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Uptone Audio Regen


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I meant to write I was told to read post #2123; but I do not know what to conclude about the 30W Teradak from that post; is that a value-for-the-money power supply?

 

 

My head hurts and am confused, having received delivery today of the Amber Regen device; two topics of my inquiry......power supply and USB cable.

 

1) power supply, at an affordable price; iFi Power or the 30W Teradak? or another suggestion. Would the Furutech wall outlet make this point moot? I was told to read post 2183, but I don't know what to conclude from it.

 

2) USB cable; data-only cable? Y-cable, and use date-side only, or a good-quality cable, and tape over the power connections?

 

Well, I am using the Geek Pulse DAC/Amp, and, IIRC, it requires a power handshake and afterwards that can be dropped.

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Thank you. I will take a look at that Mapleshade.

 

 

Life is more simple than this.

 

Power supply: The included MeanWell is very nice. The iPower is slightly better; the Chinese supply on eBay you were directed to is slightly better yet. Small differences, not night and day.

 

Cable: Use what you have for a nice improvement from what you were hearing before. Other relatively low cost well thought of cables are the Supra and the Mapleshade Clearlink Plus. No reason to do anything to the cables, just use them as is.

 

See? Simple! Now you can spend your time listening to music. :)

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Did you notice much of a difference when you removed the ferrite beads? I've one around here, and maybe it would be worth a try...

 

Enough of a difference to ditch them.

 

I've posted on this subject before. The Kimber USB Cu bested two other USB cables that I owned that were triple its price.

This is my subjective impression. YMMV.

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Received my Regen last Monday, connected it to the system with a Paul Hynes SR3 turned down to 7.5v. Noise level increased compared to what it was before Regen. I thought let it burn for few days. Nothing changed until today while the system was running 24 hours, so I wanted to see what was going on, and connected an Anker 5v battery to Regen and the noise floor dropped, and things started to sound good again.

 

I am using JCat USB card with no power coming to Regen and I have blocked pin 1 on hard adapter, so no power is going to DAC.

 

Anyone tried battery to Regen? I will turn down my Hynes to 5v and see what happens, I do not know it was the voltage or the difference between LPS vs battery.

 

Is your SR3 just powering the REGEN? If you have a supply powering a DAC AND that same supply powering a REGEN you can defeat galvanic isolation in the DAC. (it depends on the DAC whether this happens or not)

 

John S.

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Is your SR3 just powering the REGEN? If you have a supply powering a DAC AND that same supply powering a REGEN you can defeat galvanic isolation in the DAC. (it depends on the DAC whether this happens or not)

 

John S.

My SR3 is only powering the Regen. I do not understand the second part about galvanic isolation. My DAC is PS Audio DirectStream. I did not have 5v going to it before, (JCat USB was set so no power goes to DAC). That is why I blocked pin 1 on hard adapter going out from Regen. Is that good or bad? Thanks.

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.....

 

Anyone tried battery to Regen? I will turn down my Hynes to 5v and see what happens, I do not know it was the voltage or the difference between LPS vs battery.

 

How are you changing the o/p volts on the Hynes? Is this a special SR3? When I had one a couple of years back, there was only about 1v variation on a 15v output.

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How are you changing the o/p volts on the Hynes? Is this a special SR3? When I had one a couple of years back, there was only about 1v variation on a 15v output.

 

Paul Hynes contacted me today and in his words,

There is an adjustment potentiometer in the SR3 that can be used for adjusting the output over a few volts range to allow reasonably precise settings, however the potentiometer I fit in the SR3-12 would only allow you to adjust to around 10.2v at the low end.

 

I won't be touching mine and will be leaving my SR3-12 on my Off-Ramp 3 USB converter. I'll wait for the Mean Well add-on PS (unless I can get a linear PS cheaper). Cost effective is a necessity which was why the Regen was so attractive to begin with.

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How are you changing the o/p volts on the Hynes? Is this a special SR3? When I had one a couple of years back, there was only about 1v variation on a 15v output.

 

Hi Bob,

 

I think I bought yours and yes, it can be turned down according to Paul...

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SR3 Adjustment.

 

The regulator topology used in the SR3 is a floating regulator, which means that it can be used over a wide voltage operating range as long as component ratings are not exceeded (I have used this circuit configuration to provide regulated voltages from 0.8v to 600v).

 

The SR3 has a 22 turn precision adjustment potentiometer which was originally included in the design to accommodate component spreads when setting the output voltage. Only a small operating range was required for this function. The voltage adjustment range can be increased by altering the value of a resistor in series with the potentiometer, and also by changing the resistance value of the potentiometer. Other component changes may be required if the new voltage range causes component ratings to be exceeded or, in the case of capacitors, to be run with too little voltage for correct operation. I would not recommend anyone attempting to do this unless they have a reasonable level of DIY electronics experience.

 

Sig8,

I have never used the Anker battery supplies so I cannot advise from experience. However, I am concerned about the result you are getting when powering the Regen as others have reported sound quality improvements using the SR range of power supplies, against Anker battery supplies. How old is the SR3 you used with the Regen? The SR3 has been around for over 7 years and has been upgraded 4 times during this period. It’s rare, but there is also the possibility that the SR3 you are using is faulty. Is it easy for you to substitute one of your other SR3 power supplies to verify if this is the case?

 

Regards

Paul

Design and manufacture of high performance power supplies

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My SR3 is only powering the Regen. I do not understand the second part about galvanic isolation. My DAC is PS Audio DirectStream. I did not have 5v going to it before, (JCat USB was set so no power goes to DAC). That is why I blocked pin 1 on hard adapter going out from Regen. Is that good or bad? Thanks.

 

Some DACs have a USB receiver powered off the VBUS, then a full galvanic isolation stage, then the main DAC circuitry. If you have one of these DACS and power both the REGEN and the DAC from the same supply you are now defeating the galvanic isolation because the same ground is used for both. This can lead ground loops etc.

 

Galvanic isolation is primarily concerned with ground connections rather than the + connections. I do not know if your supply has the DC negative connected to AC ground, if it does that might be another path for ground loops to enter in to the picture which a battery would fix.

 

John S.

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Sig8,

I have never used the Anker battery supplies so I cannot advise from experience. However, I am concerned about the result you are getting when powering the Regen as others have reported sound quality improvements using the SR range of power supplies, against Anker battery supplies. How old is the SR3 you used with the Regen? The SR3 has been around for over 7 years and has been upgraded 4 times during this period. It’s rare, but there is also the possibility that the SR3 you are using is faulty. Is it easy for you to substitute one of your other SR3 power supplies to verify if this is the case?

 

Regards

Paul

 

Paul: I connected my other SR3 turned down to 12v, and now my Regen sounds wonderful. So there must be something wrong with my other power supply. I will contract you via email.

 

My power supplies are 2-3 years old.

 

Thank you very much, if you had not said something, improbably would not have tried this.

 

Thank you very much.

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Just had a long and terrific conversation with John about the Neutron Star clock system you installed (and he looked at it and your installation). He will be along shortly with information, feedback, and ideas that you are sure to fine VERY interesting. :)

John, are you still thinking about this? I'd very much like to hear your views.

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Hello John,

 

Great work you and Alex are doing to further the art. It’s refreshing to see some new ideas develop into ground breaking new products.

 

Regarding the SR3, the 0v of the supply rail is floating until connected to the load so there is no possibility of a ground loop when powering a single item of equipment. It looks like the first SR3 sig8 used may be faulty. I will deal with this via e-mail rather than clutter your thread.

 

Regards,

Paul

Design and manufacture of high performance power supplies

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John, are you still thinking about this? I'd very much like to hear your views.

Something very strange happened, I actually have a few minutes free so I can talk about this.

 

First off on REGEN clock jitter in general. The whole purpose of the REGEN is to improve the signal integrity so the USB PHY in the DAC generates less noise. Jitter is a PART of the signal integrity, but as far as I know not a very large part. Meaning going into ultra low jitter territory should not make much of a difference. I have designed a few USB PHYs and none of those would have much of any noise difference when the incoming jitter goes from really good to really really good. But that doesn't mean all PHYs behave the same way.

 

Note that the clock in the REGEN is not the same as the clock in the DAC that feeds the DAC chip(s). THAT clock is very important. The REGEN clock is not even the clock that is in charge of the timing of the I2S signals to the DAC chip, that is part of the DAC again. It is not even in charge of the USB processing in the DAC's USB receiver, that is controlled by the clock connected the USB chip in the DAC. About the only thing it can possibly affect is the PG noise from the PHY.

 

The Neutron Star looks like a well implemented external clock but I have not seen a phase noise plot for it so it is hard to tell how good it really is. If anyone has actually seen a phase noise plot I would like to see it.

 

The connection of the Neutron Star to the REGEN shown earlier in this thread shows an unterminated connection. The coax is just connected across the original clock pads. This is not necessarily the best way to connect a clock. The BEST way is to have a termination resistor at the destination side that matches the impedance of the cable, which I presume is 50 ohms. But in order for that to work the output impedance of the clock also needs to be 50 ohm. I did not see anything in the documentation which specifies the output impedance. There is an output transformer but no information on its characteristics or the circuit driving it. So given the unterminated connection and non-specified output impedance, there are likely to be reflections at the connection to the board. Given the fairly short length of the cable they may not have any impact on the hub chip, but who knows, I certainly have not done any analysis on the SI sensitivity of the hub chip clock input.

 

All my previous experimentation with DAC clocks has shown that the external clock REALLY has to be much better than the on board one it is replacing to make any significant difference, the connection from board to board almost always adds enough signal degradation to partially counteract the "goodness" of the external clock.

 

Because of all of the above I was surprised by the amount of improvement heard with the Neutron Star. I would have assumed some small improvement, but not doubling the improvement of the REGEN. The only thing I can think of is that if this was a system that was already highly optimized, so the SI was already very good, the SI improvement of the off the shelf REGEN would not be all that large, so maybe in that case lower jitter may have larger percentage of the total improvement.

 

I want to emphasize that I am NOT recommending that everybody go out and spend $600 upgrading the clock. There is not nearly enough information to know how effective this is going to be on most systems. If you REALLY want to spend the money trying this you are of course free to do so, (it does void the warrantee), but be prepared that it may not double the improvement in YOUR system.

 

John S.

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John,

 

What has my interest piqued regarding clocks are a few things:

 

1) SQ benefit of vibration isolation of computer, network switch - most vibration sensitive part of computer/switch is the crystals

2) PPA USB -- best I can tell major upgrade is very low jitter TCXO clock (V2) and OCXO (v3)

3) PPA Ethernet switch ($10 switch + TCXO)

 

So I'm wondering if upgrading clock on Regen "green", connecting this to motherboard USB and using this as upgraded USB output, would provide equal or greater benefit to PPA USB card? See where I'm headed...

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Hello John,

 

Great work you and Alex are doing to further the art. It’s refreshing to see some new ideas develop into ground breaking new products.

 

Regarding the SR3, the 0v of the supply rail is floating until connected to the load so there is no possibility of a ground loop when powering a single item of equipment. It looks like the first SR3 sig8 used may be faulty. I will deal with this via e-mail rather than clutter your thread.

 

Regards,

Paul

 

Hi Paul:

 

Thank you for your kind words. From our e-mail exchanges back in May, you know that I admire your research and the quality products you have built.

 

Regarding floating DC output grounds: I think your supplies and our own JS-2 might be some of the only audio-world LPS units to do this. We think it is not only important to help prevent ground loops, but also to keep the crud from the house ground from getting into the nice clean DC going straight into the most sensitive system gear.

 

Not sure how you accomplish the isolation with your discrete regulator circuit, but I can tall you that its challenging feat ion our supply. That's because being a ranging LPS (5,7,9,12V) using just one transformer primary, one set of diodes--so we can get away with just one big choke, the key feature of the JS-2--full rated 5 amps continuous at the 5V setting has us dissipating over 30 watts of drop. (Not that anyone's device draws 5A at 5V--or the new 12V rating of 6.4A max. continuous.)

 

We had to scour the globe for thermal pads that were both electrically isolating AND had fantastic thermal performance. Tried a whole bunch that supposedly would work; found only one material that does. And since that exotic material does not come pre-die-cut for devices, I've been hand cutting and punching them for our TO-220 regs for over a year. But at 38W with a 19C temp differential (device tab/outside of heatsink) we are getting an outstanding 0.5 thermal coefficient--through an electrically isolated pad!

 

Cheers,

--Alex C.

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And since that exotic material does not come pre-die-cut for devices, I've been hand cutting and punching them for our TO-220 regs for over a year.

No idea what the material is but you ought to think about the alternatives. I could probably help. ;-)

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No idea what the material is but you ought to think about the alternatives. I could probably help. ;-)

 

Alternatives such as?

 

Thanks, but I have already gotten a quote from Berquist (the mfr.) for die cutting them to my spec (can't even have them use one of their stock dies as all of their supposedly TO-220 die sizes are ridiculously oversized). $500 ($250 set-up plus min run) gets me enough pads to build 1,300(!) JS-2s.

 

The key will be keeping them cool. My assistant left a whole baggie of hand-cut and punched pads in the garage last month and the heat made the green thermal conductor on both sides of the isolating film soft enough so that it stuck to the peel-away protective films on both sides. Total mess and I tossed 90 minutes of work.

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For anyone who can't use the hard connector and is using the supplied short USB cable, try something else in its place immediately!

 

I've had a Regen for over a month and it definitely fixed the strange upper midrange push of my DAC (Chord 2Qute) and evened out its frequency response. However it added a very harsh lower treble that was not there before. Tried changing a few input USB cables into the Regen, all noticeable changes, but didn't fix this issue. I left the supplied short cable between the Regen and to the DAC because it is so short. And the shorter the better right?

 

Well with the short cable, the Regen was two steps forward and two steps back. So I finally tried a 70cm Supra in its place connecting the Regen and DAC and it is so much better! Now I just want to hear the hard connector, but for my DAC it definitely doesn't fit without multiple hard connectors daisy chained (as demonstrated by Rocky in this thread). And yes I am waiting for some additional right angled hard connectors to arrive.

 

So please bring to market the mythical flexible PCB connector!

Are there any other recommendations for connection cables from Regen to DAC?

And for those still using the short supplied cable, because the hard connector doesn't fit, try something else immediately especially the Supra if you have one on hand.

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