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

[RickyV]

4 hours ago, Dutch said:

The price of the 3A one is mentioned on their website: 479 euro ex VAT. No mentions of shipping costs.

 

Mmmmm I don’t know how much an SR4 costs but if the farad uses only one of the shelf low noise regulator after the super cap buffering I am skeptical it will be better then an SR4.

 

oh my page 499 

[auricgoldfinger]

38 minutes ago, RickyV said:

 

Mmmmm I don’t know how much an SR4 costs but if the farad uses only one of the shelf low noise regulator after the super cap buffering I am skeptical it will be better then an SR4.

 

oh my page 499 

 

How many regulators are in the SR4?

[Dev]

6 hours ago, Dutch said:

I just read the, discussed before, Farad Power Supplies by Mattijs de Vries (spin off of Pink Faun) are now available.

 

These are not ‘bank switching’ like Uptone’s LPS-1(.2). First one is a 3A continuous output (fixed voltage, factory set) model and they’re testing a 12A version.

 

http://www.faradpowersupplies.com/

 

Below is the interesting part and key difference from LPS-1(.2). Any thoughts from the PSU experts ?

 

Why are you using the super capacitor power bank as smoothing capacitors and do you not switch between one bank while loading the other?

There are several reasons why we do not do this. First it means extra switching electronics in the supply lines, second it means that you are using only half of capacity of the super caps at a time. Third and maybe most important, it means that the final regulator does not get a constant voltage at its input, meaning different voltage drop, and therefore slowly varying power dissipation and temperatures all the time. This influences the output characteristics of the regulator, and the output power quality. Because in our supplies we use a choke smoothing and pre-regulation before the supercapacitor banks, noise residue will be minimal and also the necessity for switching.

[RickyV]

55 minutes ago, auricgoldfinger said:

 

How many regulators are in the SR4?

Don’t know maybe one but there will probably be a FET after it to get the noise further down. Or none at all and the regulation is done with a transistor/ fet circuit.

On the farad site they say “From this source the output voltage is stabilized by a fast transient, low noise regulator”, mmmmm ? I assumed “of the shelf” that’s a boo-boo they may have designed a regulation circuit or “regulator” themselves.

Anyhow imho in a 479 euro power supply there can’t be just an “of the shelf” regulator.

[RickyV]

Sorry, I have read the Farad site to quickly judged to quickly. From what I understand now it’s a unique and interesting  power supply design and looking forward to it review.

[rickca]

3 hours ago, Dev said:

Below is the interesting part and key difference from LPS-1(.2). Any thoughts from the PSU experts ?

Answer from John Swenson

https://www.computeraudiophile.com/forums/topic/38213-announcing-the-next-generation-ultracap-lps-12-now-57912v-now-with-parallel-lt3045-regulators/?do=findComment&comment=907618

 

[auricgoldfinger]

I'd say the Farad a risky purchase given that it fails to block leakage currents.  I wonder if the company is even aware of them.

[sandyk]

14 minutes ago, rickca said:

Answer from John Swenson

https://www.computeraudiophile.com/forums/topic/38213-announcing-the-next-generation-ultracap-lps-12-now-57912v-now-with-parallel-lt3045-regulators/?do=findComment&comment=907618

 

I certainly don't consider myself a PSU expert, but I have done a lot of playing around with different types of PSUs over the years.

 My only thoughts on this are that based on my own experience, I doubt that even a Supercapacitor doesn't have a sound signature of it's own, (i.e not completely neutral) just as normal electros, including low ESR types do, even when using a Capacitance Multiplier, and that the types and values of the input and output capacitors used with the LT3045s don't also have an influence on the final sound just like Cornan has found and manipulates to obtain increased HF "detail"

 Personally, I would like to see much larger value output capacitors at the output, but there are space limitations to consider.

 Neither do I agree with John's philosophy of very low ESR filter capacitors such as Panasonic FM with voltage regulators  as I find capacitors with very low ESR used at this location tend to " harden"  the sound a little.(Lower output impedance at 100kHZ.)

 

[rickca]

Thanks @sandyk but what you said is way over my head.  I have zero EE background.

 

The only caps I know about are the kind where rappers say I'ma bust a cap in you ass.

[auricgoldfinger]

15 minutes ago, rickca said:

Thanks @sandyk but what you said is way over my head.  I have zero EE background.

 

The only caps I know about are the kind where rappers say I'ma bust a cap in you ass.

 

+1 

[gsquared]

12 hours ago, luisma said:

There is excellent advise from the other members here but can you try HQP again? I run a similar system to yours and found that HQP vs Roon makes a difference. Also see if really the bass is lacking, maybe you are familiar with the effect but many times changing a single component even a cable will give you a different presentation of instruments giving you the impression of lacking something. 

On my system from what I remember the biggest difference in bass happened when I replaced the smps by an LPS1. 1. 

I just literally moved myself to a different house and haven't started my system yet but I suspect problems due to congested venomous mains 

Will see 

 

 

I installed HQP setup exactly as I had before - running on a Mac Mini powered by a Paul Hynes SR5 and I listened to a few tracks that I was accustomed to hearing more bass from and this did NOT solve the problem. 

 

An interesting side note: I did a careful comparison between straight Roon - NUC server and ultraRendu endpoint, level matched and on the few tracks I listened to, Roon sounds better IMO. In HQPlayer, one song was a redbook track upsampled to DSD128 in HQPlayer and in Roon of course it is 44.1Khz and Roon sounded much more organic, more nuances to the music, definitely a more detailed presentation. It might be an apples to oranges comparison because the Mac Mini is nowhere near as optimized as either the ultraRendu or NUC.

 

The only thing left for me to test is the fiber network setup that I had before. If this doesn't solve the issue, then it has to be something with the power in the house. There's not much left to test.

[Middy]

Buster Cap, one of those silent movie actors from the 1930s....?

[rickca]

Merry Christmas everyone!  Looking forward to the next 500 pages of discoveries in 2019.

[Middy]

I know a googleplex is a huge number, 

With this thread, 2019 will be a Nucoplex. Happy Christmas all.

A great read from lovely people. 

Dave

[Cornan]

 

 

[Volfram]

Has anyone tried to bridge a MSI cubi 3 silent S?

https://www.msi.com/Desktop/Cubi-3-Silent-S-7m

 

It does support Legacy boot according to MSI support, see attached, for those intrested in using it with ROON ROCK.

Seems like a neat, cheap, easy and silent bridged ROCK server option.

 

reply1_377289_20181217101516.pdf

[misterspense]

12 hours ago, Volfram said:

Has anyone tried to bridge a MSI cubi 3 silent S?

https://www.msi.com/Desktop/Cubi-3-Silent-S-7m

 

It does support Legacy boot according to MSI support, see attached, for those intrested in using it with ROON ROCK.

Seems like a neat, cheap, easy and silent bridged ROCK server option.

 

reply1_377289_20181217101516.pdf

Yes, I have the i5 version of the MSI cubi 3. Works well.

[Volfram]

2 hours ago, misterspense said:

Yes, I have the i5 version of the MSI cubi 3. Works well.

I'm intrested using it with ROCK. The "S" version because it has dual lan and there is no need for a usb ethernet adapter. Given you don't want to use Wifi. 

 

There has been reports of mobos with dual lan, fully functional while using Windows,  that after installing ROCK leaving only one port available. How is your unit set up?

[tapatrick]

Can anyone report if there is an improvement in SQ by moving to headless 0.7 version from 0.3? or is the difference just in the new menu functionality? 

thanks in advance

 

[austinpop]

4 minutes ago, tapatrick said:

Can anyone report if there is an improvement in SQ by moving to headless 0.7 version from 0.3? or is the difference just in the new menu functionality? 

thanks in advance

 

 

None that I can tell. Other than Extreme on 0.3 is Extreme2 on 0.7.

[Superdad]

On 12/19/2018 at 8:57 AM, austinpop said:

Thanks, this is interesting.

 

One concern with Super capacitor supplies is that in the quest to deliver more current capacity, the higher number of capacitors can raise the output impedance, which has a very noticeable correlation with SQ. I notice in the writeup, they talk about the impedance of the output connector and the cable being factors, but I don't see (or did I just miss?) the output impedance of the supply itself?

 

If I recall right, the LPS-1.2 measures under 3mΩ up to 100kHz, but @Superdad can clarify, I'm sure.

 

Well that is a complicated area, and depends very much on how the supercaps (or any caps for that matter) are used.  I'll leave it to @JohnSwenson to explain in more detail some time, but simplified, but when using supercaps the way we do--where the active bank is only ever discharging (not simultaneously charging)--the ESR of the caps has no impact on output impedance.

 

When using supercaps just as a typical (though VERY large value) filter capacitor--where it is simultaneously charging and discharging--then yes, ESR have an effect on output impedance (typically at very low frequencies).

 

The FAQ of the Farad power supply page makes several extremely incorrect statements about our UltraCap units (no they don't name UpTone, but since we are the only bank-alternating supercap LPS on the market...), indicating that they do not understand our sophisticated design.  I just made a long post explaining how our product actually functions--here:

 

And a couple of posts above that one I also clarified valid question about leakage (sources, loops, and blocking).

 

Hope everyone has a wonderful holiday and New Years!

--Alex C.

 

 

 

[thyname]

Any of you guys with Innuos ZEN or ZENith using Roon?

 

When using an Innuos ZEN or ZENith as Roon Core, are you able to schedule Roon backups on the built in storage of the Innuos unit itself?

 

I don’t see this as an option. Just migrated the Core from the NUC to ZENith MK3 yesterday, and the only option I see for my backups is my Dropbox. I would like to set a second one to Innuos built in storage as well.

 

I tried putting the network path as well, basically as NAS, Roon Backup setting did not recognize it.

 

thanks!

 

 

[austinpop]

1 hour ago, thyname said:

Any of you guys with Innuos ZEN or ZENith using Roon?

 

When using an Innuos ZEN or ZENith as Roon Core, are you able to schedule Roon backups on the built in storage of the Innuos unit itself?

 

I don’t see this as an option. Just migrated the Core from the NUC to ZENith MK3 yesterday, and the only option I see for my backups is my Dropbox. I would like to set a second one to Innuos built in storage as well.

 

I tried putting the network path as well, basically as NAS, Roon Backup setting did not recognize it.

 

thanks!

 

 

 

I had no issues with backup to NAS when I owned my Zenith SE. Did you try to find the NAS by it's IP address rather than by it's network name? Something like this:

 

 

I personally do not think it advisable to store a backup on the same device you are backing up - i.e. the Zenith. Put it on the NAS - it's a cleaner solution. I actually backup to BOTH NAS AND Dropbox. I'm the kind of person who likes to groom their library to be just right, so I don't want to lose that time and effort.

[lmitche]

27 minutes ago, austinpop said:

 

I had no issues with backup to NAS when I owned my Zenith SE. Did you try to find the NAS by it's IP address rather than by it's network name? Something like this:

 

 

I personally do not think it advisable to store a backup on the same device you are backing up - i.e. the Zenith. Put it on the NAS - it's a cleaner solution. I actually backup to BOTH NAS AND Dropbox. I'm the kind of person who likes to groom their library to be just right, so I don't want to lose that time and effort.

Obviously you have spent a lot of time here:

 

Groom Library
201 Broadway Ave, Groom, TX 79039
(806) 248-7353
https://maps.app.goo.gl/89b5Z

 

[lmitche]

Not entirely relevant but some fun facts about NUCs can be found in this article:

 

https://www.anandtech.com/show/13734/ecs-liva-z2-and-intel-nuc7pjyh-gemini-lake-ucff-pcs-review

 

Celeron NUCs are obtainable again.

 

https://m.newegg.com/products/1VK-004K-001W5?ignorebbr=1&nm_mc=KNC-GoogleAdwords-PC&cm_mmc=KNC-GoogleAdwords-PC-_-pla-_-Desktop+PC-_-1VK-004K-001W5&gclsrc=aw.ds&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI1Juduc-33wIViAOGCh3NmgnpEAQYASABEgKoyPD_BwE