4.4.9-rt17 series

[Leonard]

I have tried the PXE version of the 64bit kernel. And it worked correctly on my setup.

Compared with the standard kernel the sound seems to have improved a little bit as I have the feeling that there is a more space between the instruments. Not night and day, but so far I have only tested using my headphones. Tomorrow I will also test using my speakers which I expect will make it easier to hear the differences.

Tnx for your effort! :-)

[Leonard]

Today I tested the sound quality again but now using my speakers instead of my headphone. And as I already expected it was immediately clear that the sound stage has indeed extended a lot! Difference is more than subtile. Never have been able to create such a room filling sound stage with my setup before. Really impressed by that!

Downside however is that I must also say that this benefit comes at a price. The sound is also a bit aery and thin. The singers and instruments don't have enough body and because of that the music is also a bit less engaging.

Difficult to make a choice between both kernel versions. For me this is another proof of how important good  tuning of the software is for the sound you get out of your system. As I think of it now, after listening to both versions for a while, I think I will go for the impressive soundstage of the new PXE version you created and try to tweak my setup to see if I can enhance the weight/body.

[agent_kith]

Today I tested the sound quality again but now using my speakers instead of my headphone. And as I already expected it was immediately clear that the sound stage has indeed extended a lot! Difference is more than subtile. Never have been able to create such a room filling sound stage with my setup before. Really impressed by that!

Downside however is that I must also say that this benefit comes at a price. The sound is also a bit aery and thin. The singers and instruments don't have enough body and because of that the music is also a bit less engaging.

Bigger sound stage is what I noticed too..

Do you mean airy and thin? As in perhaps more "treble energy"? If yes, that's what I find too. A lot of the music I was used to listening now sounds harsher for me too. But I reckon it's the recording itself (Still a guess at this stage, as I'm still testing).

Do you have any recording of shattered glass, something like the following video:

Listen to the "timbre" of smashed/smashing glass is a good indication of how good the presentation of the upper frequencies are. Another would be wooden flutes (from China and Japanese).

Difficult to make a choice between both kernel versions. For me this is another proof of how important good  tuning of the software is for the sound you get out of your system. As I think of it now, after listening to both versions for a while, I think I will go for the impressive soundstage of the new PXE version you created and try to tweak my setup to see if I can enhance the weight/body.

[Leonard]

Bigger sound stage is what I noticed too..

Do you mean airy and thin? As in perhaps more "treble energy"? If yes, that's what I find too. A lot of the music I was used to listening now sounds harsher for me too. But I reckon it's the recording itself (Still a guess at this stage, as I'm still testing).

With airy and thin I mean that the music lacks 'body and weight'. As if you can see right through the musicians. They are not actually there.
I cannot say the sound is too harsh in my setup. However as the mid-range is less apparent the high frequencies are more prominent. I assume this is actually because there is less noise. This may also be one of the reasons that sound stage got wider.
In the end I think the new kernel is an improvement in terms of sound stage and less noise. However I still have to work on how to get that nice mid-range back again. 

[agent_kith]

With airy and thin I mean that the music lacks 'body and weight'. As if you can see right through the musicians. They are not actually there.
I cannot say the sound is too harsh in my setup. However as the mid-range is less apparent the high frequencies are more prominent. I assume this is actually because there is less noise. This may also be one of the reasons that sound stage got wider.
In the end I think the new kernel is an improvement in terms of sound stage and less noise. However I still have to work on how to get that nice mid-range back again. 

Try this, edit /boot/grub.cfg, look for your boot menu item, add "nolapic" at the end of the line. It'd look somehing like the following:

Code:

linux /casper/vmlinuz boot=casper file=/cdrom/preseed/snakeoil.seed persistent toram quiet splash nolapic

Save the file and try and see how it goes.. Also try noapic over nolapic and see which you prefer.

[Leonard]

Try this, edit /boot/grub.cfg, look for your boot menu item, add "nolapic" at the end of the line. It'd look somehing like the following:

Code:

linux /casper/vmlinuz boot=casper file=/cdrom/preseed/snakeoil.seed persistent toram quiet splash nolapic

Save the file and try and see how it goes.. Also try noapic over nolapic and see which you prefer.

That helped a lot. Tnx!!!! 

[agent_kith]

First post updated with new kernel supporting USB M2Tech devices.

Update: Thread closed as we are transitioning to Snakeoil 1.0.0!