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

[seeteeyou]

10 minutes ago, austinpop said:

 

I liked the Mscaler. Nothing more. 

 

It would be mighty interesting once we're able to get our hands on Davina

 

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/chord-electronics-dave.766517/page-556#post-13450235

Quote

Davina is bi-directional on the USB; it can receive and transmit data at the same time.

 

Ideally we could all split the cost of acquiring a single Davina and then send that to a trustworthy member with plenty of Internet bandwidth who doesn't live in a region that's prone to natural disasters etc.

 

Suppose that Davina could be connected to an "ordinary" server while the process of utilizing the Mscaler is easily automated without much interactions except for some scripts to play / record the music, there will be lots of possibilities.

 

Basically a server that will act like VPS (virtual private server) could be our workhorse to be partnered with Davina, or simply install stuff like Reboot Restore Rx on any kinda "plain vanilla" Windows machines

 

http://horizondatasys.com/reboot-restore-rx-freeware/

 

Get Remote Desktop Services and FTP server etc. up and running, then those of us who paid for Davina are allowed to access that machine for a specific amount of time.

 

Alternatively, just write some simple scripts (we should be able to find an expert or two on this site) to scan specific folders for ALAC / FLAC / WAV etc. files that were uploaded by a member, finally Mscaled WAV files (either 705.6 kHz or 768 kHz) should be saved accordingly and they could be downloaded by the same member afterwards.

 

Of course the $64,000 question is whether Mscaler is only able to work in real-time or could that simply accept an entire lossless music file and then split the Mscaled WAV file out as soon as it's done.

 

(BTW, please behave and don't think about stuff like Qobuz and TIDAL etc.)

[austinpop]

57 minutes ago, austinpop said:

 

I liked the Mscaler. Nothing more. 

 

I should clarify. (I wrote that in a parking shuttle!)

 

I stand by everything I've written about my experiences with DAC differences. Remember - I never said I couldn't hear a difference between my Codex and the DAVE. It was clearly better. But that difference was not worth the massive price difference. To me.

 

I didn't get a chance to do any head to head DAC comparisons at RMAF. The M-Scaler demo was designed to A-B a) DAVE, and b) M-scaler > DAVE.

 

What I am saying is that going from A to B was staggering. Much, much greater in magnitude of an SQ difference than the typical DAC differences I've heard. Granted - the M-scaler is waaay outside my price range, but it generated the "I must have it" impulse that the DAVE alone, or the QX-5, did not.

 

For you Chord owners - assuming the M-scaler will sooner or later come out standalone (without the CD player) and cheaper, it would be an intriguing combo with the Hugo 2, and other  forthcoming sub-DAVE DACs (would that be 3Qute? Hugo TT2?)

[AmusedToD]

4 hours ago, austinpop said:

I'm on my way home from RMAF.

 

It was an absolute treat to hang out with @romaz and @limniscate. Roy is just the nicest guy you could imagine, and the man is literally a walking encyclopedia of audiophilia. If he hasn't auditioned it at home, he's heard it, or at least heard of it, and can give you amazing insights into it. It was also great to meet @kennyb123 from this thread at the RMAF happy hour that @The Computer Audiophile hosted. It was great to meet several other CA'ers at the happy hour. And through Roy, we met and hung out with "Audio Bacon."

 

W also got the opportunity to go out to dinner with May and Lee. I continue to be amazed at what this little company of 6 manages to deliver. And they are both the nicest people.

 

The SOtM (pronounced Sohm (t-silent), we learned ) room was one of the better sounding rooms, primarily due to the Ultra chain. Lee had brought his Advanced sCLK-OCX10. This is the middle version, not the Reference. Even so, the demo with the clock connected vs. disconnected was as dramatic as we had heard in our own systems. There's no way at a show to say how this clock would compare to a Cybershaft or the Ref 10, but it's certainly making a huge difference over the sCLK-EX. It was nice to see Roy, Eric, and me have the same knowing reaction to the clock's effect.

 

Extending this further - now that we've gotten so used to the glare-free and natural presentation of our clock chains, it was actually the rare room at the show - among those playing digital - where the "glare" was not immediately obvious.

 

One such exception was the Bluebird room, which demo'd the Chord Dave and Blu-2 M-scaler, playing on Vienna Acoustics speakers. Hearing the Dave by itself and then with the M-Scaler was epic. This was a fall out of your chair improvement. I know I've said I find DAC differences to be modest, but this was anything but. I heard the same effect downstairs in the CanJam Chord booth.

 

Finally, it was a treat to have a long chat with Rob Watts, due to our "friends of Roy" elite status.

 

I'm so glad I went!

 

Great to hear forum members are becoming friends in real life and even hanging out with audio manufacturers, congrats on that!

 

I am sure the new sCLK-OCX10 will perform beautifully, Mr. Lee has proved what he can do in that field.

 

Regarding the Chord’s new upsampler, it appears other companies are doing now what dCS have been preaching for the past 20 years with their 4- box stacks (transport-upsampler-clock-DAC). Even more reasons to respect such a company. After hearing some of their gear in familiar setups, I am even more persuaded they are the Mercedes S-Class of the audio world.

 

Any word on Chord going down the external clock route? 

[seeteeyou]

35 minutes ago, AmusedToD said:

Any word on Chord going down the external clock route? 

 

Rob Watts should be so confident about Pulse Array and external clock wouldn't be a necessity.

 

In addition, @romaz also talked about that particular topic and decided not to mod his Hugo 2

 

https://www.computeraudiophile.com/forums/topic/30376-a-novel-way-to-massively-improve-the-sq-of-computer-audio-streaming/?page=149&tab=comments#comment-723562

 

Actually we could keep an eye on the upcoming Teac NT-505 and UD-505 with 10 MHz reference clock inputs while both of them do accept 768 kHz via USB

 

https://www.supersonido.es/p/teac-nt-505

https://www.supersonido.es/p/teac-ud-505

 

In other words, we could feed 705.6 kHz / 768 kHz WAV M-scaled files to either DAC from Teac while taking advantage of one of those 10 MHz reference clocks from Cybershaft / MUTEC / SOtM etc.

[beautiful music]

51 minutes ago, seeteeyou said:

 

Rob Watts should be so confident about Pulse Array and external clock wouldn't be a necessity.

 

In addition, @romaz also talked about that particular topic and decided not to mod his Hugo 2

 

https://www.computeraudiophile.com/forums/topic/30376-a-novel-way-to-massively-improve-the-sq-of-computer-audio-streaming/?page=149&tab=comments#comment-723562

 

Actually we could keep an eye on the upcoming Teac NT-505 and UD-505 with 10 MHz reference clock inputs while both of them do accept 768 kHz via USB

 

https://www.supersonido.es/p/teac-nt-505

https://www.supersonido.es/p/teac-ud-505

 

In other words, we could feed 705.6 kHz / 768 kHz WAV M-scaled files to either DAC from Teac while taking advantage of one of those 10 MHz reference clocks from Cybershaft / MUTEC / SOtM etc.

Did you know when Teac UD-505 will be Available?

 

[seeteeyou]

48 minutes ago, beautiful music said:

Did you know when Teac UD-505 will be Available?

 

They only said that's expected to be available within 2017 but no specific dates yet

 

http://av.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/news/1078891.html

Quote

年内の発売を予定しており、価格は未定。

 

Most likely they'll stick with 50 Ω instead of 75 Ω since we could find that on page 9 of UD-503 manual

 

http://www.teac.com/content/downloads/products/935/ud-503_om_efs_va.pdf#page=9

Quote

• Use a commercially-available BNC coaxial cable (50 Ω) for connection.

 

Consequently, there will be VERY limited choices for decent clock cables unless we're willing to settle for the cheapest ones from Mogami etc.

 

Esoteric 8N-A2000 BNC (Discontinued)
http://www.esoteric.jp/products/esoteric/8na2000bnc/indexe.html

 

Shunyata Alpha Clock-50 ($1,000/£1,000)
https://shunyata-uk.com/product/digital-cables/alpha-clock/

http://www.shunyata.com/media/PDFs/2017_Cable_Guide_v2.pdf#page=60

 

Shunyata Sigma Clock-50 ($2,000/£2,000)
https://shunyata-uk.com/product/digital-cables/sigma-clock/

http://www.shunyata.com/media/PDFs/2017_Cable_Guide_v2.pdf#page=72

 

Evolution Acoustics BNC Links ($6,000)
http://www.evolutionacoustics.com/cables/bnc-links/

 

It makes sense to pay for an expensive clock cables if we're able to afford one of those pricey DACs from Esoteric. OTOH, both NT-505 and UD-505 would cost roughly €1,399 so that clock cables might not make that much sense if they're almost as expensive as the DAC itself IMHO.

 

SOtM wouldn't wanna modify any DACs unless we're happy to pay for multiple sCLK-EX boards, that's why it's just way too difficult to find an affordable DAC with 75 Ω external clock input.

 

Esoteric N-05 does have 75 Ω external clock input but it ain't exactly cheap to begin with

 

https://www.musicdirect.com/network-player/Esoteric-N-05-Network-Streamer-and-DAC

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Esoteric-N-05-Network-Audio-player-Japan-made-/352040960914

 

Maybe it's good enough to stick with Chord Hugo 2 or the upcoming 3Qute since their ultra-low output impedance should be great for Omega speakers etc. Other than that, I wonder if there were anyone who might be able to perform sCLK-EX modifications for DACs without asking for a ridiculously high fee?

[beautiful music]

8 minutes ago, seeteeyou said:

 

They only said that's expected to be available within 2017 but no specific dates yet

 

http://av.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/news/1078891.html

 

Most likely they'll stick with 50 Ω instead of 75 Ω since we could find that on page 9 of UD-503 manual

 

http://www.teac.com/content/downloads/products/935/ud-503_om_efs_va.pdf#page=9

 

Consequently, there will be VERY limited choices for decent clock cables unless we're willing to settle for the cheapest ones from Mogami etc.

 

Esoteric 8N-A2000 BNC (Discontinued)
http://www.esoteric.jp/products/esoteric/8na2000bnc/indexe.html

 

Shunyata Alpha Clock-50 ($1,000/£1,000)
https://shunyata-uk.com/product/digital-cables/alpha-clock/

http://www.shunyata.com/media/PDFs/2017_Cable_Guide_v2.pdf#page=60

 

Shunyata Sigma Clock-50 ($2,000/£2,000)
https://shunyata-uk.com/product/digital-cables/sigma-clock/

http://www.shunyata.com/media/PDFs/2017_Cable_Guide_v2.pdf#page=72

 

Evolution Acoustics BNC Links ($6,000)
http://www.evolutionacoustics.com/cables/bnc-links/

 

It makes sense to pay for an expensive clock cables if we're able to afford one of those pricey DACs from Esoteric. OTOH, both NT-505 and UD-505 would cost roughly €1,399 so that clock cables might not make that much sense if they're almost as expensive as the DAC itself IMHO.

 

SOtM wouldn't wanna modify any DACs unless we're happy to pay for multiple sCLK-EX boards, that's why it's just way too difficult to find an affordable DAC with 75 Ω external clock input.

 

Esoteric N-05 does have 75 Ω external clock input but it ain't exactly cheap to begin with

 

https://www.musicdirect.com/network-player/Esoteric-N-05-Network-Streamer-and-DAC

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Esoteric-N-05-Network-Audio-player-Japan-made-/352040960914

 

Maybe it's good enough to stick with Chord Hugo 2 or the upcoming 3Qute since their ultra-low impedance should be great for Omega speakers etc. Other than that, I wonder if there were anyone who might be able to perform sCLK-EX modifications for DACs without asking for a ridiculously high fee?

Thanks for this information.

[tedwoods]

A question for those who attended RMAF, if I may: any first hand info on the SOtM cables (usb or other)?

[toetapaudio]

Thanks to everyone participating in this excellent thread helping to expand knowledge base.

 

I don’t think that my question has been covered before in this thread, but correct me if I am wrong. What difference in terms of simplification to the “spaghetti “ set-ups would the introduction of the SOtM 1000 range of products make? 

[rickca]

36 minutes ago, toetapaudio said:

What difference in terms of simplification to the “spaghetti “ set-ups would the introduction of the SOtM 1000 range of products make? 

What is this SOtM 1000 product range?

[seeteeyou]

14 minutes ago, rickca said:

What is this SOtM 1000 product range?

 

Their sMS-1000 and sMS-1000SQ series with x86 processors from Intel

 

http://www.sotm-audio.com/sotmwp/english/shopold/sources/network-player/

[Boomboy]

1 hour ago, tedwoods said:

A question for those who attended RMAF, if I may: any first hand info on the SOtM cables (usb or other)?

Id like to know more aswell .. especially if they are expanding their cables to speaker cables as mentioned here .

[lmitche]

8 hours ago, austinpop said:

 

I liked the Mscaler. Nothing more. 

Rajiv, you could always build your own Mscaler with HQplayer. ?

[limniscate]

I agree that the DAVE with the Blu is a big jump. 

[beautiful music]

Does anyone know the price of an upcoming SOtM reference clock and when it will be available?

[limniscate]

According to Lee, two months.

 

$2500, $3000, $3500 depending on quality 

[beautiful music]

1 minute ago, limniscate said:

According to Lee, two months.

 

$2500, $3000, $3500 depending on quality 

 

Quality of what??

[rickca]

16 minutes ago, limniscate said:

According to Lee, two months.

 

$2500, $3000, $3500 depending on quality 

At that price, SOtM is going to have to convince me their reference clock is as good or better than the Mutec REF 10.

[limniscate]

I believe the pricing depends on the quality of the crystal. 

[kennyb123]

13 hours ago, austinpop said:

I'm on my way home from RMAF.

 

It was an absolute treat to hang out with @romaz and @limniscate. Roy is just the nicest guy you could imagine, and the man is literally a walking encyclopedia of audiophilia. If he hasn't auditioned it at home, he's heard it, or at least heard of it, and can give you amazing insights into it. It was also great to meet @kennyb123 from this thread at the RMAF happy hour that @The Computer Audiophile hosted. It was great to meet several other CA'ers at the happy hour. And through Roy, we met and hung out with "Audio Bacon."

 

 

It was great getting to meet everyone!!  I just wish I would have had more time to spend with you guys.

 

RMAF was a lot of fun.  I'm already looking forward to going next year.

[mozes]

2 hours ago, lmitche said:

Rajiv, you could always build your own Mscaler with HQplayer. ?

I see everyone talks about upsampling to DSD512, but has anybody tried upsampling PCM to 705Khz?

[mozes]

1 hour ago, limniscate said:

According to Lee, two months.

 

$2500, $3000, $3500 depending on quality 

It seems that Mutec Ref10 maybe a better value given that it has its built linear PSU.

[beautiful music]

11 minutes ago, mozes said:

It seems that Mutec Ref10 maybe a better value given that it has its built linear PSU.

This is what I want to say 

[limniscate]

7 minutes ago, beautiful music said:

This is what I want to say 

True, we'll have to see if the SOtM with LPS-1 or Paul Hynes sounds better. 

[auricgoldfinger]

Seems like a good opportunity for SOtM to introduce a bespoke power supply.