HQPlayer compatibility

[HoldCtrlAlt]

HoldCtrlAlt asked via Email:

Hello, I have an Ubuntu-24 Server running HQPlayer Embedded (HQPE) from Signalyst.com. I use the Dante Virtual Soundcard today on Windows and Mac. I am very interested to send music from HQPE via ALSA to the Inferno Virtual Soundcard (alsa_pcm_inferno) and then on to my Dante devices without having to send via a Mac or PC in the middle. Today I send from HQPE on the server via HQPE-NAA over the network to a Mac and then out through a Dante VSC to the Dante devices around the house.
I tried to make this work last weekend but had no joy. Inferno did not show up on ALSA lists on the server. Is this something that should work though?

Here is a list of what I managed.
• Rust installed
• Git cloned and cargo built the Inferno version of Statime
• Correct network interface set
• Ran sudo target/debug/statime -c inferno-ptpv1.toml
• Ran sudo systemctl stop systemd-timesyncd.service
• Git cloned recursively and cargo built Inferno
• Copied libasound_module_pcm_inferno.so from target/debug/ to /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/alsa-lib/
• Added Inferno pcm device to a new file called .asoundrc in ~/

Any help / pointers much appreciated. Do I need to start any applications or open a PCM stream some particular way?

Teodly Reponded via Email:

It depends on the application. The lines in .asoundrc:
hint {
show on
description "Inferno ALSA virtual device"
}
mean that the device should be visible in applications. Nevertheless, it is visible in Audacity, but aplay -L or Ardour does not show it.
Interestingly, Ardour shows only hardware interfaces, and aplay -L shows also null, pipewire and default devices, but not Inferno. Meaning that apps have different ways of enumerating devices.
If HQPlayer has a way of specifying custom device name, enter it here and it should work. If not, try to select other audio interface, stop HQPlayer, change hw:... device name in HQPlayer config (if it is editable, I don't have any experience with it) and start HQPlayer. There is also ALSA_OVERRIDE_PCM environmental variable.
Otherwise, we need to find a way of forcing the device to be displayed. It may be nearly impossible in some cases, e.g. if the app is scanning /proc/asound, then userspace devices won't be visible at all. You could study PulseAudio, PipeWire and JACK ALSA plugin configs to find what they do to make the device visible at least in some apps.
Also, verify that the plugin is correctly installed by running something simpler, e.g.
aplay -vvv -D inferno -r 48000 -f s32 -c 2 music.wav
The only daemon that must be running is the clock receiver (Statime or ptp4l).

[DrEVILish]

I used /etc/asound.conf as my ALSA setup file: below is what works and delivers me the below output in aplay -L (truncated otherwise you'll end up with a billion non related ALSA things)

aplay -L
null
    Discard all samples (playback) or generate zero samples (capture)
pipewire
    PipeWire Sound Server
default
    Default ALSA Output (currently PipeWire Media Server)
fixed
    Plug - Inferno ALSA
inferno
    RAW - Inferno ALSA
hw:CARD=Headphones,DEV=0
    bcm2835 Headphones, bcm2835 Headphones
    Direct hardware device without any conversions

pcm.fixed {
        type plug
        slave.pcm "inferno"
        hint {
                show on
                description "Plug - Inferno ALSA"
        }
}

pcm.inferno {
        type inferno
        rate 48000
        NAME Inferno_AIV
        SAMPLE_RATE "48000"
        BIND_IP eth0

        hint {
                show on
                description "RAW - Inferno ALSA"
        }
}

ctl.fixed {
        type null
}

[DrEVILish]

Things to be aware of if using services, pipewire is a USER service meaning anything ran as root will NOT be able to send audio via the pipewire server.

Ensure all your apps are run via the USER services or as a local app.

e.g. systemctl --user status myaudioapp.service and not systemctl status myaudioapp.service

Location to put services for users is ~/.config/systemd/user/myaudioapp.service

Hope that helps.

[HoldCtrlAlt]

OK. Thank you for the pointers. And hopefully you will continue to have patience for this nube.

I switched to using asound.conf in ETC and now when I enter aplay -L I see near the top:
fixed
Plug - Inferno ALSA

However, I do not see anywhere in the list:
inferno
RAW - Inferno ALSA

hqplayerd generally runs root. I will contact the developer to ask both about running as user and whether a custom ALSA device name can be specified.

Other than that for now, I suspect that I do not have statime set up right. It does not show up when I enter: sudo systemctl | grep running

An when I enter: sudo target/debug/statime -c inferno-ptpv1.toml

I get a long stream neverending that looks like:
2025-05-04T09:32:46.742436Z WARN log: Unrestricted config file permissions: Others can write. log.target="statime_linux::config" log.module_path="statime_linux::config" log.file="statime-linux/src/config/mod.rs" log.line=222
2025-05-04T09:32:46.750347Z INFO log: Clock identity: a8a159a748910000 log.target="statime" log.module_path="statime" log.file="statime-linux/src/main.rs" log.line=266
2025-05-04T09:32:48.753077Z DEBUG log: Recommended state port 1: None log.target="statime::ptp_instance" log.module_path="statime::ptp_instance" log.file="/statime/statime/src/ptp_instance.rs" log.line=131
2025-05-04T09:32:50.755642Z DEBUG log: Recommended state port 1: None log.target="statime::ptp_instance" log.module_path="statime::ptp_instance" log.file="/statime/statime/src/ptp_instance.rs" log.line=131
2025-05-04T09:32:52.757268Z DEBUG log: Recommended state port 1: None log.target="statime::ptp_instance" log.module_path="statime::ptp_instance" log.file="/statime/statime/src/ptp_instance.rs" log.line=131
2025-05-04T09:32:52.940445Z INFO log: new state for port 1: Listening -> Master log.target="statime::port" log.module_path="statime::port" log.file="/statime/statime/src/port/mod.rs" log.line=658
2025-05-04T09:32:52.941895Z WARN log: trying to act as master in PTPv1, not implemented yet log.target="statime::port::master" log.module_path="statime::port::master" log.file="/statime/statime/src/port/master.rs" log.line=98
2025-05-04T09:32:54.758808Z DEBUG log: Recommended state port 1: Some(M2(InternalDefaultDS { clock_identity: ClockIdentity([168, 161, 89, 167, 72, 145, 0, 0]), number_ports: 1, clock_quality: ClockQuality { clock_class: 248, clock_accuracy: Unknown, offset_scaled_log_variance: 26880 }, priority_1: 251, priority_2: 128, domain_number: 0, slave_only: false, sdo_id: SdoId(0) })) log.target="statime::ptp_instance" log.module_path="statime::ptp_instance" log.file="/statime/statime/src/ptp_instance.rs" log.line=131

And on and on until I ctrl-c.

[teodly]

Statime should be running in background. So either prepare systemd .service file (https://duckduckgo.com/?q=systemd+service+example) or run it under screen or tmux. In the latter case, you must start it manually, but it is more convenient for testing or using AoIP sparingly.

hqplayerd generally runs root

If there is no audio server (PulseAudio, JACK or PipeWire), it is not a problem.

[HoldCtrlAlt]

I am OK with starting statime manually while testing. Would like a .service file eventually so can systemctl start and stop at will. But I still do not seem to be able to get statime running properly in the first place.

What should be the correct command to start it? I kinda need that even to make a .service file, right?

From last weekend following the Inferno instructions, I have a statime directory /statime that went through cargo build and from which I can enter sudo target/debug/statime -c inferno-ptpv1.toml and get an endless spool of text like above.

And I now have a new etc/statime that went through cargo build by following the pendulum project statime infos on github. But when I enter sudo ./target/debug/statime -i , with the right interface name, I get: -bash: syntax error near unexpected token `newline'

Am thinking I should remove what I have already done and start anew. But I do not know how to do that either.

[DrEVILish]

Hope the below helps.

Once you've created don't forget to enable and start.

Create a service file, you'll need to ensure it starts after the networking has arisen and is prepared.

Decide if you're using PTPv1 or PTPv2 and name appropriately it'll help you later if you wanna change.

You can change restart if the process fails to just fail out or restart

[Unit]
Description=Statime PTPv1
After=network-online.target
Requires=network-online.target

[Service]
Type=simple
User=root
WorkingDirectory= [COMPLETE PATH TO STATIME FOLDER]
ExecStart= [THE COMMAND TO START STATIME]
Restart=on-failure

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

[DrEVILish]

OK. Thank you for the pointers. And hopefully you will continue to have patience for this nube.

We were all there at one time.

I switched to using asound.conf in ETC and now when I enter aplay -L I see near the top: fixed Plug - Inferno ALSA

However, I do not see anywhere in the list: inferno RAW - Inferno ALSA

If inferno RAW is not showing up that means that the type:inferno isn't loading or available, make sure you've followed all the alsa_pcm_inferno instructions and installed or linked the libasound....inferno.so file into the /usr/lib/.../alsa-lib directory. ...'s because I'm lazy and you should find the relevant info in the README's

[HoldCtrlAlt]

Some progress here:

1. I simply deleted the extra statime directory (/etc/statime) that I created by following the pendulum project statime info on GitHub. In a Windows environment I assume the registry would be a mess after that. Hopefully Linux / Ubuntu survives.

2. I got more careful to make sure that I was just using PTPv1 versions. For example, inferno-ptpv1.toml not inferno-ptpv2.toml. My thinking here is that I am just using Dante at present and not AES67.

3. I created /etc/systemd/system/statimeptpv1.service as follows. I was able to start this with systemctl with no error messages (eventually). Grep shows me: "loaded active running Statime PTPv1". Hopefully statime itself is running too.

4) I have not solved getting aplay -L to show "inferno - RAW - Inferno ALSA". I went through the alsa_pcm_inferno readme again a couple times. I have a question about "copying" vs "installing". Based on the readme advice to copy, I simple entered: sudo cp libasound_module_pcm_inferno.so /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/alsa-lib. As a result, under this directory there are now the following files: "libasound_module_ctl_pipewire.so", "libasound_module_pcm_inferno.so" and "libasound_module_pcm_pipewire.so". Some research into libraries talked about installing them.

Do I need to do anything different with libasound_module_pcm_inferno.so besides simply copy it to /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/alsa-lib (on my ubuntu machine)?

Some info back from the developer of HQPlayer:

hqplayerd runs as "hqplayer" user, not root. It could be run under my regular user logon instead though.

I can set up a custom ALSA device in the configuration file for hqplayerd. At present, with HDMI2 of my graphics card selected, the relevant row reads as follows:

alsa any_dsd="0" channel_offset="0" dac_bits="0" device="hw:CARD=NVidia,DEV=8" dualwire="0" friendly_name="HDA NVidia: HDMI 2" pack_sdm="0" period_time="100" volume_element="Master"

Presumably, I would swap out the hw.CARD etc with something for Inferno. Simply slapping "inferno" in there did not work. At least not yet.

[DrEVILish]

deffo follow the inferno statime setup from the README, the rest I don't think is necessary (It wasn't for me to get things working)
I was using Debian/Raspbian but ubuntu should be incredibly similar.

I created /etc/systemd/system/statimeptpv1.service as follows. I was able to start this with systemctl with no error messages (eventually). Grep shows me: "loaded active running Statime PTPv1". Hopefully statime itself is running too.

journalctl -u statimeptpv1.service will give you the logs of that service -f will "tail/watch" those logs so you can see them spit out in real time. Statime spits out a LOT of logs in the current form so might want to keep an eye on your log size if running for a long period of time.

Do I need to do anything different with libasound_module_pcm_inferno.so besides simply copy it to /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/alsa-lib (on my ubuntu machine)?

This should be the final step for getting inferno to show up in aplay -L big L it won't show up in aplay -l little L as it's not a hardware device.
If you've setup your asound.conf file the same as mine, it should be there. Past this point is past my ability to help, and Teo would have to step in.

One last test is to use speaker-test while using my asound.conf
speaker-test -D inferno should error this indicates the alsa module is loading correctly
speaker-test -D inferno -r 48000 -F S32_LE -c 2
It should give you a working test sound output via Inferno.

Apollogies if that doesn't help much more.

[HoldCtrlAlt]

@DrEVILish Thank you very much. speaker-test is good stuff. Reassuring. I will watch the syslog size too. There are indeed a lot of statime logs popping in there.

@teodly Using the following asound.conf, "Plug - Inferno ALSA" shows under "fixed" when I run aplay -L. But "RAW - Inferno ALSA" does not show. There is no "inferno" section after "fixed". See example from DrEVILish above from two days ago.

I take it, I need this. Any more clues? Note: I tried both leaving BIND_IP as eth0 and as the enp59s0 that I get from ip a, as shown below

BTW, do I understand correctly that it is in this asound.conf where I can specify channel count as well as 96K instead of 48K sample rate? Anyplace else where I need to do that? I normally run either stereo or sixteen channels at 24-96K. Though I am fine to reduce sixteen channels to 48K if needed.

Thanks again.

pcm.fixed {
type plug
slave.pcm "inferno"
hint {
show on
description "Plug - Inferno ALSA"
}
}

pcm.inferno {
type inferno
rate 48000
NAME Inferno_AIV
SAMPLE_RATE "48000"
BIND_IP enp59s0
hint {
show on
description "RAW - Inferno ALSA"
}
}

ctl.fixed {
type null
}

[DrEVILish]

The lower case rate 48000 tells applications trying to use Inferno that it's set to 48kHz.
SAMPLE_RATE "48000" tells inferno what sample rate to use.

The rest of the Inferno config options are in the README

[teodly]

But "RAW - Inferno ALSA" does not show. There is no "inferno" section after "fixed". See example from DrEVILish above from two days ago.

Maybe try adding

ctl.inferno {
    type null
}

(just a guess)

Note: I tried both leaving BIND_IP as eth0 and as the enp59s0 that I get from ip a, as shown below

It doesn't matter for device visibility. aplay enumerates devices without creating them so it would be visible even if the config was wrong.

[HoldCtrlAlt]

Long story short... SUCCESS!!! I can see Inferno as a transmitter in Dante Controller using speaker-test pink noise. And the pink noise is actually playing!

Basically I resorted to randomly breaking things until some error message sent me the right way to find what I screwed up last week somewhere when trying to get things to work then. Will try to write a correct guide for noobs like me to set up Inferno (for Ubuntu 24 at least) once all done. I kept a lot of notes copied from the terminal to a text file.

Of course I still have to figure out how to get HQPlayer to output through Inferno. But that we be another day.

Thank you both so much!

[teodly]

Right, the Quick start from README may be too generic. I will happily accept a pull request with full tutorial for a specific distro.