The latency is way too high.

[awrtva]

My previous amp doesn't have a parametric eq (none apparently does, except for the wiim), so I always struggled with room correction when monitoring my instruments. I was pretty hyped when I read about the WiiM and thought it might solve all my problems. Being only a casual musician (I just listen to other peoples music most of the time, and enjoy playing e-piano), I prefer to have smart hifi gear over studio hardware racks.

But then, after giving it a try, I realized it has a 50ms latency.

Never, ever, have I used any kind of audio hardware (for casual listening and for production) with that kind of latency. No guitar pedal, no interface, no other amplifier, active speaker or soundcard has ever had me notice any sort of latency.

50ms for line-in is really, really a lot. While I appreciate the innovations WiiM is bringing to the table: If you are ever considering to route an instrument into it, or are using a daw sometimes for any sort of casual music production, this isn't acceptable. I mean, seriously, when I pluck my guitar string, I hear it delayed in my speakers. It's that much.

Here are three random pieces of equipment for which I was able to find the latency in their data-sheet:
- The t.amp quadro 500 dsp claims a latency of 0.66ms: https://images.static-thomann.de/pics/atg/atgdata/document/manual/438086_c_438086_v3_en_online.pdf
- There is also the Behringer X32 Compact, with 0.8ms latency: https://images.static-thomann.de/pics/atg/atgdata/document/specs/308703.pdf
- This one also has a latency of 0.8ms: https://images.static-thomann.de/pics/atg/atgdata/document/manual/454281.pdf

And here is the officially stated latency for the WiiM Amp:

Enhanced Latency for High-Resolution Audio: We've reduced the latency to 50ms for 176 kHz / 192 kHz audio via SPDIF-in and Line-In.

https://faq.wiimhome.com/support/solutions/articles/72000617766-wiim-amp-firmware-release-note

My own measurement found it to be 48ms slower than my headphones monitoring port, for 44kHz/16bit...

Why is it, that suddenly out of nowhere latency is an issue for audio hardware, despite improving technology?

I guess my Feature Request is, that you should please develop an amplifier that uses a proper dsp processor for your stuff, or fix the firmware, or whatever the problem here is.

Edits:
- As discussed in https://forum.wiimhome.com/threads/the-latency-is-way-too-high.2920/post-41456, I wouldn't be surprised if there was a way to substantially reduce the latency without hardware changes.
- If every manufacturer of every piece of gear in your audio chain is this lax with latency, you'll end up with some horrible lipsync. So yes, even non-musicians and also gamers should care about this. I just happen to be one of the first ones to notice because of my hobby.
- Since people are liking that first comment so much, I'd like to reiterate that everyone benefits from lower latencies, and that historically latencies weren't an issue in this magnitude. This isn't a question of someone using the wiim incorrectly. Hi-fi gear being only suitable exclusively to people who listen to music is an issue that didn't exist in the past, as far as I know. This is a fragmentation of the ecosystem that only causes trouble, and that benefits noone.
- I tried to measure the latency of my wxa-50, and unless I screwed the measurement up, it has a latency of 2ms including the eq. So apparently it is possible to make one without this issue. Everything over 5ms is bad in my opinion.

 

[Fender]

Let gear do the job it is made for.

 

[awrtva]

Let gear do the job it is made for.

Well, I honestly expected a response like this.
1. This is a major downgrade compared to probably almost every other amplifier on the market, for no apparent reason
2. Studio hardware is also just audio hardware. For example, studio monitors are just active speakers for the most part, with many not even measuring well.
3. Is it you, who decides what audio hardware is designed for? I'd say audio hardware is designed for audio listening. Turns out listening to me play guitar is also listening.
4. If the WiiM had acceptable latency, which every other hi-fi gear has, it would be perfectly reasonable to use in any studio that uses passive speakers. Which is also perfectly fine because all that matters is, if they measure well.
5. Do gamers who want low latencies buy special gaming amps now?

 

[Fender]

My nickname might give you an idea that I am at least interested.
Do not own a WA but it seems to be a quite nice piece of affordable technique. Never would expect from such a device it will bring good results when plugging in my guitars.
Even better if WiiM will deliver what you expect. My post was not meant aggressive.

 

[awrtva]

All right, sorry for overreacting.

Turns out sonos has a latency of 75ms. This time it was a gamer who noticed it: https://en.community.sonos.com/spea...sing-sonos-speakers-with-my-gaming-pc-6885776

I used a yamaha wxa-50 previously, which never caused issues. I haven't tried to measure it, but given that I didn't notice anything it's probably below 5-10ms, which is apparently the threshold of perception.

Never would expect from such a device it will bring good results when plugging in my guitars.

As long as you plug a modelling pedal into your chain, it really shouldn't matter anymore what you chose to listen through.

 

[Mr Ee]

Is your other gear just analog?
The wiim will do A to D to A conversion on the input.
imo, this is not really a good use case for a device like the wiim.

 

[awrtva]

Is your other gear just analog?
The wiim will do A to D to A conversion on the input

A/D converters add 1ms of latency afaik. All my gear is digital.

imo, this is not really a good use case for a device like the wiim.

I really don't think that it is reasonable to expect people to buy 3 different amplifiers. One for music, one for gaming and one for instruments. I firmly believe that hi-fi gear should be versatile. Especially with modern technology. And really, all you need is low-latency, line-in and bluetooth for that matter, which many amplifiers were delivering before that already.

 

[Brantome]

Is your other gear just analog?
The wiim will do A to D to A conversion on the input.
imo, this is not really a good use case for a device like the wiim.

I was going to comment similarly but then noticed the firmware update referred to the spdif input as well. Maybe the Amp is lacking a “pure direct” mode that minimises the path/processing the signal undergoes.
Edit: I wonder if that can be achieved in firmware or whether it requires a hardware redesign/change?

 

[Fender]

@awrtva Could do my first post also a bit more friendly ;-)
Eventually it was because I never used any electric in my audio = living room. Garage for the axes. Living room for the acoustics.

 

[Mr Ee]

But it's not really an amp...
It's a streamer with an amp, not an amp with a streamer

 

[awrtva]

Edit: I wonder if that can be achieved in firmware or whether it requires a hardware redesign/change?

Apple M1 can get 2.7ms after quickly glancing over https://www.bluecataudio.com/Blog/behind-the-scenes/apple-m1-vs-intel-for-audio-a-benchmark/, my workstation is set to 1.4ms

(Whatever the roundtrip latency is here, at least twice as much)

Granted, an M1 is probably more powerful than any ARM Cortex-A7 or whatever the WiiM Amp has. But you also have to consider that the M1 does this while running a DAW with various effects, while still offering multiplexing capabilities, and all of that while running in a complex operating system with some people probably watching youtube videos in parallel. And I don't believe buffer handling and effect-routing can be parallelized so you have to look at single-core performance here.

I would usually expect even lower latencies from specialized embedded devices. Not 9 times as much.

So yeah, I would expect a firmware update to be able to improve the latency. But it's probably still easier said than done.

 

[Mr Ee]

I'm not trying to detract from your frustration; I get it.
I had a bluesound node n130 and its hdmi input lag was so bad it made watching tv a really frustrating experience.
iirc that was around 50ms too.

 

[Wiimer]

There is indeed a big delay.
I connected the AVR pre-out to the WiiM amp and couldn't sync the front and surround speakers at first. But luckily, I was able to synchronize with the AVR's automatic room correction.

As @Brantome said, it would be ideal if you had a pure direct mode.

 

[Wiimer]

Even if the update adds Pure Direct Mode, in which case you may not be able to use Sub-Out?
That's a problem with it...

 

[onlyoneme]

All my gear is digital.

There is some sort of adaptive reclocking based on buffering over digital input, thus resulting in the increased delay. Maybe an ASRC solution which is in the beta stage will help to reduce it.

 

[awrtva]

There is some sort of adaptive reclocking based on buffering over digital input, thus resulting in the increased delay. Maybe an ASRC solution which is in the beta stage will help to reduce it.

It's connected via analog cables, was that your question? I meant to say that all my gear is digital internally (this is how digital/analog is understood in the world of guitar pedals at least)

 

[tsanguine]

When the signal needs to be processed it will always implement delay. I'm going to guess that is the tradeoff and we just won't be using this for Karaoke. Bought it for it's HP and LP filters for bass management and I'm not sure that I can have my cake and eat it too.