[Forcezeeed]

Whilst I have been using Mobile Sheets for over twelve months, this is only my second post to the forums. This post is a little long, but I hope it will prove to be helpful to other members.

Like most MS users, I rely on it to provide charts and lyrics when working live with my band.
But recently I decided to do some solo gigs with sequenced backing tracks. For me, the most elegant way to play the backing tracks would be to use the Android audio player that works well within MS. I use a Toshiba AT300 tablet and, whilst its' inbuilt Digital To Analogue Converter (DAC) is okay, it is certainly not good enough for high quality amplified sound.

I figured a USB DAC should work, but currently that is not an option. There are USB audio output devices that will work with Android tablets, but AFAIK, the only current Android audio player app that will address such a DAC is one called "USB Audio Player Pro" and that will not work with third party apps like MS.
I know Mike is looking at this whole USB DAC thing now, so maybe he will come up with a solution.

But in my situation, I have found a great workaround that works perfectly right now. Provided your tablet has a HDMI output this will work for you as well. The solution involves purchasing (eBay or Amazon) a US$34.95 “ViewHD Premium HDMI to HDMI + SPDIF + RCA L / R Audio Extractor.” (or similar).
As those of you who have HDMI equipped tablets will know, the moment the tablet recognises an EDID signal on the HDMI cable, it switches off the inbuilt analogue audio output and sends digital audio, together with the video out by way of the HDMI cable. Unfortunately, in most tablets, it also changes the display from portrait to landscape to comply with the display of a TV set. This is easily fixed by purchasing an app called ‘Orientation Control’. (US$1.49 on the play store). I tried several other apps, but this is the only one that would work for me.

So now I have my digital audio coming through the ViewHD box and I can take a relatively good quality analogue stereo output from there into my mixer. (The ViewHD’s DAC is surprisingly good.) But I spend a lot of time building my backing tracks, so I want the best possible reproduction. I save them as 24 bit, 48 kHz wave files (about 50 MB for a 3 minute song). To maintain that quality throughout the output chain, I use the SPDIF (optical) output from the ViewHD and feed it to my Edirol FA-101 for digital to analogue conversion. No doubt many members will have similar devices that will take a SPDIF input.
The results I am hearing are superb and I could not be happier.

I hope the above info is of some help to other MS users.

Regards,
Greg

[Zubersoft]

That is a very creative solution to the problem Greg. Thanks for posting all the information. If other users also need high quality sound, like you would get through a USB DAC, I would love to hear this so I know how many people require it.

Mike

[Forcezeeed]

Thanks Mike.

After nine days with no other responses, it seems clear that my requirements were unique and that there is no demand for such a feature. Provided the new player will work with the same audio files and the hdmi output work in the same way as with the current player, I have no need of a USB DAC.

Regards,
Greg

[gman]

It is a great idea however in so many situations the room acoustics, sound system etc have such impact that the improvement might not be discernable.

Sent from my ASUS Transformer Pad TF300T using Tapatalk

[Forcezeeed]

A good point gman. But in my experience, if you start with a degraded signal, it can only get worse and the result will always be poor, regardless of the sound system or the room.
But if you start with the very best possible signal, there is a much higher likelihood of getting a good result. I use my own high-quality FOH system and the difference between the tablet's analogue output and the digital output, is like cheese and chalk.

[gman]

Totally agree. We use wma audio which is slightly better than mp3. Our most important track is bass and it comes through pretty accurately. Compared to bands using key bass tracks and drum machines our tracks from the studio shine. I am considering bumping up to wave files. Can't disagree though the best quality is the ultimate goal.

Sent from my ASUS Transformer Pad TF300T using Tapatalk