A novel way to massively improve the SQ of computer audio streaming

[KMan]

4 hours ago, flkin said:

 

They probably tested it but my problem was intermittent - my SOtA/Uptone stack would play for a few hours/minutes just fine then in mid-track, it would crash. Sometimes a complete reboot of all components would solve the problem, other times the stack simply wouldn't reboot. So it was difficult to figure out what happened.

 

Fortunately the stack was in a state of working when Kim connected into my system and he actually watched it start to disconnect with intermittent successful sMS-200 pings and then finally totally fail. He rooted into the sMS-200, did some checks in Eunhasu, had me reboot with clock cables disconnected (first 24M then both 24M and 25M) and kept an eye on the network pings. Eventually concluding it was a hardware issue.

 

There are probably many here that have the Trifecta set and it's not as if every other stack fails. So I just count myself unlucky. SOtM agreed to send me a new replacement immediately and not wait for me to return my unit first, that's pretty decent of them. Hope to have it before Christmas..

SOTM customer service/technical support is quite good and very responsive. I did have a similar experience and I thought I must have bee extremely unlucky as I did not see a similar report here.

 

I received my modded switch/sms-200/txUSBultra about 10 days back, now it is on its way to SOTM to be fixed. It would play redbook for about 40 minutes and higher sampling rates for progressively shorter duration before it would stop responding to pings. When I replaced the sms-200 with my microRendu (of course without any reclocking), everything would work without any issues . Then things started getting worse and sms-200 would stop responding after a few minutes, which made it easy to show the SOTM team when they did the team-viewer session. We came to a similar conclusion, something was broken in how the SMS-200 was reclocked.  But during the short spans when it was working, it sounded wonderful as many have already reported here. I was willing to accept the risk and the delay as this is a custom build, with the assumption that it will be resolved, just as I am willing to wait patiently for PH's  power supply...

 

I had asked for a SMS-200 as a loaner to make sure it was not my network and I was promptly shipped one and it has been working flawlessly.

[KMan]

@austinpop I have been following your informative posts and have a SOTM trifecta and waiting for my SR7. Sorry if you have answered this before, what is the clock cable you use with your Ref. Clock? I am looking at getting Mutec Ref clock. I use Habst with Blu2 now, but do not want to buy another pair for expense reasons.

[KMan]

1 hour ago, austinpop said:

That is a good question. It's a very inexpensive $20 0.5m cable that Hasegawa-san at Cybershaft supplied with my OP-14. I've never actually looked at it closely. Note: it is a 50 Ω cable.

Thanks for the response, it is a pity that OP-14 is rare species or it would have been my first choice. Yes a 50 Ω cable limits the options indeed. I am not much of a DIY person and a pre-built cable is the only option for me. Could you  please share the link to the right post by  @seeteeyou I did not remember seeing  50 ohm options.

[KMan]

I had the opportunity to visit @austinpop and spend a few hours to do some comparisons last Sunday. Rajiv is a great host and we had a good time discussing and comparing notes. Some of the objectives of my visit were

1. I was most interested in hearing the cumulative effect of all the tweaks Rajiv has done. I have been following this thread almost since its inception and right now use a NUC end-point running Roon bridge and connected to HMS and Chord DAVE. My NUC is wirelessly connected (thanks to  @lmitche ) to my Roon server.  

2. Compare Chord Hugo TT2 vs Chord DAVE on Rajiv’s setup, both being fed upsampled signal from Chord HMS.

3. To compare Roon-bridge and Euphony end-point.

4. To hear the effect of Master clock.

5. To hear what difference my Sound Application TT-7 power conditioner made.

When I got there, he already had his system plugged in to a  TT-7 he had on loan. The playlist I had shared were also ready to go. We did not know the vintage of the TT-7 other than that it was older than what I had. Jim Weil of Sound application keeps tweaking and improving his power conditioners, so it is hard to know what has changed. 

 

We first listened to a few soundtracks via HMS and TT2. The first thing that caught my attention was there was certain sweetness/smoothness to sound and pitch black background in comparison to my setup. I felt this signature was the cumulative effect of all the care that went into setting up the digital front-end in Rajiv’s setup. We were using headphones that were relatively easy to drive and no amplifier was needed. This was the ideal way to do a direct comparison of TT2 and DAVE.

 

We then connected the Chord DAVE I had brought to HMS and with the first track we listened to, both of us agreed that the difference was profound compared to TT2. There was a noticeable improvement in depth and air. The difference was more profound than what I had expected (I had thought the Hugo M-Scalar may level the field), I am still surprised that the 10 elements pulse array of TT2 vs 20 elements of DAVE made such an improvement.

 

For most of our listening, music was being streamed from Roon Core to StylusEP (end-point) both running on  Euphony OS on the same server. When Rajiv switched to a Roon-bridge from StylusEP, the sound-stage collapsed and there was less air. I was quite surprised by this. The scale of change is what I would expect when swapping out component such as a DAC or Amp not when there is a software level change. Hearing this alone made my trip! I was eager to replicate this on my setup. When the Roon core was swapped for the Stylus player, I heard an uptick in SQ along similar lines but not the same scale. I felt switching to StylusEP was the biggest jump (85%) while switching out Roon Core  added another 15%. It was a relief as Roon core is indispensable to me and I can live with the slight loss in sQ. 

 

I never had the opportunity to hear first-hand what difference the master clock made to audio chain. Switching Ref 10 Master clock  on and off made an audible difference, a bit more air a little smoother but the change was less than what I expected and the scale of change was less than what I heard when switching between Roon-bridge and StylusEP.

 

Finally we swapped the TT-7 Rajiv had on loan for my newer TT-7. When we started listening, I heard the improved speed and transient attack I am used to hearing but I felt something was off as the sound-stage seemed slightly diminished. Rajiv agreed and while trying to figure out what was wrong, he found that his JCAT Net card was not being powered by Farad 3. It was inadvertent, but we got to validate the advantage of powering the Net card using an external LPS. Once plugged in, we heard a clear improvement with the new TT-7 in terms of transient speed and clarity.

 

Once back to my system, I missed some of the magic I heard at @austinpop’s. I downloaded and burnt a trial version of Euphony OS on a USB stick. With some back and forth help from Rajiv and Željko I got StylusEP running on Ramroot on my wireless NUC. I am happy to report, I hear a similar bump in SQ when I switched from Roon-bridge to StylusEP.

 

I wish to thank  @austinpop for having me and look forward to similar meetings in the future. 

[KMan]

I have a MP SlimRun connected directly from a i7 NUC Server to Chord DAVE. I use a LPS 1.2 to power the MP SR and the the LPS 1.2 's energizing supply is plugged into a different dedicated circuit than the one powering the rest of my setup. The female USB end of the MP SR connects to DAVE via USPCB (which I found to be better than Lush 1 USB cable). In my setup the MP SR + USPCB sounds better (cleaner) than Lush 1 direct to DAVE. I do not hear added harshness either. I have the unused loops of of the MP SR  wrapped in a aluminium foil and placed it away from both the server and the DAC. At some point I plan to try the Sablon USB cable  instead of USPCB.

 

The effectiveness of MP SR could come down to both good PSU and  the DAC too (i.e how the DAC handles jitter from the not so great clock of MP SR). 

 

The MP SR direct from the i7 NUC server sounded better (more air and depth, more present) than when connected from a Pentium NUC endpoint.

 

[KMan]

2 hours ago, John769 said:

Was that a NUC7i7DNHE?  I tried a MP slimrun to my NHE's (as endpoint) front and rear USB ports, with and without an Sbooster Vbus2 isolator. That was connected to a RME ADI2DAC with USPCB or regular cable, with and without a 2amp PSU connected to the MP. I tried reversing the female end of the MP to be near the endpoint, as reported by @ray-dude, using adapters. It didn't work in any configuration but often weird knocking noises were audible. The assumption is that the RME DAC and MP are not compatible.

Yes it is a NUC7i7DNHE in Akasa case running AL that Larry built for me. It worked both the front and back USB ports. If you are using USPCB, did you make sure the VBUS was on? some DACS require VBUS for initial handshake. 

[KMan]

2 minutes ago, John769 said:

not sure but it also didn't work with a regular cable with VBUS active. Did you cut the VBUS from your NUC USB output in order to achieve galvanic isolation (in conjunction with the LPS 1.2 powering the SL)?  

No I did not, my understanding was that by powering the MP SL, VBUS of the NUC is not longer being used

[KMan]

On 6/5/2020 at 5:28 PM, John769 said:

I think it is used, which is why Romaz disabled it via the jumper on his USB card.  And why I used the vbus 2 isolator into my NUC. Failing that, a USB A male to USB A female adapter, with the 5V pin broken might do the trick? You are happy with the sound anyway, so probably not worth sweating over.-)

Can you please refer me to that post? But you are also right, for the price I am already happy with the sonic benefit.