LUMIN - Audiophile Network Music Player

[Nicoben45]

Excellent! That´s one of the thing I look for to make the Lumin really shine. Maybe two Rcore transformers, mkp and pio decoupling capacitors... Looking inside some of the most musical gears tells what are the best ideas for the best power supplies, I love the Lumin and the outside power supply is an opportunity for diyers, and for Lumin itself...maybe... :-)

[Nicoben45]

Hi Nicoben45,

 

Thanks for your reply, yet, the R-core is not good as my custom bulit O-Type transformer, I test it before, O-Type is the best one, much more musical and details, trust me!

 

Regards,

Kenneth Lau

 

Well if everything has been tested, I can trust you (but earth have many power supply models with many différent résults in term of quality of music reproduction) I am just a bit afraid because what matter once is the musicality, and I have had some smal ones with the best régulators ever made, the best performance that can be measured but it wasn't enough to give musicality, only performance was here, like many digital gears in the world as you for sure know, so for me no matter at all of the case dimensions to have this...:-) I am not a power supply maker so.... but some of the best ones I have heard in term of musicality are made of much more capacitors , research for best découpling capacitors, for some we can find coke bottles of mkp capacitors to give the right energy, to come close to a battery supply, and one power transformer per rule for example.

These are questions of course, for the best :-)

Regards, Nicolas.

[Nicoben45]

Hello psme, no comment about the power supply described behind ?

Regards, Nicolas.

[Nicoben45]

I think it should, like in every audio gear! We maybe can say that for the final result, we have 1/3 for supply, 1/3 for analogue stage and 1/3 for digital stage. Of course having better results should mean improved objective qualities AND improved musicality, not so easy, the personal taste of the power supply maker is naturely entire part of this work. Lets wait and see...no...hear, we have already seen !

 

Regards, Nicolas.

[Nicoben45]

Au pire je pourrais dire que l'affichage est turquoise. Une photo aiderait a se rendre compte peut être. Je ne crois pas que quelqu'un ait eu ce souci, si souci il y a.

 

At worst I could say that the display is turquoise. A picture would help to realize maybe. I do not think anyone has had that problem, if there is concern.

 

Regards.

[Nicoben45]

Yes, I understand your problem. I just tried to take a picture of the Lumin with the iPad and the color is blue on the picture...not the same we can see, that is turquoise in reality, but not Green.... Sure you see just the same color as I see! So no problem at all...

 

Regards, Nicolas.

[Nicoben45]

Yes I confirm, blue for the PSU, turquoise for the Lumin display...

[Nicoben45]

Lumin Audiophile Network Music Player : Musique dématérialisée - Page 66

 

Hello! I let you see and translate from french what I say about Kenneth Lau's PSU for the Lumin. To resume...a must have for Lumin owners maybe.

 

Best regards, Nicolas.

[Nicoben45]

Maybe in the future? I can't imagine that Lumin would only make one product, so just a renderer without dac, based on actual Lumin technology, adding aes and other outputs, a real i2s, why not... Would it really be very less priced? Not sure...

We can too imagine other integrated streamers, lower and higher in price range, and a Lumin 2 that would outperform the actual Lumin, for the same price. Lumin is not the best sounding audio gear in the world, thinking that would be the end for Lumin, that must do better to be worth the money tomorrow, better than others too because the name is not known like others for now.

 

 

But i am sûre that the best audio source for tomorrow is in one box, including the best renderer, dac and preamp, with high end power supply in an other box, not a drive/dac/preamp trio with too long roads of numeric informations. THAT can be worth the price too, too much box is too much money at the end. But an external dac is important for some people....yes....So Lumin lacks a numeric input to be considered as a good dac maybe.

 

 

Linn never wanted to do it, only a renderer, maybe because their philosophy is to make audio gears only for their own items range, like the last all in one ds speaker system, that´s one of the reasons I left them. The second reason is the sound type. If Lumin played with Linn and the klimax appearance for evident marketing reasons, but for good technic ideas too, they just didn't make the same sounding device. So only people that waist their time with it are Linn users, although the sound is différent.....strange, when you know that Linn officialy doesn't mind of Lumin.

 

 

Well all in all I think that people who had Linn like me because they were the only one in the high end streamer market, now they go for others, and the Linn friends stay with Linn, like it was before network music players. Today, without doubt, I don't regret my Akurate DS, that was not the sound I was looking for, Lumin make more music.

 

Best regards, Nicolas.

[Nicoben45]

I forgot, of course I am happy with my Lumin, and of course a bit more because I had it with the introduction price. Would I buy it today for the real price? No, because I never buy such high end audio gear at the market price, it´s not for me, I buy second hand at half the price, or new at introduction price. I am sure many people do it like me, because if I don't do that, I don't go in high end audio gears, not enough money. So I agree Lumin can loose a part of the market, my part at least, but nothing more than others at the same price. For those who want to know, I run Lumin with Andra 3 and sugden preamp/monoblocs, full symetric Argento interconnects.

[Nicoben45]

Did you rebooted all the network accessories too? If not, you may try to shut down all network users (ie lumin, tablet, nas..) and network accessories (box, router, switch..) and reboot all in this kind of order:  box >router>switch>Nas>lumin>tablet

 

Best regards, Nicolas.

[Nicoben45]

Cool  I had the same kind of issue when I had the A1, more a network congestion than a Lumin problem. Today I still make some off/on punishment to all network toys at the first sign of slowness or weird things...

 

Nicolas.

[Nicoben45]

Bluskyy,

You can verify this on jriver (if it’s like this on your jriver version):

- right click on the lumin on jriver 

- go to dlna controller options

- verify « next track function desactivation » is NOT selected

Maybe....

 

Best regards, Nicolas.

[Nicoben45]

Good Job! That will be clearly a better choice for volume control than many classical ones, and one more argument to choose a Lumin. The U1mini could become a best seller 🤓

[Nicoben45]

Wouldn’t it be strange to love the X1 for a digital output that may better be made by the U1 for half the price?   

[Nicoben45]

Not all dacs are great power amp drivers, and not all dac / amp « weddings » are of a tonal balance such as to forget the preamp either. Not counting sometimes the subjective gain in that the voltage gain of the preamp always brings something of presence, energy, scale ... which would be hard to exist on a lot of dac / amps couples. Pure transparency is not the only attribute to remake a credible musical restitution very often, everything is compromises, subtle balance as well as personal tastes.
 

Anyone who thought about selling his preamp has already try some direct connection between dac and power amp, and I think the dac volume control is not the first thing that went wrong if the preamp went back quickly in the audio chain. Thinking about a direct link can rhyme with change of audio elements, it’s a global approach that leedh processing can be a part of.

 

@barrows no digital volume control in DSD, converting back to pcm is a necessity, like it would be with all digital volume controls. Maybe leedh processing is not the best toy for the dacs that only sound good with a dsd playback  But I think it’s worth a try anyway.

 

[Nicoben45]

And use unshielded cable too between the switch and the home network. It may be disappointing, but each unshielded cable will have his own sound  (like each audiophile switch will have too, Etherregen give good improvements but is a bit hot and in your face like a B class Naim Olive amplifier and the original power supply don’t help... but many love it as it’s better than no audiophile switch at all  ).

Let’s try this one: 

https://www.amazon.com/Monoprice-Cat5e-Ethernet-Patch-Cable/dp/B00ACR5VSW/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&keywords=Monoprice+cat5e+flat+30&qid=1597900411&sr=8-2
 

And this one that sound different but good too:

https://www.amazon.fr/1aTTack-réseau-Compatible-routeur-Internet/dp/B07GLXJZ6D/ref=sr_1_17?__mk_fr_FR=ÅMÅŽÕÑ&dchild=1&keywords=1attack+cat5e+cca&qid=1597900531&sr=8-17

Don’t think that a cheap ethernet cable is the same choice than an other... and Yes of course for linear power supply on the switch, it’s one of the first things to do.

 

 

[Nicoben45]

The Supra give a gentle round sound and with some time and comparisons by some unshielded cat6 or cat 5e, it just proved to be a bottleneck that lose air, live feeling of music. But all unshielded cables won’t give the same results... removing the metal of the connectors is not enough, although it’s hard to know why...

 

It’s really funny to see almost all the high end cable makers use expensive ethernet connectors, shielding... bad recipes just adapted to lose air, resolution, naturalness of the music, but good to make pretty computer ethernet cables for high bitrate online games. All these kind of ethernet cables give their own coloration to music without solving the real problem, because people make cables without knowing what the problem is !  

[Nicoben45]

Don’t tell that to Roon people, they will say you are crazy because in the network world zeros are zeros and ones are ones.... 

But despite what they think, that is a reality, software impact on sound quality at the end of the chain is a reality for many peuple who compared Roon, UPNP, Audirvana.... but the reality may be that hardware has impact on that too, the best the Roon Server and network upgrade is, the best Roon will sound (ssd for the system and storage, linear power supplies for server and all network accessories, non shielded ethernet cables choosed by ear, audiophile ethernet switch for the last network meters near audio gears...), everything matters in this side of audio toys and can make UPNP sound better but can make Roon sound better too and minimize differences between software solutions.

Some will tell you to use HQplayer to make Roon Sound the way you want, but tinkering with the signal don’t make it more natural, except if the dac need that to sound better, but it’s an other problem.

[Nicoben45]

These are words full of common sense, I gladly share this vision of things.

Proving these impacts by measurement, highlighting a possible prioritization of current and developing network audio protocols would be a major advance in the objectification of certain subjective audiophile feelings, ambitious isn’t it 😊

[Nicoben45]

Let's say that each way is good to explore in order to hope to find a common point between protocol and potential sound impact ...

Quite a few people are working on protocols ( WNDR for Waversa, Diretta...), sorry that the way to renderer immunity to whatever goes upstream is not well lit,  the future of dematerialized musical quality depends on it. Total immunity to protocols, power consumption, electrical pollution carried by the network and server, hard drives, usb links (so affected by the usb cable, unsuitable connection for an audio stream ... or it’s the receiver that should be immune to usb signal and power wires).
 

Let’s sum up: the manufacturers of dacs are far from the goal, to make their machines, the analogue output of d/a conversion and output stage totally immune to what is happening upstream, the real goal is here for future, it is a fundamental problem to which solutions are sought in each small cause upstream but if all the energy deployed for the upstream was used for the immunity of the downstream, the audiophile would once and for all be reconciled with dematerialized audio (but all manufacturers of small boxes would no longer have any work,  like manufacturers of injection pumps for cars soon 🙄). We are not there for now.

[Nicoben45]

The U1mini has a simple 12v power supply, when the U1 and friends has two different power inputs. So the U1mini can only be upgraded by an other psu that bring one 12v output. Good results at home with the Paul Hynes SR4t and home made dc cable. 

[Nicoben45]

I didn’t want to bore Peter with that but it’s the same for me.
 

I have a U2mini, no problem, but I use the Lumin app with an Engineered e-red dock card with bubble server to make it Openhome and now the next track / last track / pause functions are out of order with the Lumin App last upgrades.

 

If you can make these functions work again in Lumin App for bubble server users it would be great. 
 

Regards, Nicolas.

[Nicoben45]

Sorry Peter….

 

Let’s tell you the tests I made in the last hour: 

- I had the Lumin 8.1.0 version of Lumin App in my ipad, I updated to 8.2.0 : it doesn’t work with these two versions (It worked before these two versions) . Lumin app used with bubbleupnp server on two different renderers (Engineered e-red dock and Marantz MCR510). 
- I tried with my iphone (X) and ipad (air 3) ,  same problem. 

- I tried with the last 5.1.0 version of Lumin app in my son’s droid phone: no problem with bubbleupnp server, it works on all renderers

- The last bubbleupnp server update is from march so it can’t be concerned. 

 

Sorry to give you good reasons for a bug in the two last versions of the Lumin App. As a happy Lumin User (I had the A1, M1, U1mini and now U2mini), I use Lumin app from the beginning of Lumin for Lumin hardware AND all upnp hardware in house with bubble server. 

 

Regards, Nicolas.
 

[Nicoben45]

@wkliewon’t ignore the reality of the bug and help Lumin users to manage their different audio gears with the Lumin App, it would be commercially incoherent, the App is a tool to make non Lumin users be interested into Lumin products, elementary 🤓, isn’t it Peter?