What does jitter sound like?

[cfmsp]

 

 

"This is anecdotal. Not that there's anything wrong with anecdotal.

But it is what it is, and nothing more than that."

 

This was no more 'anecdotal' than any other post in this thread, AFAIC.

 

Perhaps I missed your point?

 

 

clay

 

 

 

 

[mpmct]

I'm afraid you have missed my point.

No one else has linked to anecdotal evidence,

on this thread, as some sort of implicitly claimed 'proof'.

I admit to having linked to science, as it is defined,

whether any of you like that or not. If you intend

to redefine science, please get on with it, and be

explicit and thorough.

A review in an audiophile publication is just one

more anecdotal, for whatever it is worth.

Not that there's anything wrong with the

anecdotal. But a "shoot out", whatever that

exactly or loosely means, is decidedly not: "proof".

It is anecdote.

 

 

 

 

[cfmsp]

 

 

I've not seen one shred of 'science' linked to here that proves the inaudibility of jitter,

so if that's what you're suggesting, we'll have to disagree.

 

clay

 

 

 

 

 

 

[sastusbulbas]

Ashley wrote,

 

"You cannot put anything into a digital cable to reduce jitter any more than you can wash your car half way down a muddy track and expect it to be clean when you arrive."

 

Not sure why this is relevant? I was asking about a source component (in my current case it's an old PC used to see if there was any validation in a claim regarding spdif direct from motherboard being a better option).

 

I output this into a couple of Dacs with poor results, using various media players and configurations, with what I have read as to be a detrimental sound chip, the AC97 audio Wave type. If I run this output through a Genesis Digital Lens things improve, the Lens removes jitter and re clocks, leaving only the outputting spdif cable as a source of jitter.

 

The Genesis Digital Lens was designed with the removal of jitter in mind, and I think it makes a point in my system with PC audio, therefore makin teh opinion of "decent Dac versus rubbish Dac" mute, as the jitter exists and as far as I am aware not every current Dac deals with the issue nor in teh same manner, therefore it may be quite audible if a step is made to compare a digital signal with it removed by such a device in comparison to a direct feed.

PS I am sure every review of the Genesis and others items of it's ilk such as the Meridian 518 gave measured results correlating audible benefits of jitter removal?

 

In my case I would have liked to have simplified with as little cost a computer capable of reasonable playback of 16/44.4 digital into the Dac section of an old integrated amp I like, it has not been successfully implemented due to the PC giving a poorer performance than the various CD transports I use. I think this concludes that not al 0's and 1's are the same, and that equipment component and ancillary choice matter, and that not everyone wants to go down the new Dac/Mac route (I still have Mac and PC, oldies though)

 

[audioengr]

Sastus wrote:

"If I run this output through a Genesis Digital Lens things improve, the Lens removes jitter and re clocks, leaving only the outputting spdif cable as a source of jitter."

 

The Lens reduces jitter, it does not remove it. I have modded several reclockers over the past 8 years including the Big Ben and Monarchy DIP's, which definitely work, but all of these are old technology. Even with mods and Superclock4, they are no match for current technology.

 

I read accounts like yours all the time on the web. Someone dabbles a bit in computer audio and decides that it's not as good as the CD player. I would not give up on it yet.

 

I suspect that if you had a modern reclocker driving a NOS DAC such as the VALAB with upgraded coupling caps, this would easily outperform your transport/CD player.

 

Steve N.

Empirical Audio

 

[shenzi]

Catching up on this megathread, I spotted a references to Timex vs more expensive watches. Given the choice between a recently-purchased designer watch which is currently exhibiting a tendency to fail every 9 months vs my 25 year old Casio which has yet to go wrong ...

 

A lot of high end does seem to come down to this - what you'd prefer to spend your money on. Diminishing returns, as mentioned above. An expensive watch doesn't tell the time any more accurately than a radio-controlled Casio but there's pride of ownership. Some will feel offended that a modest component can sound as good as the expensive, bespoke, hand-crafted high end component they've just bought. The rest of us think it's rather a good thing.

 

Incidentally, an entertaining game to play in a watch shop or at an audio show - look for the ugliest, most grossly-designed item on display and you've usually spotted the most expensive.

 

[Ashley James]

With hi end watches you're usually paying for something handmade and mechanical like Bob's guitars, but without the accuracy of something you might get free with a McDonalds Happy Meal! The pride of ownership comes from the craftsmanship and the pride of the craftsmen that made it. The Happy meal watch is cheap, robot built and accurate because it is electronic and that's the point. Hi Fi electronics, regardless of the blather that goes with them are just cheap, tiny and should be robot built for reliability and longevity. And they're getting cheaper, working better and costing less all the time!

 

Therefore you can spend more on a more elegant case or more on a monster Krell because it's full of output devices, massive heatsinks, huge power supplies etc and it produces loads of power, but you can't do that with a DAC because all the bits in it amount to a few pounds maximum.

 

It's my understanding that Sample Rate Conversion (as we use) removes jitter completely and that the chip to do it costs a couple of pounds. The bits to go with the SRC chip probably add a couple more. However if a designer doesn't use SRC, jitter will still not be an issue because the receiver chip will be reducing it and the DAC is probably sold as being largely immune.

 

I can understand non technical people wanting to believe there is magic in the finest hi fi as there probably was in the old days, but not any more and certainly not with DACs. When you buy an RME Fireface, you can have up to 56 A to Ds and 56 D to As that will sound as good as the best hi end for a fraction of the price. Regardless of the quality of the DAC, the sound cannot be better than all the A to Ds together that made the recording!

 

Ash

 

[DavidJPettifor]

Ashley James wrote:

Therefore you can spend more on a more elegant case or more on a monster Krell because it's full of output devices, massive heatsinks, huge power supplies etc and it produces loads of power, but you can't do that with a DAC because all the bits in it amount to a few pounds maximum.

 

I here you Ashley, however it seems that Steve over at Empirical Audio has found a way to do just that;

 

audioengr wrote:

Price difference is significant. The Superclock4 inside the Off-Ramp costs more wholesale than the Transit does retail. The Transit is $100 and the Off-Ramp 3 is $999.00 with Superclock4, $750 with standard clock.

 

It's expensive because it's not only better, there are a lot of very expensive parts in it. It's built more like a Tektronix Oscilloscope than a piece of audio gear. The 6GHz coax cable inside it is $20.

 

Thanks for the response by the way Steve.

 

--

djp

 

[sastusbulbas]

Steve N wrote,

"I read accounts like yours all the time on the web. Someone dabbles a bit in computer audio and decides that it's not as good as the CD player. I would not give up on it yet.

 

I suspect that if you had a modern reclocker driving a NOS DAC such as the VALAB with upgraded coupling caps, this would easily outperform your transport/CD player."

 

I have not made my mind up on computer audio just yet, and have been dabbling since hospitality boards allowed beige power Macs to be connected to the rca outputs of a stereo. What I have found is that just plugging any old computer kit together with whatever is media player flavour of the month is not always entertaining, and it does look like it costs more than an integrated CD player to get results, I am also of teh opinion that just making do with any old digital output regardless of its technical merit because teh Dac will sort it, seems to be missing some point?

One of the reasons I frequent this site is due to my interest in building a computer source on a budget, but I still want to see why £700 sound cards are necessary and if there is better things to spend money on? I am here to learn, but am not going to throw away my old legacy kit and embrace PC audio until it has grown along side my current sources and became my matured choice in the home.

 

My current budget is based on old stuff laying around the house, I want to turn this current PC into a Media player for upstairs, at the moment it looks like I have to spend a bit of money to do that.

 

I am fully aware my Genesis is not the be all and end all, but it provides decent results for it's age and provides me with a lot of jitter reduction, far more than the likes of the Theta TLC was capable of, I still think it was very good for it's day, and still capable and useful, no doubt PS Audio's latest incarnation would be even better, but my old legacy system is still allowing me to hear changes in digital sources, and many of these are improved upon by the Lens.

Just out of interest what would a modern reclocker (any examples? as replacements for the Lens?) and VALAB cost?

 

On another note, as I said my CD transports still provide entertainment my computers do not, items such as the Genesis Lens help narrow gaps and show there is potential, so proves useful. Before I commit fully to a PC or Mac, I want such to sound as good in this system before moving on to a better Dac and to not relying on the Genesis Lens.

 

Edit; The argument always seems to be that jitter is inaudible, and that computers are equal to CD transports, yet it ALWAYS seems to require a modern Dac with suitable developmental to make this argument plausible, therefore it seems nothing more than baloney.

My old transports sound better than my old computers through my old Dacs, but I get constantly told a new Dac will make my old computer sound as good, therefore my Dac is rubbish, even though I enjoy it's performance with a suitable CD transport. If I use a modern computer such as an iMac or Powerbook I am told the same thing, my preference for a dedicated CD transport, and opinion that it sounds better than the Powerbook or such, is due to my Dac being rubbish!

What does seem to be the case is that computers and Macs can be made capable, and will give suitable results with the right component choices, therefore the components are more capable, not the computers, and there is as much FOO regarding all this as there is resides in Audiophile banter.

 

So far it seems conclusive that any old "legacy" Dac can show you how poor any old computer could sound, but buying the latest tech Dac is an acceptable way of polishing a turd? And of course anyone with old legacy kit either has a rubbish system, active imagination or is talking rubbish if they disagree with the opinions of the "New Tech" brigade? Oh.. and all those manufacturers of high end CD transports are part of some massive conspiracy....

 

The Jitter Files..... do we have an undisputed answer to whether or not it is audible? Or just plausible opinion based on experiences and read literature?

 

[tfarney]

Ok, you guys win. I fess up. I HEAR jitter. Tons of it. My highs are harsh. My lows blow. My mids are middling (at best). At this very moment, the great Sonny Rollins is playing for me and he sounds like a lone Canadian goose, abandoned by his cruel and uncaring flock, passing far overhead (the soundstage is HUGE!!!) and farting down pentatonic gnat notes on my poor, unrefined ears. It is all jitter, I'm sure. I take great solace in being so indiscriminating as to not quite notice.

 

For now? Off to sell midfi that measures well, but no doubt sounds horrid, to hapless suburbanites. Sometime this evening I'll begin the research that will bring me the series of magic boxes that will cure my jitters. The only question is what to sell...the house or the children?

 

Have a great day, folks.

 

Tim

 

PS: Never mind. That wasn't Sonny after all. It was my wife, from upstairs. Something about toe molding and a second coat of paint. (apologies and credit to BobH). TF

 

[BobH]

Here goes and let's hope I get this right!!

 

Ignoring the semantics some of us are guilty of having engaged in, in this debate, and our differences in system building philosophy, there is a lot of information you can glean from this thread.

 

Firstly, I think it fair to say that your computer doesn't 'sound'. You can get a great sound from a Mac and a great sound from a PC. Age doesn't matter so long as the computer is up to the job of delivering audio and has the connections you need.

 

The designers of modern dac chips have been able to incorporate fixes for many, if not all, of the 'problems' associated with earlier chips, including jitter. A well built dac, based on a modern chip, will give you excellent performance.

 

Whether or not jitter is audible is an endless debate. It is/was a problem and there are any number of different ways it gets addressed. The question for all of us is, I think, whether or not we need to address it. The consensus of advice, from this thread, I would interpret as being don't worry about it. Get the rest of your system up and running to a level you are happy with and then have another think if you can afford it. Personally, it is one of those 'tweaks' that I know about, but I won't look at it until I can afford to buy a solution for it! In other words if I don't hear how much better it could be, then I won't miss not having it!

 

As far as dac's go, then pick your price point. My advice, FWIW, is that if you are unsure whether or not computer audio is going to be a step forward, for you, then don't spend too much! The sound I get from my Tascam U122L is certainly acceptable and measurably better than the £1000 cd player it replaced. On that basis, then an M-Audio Transit is a cheap, modern DAC that many people are happy with and may be a good solution for you at this point. If you want to spend a tad more, then Chris certainly rates the Devilsound, so that might be worth a look.

 

Until you are happy that a computer can replace your CDP, then jitter should be the least of your worries. The way I always read these threads is that, if Group A are passionately in favour of something and Group B says it's all nonsense, then the truth probably lies somewhere in between, for most folks. Which group I personally end up in is always based on what I have heard - never on what I have read. The reading bit just gives you an idea about where to start listening!

 

Hope this helps!

 

[Ashley James]

Okay Sastus Bob's advise is good and it shows why the little M-Audio Transit is a goody. A year or two back I recommended the M-Audio 2496 that fits into a PCI slot, a chap bought it and wrote to tell me that it was so go, he'd sold a CD player that cost him £2,000 because the M-Audio was miles better. It is good and it is cheap and it does sound okay, so it's a good place if you're not having any luck with computer audio. I'll warn you that loading the drivers into a PC is a horrendous job. On a Mac you just download the basic driver off the net unless you're importing vinyl via the A to D.

 

I'd make Bob your counsellor!

 

Ash

 

[Al]

it has now.

 

i have the 2496 (as you will know ash from my post several pages back that you missed or ignored). i now use it with the beresford and it sounds dandy, but thats down to the beresford - i only got the 2496 for its spdif connection anyhow.

 

but i did listen to the 2496 without the dac for a while, and thought, with certain songs...just maybe...there was minimal improvement. i have never heard an expensive cd player, but if the soundcard in question (and soundcard is strictly waht it is, not a stand alone dac) is better, im glad i havent.

 

the 2496 is a decent budget level bit of kit and that is all.

 

maybe the persons setup had better spec than mine generally? maybe their pc had been tweaked in other helpful ways?

 

this is all very silly now, and its making my OE inbox ill.

 

[Olive Empithrie]

if I'm reading it correctly, is he's happy with his legacy DAC and doesn't see why he should need to buy another, and with his DAC, to his ears, the computer as transport is behind his CD transport.

 

Based on what he's written I'd expect that to be the case as his CD transport will be bit-perfect (on-the-fly error corrections aside) while the AC97 BOWIHR is not, and he may or may not be getting 16/48 out as well.

 

So, I think he's right. He either needs to invest in a better soundcard, or buy a DAC designed with computer audio in mind to bypass his AC97 card (eg JRiver/ASIO4ALL/USB/12S NOS). He needs to spend some money, which is his point. He can't just plug in any old computer and have it replace his CD transport into the DAC he already owns and loves to his audiophile standards.

 

Until he gets a bit-perfect data stream from his computer, being concerned with jitter would seem moot as presumably no device inserted in the chain can recover a signal that's not there to begin with?

 

This thread. My head hurts.

 

Or, was it the beer? How can I be sure?

 

Olive.

 

[audioengr]

sastus wrote:

"Just out of interest what would a modern reclocker (any examples? as replacements for the Lens?) and VALAB cost?"

 

The VALAB DAC is $180 and the caps to upgrade it are about $200, and well worth it. My own reclocker, the Pace-Car 2 is $1500 with one Superclock4 and one standard clock, $1200 with two standard clocks. It is used by the editors of Positive-Feedback and Stereo Times.

 

As for audibility of jitter, it depends on your system quality. If you have an inexpensive integrated amp, it may not be audible. Inexpensive components tend to have high noise and sibilance levels. This whole site is about audiophile sound, which means low distortion and noise, and musicality. In my experience, in systems that deliver this type of sound quality, jitter will be audible and not only audible, it will create listener fatigue among other negatives.

 

The majority of these other industry experts agree:

http://www.positive-feedback.com/Issue41/ca_intro.htm

 

Steve N.

Empirical Audio

 

[audioengr]

Asley wrote:

"It's my understanding that Sample Rate Conversion (as we use) removes jitter completely"

 

Well, your understanding is wrong. ASRC reduces jitter a bit, but never completely removes it. Furthermore, ALL ASRC chips, AD1896, CS8420, CS8421 etc.. are sensitive to incoming jitter. Their PLL's are not good enough to completely reject iincoming jitter. I've tested all of these in systems.

 

There are manufacturers that will claim this, but it is not true.

 

And BTW, I have had a number of customers with Audiophile 24/96 boxes that replaced them with my cheapest USB converter. Like the Transit, it's a toy IMO.

 

Steve N.

 

[Ashley James]

Steve

 

You trashed most of the pro audio industry and you've expounded all sorts of theories that don't seem plausible but that I'm not confident enough to respond to. However we've reached the stage now where I'm getting a string of emails from a Head of Research in significant International Company, some engineers of a well regarded Design Consultancy who've designed a special digital radio head for the Bentley Arnage as well as lots of hi end for companies all over the world and my business partner who was a pretty senior engineer in a leading defence Avionics company. He's worked with digital electronics since the days of the original Burr Brown, 8 Bit, monolithic DACs. All disagree with you in much stronger terms than I'd ever dream of expressing. I'm very sorry.

 

Ash

 

[DavidJPettifor]

Steve, I don't think you're helping your case by using Dave Clark's web site as a reference point.

 

http://science.slashdot.org/science/07/10/04/1354224.shtml

 

--

djp

 

[Purite Audio]

Ash wrote.'You trashed most of the pro audio industry and you've expounded all sorts of theories that don't seem plausible but that I'm not confident enough to respond to. However we've reached the stage now where I'm getting a string of emails from a Head of Research in significant International Company, some engineers of a well regarded Design Consultancy who've designed a special digital radio head for the Bentley Arnage as well as lots of hi end for companies all over the world and my business partner who was a pretty senior engineer in a leading defence Avionics company. He's worked with digital electronics since the days of the original Burr Brown, 8 Bit, monolithic DACs. All disagree with you in much stronger terms than I'd ever dream of expressing. I'm very sorry.'

 

 

Ash

I would really like to read those emails any from the 'tufty ' club?

 

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

It's rare I throw more fuel to the fire on my own site but I thought I'd add some info myself. I do know of specific examples where high-end audio engineers working for small companies have taught a few things to the designers of specific chips. In fact one little audio company new much more about the chips than the huge conglomerate manufacturer knew about its own chip.

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

After 25 rounds pages I think it's time to stick a fork in this one and call it done.