Which SBC for Analog Audio Processing?

[Yagi_Berra]

I'd like to choose an SBC -- running Armbian of course -- for the purpose of processing audio via GStreamer UDP packets. 

My requirements:

 

-- Half duplex.  Must support input (take audio and covert to UDP) and output (decode UDP and generate analog audio) but it is not necessary to handle bidirectional streams simultaneously. One direction at a time is sufficient.

-- Process audio with good but not great quality.  16 bit/44.1 kHz is the target bit rate/sample rate.

-- First choice of I/O are two 3.5mm jacks on the coastline, one for input and the other for output. 

-- Second choice of I/O are via GPIO pins.

-- I'd rather not use HDMI for audio in/out. 

-- Low latency is a must.  An easy solution is a USB soundcard dongle but those cause considerable latency, so I'm ruling that out.

-- Must have an ethernet jack.

 

So... what board comes closest?  thanks!

[TonyMac32]

Tinkerboard has high quality USB attached codec with input and output.

[Yagi_Berra]

Thanks. The Tinkerboard looks almost ideal but the USB gives me pause because I'm afraid the root hub will introduce latency.  OTOH, the latency might be acceptable if I don't connect other devices to the other USB ports.  I could be overthinking it.

[sfx2000]

19 hours ago, Yagi_Berra said:

Thanks. The Tinkerboard looks almost ideal but the USB gives me pause because I'm afraid the root hub will introduce latency.  OTOH, the latency might be acceptable if I don't connect other devices to the other USB ports.  I could be overthinking it.

 

Tinker is probably a good solution here - as @TonyMac32 mentioned, the Tinker does have a decent codec, better than most, if not all, single board computers...

 

Key thing with Tinker is...

 

a) good power - seriously, you need to consider that one

b) good cooling - the Asus supplied Heatsink is ok for casual running, but under sustained load, it's tragically insufficient... Asus supplies their HS as part of the kit, as without it, the RK3288 would throttle even when idle...

 

Do note that the TInker image is RT-PREMPT, which might be of interest for your use case...

[TonyMac32]

The tinker sound codec is on its own USB root hub, no other devices share it.

 

To expand, in case there is some confusion:. The tinkerboard has 3 USB master ports, one is for the 4x ports on the side, one is for the audio codec, and one is an OTG that I haven't gotten working (minimal effort) on the micro USB.  They are independent controllers within the SoC, this is not an RPi situation where the SoC has only 1 USB interface.

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