:
But instead of using a moodeaudio-pi for this, I splitted the tasks.
1) Pi3B+ for audio with an Audiophonics DAC connected to a couple of Dynaudio Emit 10's.
2) all music on a separate, network connected, mini computer(I actually have the HC1, wich is the size of an SSD drive+aluminium heat sink

This way, the pi doesn't get overworked, and we can actually get streaming music an video everywhere in the house simultaniously.

Works very well.

[TheOldPresbyope]

@hjheins

If you happen to read certain of my other posts, you'll see that I also have an Odroid HC1 which has been the hardware platform for my OpenMediaVault NAS for several years. As you say, works very well.

As I think about "downsizing" (code for, getting rid of tons of stuff I've accumulated over the years) in preparation of a move to a smaller place I think about consolidating services. The RPi4B is so muscular I don't think it's in any danger of being overworked if I make it my sole music server.

But the wonderful thing about DIY is you get to make what you want.

Regards,
Kent

[Tim Curtis]

Yer not moving to a Mini-House are u :-0

[hjheins]

@TheOldPresbyope

You're right, you can "shape" t any way you want, which is something I really like.
Though before I installed the HC1, I did test throughput and stability on the pi3B+, and found that stability was somewhat of an issue during high load/volume down or uploads to the machine. I would guess this would be improved a lot with the pi4. But that was the reason for me to choose the HC1: you can run huge amounts of network traffic to it, and it will just keep going.

Hendrik-Jan