Hi
I Just came across this site and a very interesting read, if you are not already familiar
http://www.cicsmemoryplayer.com/index.php?n=Main.HomePage#cPlay
Regards
John
I have seen cPlay mentioned on the forum before but I had not seen the website. The “Software Jitter” link is very concise and understandable. Does anyone with more advanced software knowledge care to vouch for the accuracy of the information?
Some of these concepts seem to ring true with what I have been experiencing lately while playing with my new PC server. Trimming away the tasks that the CPU/OS has to accomplish outside of audio stream delivery has sonic benefits clearly, I think. The way that I am trimming off services is rather uneducated though and I sometimes wonder if I am blocking a service that would be beneficial to the sound quality. All I can do is trial and error my way through the process and the time lag between making a change to Windows and the actual listening is a disadvantage (especially when my server is two floors away!). I can clearly hear the difference between a “regular” boot of Windows and a “bare bones” boot, though.
Looking further through the information here. The optimization guide is the most thorough that I have seen although some of the details are BIOS/MOBO specific. None the less, the BIOS optimizations can be inferred from what is presented. It looks like they have the answers to my “essential services” questions (plus networking, of course). This will keep me busy for a while. 
cPlay will only work with ASIO devices, but I wonder how the cMP shell would perform with EMM. cMP’s memory utilization and audio thread CPU exclusivity look really interesting but might take some tweaking to get going. I almost wish that I wasn’t traveling later this week so I could get my “geek” on and play with it now. 
@wglenn
Yes lots of good information there, I’ll have to come back another time as a fair bit of effort going into some reconfiguration on my amps internals. I have plans on another PC build - new mobo and cpu in a couple of months so will revisit a few things. interesting with the new intel Haswel processor and the on board power regulators could offer improved power to the cpu and benefit audio perhaps
Cheers
John
Yes, the Haswels look interesting. I bypassed them due to the wide availability and price of the last generation of processors and MOBOs. I had heard rumors about the benefits of under clocking the system. I’m not sure if there are actual direct sonic benefits from doing this or whether this is the end-run that gets a large processor to generate less heat so you can do away with the fans. I bought an i7 processor because it was fast and multi-core. It almost seems like a sin to underclock it. I’ll try it anyway. Interesting, too, is the specification for tiny amounts of memory. This flies in the face of conventional thinking about more is better, but I see where their shell uses onboard cache as “memory” instead of RAM, which is a cool concept. Part of the fun of this hobby is experimenting, “on the fringe,” and there is plenty to play with here. I just wish I knew more about software than I do… but of course I’m learning as I go. Good nerd fun. 