Sound Quality in release 4.1

[philrandal]

Concepts such as "musical" and "veil" when applied to audio are extremely difficult to quantify and therefore troubleshoot. These subjective terms have as much to do with an individual's personal context and cognition as with anything tangible. That's not to say there aren't quantifiable triggers to these perceptions, e.g. distortion levels, sampling artifacts, EQ differences or even just a difference in overall level.

Skip is suggesting that the mid-range quality is different -- too much 'presence'. If there is a convolutional difference then this can be measured and I might be able to do this. I think I still have an SD Card with 3.8.4 on it, so I could do a comparison.

However, this won't identify what has caused the changes even if we can find a measurable difference . . .

What do people prefer: the RT or LL kernel?

-Richard

My experience was that LL was better.  From what I recall, people using external USB DACs tended to prefer the LL one, while people using internal i2s solutions overwhelmingly favored the RT Kernel.

Again, of course, just subjective appreciations and what I remember reading, so take it with a pinch of salt.

Best regards,
Rafa.

My experience on a Pi Zero W with I2S DAC (Pimoroni pHAT DAC) was that the RT kernel sounded best in 3.8.4.  LL sounded harsh to my ears.

In the early 4.0 betas, I found the RT kernel unusable, for whatever reason (kept getting audio stutters).

Phil