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Jcat launches the new, 'Femto' USB card


Elberoth

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13 minutes ago, chauphuong said:

Thanks. Mine is the one in this link (200 x 60 x 225mm):

http://kimlongcomputer.com/minibox-e-w60-silver-kem-ngu-n-120w.html

 

Do you think the card will fit? By the way, this is my mainboard:

http://www.biostar.com.tw/app/en/mb/introduction.php?S_ID=728

 

Please advise if the femto card can get in? Sorry for all noob questions.

 

The enclosure is only 6cm high. The card won't fit in vertical position as it's 8cm with the low-profile bracket. 

However, it will work if you use PCIe riser cable and put it horizontally :) 

 

Biostar motherboard is fine. It's equipped with one PCIe x1 slot which is exactly what's needed. 

 

Best regards,

Marcin

JPLAY & JCAT Founder

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  • 7 months later...
  • 3 months later...

Just posted this on the Uptone LPS 1-2 thread, thought it might be good to repost here:

 

A few days ago I added the LPS1-2 to a PPA V4 usb card on the audio pc of my 2 pc streamer. It replaced a Teradak + iFi DC iPurifier setup I had feeding it. This supply combo already sounded good but I wanted to play around and add the LPS-1.2 to different points in my system ( love the selectable versatility).

 

Result: I'm very impressed with the improvement. As others have stated, the bass end is most impacted, more focused and controlled. However, the improvement affects all aspects of the sound profile. More texture, more detail and improved imaging. Just seems to get higher definition from the PPA V4 card. Great job Uptone.

 

It makes me wonder how much improvement I'd get from changing from the PPA v4 usb card to the JCAT Femto usb card.

***********************************

Would welcome feedback from anyone who has compared the 2 cards.........Thanks

2 modified PCs in a streamer with WS2012/ AO 2.20/ Jplay 7/ Fidelizer Pro 8.2/ Process Lasso/

Pachanko lan cables & PPA ethernet switch between pcs > Audio PC JCat Femto usb audio card > iFi Gemini 3.0 dual headed usb cable > iFi iGalvanic > iFi iUsb power 3.0   > iFi iPurifier 3 > Singxer SU-1 (i2s out) > Wyred 4 Sound DAC2V2 DSDse >

1) maxed out Woo WA2 > Beyerdynamic T1 w/ Forza Noir hybrid cable mod

2) Woo WA2 pre amp > Exposure 2010S2 Int Amp + Exposure 2010S2 Power Amp > Von Gaylord Legend Speakers + REL T-5 Sub-Bass System

***Audio system powered by two Equi=Core 300 balanced power sources                                                       

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  • 3 weeks later...

The Jcat USB Femto is fitted to the current server build. There's a nice lift in clarity and removing grunge using the card, a very worthwhile addition and highly recommended. I did notice a variation in potential of the metal bracket and the 0V of the ATX power supply of about 12mV. Running a small braid from the metal bracket to the case of the ATX power suppl fixed that, now that voltage is <0.001mV.

Using the ATX power at the moment, just wondering if an external 5V is worthwhile considering the ATX supply has (usually) very good regulation and low impedance (it's a 900W unit, came with the case). The 0V is grounded to the incoming ground wire from the AC, but like the metal bracket, other parts like the mobo and SSD were at different potentials, braids to the frame fixed that. I don't have a scope or meter sensitive enough to see if this would affect the output, but the ears like it for sure. Simple to do.

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2 hours ago, One and a half said:

The Jcat USB Femto is fitted to the current server build. There's a nice lift in clarity and removing grunge using the card, a very worthwhile addition and highly recommended. I did notice a variation in potential of the metal bracket and the 0V of the ATX power supply of about 12mV. Running a small braid from the metal bracket to the case of the ATX power suppl fixed that, now that voltage is <0.001mV.

Using the ATX power at the moment, just wondering if an external 5V is worthwhile considering the ATX supply has (usually) very good regulation and low impedance (it's a 900W unit, came with the case). The 0V is grounded to the incoming ground wire from the AC, but like the metal bracket, other parts like the mobo and SSD were at different potentials, braids to the frame fixed that. I don't have a scope or meter sensitive enough to see if this would affect the output, but the ears like it for sure. Simple to do.

 

ATX power are much better than many here give it credit for. To use a LPS of good quality that are separated from the rest of the computer are beneficial thou, not only because the LPS itself is better but because it prevent all the noise, emi etc from the mother board to pollute the USB card and USB signal.   

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49 minutes ago, Summit said:

 

ATX power are much better than many here give it credit for. To use a LPS of good quality that are separated from the rest of the computer are beneficial thou, not only because the LPS itself is better but because it prevent all the noise, emi etc from the mother board to pollute the USB card and USB signal.   

The other issue is that are standards for ATX power supplies are built to require them to maintain voltage levels within tolerances, and for values at 5V at high currents or 1.3V, that's not so simple. For the JCAT card, the 5V is not a major problem, since the current demand is small. Wasn't there a problem with the SOtM tX-USBexp that if the 5V external failed, the card would smoke?

From Sotm

"The external power input voltage is +6.5V  +9Vdc, and the input current is 2A max.

While using the external power supply, please connect the internal 4 pin IDE power connector. This is to protect in any case if the external power get fails."

 

 

 

developer-specs-atx2_2.PDF

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33 minutes ago, One and a half said:

The other issue is that are standards for ATX power supplies are built to require them to maintain voltage levels within tolerances, and for values at 5V at high currents or 1.3V, that's not so simple. For the JCAT card, the 5V is not a major problem, since the current demand is small. Wasn't there a problem with the SOtM tX-USBexp that if the 5V external failed, the card would smoke?

From Sotm

"The external power input voltage is +6.5V  +9Vdc, and the input current is 2A max.

While using the external power supply, please connect the internal 4 pin IDE power connector. This is to protect in any case if the external power get fails."

 

 

 

developer-specs-atx2_2.PDF

 

I would hope that all good PSUs are made to maintain voltage levels within tolerances. If one doesn’t it not very good in my book.  

 

Sorry I don’t know anything about the SOtM tX-USBexp and its tolerance or intolerance.

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On 3/30/2018 at 12:24 PM, One and a half said:

The other issue is that are standards for ATX power supplies are built to require them to maintain voltage levels within tolerances, and for values at 5V at high currents or 1.3V, that's not so simple. For the JCAT card, the 5V is not a major problem, since the current demand is small. Wasn't there a problem with the SOtM tX-USBexp that if the 5V external failed, the card would smoke?

From Sotm

"The external power input voltage is +6.5V  +9Vdc, and the input current is 2A max.

While using the external power supply, please connect the internal 4 pin IDE power connector. This is to protect in any case if the external power get fails."

 

 

 

developer-specs-atx2_2.PDF

JCAT will not smoke if external 5V PSUs goes off - it will switch to PCIe power automatically. 

 

Best regards,
Marcin

JPLAY & JCAT Founder

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On 3/30/2018 at 6:58 AM, Summit said:

 

I would hope that all good PSUs are made to maintain voltage levels within tolerances. If one doesn’t it not very good in my book.  

 

Tight voltage regulation may or may not be important in many situations. Capacitance multipliers, for example, can greatly reduce output impedance yet not involve voltage regulation. 

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17 hours ago, jabbr said:

Tight voltage regulation may or may not be important in many situations. Capacitance multipliers, for example, can greatly reduce output impedance yet not involve voltage regulation. 

 

Am not sure I understand your remark to my post. Do you think that’s NOT important for a good PSUs to maintain voltage levels within stated tolerances?

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25 minutes ago, Summit said:

 

Am not sure I understand your remark to my post. Do you think that’s NOT important for a good PSUs to maintain voltage levels within stated tolerances?

Perhaps within stated tolerance, but a tight stated tolerance is not nesessarily the mark of a good PSU.

 

ATX specifies a voltage tolerance of +/- 5% which is very reasonable. That doesn’t mean a PSU with +/- 0.00005 % is “better”

 

Depends entirely on the application. Low leakage current and low wide range output impedance, for example,  may be far more important. It all depends.

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25 minutes ago, jabbr said:

Perhaps within stated tolerance, but a tight stated tolerance is not nesessarily the mark of a good PSU.

 

ATX specifies a voltage tolerance of +/- 5% which is very reasonable. That doesn’t mean a PSU with +/- 0.00005 % is “better”

 

Depends entirely on the application. Low leakage current and low wide range output impedance, for example,  may be far more important. It all depends.

 

Yes of course other bounds and factors are impotent too, and some are of even more significance, but now the topic was PSU’s ability to maintain voltage levels within stated tolerances just like ATX power. And I stand by my original comment that “I would hope that all good PSUs are made to maintain voltage levels within tolerances. If one doesn’t it not very good in my book.” 

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20 minutes ago, Summit said:

I would hope that all good PSUs are made to maintain voltage levels within tolerances. If one doesn’t it not very good in my book

Correct but on this site there is often a tendency to think more is better and a fascination with the use of extremely tight tolerance regulators when the PSU is just being used as a pre-reg anyways

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 4/13/2018 at 11:48 AM, One and a half said:

Surely 1x would be plenty enough?

 

I was thinking in terms of playing DSD256 and DSD512 (I've had intermittent playback issues, which I actually traced to the motherboard).

 

When I was installing the new motherboard, and I was wondering if it was worth actually having the JCAT card in a higher bandwidth slot (if it would even be utilised). If anyone has technical info, that would be great to know.

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48 minutes ago, jermaink said:

 

I was thinking in terms of playing DSD256 and DSD512 (I've had intermittent playback issues, which I actually traced to the motherboard).

 

When I was installing the new motherboard, and I was wondering if it was worth actually having the JCAT card in a higher bandwidth slot (if it would even be utilised). If anyone has technical info, that would be great to know.

I follow your reasoning now and would agree. Maybe someone can chime in the mathematics of throughput. Playback of DSD512 is particularly onerous on the CPU(s), so feeding data could be a problem. The player application should offload work to several CPU to ease that burden, HQplayer has techniques for that , not sure of Roon though.

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3 hours ago, One and a half said:

I follow your reasoning now and would agree. Maybe someone can chime in the mathematics of throughput. Playback of DSD512 is particularly onerous on the CPU(s), so feeding data could be a problem. The player application should offload work to several CPU to ease that burden, HQplayer has techniques for that , not sure of Roon though.

A single PCIe 2.0 (quite old) lane provides 4 Gbps throughput. That's more than 8x the raw bit rate of USB 2.0, which is what DACs typically use. In comparison, stereo DSD512 uses about 45.2 Mbps. PCIe bandwidth is not an issue here.

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19 minutes ago, mansr said:

A single PCIe 2.0 (quite old) lane provides 4 Gbps throughput. That's more than 8x the raw bit rate of USB 2.0, which is what DACs typically use. In comparison, stereo DSD512 uses about 45.2 Mbps. PCIe bandwidth is not an issue here.

That settles that, thank you! Means I can leave the JCAT card in the 1x lane.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 12.04.2018 at 5:01 PM, jermaink said:

How much PCIe bandwidth can the JCAT cards utilise? Is there any point having it in an x4 slot rather than a x1 slot?

PCIe x1 is enough. But if you have a choice, I'd recommend installing the card in a x16 slot which often connects directly to a CPU. (you'd need to check the motherboard's block diagram though to be sure)

 

BR,
Marcin

JPLAY & JCAT Founder

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