MAS-Player and 68030

[Tenacious]

Hi.

 I tried reading a 320 kbs 44 KHz MP3 from an USB key, from the hard drive or from RAM: but i only get choppy output while multitasking, and most of the time when doing nothing.
I use the simple program which comes with the MAS Player, with 0 priority and 2MB buffer.

Subsidiary question:
I connect the output from the MAS Player to the "line in" connector of my Logitech speakers, while in the meantime, the Paula output is connected to the main jack entry of these speakers. Could there be any danger for the amiga circuitry (some kind of dangerous electronic loop or so)?

Thanks for your help.

Gee Whiz!  Where do you find Mp3s encoded at 320 kbs?  I think most of mine are at 128kbs.  Can you hear the difference in the 2 bit rates?  I enjoy music,but, I'm not an audiophile.

My Amigas are offline, currently.  Otherwise, I would DL a Mp3 at 320kbs and try it out.  MasPlayers, though wonderful, are built around an old chip.  I wouldn't be surprised to find out that 320 kbs is too much for the chip or the Amiga's parallel port (the serial port only supplies power to the MasPlayer).  

I have often heard of ppl happily using MasPlayers at their full fidelity with 7 MHz A600s (haven't tried this myself, yet).

SUBSIDIARY ANSWER:  I don't know the specifics of your speakers.  Often, audio switching hardware only switch the left and right signals of different audio sources, not the grounds.  This is usually desirable.  So, yes, you probably do have a ground loop. You could try unplugging the Paula source and checking playback.  This is probably not the problem, though.  I have a Radio Shack 4 input switcher (selecting MasPlayer, Paula, CDRom, & a Macintosh) supplying one speaker system, no sweat.

Ground loops are bit unpredictable.  There are a number of issues, one of the worst is if one of the components connected together has a chassis ground at a different voltage than the others.  In that case, the signal ground could be carrying substantial current, maybe at 60 Hz (hum).  Sometimes the components can be de-coupled with capacitors.

[Tenacious]

People still use mp3?

I use what I have.  What do you have/use?

@ Xanxi

I've often wondered if the quality of an Mp3 is not more dependent upon the quality of the source and the recording skill as opposed to the bit rate.  I will try someday recording the same material at multiple bit rates to see if I can hear the difference.

That Paula channel loss thing you mentioned may be the best argument yet for avoiding a ground loop.  Sometimes chips accumulate damage and then fail like an avalanche.  Food for thought.

[Tenacious]

So, no one answered yet about the differences between the normal and the pro version??

IIRC, there is little difference in the 2 versions.  Maybe it was the casing or the audio out (2 phono plugs vs. one 0.125 stereo plug).  I believe they both used the same chip, both were powered by a serial pass-thru connector.

The chip is the big deal, supposed to be hard to find.

[Tenacious]

Where can i still buy a mas player. I've never been able to find one.
Best regards from Chile

Amigakit was selling them until recently.  I would contact them and see if more are on order.  They were also selling another brand of hardware Mp3 decoder (I've never tried it).