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exaSound e18 - e20 - e28 - Info and Experiences Post All Here


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New details: I leave the DAC playing from foobar all the night long. Now I turned the amps on and left channel is playing on center and right on subwoofer.

 

What is this if not a driver problem?

The exaSound dashboard is displaying correctly the meters

Cattura.PNG

but the sound comes from others channels.

 

Because the dashboard has the right signal I think this has nothing to do with foobar nor the OS.

 

Thank you

Andrea

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New details: I leave the DAC playing from foobar all the night long. Now I turned the amps on and left channel is playing on center and right on subwoofer.

 

What is this if not a driver problem?

The exaSound dashboard is displaying correctly the meters

[ATTACH=CONFIG]27369[/ATTACH]

but the sound comes from others channels.

 

Because the dashboard has the right signal I think this has nothing to do with foobar nor the OS.

 

Thank you

Andrea

 

Very strange indeed. I do not think it is either the DAC or the Exasound driver. As George said, no one else has experienced a similar problem. And, your old E28 exhibited no problems in use in his testing. I believe him. And, he has gone the extra mile at considerable expense in sending you a brand new DAC. I do not believe it is an Exasound problem. As he says, it is something in your PC environment, most likely in software, but not necessarily.

 

There appear to be two problems, which may or may not be related:

 

1. White noise at 0dB.

2. Channel remapping.

 

From the above, the driver appears to be receiving and transmitting the correct signals. You did say the 0dB white noise appeared on the driver's meters, I believe. Correct? So, the indication is that is upstream of the driver. Are you certain the played rips themselves are OK and free of the white noise? You might want to do further testing with your amps off or disconnected to protect your speakers and just look at the meters.

 

But, if the Exa driver is seeing signal in the correct input channels, the reassignment of output to different, incorrect channels must be occurring after the driver, which is quite weird.

 

I doubt it could be a problem with the USB cable or the PC's USB ports. I am over my head here, but I believe that the data sent to the DAC is serial. I do not really know how the channels are identified in that serial data stream. But, for the heck of it, have you tried a different USB cable and output USB port? How long is your cable? Is it a USB 2.0 certified cable or above? Also possibly, there is a strange problem in the USB 2.0 hardware or drivers. Not sure if it would make a difference, but have you tried a USB 3.0 port?

 

Not sure how to test the channel misalignment without putting your speakers at risk without measurement instruments, which is over my head. Maybe a simple AC voltmeter connected to the E28 analog outs one at a time would reveal something, preferably with a steady state test tone disc being played. You could attach the meter leads (via alligator clips?) to the plug at the end of an analog cable, rather than trying to get the meter probes inside the E28's output jacks.

 

Here is another wild guess, which might be quite stupidly off the mark: anti-virus software. That has caused many weird problems with JRiver, which I use. You can test this by disconnecting the PC from the Internet and uninstalling your antivirus. Just shutting it down does not always do the trick. If this reveals nothing, reinstall the AV software.

 

Trying a different PC with new installs of the minimum player and driver software for playback would also be advisable. Don't know if that will turn something up if it is intermittent or takes weeks to suddenly appear. But, if your USB cable is fine and your rips are good, I have a hunch a new PC would work fine, unless the antivirus software is to blame.

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The white noise doesn't appear on the driver's meters: when the white noise is playing moving slightly a driver's meter remove the white noise and restore che normal playing (it would be interesting to know from exaSound what is actually doing this action on the DAC? It could help to find out the problem).

 

I think the two problems are related.

 

The rips are certanly OK, I played it hundreds of times without white noise.

 

Now I tested the DAC five days 24h/24h with amps off connected with the same USB cable to another computer (Lenovo Yoga3 Pro Netbook - foobar2000 - exaSound ASIO). Sometimes I turned the amps on to check if the white noise was there (the noise remains until user intervention on the PC), but nothing, perfect playing for five days.

 

Since yesterday the DAC is playing again connected to my main PC: until now the playback is ok.

 

To know if the data to the DAC is serial we need support from exaSound: I tried all USB 3.0 ports on my PC (on the back I have no USB 2.0 - could try with those on the front) and was considering to buy something such as this card SOtM - English | tX-USBexp to prevent any problem from the USB hub.

 

I always used the same USB cable - 10m long from Oehlbach USB A/B | Cable | USB | Computer | Oehlbach

A corrupted digital signal from the USB cable should produce silence because the DAC would be unable to decode it. If this produces a white noise, then the 0's are inverted with 1's from the DAC in the digital stream.

 

To test the speakers misalignment I set the preamp volume down when turning amps on, at low levels I can hear the channel misalignment or the white noise without putting my speakers at risk.

 

I use avast! free antivirus: are there some concrete experiences? Maybe exaSound can tell us if someone ever had problems with an antivirus software?

 

PSU: as I said, when exaSound replaced my MKI DAC with a new MKII, the PSU remained the same.

How does the DAC react if the PSU is outputting an variable voltage? Should I check the output voltage of the PSU with a DC voltmeter connected to the PSU output with alligator clips?

 

Any other suggestion?

 

Thank you

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It happened again (was playing FLAC, 6ch, 96kHz, 24bit) - same files as with the laptop on the last 5 days (see previous post), I tried some things:

1. connected headphones to the headphones exit on the DAC, the noise is present in the same way as with the analog outputs on the back.

2. I tried gradually lowering the volume on Foobar to the minimum level, I found out that when I get to ~5% you start to hear the music emerging from the noise, it sounds heavily distorted, and then at 1% level it's clearly audible but you can still hear some distortion (it sounds a bit like clipping).

3. I recorded the output signal of the headphones output, which you can hear at the bottom, corresponding to the three situations described:

a) low white noise, music is distorted but audible (foobar volume 5%, DAC volume 0.0dB)

b) low white noise (foobar volume 10%, DAC volume 0.0dB)

c) strong noise (music inaudible) (foobar volume 100%, DAC volume 0.0dB)

 

0

 

4. I tried to move the volume on the DAC while this was happening, using the two buttons on the front face, the volume changed both on the display of the DAC and on the dashboard on Windows, and the noise continued but its volume changed along with the volume setting.

Doing the same thing from the dashboard on windows (changing the volume with the cursor on the dashboard), immediately at the first step (-0.5 dB) the noise stopped immediately, and you could hear the music normally at the expected volume.

 

A did this tests with an electronic engineer (friend of mine). He told me that it could be the USB hub that generates the problem, but, for sure, something is wrong in the firmware of the DAC or in the drivers, because of the different behaviour when changing volume from the DAC or from the dashboard. It seems that anywhere the software lacks of some checking?

 

I really hope now to get an answer from exaSound.

 

Thank you for any suggestion....

If you have any ideas for tests I can run the next time, please tell me.

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We‘ve replaced your DAC with a brand new device after the end of the warranty period and we’ve offered a free upgrade to the latest Mark II revision.

 

That represents a pretty impressive effort to make things right...

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The white noise doesn't appear on the driver's meters: when the white noise is playing moving slightly a driver's meter remove the white noise and restore che normal playing (it would be interesting to know from exaSound what is actually doing this action on the DAC? It could help to find out the problem).

 

I think the two problems are related.

 

The rips are certanly OK, I played it hundreds of times without white noise.

 

Now I tested the DAC five days 24h/24h with amps off connected with the same USB cable to another computer (Lenovo Yoga3 Pro Netbook - foobar2000 - exaSound ASIO). Sometimes I turned the amps on to check if the white noise was there (the noise remains until user intervention on the PC), but nothing, perfect playing for five days.

 

Since yesterday the DAC is playing again connected to my main PC: until now the playback is ok.

 

To know if the data to the DAC is serial we need support from exaSound: I tried all USB 3.0 ports on my PC (on the back I have no USB 2.0 - could try with those on the front) and was considering to buy something such as this card SOtM - English | tX-USBexp to prevent any problem from the USB hub.

 

I always used the same USB cable - 10m long from Oehlbach USB A/B | Cable | USB | Computer | Oehlbach

A corrupted digital signal from the USB cable should produce silence because the DAC would be unable to decode it. If this produces a white noise, then the 0's are inverted with 1's from the DAC in the digital stream.

 

To test the speakers misalignment I set the preamp volume down when turning amps on, at low levels I can hear the channel misalignment or the white noise without putting my speakers at risk.

 

I use avast! free antivirus: are there some concrete experiences? Maybe exaSound can tell us if someone ever had problems with an antivirus software?

 

PSU: as I said, when exaSound replaced my MKI DAC with a new MKII, the PSU remained the same.

How does the DAC react if the PSU is outputting an variable voltage? Should I check the output voltage of the PSU with a DC voltmeter connected to the PSU output with alligator clips?

 

Any other suggestion?

 

Thank you

 

Aha!

 

Try a 5 meter or less cable. 5 meters is the specified max for metallic USB 2.0 without repeaters or hubs, which it does not appear your cable has. The Exasound is USB 2.0. If I really needed 10 meters, the only thing I would use is a Corning glass fiber cable. I have tried that briefly, and it works with my E28. I have been using a 5 meter metallic cable with no problems for several years. Cable quality is not an issue with Exasound due to its superior isolation.

 

It is a good idea to use USB2.0 ports on the PC for the DAC. That removes the audio from the USB 3.0 internal hub/controller, freeing them up for use and eliminating contention with high speed devices if used at the same time as audio. There is no advantage to USB 3.0 for audio signal, and the USB 3.0 ports automatically downshift to USB 2.0 operation when connected to a USB 2.0 device. (The Corning cable is USB 3.0 and it acts as a hub on the DAC end. I believe that the Corning needs a USB 3.0 port on the PC. The downshift to USB 2.0 occurs at the receiving DAC end. A passive male A - male B adaptor is required, as I recall. But, double check, if you wish to go this route. It has been awhile for me.)

 

Since it is now established that the white noise is not seen by the Exasound driver, the problem seems localized to something after that driver in the chain. The channel assignment mixup is also not seen by the Exasound driver. I think the cable is most likely to be the problem. But, you will not know for sure unless you try a 5 meter or less cable.

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Thank you again!

 

Did you hear the sounds I uploaded? What do you think?

1) I agree with you about the cable length (my cable only has a "swelling" at the beginning), but, as said, if the signal is corrupted, I should hear nothing, not the music at 2000% volume causing a completely clipping distortion (see my last post).

2) Same cable on laptop: 5 days 24h/24 music playback without noise. Why?

3) If it happens after the drivers: why moving the fader on the dashboard restore the normal situation and the music playback as expected?

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Thank you again!

 

Did you hear the sounds I uploaded? What do you think?

1) I agree with you about the cable length (my cable only has a "swelling" at the beginning), but, as said, if the signal is corrupted, I should hear nothing, not the music at 2000% volume causing a completely clipping distortion (see my last post).

2) Same cable on laptop: 5 days 24h/24 music playback without noise. Why?

3) If it happens after the drivers: why moving the fader on the dashboard restore the normal situation and the music playback as expected?

 

Don't speculate about the cable. Just bring it into proper specifications and try it. If it makes no difference, another potential cause is eliminated. That is useful information in narrowing down the search.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I tested for a week with a USB cable of proper length on the same computer, and it didn't happen.

Then I switched to the longer cable and after a day it happened.

 

Since it possibly was a cable problem, I tested again with 32 bit/384kHz audio files in order to push it to the limits, with the long cable and it happens after only 5 minutes.

Then I repeated the test several times restarting the DAC every time and it happens again always after only a few minutes.

Then I played the same files with the shorter cable all night long and it didn't happen.

 

Now I'm testing with this file since 2 hours using my laptop with the long cable and nothing happened yet.

 

Do you have any further suggestion?

 

At this point I think it could be the cable the problem, but with the laptop it hasn't happened yet.

As I cannot move the DAC, do you any suggestion about a replacement for the long cable?

 

Thank you

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An active USB repeater cable or a powered USB-hub might help here.

But changing the cable to another brand might do the trick also, ... (and I don't talk about fancy and expensive ones here)

Esoterc SA-60 / Foobar2000 -> Mytek Stereo 192 DSD / Audio-GD NFB 28.38 -> MEG RL922K / AKG K500 / AKG K1000  / Audioquest Nighthawk / OPPO PM-2 / Sennheiser HD800 / Sennheiser Surrounder / Sony MA900 / STAX SR-303+SRM-323II

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I tested for a week with a USB cable of proper length on the same computer, and it didn't happen.

Then I switched to the longer cable and after a day it happened.

 

Since it possibly was a cable problem, I tested again with 32 bit/384kHz audio files in order to push it to the limits, with the long cable and it happens after only 5 minutes.

Then I repeated the test several times restarting the DAC every time and it happens again always after only a few minutes.

Then I played the same files with the shorter cable all night long and it didn't happen.

 

Now I'm testing with this file since 2 hours using my laptop with the long cable and nothing happened yet.

 

Do you have any further suggestion?

 

At this point I think it could be the cable the problem, but with the laptop it hasn't happened yet.

As I cannot move the DAC, do you any suggestion about a replacement for the long cable?

 

Thank you

 

I have an e22, and my setup has my main home music server (I custom built it) over 17 feet from the DAC. Before the Exasound, I had used a USB to coax converter - coax signals are a lot less susceptible to getting screwed up by long runs of cable. One of the motivations for the upgrade to the e22 was to get DSD capability, which it won't do via coax. So, I needed a solution. Note in all the experiments below, the USB cables (except the optical) are Audioquest.

 

I tried using ethernet between my main computer and a local (near the DAC) small computer, and had issues with random dropouts that I couldn't solve. Tried ethernet to a NAS from the local, still got dropouts. No patience... tried two reasonable length USB cables with a hub between them, from main server to DAC, and that worked OK. Then I tried a USB drive with my whole library on it attached to the local small computer (a NUC) and it sounded about the same, so not really worth the effort.

 

Read a few posts here about people using Corning's USB optical cable. Takes the USB signal from the computer, converts it to light pulses in the optical cable, then converts back to USB at the end. You have to add a short regular USB cable to it... it's terminated like it's a cable extender. Well, THAT sounded amazingly good. Really, way better than the small local computer with its own source. Subsequent testing has convinced me that a NUC isn't a great musical server, everything's crammed into such a small space that there are probably fields everywhere messing things up. My custom built server is a full size board, in a very large case using externally powered fans, and a relatively isolated USB board.

 

The Uptone Regen guys tested an optical USB cable and found that it significantly improved sound over regular USB. Now, they think they can get an even better result with more stuff added on, but... at the moment, the sound quality is so good that there's an eerie sense of the performers hanging out in my family room. I can't imagine better.

 

BTW, I'd also tried streaming via wireless between my main server and a local computer. For that I was using an old laptop. That worked really well, I could even stream 2x DSD and DSF without any problems, and it sounded good, better than the NUC when I tried the same thing. (Hence my opinion the NUC is crappy for the application.) I did try the NUC on the optical cable (30 feet of cable to travel about 2 feet... UGLY) and while it sounded better than with a good USB cable, it was worse than from my main music server.

 

So there you have all my insane experiments. I'd recommend buying the Corning optical USB in the shortest length possible (I think that's 30 feet), coil the excess and hide it behind furniture, and run it to the Exasound DAC. It's not very expensive. There are some much more expensive options that will let you get shorter runs... but really, they're a LOT more expensive.

 

A recent story on Audiostream.com compared optical ethernet for a long run with very high quality CAT6 and said that the optical ethernet was seriously better sounding. I sense a pattern.

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I tested for a week with a USB cable of proper length on the same computer, and it didn't happen.

Then I switched to the longer cable and after a day it happened.

 

Since it possibly was a cable problem, I tested again with 32 bit/384kHz audio files in order to push it to the limits, with the long cable and it happens after only 5 minutes.

Then I repeated the test several times restarting the DAC every time and it happens again always after only a few minutes.

Then I played the same files with the shorter cable all night long and it didn't happen.

 

Now I'm testing with this file since 2 hours using my laptop with the long cable and nothing happened yet.

 

Do you have any further suggestion?

 

At this point I think it could be the cable the problem, but with the laptop it hasn't happened yet.

As I cannot move the DAC, do you any suggestion about a replacement for the long cable?

 

Thank you

 

I also would use a 10 meter Corning Cable, which is fiber optic for signal, but with copper power leads. I know it works because I tried one myself to my E28. You do not need a short USB cable at the DAC end. You can find an inexpensive "hard" adapter for male-male USB A-B. The Corning has a female termination, as I recall. Not sure, but you might need to use a USB3 port at the PC end. It is a USB3 cable.

 

But, glad you found the problem. It was as I suspected. A normal, passive metallic USB cable greater than 5 meters is out of spec and should never be used. That someone sold one to you is bad, bad, bad. They are not to be trusted again.

 

Also, I do not recommend add on devices like the Uptone Regen with the Exasound. I tried one, and it sounded slightly different. But, I concluded that it sounded better without it.

 

Good luck!

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I also would use a 10 meter Corning Cable, which is fiber optic for signal, but with copper power leads. I know it works because I tried one myself to my E28. You do not need a short USB cable at the DAC end. You can find an inexpensive "hard" adapter for male-male USB A-B. The Corning has a female termination, as I recall. Not sure, but you might need to use a USB3 port at the PC end. It is a USB3 cable.

 

But, glad you found the problem. It was as I suspected. A normal, passive metallic USB cable greater than 5 meters is out of spec and should never be used. That someone sold one to you is bad, bad, bad. They are not to be trusted again.

 

Also, I do not recommend add on devices like the Uptone Regen with the Exasound. I tried one, and it sounded slightly different. But, I concluded that it sounded better without it.

 

Good luck!

 

I can confirm that you MUST use a USB3 port on the PC end with the Corning cable. I upgraded my drives in my server a few weeks ago, and in the process of re-assembling everything plugged the Corning into a USB2 port. And then went totally insane for most of a day trying to figure out why nothing worked. Then I noticed the blue insert in the Corning cable. Moved it to a USB3 port, and suddenly everything was pretty flowers again. No need for USB3 from the Corning to the DAC. BTW, there are a number of people who say USB3 port and hub design has some significantly better characteristics than USB2 for digital music. Also a couple who say the reverse. Strength of evidence is on the "better" side. I'm familiar with some of the protocol differences and I know I'd be on the better side.

 

Originally I tried a hard adapter that I had laying around instead of a really short Audioquest cable, and it sounded noticeably worse, but your mileage may vary. On the Uptone site, they tell a story in their blog about when they added an original design Regen to the Corning cable, they said it sounded worse, which led them to re-design the Regen to include some things that are part of the Corning cable. I had a long discussion with someone at Uptone about whether it was worth trying to add a Regen (now that it's been redesigned) and I got a lot of equivocation, which told me that they're not sure, so I'm not going there.

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Thanks everybody for the replies.

 

I ordered the cable you suggested me: EET Europarts CH: Corning USB A to USB A REC Optical cab

Now I am searching for an adapter USB A male to B male: do you have any suggestions? I don't want to buy a 0.5$ chinese adapter on ebay after a buying a >100$ cable!

 

Something is still unclear to me: why does the long cable work well with my laptop?

Now it's playing music since 6 hours without problems!

We assume that the cable is the problem because it's 10m long and my desktop PC worked well within a week with a shorter cable but I'd really like to have a confirm experiencing the problem also with my laptop.

 

Is there something more stressful than playing 32bit/384kHz 8ch FLACs?

 

Thank you

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Some further testing:

- with the long cable on laptop nothing happened after 5h playback 32bit/384kHz (on desktop happens after less than 10 mins).

- long cable on the laptop USB2: "unknown device"

- long cable on desktop USB2 happens as for USB3

- I built up a 5.7m USB2 cable connecting some extension cables (5.8m, so +10cm, I get "unknown device"): with this cable I got the white noise on the desktop after 10 min. So first time with another "long" cable. Now testing with this cable on the laptop: nothing happened until yet.

 

Are you still sure that the cable is the problem?

 

Thank you

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...

Are you still sure that the cable is the problem?

 

Most likely yes.

USB cables are usualy lenght-limited to 5 meters. And even 5 meters can cause problems with "bad" cables.

To make it even more complicated, not every USB port behaves the same in regard to the attached cable.

 

If you get your Corning xtender, please report back!

Esoterc SA-60 / Foobar2000 -> Mytek Stereo 192 DSD / Audio-GD NFB 28.38 -> MEG RL922K / AKG K500 / AKG K1000  / Audioquest Nighthawk / OPPO PM-2 / Sennheiser HD800 / Sennheiser Surrounder / Sony MA900 / STAX SR-303+SRM-323II

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Most likely yes.

USB cables are usualy lenght-limited to 5 meters. And even 5 meters can cause problems with "bad" cables.

To make it even more complicated, not every USB port behaves the same in regard to the attached cable.

 

If you get your Corning xtender, please report back!

 

Agree completely.

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Today it happened: the Oehlbach 10m cable made the DAC crazy also with my laptop.

I'm now sure that the problem doesn't occour only on my desktop.

 

Now I'll wait for the Corning cable and test it hoping it will definitively solve the problem.

 

I wrote exaSound an email telling them that I'm ready to pay and send them the cable if they'll test it and search for a solution to prevent further problems with long cables to other buyers (e.g. updating the DAC’s ROM to prevent the white noise in such situations. Instead it would be nice if a checksum reports an error and the DAC stops playing music?).

I'm now waiting for an answer.

As this happened also with another 5,8m cable I built with some extension cables, it seems that the problem occours in any situation if the cable is to long. I think it could be fine if exaSound take advantage of my experience to prevent such situations in the future.

 

I also wrote to Oehlbach and send a copy to the store where I bought the cable and to exaSound.

 

I bought this converter to connect the DAC to the Corning optical cable, is it ok?

Delock USB 2 0 A Male USB A Male Adapter Converter FOR Printer Scanner Switch | eBay

 

Thank you everybody for the help, I'll report back after some tests with the corning cable.

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Yes. The converter looks right, and it is USB 2.0 rated. I would not worry about something fancier or more exotic. The Exasound is relatively insensitive to cable differences, unlike a lot of other DACs out there.

 

Remember to plug the Corning into a USB3.0 port on the PC end.

 

Yes, let us know how you make out.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Yesterday I got the USB Optical Corning cable.

I started immediately to test it and got following results:

- on desktop only 2 of the 8 USB3.0 recognise the DAC with the Corning cable. On those 2 ports flawless playback for 2-3 hours. After this time foobar freeze, the sample rate disappear on the DAC but the dashboard continues to show the play icon.

When I stop the playback on foobar and restart it I get this error "Unrecoverable playback error: Sample rate of 384000 Hz not supported by this device." or "Unrecoverable playback error: Could not start ASIO playback".

I have to plug out and in the DAC to be able to use it again or restart the computer.

- on laptop same story but after more time (5/6 hours)

 

I think the current provided by the USB ports is not sufficent to power the optical to USB converter.

What do you think?

 

Thank you.

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Great info ! I considered my Corning dead but found out my usb port were 2.0 configured. Reset SMC (os x) and first plugging a usb 3 device did the trick, the ports got reconfigured and the Corning resurrected. Well... now it's dead again : very touchy cable anyway

I can confirm that you MUST use a USB3 port on the PC end with the Corning cable. I upgraded my drives in my server a few weeks ago, and in the process of re-assembling everything plugged the Corning into a USB2 port. And then went totally insane for most of a day trying to figure out why nothing worked. Then I noticed the blue insert in the Corning cable. Moved it to a USB3 port, and suddenly everything was pretty flowers again. No need for USB3 from the Corning to the DAC. BTW, there are a number of people who say USB3 port and hub design has some significantly better characteristics than USB2 for digital music. Also a couple who say the reverse. Strength of evidence is on the "better" side. I'm familiar with some of the protocol differences and I know I'd be on the better side.

 

Originally I tried a hard adapter that I had laying around instead of a really short Audioquest cable, and it sounded noticeably worse, but your mileage may vary. On the Uptone site, they tell a story in their blog about when they added an original design Regen to the Corning cable, they said it sounded worse, which led them to re-design the Regen to include some things that are part of the Corning cable. I had a long discussion with someone at Uptone about whether it was worth trying to add a Regen (now that it's been redesigned) and I got a lot of equivocation, which told me that they're not sure, so I'm not going there.

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Great info ! I considered my Corning dead but found out my usb port were 2.0 configured. Reset SMC (os x) and first plugging a usb 3 device did the trick, the ports got reconfigured and the Corning resurrected. Well... now it's dead again : very touchy cable anyway

 

This morning I was able to play flawless from 9am to 1pm. After that playback stopped and restarting the computer doesn't solve the problem. The DAC is not recognized by Windows, nor the Corning hub displays on device manager.

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I wrote to exaSound asking them if the DAC needs the USB power to playback and this is the answer.

 

The 5 Volt from the USB cable are required for USB playback.

So it is impossible to use the corning cable with the exaSound DAC without powering it at the other end (something like câble adaptateur usb-b pour alimentation externe usb-a

 

Am I missing something? ednaz told some posts above he could use the Corning cable with the exaSound without powering it externally...

 

Thank you

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I wrote to exaSound asking them if the DAC needs the USB power to playback and this is the answer.

 

The 5 Volt from the USB cable are required for USB playback.

So it is impossible to use the corning cable with the exaSound DAC without powering it at the other end (something like câble adaptateur usb-b pour alimentation externe usb-a

 

Am I missing something? ednaz told some posts above he could use the Corning cable with the exaSound without powering it externally...

 

Thank you

The Corning cable has copper power leads within it just like any other USB cable. There is power on those when you plug into any normal USB jack at the PC end. It worked fine for me without doing anything special, except using a USB3 port instead of USB2 and an adaptor at the DAC end, as has been explained. You are overthinking it.

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