Signature Series Sonore Music Server with Deux Power Supply Upgrade

SCompRacer

Many folks haven't heard about Sonore computer audio, but Jesus Rodriguez is all about the sound. In the diy world he is considered quite a brilliant fellow. He sells music servers and parts to make diy projects and computer based servers better. Key areas such as sata filtering and high quality power supplies are used.

http://www.sonore.us/

At audio circle

http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?board=67.0

I have his USB to I2S module in my diy Twisted Pear dual mono DAC. It has isolation and high quality Crystek clocks to handle the reclocking.




I've been messing with a Vortexbox to get away from the music drive in the PC and was about to spend some serious cash on improvements to make it audiophile quality like this PCIe USB card.



Then this popped up.

Lower box houses two power supplies, one special one for the USB output. USB out and network connections on rear. It's on the way! Guess I shouldn't have sold that double wide rack....



Bit perfect playback
Up to 32/384 PCM playback and DSD DoP v1 playback
Compatible with aiff, wav, flac, alac, mp3 and other popular formats without DRM
Control of music playback with a free Android APP and free iTouch/iPhone/iPad APP MPoD from Katoemba
Control of music playback with Web Enabled Interface from any computer on the home network
Automatic ripping and tagging of your CDs with cover art finder in flac format
Automatic ripping of your DVDs to MKV format
Includes the SOtM tX-USBexp USB output
Includes the new and improved SOtM SATA power line noise filter
Includes a 3TB storage drive
Shares and stores your music collection for use on the home network
Automatically makes alac and mp3 mirrors from the flac rips for use with other player
Control your existing Logitech devices
Front usb port (used to backup content to usb drive and or to charge your mobile devices)
Fanless design
US made case that is precision CNC machined from heat-treated aircraft quality billet aluminum
High mass drive isolation system to eliminate drive vibration
Dimensions: 17-1/2" wide x 13" deep x 2-1/2" high (+ 3/8" with feet)

MSRP was $5,000

I'm excited! Be nice to get something plug and play for a change..lol

tonyb

Was 5k ? What is it now ?

Regardless, looks interesting. God help us who want convenience AND good sound quality together in one piece.

SCompRacer

He doesn't build these internal drive servers anymore. I got it very, very reasonable considering what it would take to build something like it.

His Signature series is now the DLNA server based route, calls it Rendu, $2895 MSRP. Just point it to your NAS or music drive.

http://www.rendu.sonore.us/signature-series-rendu.html

EndersShadow

Rush your picture of what you bought isn't showing for me...

Post again as I'm interested...

SCompRacer

Dan, they show up for me? Try the thread...

http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=118734.0

His web site for current offerings.

http://www.sonore.us/

EndersShadow

Wow that looks real nice! I like the USB card too

FTGV

Nice piece of kit Rich.

agfrost

Ooh that looks nice. Just can't help yourself, can you?

EndersShadow

agfrost wrote: »

Ooh that looks nice. Just can't help yourself, can you?

He's who gets all you guys hooked on the audio crack up there lol...

He samples some of the stuff then he sells it to one of youse guys

SCompRacer

You can lead a horse to different audio....

Tanks for the kind words! It's an addiction. It's OK if you recognize and feed it every now and then...lol

Here is the pic...

mrbiron

Hurry up and mod it for christ sakes!!!!
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Why haven't you modded it yet???
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*Bozolist*

I wish i was 25 years older with gobs of disposable income!!!! Awesome piece!

EndersShadow

Wow! I was thinking you were getting the other one in that thread (which also looks interesting honestly)....

I have built similar before so I know how pricey they can be and how big a headache to get the software working right!

I'm sure you will enjoy it!

heiney9

Oh My, that is nice!

H9

SCompRacer

Thanks again for the kind words.

No worries, I'll crack it open and see what I can do. But if Jesus says there is nothing left to do, who am I to argue?

Dan, regarding Vortexbox, what a trip that was. I install latest version 2.4 on an older HP desktop. Not ancient, but not 64 bit. I learnt that V2.4 is 64 bit Fedora Linux. Vortexbox only has a repair version of v2.3 up for download, IIRC Fedora 20? There are some scary sites with earlier version downloads, but no way will I try them.

Anyway, a kind fellow puts his full version of 2.3 up on his cloud for download. It works, but it is harder to mount a second drive. Ideally I would want a SSD or small drive for op system with big TB sata drive for music.

Voretexbox wiki is gone. It exists as a partial backup on some archived site, but not all the info is there.

With 2.4, it booted three lines and I get dev-disk process is running, would run for days if I let it. No reply at the vortex forums about the issue, so I find dev-disk issues in the Linux forums. They say the UUID's might be hosed, so I checked the drive UUID's and they were correct, so I left it at that.

I'll hang on to version 2.3 Vortexvox iso install forever...lol Vortexbox does not archive older versions on their site. I'll have to check if the Sonore is 64 bit so I'll know what version to install on it should the drive die.

I think I can install DLNA in this Sonore but not sure. That way I can just point it at a music disc in a NAS someday.

EndersShadow

All that is why I would just run Windows 7 or XBMC using a Linux shell as the OS... Stable builds with all the audio and video features one needs lol

SCompRacer

Never fear, I found something to upgrade! I'm going to install a larger hard drive and a small 80GB SSD msata mini drive card in the motherboard for a boot drive. Also upgrade to latest version of 64 bit Linux Vortexbox. Earlier versions will no longer have Linux upgrade support. This install has Vortexbox 2.2 installed on the 3TB drive. It also has mini dlna and MPD (Music Player Daemon) installed along with LMS (Logitech Server).

I stuck a 2.5 laptop drive in there with a bigger storage drive and installed the latest Vortexbox, 2.4. I loaded a bunch of flac on there and it worked great. It also sounds fantastic! Much better than my laptop with external usb music drive.

Some inside pics. Intel dh77df motherboard, i5 2.7GHz cpu, 8GB Corsair xms3 DDR3 ram. 3TB WD Green.

Power supplies for USB card and 'putie.



Innards with SOtM tX-USBexp PCIe card. CPU heat pipes attach to side aluminum finned sinks.





SOtM In-Line SATA Power Noise Filter.



The hard drive lives in the aluminum block. It's sandwiched between the top and bottom of case with silicone pellets. There are countersunk holes for silicone nubs to fix into. There are two transport screws underneath to hold it in place when shipped.



Cardas wire interconnects, SpeakOn connectors on PS.

EndersShadow

Daaaamn!

mrbiron

So you use the green 3.5mm to connect to your system?

So now that you've popped the hood, i foresee in 2 months time, you building your own version from the ground up sparing no expenses. The clock has been started...

bikerboy

I have the older SOtM tX-USBexp PCI card. I think it helps keep the noise from the pc down. Let us know what you think of this new digital box.

SCompRacer

EndersShadow wrote: »

Daaaamn!

I added an 'it' to your word and said it a few times doing practice setups on some old drives!

mrbiron wrote: »

So you use the green 3.5mm to connect to your system?

I actually have a nice 3.5mm to RCA from Blue Jeans that I use for vinyl needle drops.

bikerboy wrote: »

I have the older SOtM tX-USBexp PCI card. I think it helps keep the noise from the pc down. Let us know what you think of this new digital box.

That is the same card as I have. This was built in 2012. All these little things add up.

SCompRacer

Well the mods arrived!

One Intel msata 80GB SSD (solid state drive) drive for booting. It fits in slot on motherboard next to power connector. Vortexbox 2.4 is only around a 30GB install. A fill command was given in Fedora 23 Linux after Vortexbox 2.4 install and update so there is no storage on it, op system only.



I replaced the 3TB WD Green with a 6TB WD Red to give me some head room. Some folks are really happy using the Reds in music/movie servers. They don't have the park issues the Greens have. I did read that you can get some software from WD to change park and read time for bad sectors in their drives. Sounded scary to me so I left the Red as is. Since this is a fanless server, I want dependability over faster speeds and heat.



Install went much better on the new drives. The 6TB mounted immediately and shows up on the home page so I know how much room remains. Now I have some files to transfer!

SCompRacer

More software success. Loaded Minim Server and System Information page. Edited the main page to get the 'PS' icon to show up. Didn't do it right at first, couldn't connect. I have the utmost respect for programmers....they also tripped me up with 'loacation' after 'location'. The line I messed up.

if (file_exists('/var/www/html/phpsysinfo/phpsysinfo.ini')) {
$icon_array[] = array('location' => $loacation_count += 80, 'name' => 'System Information', 'icon' => 'psi_logo.png', 'link' => 'http://'.$ipaddress.'/phpsysinfo', 'newtab' => '1');
$loacation_count += 10;
}