Logitech Media Server is a piece of software, and it’s well described here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logitech_Media_Server

The highlights:

• It gets music files or streams from a plethora of diverse origins (files on local storage, files from private or public cloud storage, streams from other private streaming platforms eg another LMS or from public services eg Spotify, Tidal, Qobuz…), transcodes formats if need be, and streams/sends the songs towards compatible “renderers”, i.e. music players which in their turn feed the actual audio hw (DAC -> AMP -> Transducer)
• It’s available for Windows, Mac and of course Linux, including a few specialised Linux distributions
• It therefore runs on “usual” X386/64 hw, Apple hw, and – what matters most – on a huge array of low cost and especially low power consuming SBCs (Single Board Computers)
• Considering today’s available hw performance level, its system (CPU/RAM etc) requirements for an even fancy home setup are unbelievably low
• It’s free (GNU)

LMS does not “play music”, it just collects music, and manages its stock and access, and distributes them to the actual music players (the “renderes”).

As a “renderer” you can use either a preconfigured hardware device e.g. a Chromecast, a Squeezebox, etc which can be reached via various channels like wired ethernet, wifi ethernet, BT, AirpPlay and protocols like DLNA etc, or you can install a compatible receiver software on a general purpose system e.g. your pc, your Mac, your xbox, etc, or finally you can build a “hardware rendering device” from scracth, which is indeed my case and the good news is that it is way less complicated than it seems.

The physical system acting as LMS server may also have a Renderer inside, to “manage files, and play them out” from the same machine. Even in such case though that machine will keep being able to stream audio to other external Renderers.

While streaming audio to Renders, LMS can also manage keeping them “in sync”, resulting in simultaneous music playout in different rooms, for example.

So summarising:

• LMS is “the server”, the manager of the whole system. It cllects and indexes music files, makes them browsable, and sends (“streams”) them to companion devices called “Renderers”.
• The Renderers are the devices which get digital music data streams from LMS and push them into a locally connected DAC>AMP>Speaker/HP/IEM stack.

How I deployed it

No I won’t write a full book on the infinite ways to deploy an LMS infrastructure. I’ll just describe how my own infrastructure has been organised, for you to take inspiration

My LMS is running on an SBC-class computer.

In my specific case we’re talking about a BananaPi M2+ (recently upgraded from a NanoPi NEO2 , which is now dedicated to other tasks) but it could easily be “any” RaspberryPi, or dozens of similar alternatives.

My Banana-LMS server is wired-connected to my main home network switch.

Another SBC-class server is acting as a general file server for my home needs, that’s where my digital music files are deposited, and my Banana-LMS accesses them via NFS. In a simpler setup, I could plug a USB drive right onto Banana-LMS of course.

Once installed, the LMS server publishes an HTML interface. Which means that from any one of my PCs, or Laptops, or wifi devices (phones, tablets, daps…) I can access it as long as I can browse onto its address.

LMS creates an index of all music files on the storage, much like any “media manager” application does (including those inside DAPs).

Let’s now suspend the LMS description for a sec, and pass on to the Renderers.

Renderers

My first Renderer was is – guess what – a RaspberryPi Zero W.

As you read above, a Renderer is a device which takes the digital music data from the LMS server and sends them to the actual DAC. To do so, some sort of “music player” application is required. My choice on that is PiCorePlayer which I like as it offers two great features at the same time: it’s super-easy to install, and it sounds wonderfully well.

PiCorePlayer on Linux platform is distributed complete with a bare-bones Linux distribution, ready to work and do its job – and its job only – at the best of the hosting hardware ability. The maximally stripped-down, highly-optimised nature of PiCorePlayer’s underlying Linux distro is crucial to its performance as a low noise music player.

It’s good to note that PiCorePlayer also optionally carries LMS built in. That means that in an even simpler situation I could have avoided keeping a standalone Banana-LMS device acting as a server, and I could have elected one or my Renderers to the role of Renderer and Server for itself, and for all others.

Once at least one Renderer (the PiCorePlayer) is installed and running, I can go back onto LMS’s webpage – called from a phone, while sitting on the sofa – and I’ll see a Renderer available in my network. At that point I can browse and choose a song from LMS’s visual index, a Renderer to send it to, and click PLAY.

I have a total of 3 RPi-base Renderers active right now.

Allo

My first Renderer is the aforementioned RaspberryPi ZeroW, and it’s called Allo, at it hosts an Allo MiniBoss I2C DAC card.

Such mini-network-DAC box is subsequently connected to an Allo Volt+ amp box, giving juice to a pair of Roth Audio OLIRA1 bookshelvers. Depending on my seasonal feelings, the Allo renderer and its downstream line is either installed in a sitting corner in my livingroom, or takes some place on my desk and around it as a nearfield setup, for some non-overpretentious-quality audio output.

Groovy

My second PiCorePlayer-based Renderer is a Raspberry model 3B+, which is sitting on my desk, next to my PC.

To this Renderer one of my Groove units is normally plugged in, and it’s the resource I tap onto when I want to enjoy some specific drivers directly paired to the Groove. Hence the name “Groovy”

Indeed, Groovy is also what I typically use as a realiable, reasonably-clean USB host to audition other USB-input DACs or DAC/AMPs that I happen to receive from time to time.

Fun

The third PiCorePlayer Renderer is named “Fun”, and it’s based on a more recent RaspberryPi model 4B.

This is the support device for my “main desktop stack” for headphones at the moment, ending into my Burson Fun headphone amp – hence of course the name given to the PCP device.

Cutting the laptop out

Until some time ago I used to have a 4th Rendering point represented by my Windows Laptop itself. You do that by installing a windows app called SqueezeLite-X, which takes care of talking to the backend LMS server – much like a PiCorePlayer does. I used to, as I said, then more recently I quit using my laptop as a host for musical playing for good.

Long story short: the level of perturbance generated on a multipurpose, multimedia, gaming-level laptop like mine is significant. While a filter like the iFi Nano iUSB 3.0 undoubtedly helps reducing much of that, it’s nevertheless quite evident that cutting the problem at the source instead of fixing it later is a smarter option, when available! So I quit employing a noisy platform like a laptop in the first place, and now excluisively adopt less-noisy-to-begin-with ones for my musical pleasures.

More about LMS

So LMS allows me to browse my local digital music collection, and “play out” my preferred tracks on any of my connected Renderers.

I can reach that and browse through it via a normal web browser, or a nice number of supporting apps – either fully dedicated ones (e.g. OrangeSqueeze or others, available on Google Play) or multi purpose ones (e.g. UAPP, Neutron, HiBy Music, or any other app featuring DLNA-Controller capabilities)

If music tracks are decently tagged LMS also does some nice job in terms of music collection presentation. You can also have it acquire and cache album art, album and artist info, and even lyrics from various online resources.

If you access it via a browser you can choose the GUI “skin” you prefer, or customise your own if you are skilled enough. The UI is not remotely as phantasmagorical as on higher rank systems like Roon, but still quite pleasing nonetheless, with the non-secondary side-benefit of being… free!

And there’s more: a host of additional features can be activated / removed in forms of plugins.  Some examples:

Format conversion. LMS can convert to/from countless digital formats “on the fly”, i.e. while actually sending the file to the Renderer (and the DAC attached to it). So for example it can convert (e.g.) a DSF 128 track into a 24 bit / 176.4KHz PCM FLAC file while sending it to an endpoint which won’t natively be able to decode the DSF itself. Big caveat: this does require quite some muscle! My BananaPi-LMS does not have enough for that, for example. So for all DSD-level tracks I have, I took care of creating their relevant PCM (FLAC) version, and stored it as an alternative version of the same album on my NAS, and let LMS access them too.

Tidal, Spotify, Qobuz integration. Adding account credentials to LMS, it will connect to those services and make them available for browsing from within its GUI, and for reforwarding to the Renderers – just like it happens for any local-resident digital track.

UPnP / DLNA integration. I partially already covered this above. Any DLNA-capable mobile device (phone, tablet, dap, etc) can home interact with LMS. If the device only has DLNA-client support, you can only use it as a sort of Renderer – i.e., you need another device to browse LMS and push music from LMS into the DLNA-client device. If the device has full DLNA-controller support, instead, then it will be able to browse LMS in full authonomy, and call tracks to play onto itself. This – of course – can happen from “inside home”, and from “outside home”, provided you made your LMS accessible from the outside of course, and that your outgoing internet bandwidth is at least decent.

Airplay integration, Webradio integration, etc etc etc

Summary and conclusions

So, summarising: Logitech Media Server can be the heart and the brain of an entire domestic audio infrastructure.

What it ultimately offered me is:

• A centralised visual database of all my local digital audio material
• Some nice integration with extra artist / track information
• Access from within home, and from outside (via VPN).
• An “easy” way to keep digital audio transport off from general purpose computer hardware and OS (higher audio quality)

All this at an extremely low cost profile: LMS and its various Rendering companion sw packages are free of licenses, they can run on ARM-based hardware which is both inexpensive to buy (compared to an X86/X64 class alternative) and to electrically power up.

LMS served me well as my main audio infrastructure until a few months ago, when I switched over to Roon. I’ll write another piece on that… soon(tm).

The post A Logitech Media Server / LMS Infrastructure (Update) appeared first on Music For The Masses.

Nozzle mesh screens sometimes look like a decorative piece or something just to keep the ear juice out. They can create problems though when they wick up too much moisture or modders decide to remove them completely. Below you can see up close images of various nozzle mesh screens serving a vital function – to dampen unwanted resonances. The screen openings themselves (number of holes + diameter of holes) can also factor into the tuning of the earphone, but this was not included as part of this investigation. Below are samples of certain earphones where nozzle screens were discussed in more than passing on certain forums, as well as a popular modder tool otherwise known by the name of micropore tape or paper tape.

KZ ZS3

It was quite the rage to remove these screens and I see why. Mine was actually two plastic screens stuck together. Was this a mistake or on purpose?

SONY MH755

Reviewed here. Modders like to remove the foam plug, but do not remove the black mesh screen. It tames the peaks at 2.8kHz and 5.3khz giving it almost a textbook Harman curve. Very much important noted by certain modders like Slater.

BQEYZ SPRING 1

Our takes on the Spring 1 here. Modders claimed by removing the screen it would get rid of the woolly bass. I removed mine and the quality of the bass did not change, but treble peaks were turned up giving the illusion of improved bass. The bass was just masked by the extra treble punch. Again, I do not recommend removing unless there wasn’t enough upper midrange in the stock tuning. I have heard that other BQEYZ models employ tuning filters directly on the BA units, so this might explain why the screen only has a minor impact.

MOONDROP KANAS PRO

We covered the KPE exhaustively here. Notorious for clogging with moisture in high humidity areas or sweaty ears, Moondrop eventually started selling replacement nozzle screens and included them in subsequent models like the Starfield. They have an interesting arrangement of a small rectangular area with extra damping coverage. Similar to using a partial piece of micropore tape. Again removing it introduces peakiness. Not recommended.

MICROPORE TAPE (3M NEXCARE PAPER TAPE)

Micropore tape has a very irregular pattern. Not much to say about it other than it doesn’t seem to target any specific frequency. All the other filters are uniform and tend to dampen certain frequencies. Useful as a butter knife, not a scalpel.

SUMMARY

So personally, I do not recommend removing nozzle mesh screens unless planning to replace or mod with something else. There might be exceptions such as pure balanced armature IEM’s that utilize resistance damper filter plugs on the end of the balanced armature itself. Therefore the nozzle screen is not like putting a screen door on a submarine, most appear to be used as resistive dampers to tame the frequency response. I’m not suggesting it is wrong to remove the filters, but be aware of the consequences. If there are other earphone modding materials you would like to see up close and personal, leave a comment below or feel free to get in touch with us and we will see what we can do to expand this article.

Contact us!

DISCLAIMER

Sometimes I stare blankly at walls.

Our generic standard disclaimer.

About my measurements.

You find an INDEX of our most relevant technical articles HERE.

The post Nozzle Screen Filter Impact on Frequency Response appeared first on Music For The Masses.

In May 2019 I came up with an idea that I had never seen anywhere before. It involved turning a KZ Starline silicone eartip inside out, in what I dubbed the “Flip Tip”. The process is very easy, and (other than a pair of Starline eartips) only involves a few tools you have around the house.

TOOLS NEEDED

To perform this mod, simply get something with a round shaft that goes through the core of the eartip, but also has a large head on it. I’ve had success using a screw, a nail, and a golf tee.

THE PROCESS

Here, the process is demonstrated using a screw:

1. Insert the screw through the bottom of the Starline eartip.

2. Now pull down on the screw, which pulls the center of the eartip core inside out.

3. Once the core is inside out, you want to pull the eartip skirt down around the eartip core, like the top of an unbrella. You can do it with your fingers, or using something like the screwdriver shown in the next photo.

4. The surface of the ‘flipped tip’ is made of a stickier silicone than the normal surface of the eartip. This alllows the eartip to grip the skin of your ear better, but it also attracts dust. Simply clean the dust off using a small amount of isopropyl alcohol and a lint free cloth (such as micro fiber).

RESULT

This is what the ready inverted eartip looks like. Pull it carefully off the screwdriver’s head…and bingo!

When the 2 ear tips are placed side by side, you can see that the flip tip is different in 3 ways:

A. The center core of the flip tip is longer than the stock Starline tip. This is particularly useful to use on earphones that have short or stubby nozzles.
B. The flip tip has a wider bore at the top, like the bell of a horn. This will allow the flip tip to sound different than the normal Starline tip.
C. The flip tip has a slightly wider profile, allowing a more secure fit in some ears vs the stock Starline tips.

The final shape reminds me of the shape of Comply foam tips. And the soft and sticky silicone feels very similar to Sony Hybrid tips.

The flip tips are very comfortable to wear. They seal well and the stickier silicone material grips the ear and stays in place. I also found that the flip tips do not need to be inserted as deeply as a regular Starline tips to get the same tight seal. Because of this, the flip tips should increase the maximum time you can comfortably wear your earphones.

Of course, depending on individual ear shape and size, YMMV.

FURTHER READING

Tweaking Tips – A Simplified Guide To IEM Silicone Eartips by KopiOkaya (2020-03-24)

The Iconic AZLA SednaEarfit Silicon Tips – Is Their Price Justified? by Jürgen Kraus (2019-12-22)

Announcing The Premium Eartips Project by Jürgen Kraus (2019-10-01)

You find an INDEX of our most relevant technical articles HERE.

The post The Flip Tip: Creating Big Widebore Tips From Reversing Starlines appeared first on Music For The Masses.