FYI… DSD Master does not create a file containing both the PCM and Hybrid DSD file, they are derived separately from the down-conversion of the DSD source file…
Exactly, the PCM of the hybrid file is a conversion of the original DSD track. That’s why I don’t understand why he needs these hybrid files on the cloud in order to play the PCM conversion on his iPhone. It will be more simple, and less expensive, to store on the cloud PCM tracks that were converted from the original DSD tracks.
I did not know that Korg released a version of Audiogate for the iPhone.
And I ignored the existence of the Onkyo HF player.
I don’t listen very often with my iPhone, and when I do, I’m happy with Neutron as a player.
But I may try these players. My problem is that I just got a new streamer, and I have so many things to try… and so little free time to listen to music these days.
Did you try Onkyo and iAudioGate?
It’s my guess that the Hybrid DSD file is a DoP file disguised as a .m4a file… otherwise you must create another DXD or lower-resolution native PCM file… These “hybrid” DSD files, if in fact they are fully fleshed DoP files will be huge however conveniently visible and playable by an appropriate player and audio engine…
I don’t care to have high-resolution playback from my iPhone, it’s a compromise in comparison to my home playback system, that is designed for ultimate playback fidelity where it is configured and cannot be transported in a way that would provide the level of experience, that I’ve become accustomed to, so by definition, everything else is inferior and I accept the reality of these circumstances.
I do have both players… I like the sound of them.
I understand better. If this is the case, Music plays DoP.
For the iPhone, I completely agree with you. Even with a DAC and good headphones, it will never sound as good as the playback at home. So, it’s a compromise for me, too. Neutron’s version for the iPhone sounds good, but is inferior to Neutron’s Windows version.
That’s why, in addition to the inconvenience of the limited storage of the iPhone, I use my MacBook Pro when I’m away from home for extensive periods.
However, I will try the players that you use on your iPhone.
There would be a requirement of the player to be able to identify the DoP file hidden behind the .m4a filename and switch to an appropriate mode, in-order to play the DoP signal… Even if it was a native DSD file renamed with a .m4a filename, the player would need the appropriate faculties to identify the .DSF file embedded in some PCM container… Either way the files are not going to get compressed…
I believe the current Music application will show DSD files and deliver them to an appropriate DAC.
And what’s the benefit of all this?
To get a DSD playback with a player that does not support DSD. IMO, it’s more simple to use a player that supports DSD.
I’m amazed at the amount of discussion this topic has generated. Firstly, I already had a fair number of hybrid files from DSD Master from before I discovered Audirvana. I used to use BitPerfect to play DSD hybrid files on my Macs using iTunes. It was an acceptable solution for listening at work within the confines of an office with paper thin walls. Unfortunately, BitPerfect hasn’t been updated in years and it became unstable with with OS updates and it was on a suggestion from another audiophile forum that I tried Audirvana 2.2. The improvement was immediately apparent.
That said, the music site Native DSD still recommends DSD Master as one of the best PCM conversation apps available today, which is why I still use it. The files it generates are PCM conversations with ALAC lossless compression, with an optional DSD fork that’s most likely hidden in the metadata and playable only by BitPerfect. The primary reasons I continue to generate PCM conversations is because I need them anyway for uploading to VOX, and because iTunes is still a decent music organizer and metadata editor for my PCM high-res music. It’s unfortunate that Apple has hamstrung an otherwise excellent music player and service by tying it to Apple’s own format, but they’re in the business of selling their own services.
I tried using the otherwise excellent Onkyo app on the iPhone, but the need to manually download music was daunting. As capacity has grown, this is less of a problem now, but even a 1TB model can only hold maybe 20% of my collection, if I load little else on the phone. Granted, it would take me weeks to listen to the entire collection, but swapping out large music files is tedious and therefore doesn’t happen. It’s hard to argue with the convenience of a cloud-based solution. Someone suggested using iCloud, but the max capacity is 2TB, which is shared with my wife and half of which is already full with a lifetime of photos. Yes, hybrid DSD/PCM files take up more space, but that hasn’t been an issue before. I used to do a lot of driving and listened to my music via VOX in my car, far more than I listened at home. Now, listening on my phone is on the streets, buses and subways of NYC, which severely limits the practicality of listening to high-res on the go.
So, I now find myself converting DSD files to PCM for use with VOX, adding those files to iTunes, which organizes them and then changing the file extensions to .mov, which iTunes can still recognize but Audirvana doesn’t. I place the original DSD files in the same folder, which Audirvana recognizes and plays. Audirvana’s metadata editor unfortunately still leaves a lot to be desired, but alternatives for editing DSD metadata are even worse. It gets to be even more complicated with my growing collection of multichannel DSD files, which I play in 5.1 PCM on my home theater, stereo DSD when listening with headphones at home and stereo PCM on my iPhone via conversion and upload to VOX. Note that my home theater video processor supports either DSD256 stereo or DXD 7.1 surround sound, but the rear speakers are silent when playing 5-channel music as opposed to a 5.1 surround sound movie. However, multichannel audio playback is clearly a topic for another thread, as is the use of headphone psychoacoustic transfer functions.
Thanks for everyone’s input, even though I got more answers than solutions.
Hi @Agoldnear ,
I was right about the hybrid files, and you were wrong to think that iTunes plays DoP.
Look what @SteveInNYC says about these files:
Hi @SteveInNYC ,
You said :
I have an excellent solution to this problem. For library management, I use Swinsian on my three Macs.
This application is the best library manager on Mac. It has an iTunes like UI, but with many powerful features that iTunes does not have, like search/replace for metadata… It handles my 140K tracks with ease, and it operates everything I do with the speed of light.
It supports all the formats that you can imagine, including all the DSD formats and all the multichannel formats that you use.
Swinsian can also play the tracks, but I don’t use it as a player. It became my library manager for all my other players.
You can try it for free during one month.
Otherwise, regarding your phone, maybe the best solution will be to buy an Android to have your music with you, since they accept SD cards. And there are excellent players for Android that play DSD and all the other formats. Neutron exists also in an Android version.
You won’t have to convert formats, change the extensions of tracks, etc… All this is time-consuming that you can not dedicate to listening to your music.
For library management, JRiver is also a better solution than iTunes.
Its UI is iTunes like, but with many powerful features that iTunes lacks.
It supports all the file formats that you have.
It is also a decent audiophile player, and video library manager and player.
You can try it for free during a month.
But for the library management of my music, I prefer Swinsian.
EDIT
In addition, JRiver can also convert your DSD tracks to Hi Res PCM.
I don’t believe that you’ll hear any difference between the PCM conversion of JRiver and the PCM conversion by DSD Master, especially on a phone.
I see now that I forgot about the nature of these hybrid files and didn’t read carefully the full explanation of the Hybrid DSD product of DSD Master… I don’t use this conversion option of the software and only create DXD versions of my stereo DSD content with DSD Master …
From the BitPerfect site regarding the Hybrid DSD file product:
(quote):
Hybrid-DSD (“DSDh”) is a new technology introduced for the first time here in DSD Master. A DSDh file utilizes the Apple Lossless Audio Codec (ALAC) file format and has the file extension “.m4a”. It contains both PCM data and DSD data. iTunes sees it as a regular ALAC file and will therefore import it without difficulty. During playback, BitPerfect recognizes that it is reading a DSDh file, and if the selected audio output device supports DSD it plays the DSD content, otherwise it plays the PCM content. BitPerfect version 2.0 or later is required to support this feature. iTunes, on the other hand, interprets the DSDh file as an ordinary ALAC file and only ever plays the PCM content.
When creating a DSDh file, DSD Master allows the user to select any available sample rate for the PCM content, but the DSD content is always stored at its native sample rate. For example, DSD128 files may not be converted to DSD64, or vice-versa.
(unquote):
Obviously this was an interesting solution years ago when there were few players for macOS that were supporting DSD, and there were almost no players, other than iTunes, with a decent library management.