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

[austinpop]

43 minutes ago, Always.Learning said:

 

Fascinating stuff, Rajiv. As the owner of a Chord DAVE, I'm surprised at @limniscate's finding that his DAVE had the least amount of impact. I migrated from an Ayre QB-9 DSD to a DAVE and found the delta quite large. I also owned a Schiit Yggy for a brief spell and found it inferior to both the Ayre and DAVE. For what it's worth, I think the consensus among DAVE owners is that it really excels with PCM and DSD is a clear second best. Certainly the designer, Rob Watts, prefers PCM. So you might try setting it to PCM in your next evaluation. 

 

In any event, it's exciting to hear that a lowly modded switch can have the impact you heard. I currently run a switch modded by Paul Pang with a TXCO clock between my server and sMS-200. I wonder if SOtM would be willing to modify it? If not, it's probably worth having them modify another switch based on these results (and pending the results you hear on the Maggie speaker system). 

 

If you have some recommended tunings on the DAVE, please do let us know.

 

A lot of my collection is DSD64, and we definitely found the SQ improved by switching from the PCM+ to the DSD+ mode. But please note - neither of us know the DAVE well at all, so it's possible we may not be using it optimally.

 

Please advise the best settings for:

• DSD64 tracks
• 24-bit 48/96/192 PCM

We'll be doing another sessions's at Eric's later this week.

[ElviaCaprice]

6 minutes ago, austinpop said:

 

If you have some recommended tunings on the DAVE, please do let us know.

 

A lot of my collection is DSD64, and we definitely found the SQ improved by switching from the PCM+ to the DSD+ mode. But please note - neither of us know the DAVE well at all, so it's possible we may not be using it optimally.

 

Please advise the best settings for:

• DSD64 tracks
• 24-bit 48/96/192 PCM

We'll be doing another sessions's at Eric's later this week.

I would just use the PCM as PCM bitperfect.  I don't think the Chord DAC's sound better changing PCM to DSD or upsampling.  In fact, internally they change DSD to PCM for the filtering if I'm not mistaken in the DAVE also, that way they can control the volume digitally.  I don't know what you think sounds better SQ wise, but rounded edges from DSD doesn't sound better to me.  Yeah it's blacker and sounds cleaner, but not necessarily better.  Chord DAC's are not known for superb DSD, it's PCM bitperfect that they excel at.  But you guys go with what works for you, should not effect the comparison testing.

[austinpop]

24 minutes ago, ElviaCaprice said:

That's no problem, would be nice if you could disconnect the 5V vbus, since the tX-USB Ultra doesn't need it.  In fact give us a heads up between mRendu only vs. tX-USB Ultra only, both with DAVE.  Would be very interesting.  Do not use the upgraded switch with clocking.

Add the sms-200 ultra in the mix only, please, again no extra upgraded clock components!!

This would clarify if 1 Ex clock sotm component USB only vs. Ethernet renderer no upgraded clock.vs sms-200 Ultra only.

 

Fantastic, this has never been done, would answer a lot of question and bring up some new ones!!!  With the DAVE is perfect, because the question of galvanic isolation is covered.  It's a fair fight.

 

Interesting thoughts. We'll see if we can do these at @limniscate. His Magnepan setup is amazing.

 

BTW - I forgot to mention that we swapped out my normal Curious 0.2m cable to the DACs with a Lightspeed 2G dual-headed cable. It worked perfectly with the 2 ports on the tX. We did not have time to try a cable comparison, but the Lightspeed 2G was certainly sounding good!

[austinpop]

BTW - does the DAVE handle native DSD over USB? When it came up on both the mR and the sMS-200, it showed up as a DoP device, so we decided to leave it as is, as we didn't want to waste time researching.

 

Again, I may be a bit unusual in that a lot of my collection is DSD64, so I tend to listen more to DSD music than PCM.

 

Also, we were not upsampling at all - just passing through the native resolution.

[austinpop]

We're not doing conversion - at least not intentionally. Here is what the DAVE manual says:

 

DSD+ or PCM+ Mode

Dave has two menu options specifically tailored for PCM or DSD playback. You can play both PCM and
DSD music using either mode, but each one is specifically optimised for a particular format. In order
to cycle between each mode please highlight the segment, typically by pressing the down button, and
then either press the left or right button for two seconds.

 

PCM+ - Use this for PCM playback up to 768KHz. DSD playback up to DSD256 is also supported but
it is decimated and not optimised in this mode.

 

DSD+ - Use this for DSD64, 128, and 256 (single, dual and quad speed) playback. There is no
decimation. PCM can still be played and this mode is ideal for streaming video with audio as it has a
lower delay.

 

Based on this, we felt DSD+ was the safest mode to run in. I guess we could toggle to PCM+ every time we switched to a PCM track, but we didn't do that.

[ElviaCaprice]

7 minutes ago, austinpop said:

BTW - does the DAVE handle native DSD over USB? When it came up on both the mR and the sMS-200, it showed up as a DoP device, so we decided to leave it as is, as we didn't want to waste time researching.

 

Again, I may be a bit unusual in that a lot of my collection is DSD64, so I tend to listen more to DSD music than PCM.

 

Also, we were not upsampling at all - just passing through the native resolution.

Not really, I think DAVE can receive the DSD natively but it still decimates it to PCM, so its not a NOS DAC. 

EDIT:  Interesting, didn't know that DSD could be played natively as NOS??

[austinpop]

Just now, ElviaCaprice said:

Not really, I think DAVE can receive the DSD natively but it still changes it to PCM, so its not NOS DAC.

 

That's 2 Qute. 

 

Sorry. 

[ElviaCaprice]

4 minutes ago, austinpop said:

 

That's 2 Qute. 

 

Sorry. 

LOL, I guess you get those features when you pay 8X the price.

[Always.Learning]

26 minutes ago, austinpop said:

 

If you have some recommended tunings on the DAVE, please do let us know.

 

I would just recommend that, as the manual makes clear, use the PCM setting for PCM recordings and the DSD setting for DSD recordings. But I don't think DAVE does DSD in true native form, and I think you should at least listen to a few PCM recordings when doing your comparisons. As ElviaCaprice said, Chord dacs are best known for great PCM playback. You don't need to worry about upsampling options or filters; DAVE does all that internally. 

 

I assume you were listening to your headphones via DAVE's headphone out? Or were you sending the signal via interconnects to your Cavalli headphone amp? If the latter, then you are no doubt losing some transparency. DAVE's headphone out simply grabs the signal that comes straight from the dac; there is no separate headphone amplification stage. This is the purest, most transparent way to listen to DAVE with headphones. 

 

Regarding the HF filter on DAVE, I prefer to leave it on. I personally don't think it makes a significant difference.

 

Finally, you should make sure that when you are using DAVE on speakers (as opposed to headphones), the Crossfeed setting is set to zero. The Crossfeed setting appears only when headphones are plugged in, but once it is set, it remains in effect even when listening to speakers. If you happen to leave the setting on when listening to speakers, you will get crosstalk on your stereo channels, which tends to muddy the sound and degrade the soundstage. 

 

I'm looking forward to the reports from your speaker-based listening session. 

 

 

[austinpop]

40 minutes ago, Always.Learning said:

I would just recommend that, as the manual makes clear, use the PCM setting for PCM recordings and the DSD setting for DSD recordings. But I don't think DAVE does DSD in true native form, and I think you should at least listen to a few PCM recordings when doing your comparisons. As ElviaCaprice said, Chord dacs are best known for great PCM playback. You don't need to worry about upsampling options or filters; DAVE does all that internally. 

 

I assume you were listening to your headphones via DAVE's headphone out? Or were you sending the signal via interconnects to your Cavalli headphone amp? If the latter, then you are no doubt losing some transparency. DAVE's headphone out simply grabs the signal that comes straight from the dac; there is no separate headphone amplification stage. This is the purest, most transparent way to listen to DAVE with headphones. 

 

Regarding the HF filter on DAVE, I prefer to leave it on. I personally don't think it makes a significant difference.

 

Finally, you should make sure that when you are using DAVE on speakers (as opposed to headphones), the Crossfeed setting is set to zero. The Crossfeed setting appears only when headphones are plugged in, but once it is set, it remains in effect even when listening to speakers. If you happen to leave the setting on when listening to speakers, you will get crosstalk on your stereo channels, which tends to muddy the sound and degrade the soundstage. 

 

I'm looking forward to the reports from your speaker-based listening session. 

 

 

 

Ok thanks.

 

We listened to a mix of DSD and PCM tracks.

 

No, we didn't use the HA on the DAVE, just fed via balanced XLR to the Cavalli. I would seriously doubt the DAVE HA could match the Cavalli, but in any event, the intent was to only switch DACs while holding everything else constant.

[Always.Learning]

20 minutes ago, austinpop said:

 

Ok thanks.

 

We listened to a mix of DSD and PCM tracks.

 

No, we didn't use the HA on the DAVE, just fed via balanced XLR to the Cavalli. I would seriously doubt the DAVE HA could match the Cavalli, but in any event, the intent was to only switch DACs while holding everything else constant.

I understand that it would make sense to go with what you know and that it made sense to use the Cavalli when comparing DACs. 

 

And I know the Cavalli is a great headphone amp. But if the DAVE makes another appearance in your home, or you bring your headphones to lemniscate's home, you MUST listen to DAVE's headphone out. I think you will be pleasantly surprised at just how transparent the music is.

 

Roy (Romaz) and many others have reached this same conclusion--i.e., that DAVE is basically the most transparent headphone amp on the planet--on the insanely long Chord DAVE thread on head-fi. 

[austinpop]

4 minutes ago, Always.Learning said:

I understand that it would make sense to go with what you know and that it made sense to use the Cavalli when comparing DACs. 

 

And I know the Cavalli is a great headphone amp. But if the DAVE makes another appearance in your home, or you bring your headphones to lemniscate's home, you MUST listen to DAVE's headphone out. I think you will be pleasantly surprised at just how transparent the music is.

 

Roy (Romaz) and many others have reached this same conclusion--i.e., that DAVE is basically the most transparent headphone amp on the planet--on the insanely long Chord DAVE thread on head-fi. 

 

Ok cool, I'll give it a shot if I can. I'll need to check if it has a balanced 4-pin XLR headphone output.

 

I must say, the only other time I'd heard the DAVE was at a CanJam, and I'll be honest - it really didn't impress. But CanJam's are noisy suboptimal environments. 

 

So it was good to hear it in my own setup. 

[limniscate]

1 hour ago, Always.Learning said:

I would just recommend that, as the manual makes clear, use the PCM setting for PCM recordings and the DSD setting for DSD recordings. But I don't think DAVE does DSD in true native form, and I think you should at least listen to a few PCM recordings when doing your comparisons. As ElviaCaprice said, Chord dacs are best known for great PCM playback. You don't need to worry about upsampling options or filters; DAVE does all that internally. 

 

I assume you were listening to your headphones via DAVE's headphone out? Or were you sending the signal via interconnects to your Cavalli headphone amp? If the latter, then you are no doubt losing some transparency. DAVE's headphone out simply grabs the signal that comes straight from the dac; there is no separate headphone amplification stage. This is the purest, most transparent way to listen to DAVE with headphones. 

 

Regarding the HF filter on DAVE, I prefer to leave it on. I personally don't think it makes a significant difference.

 

Finally, you should make sure that when you are using DAVE on speakers (as opposed to headphones), the Crossfeed setting is set to zero. The Crossfeed setting appears only when headphones are plugged in, but once it is set, it remains in effect even when listening to speakers. If you happen to leave the setting on when listening to speakers, you will get crosstalk on your stereo channels, which tends to muddy the sound and degrade the soundstage. 

 

I'm looking forward to the reports from your speaker-based listening session. 

 

 

We had the crossfeed setting at 0.  I saw this on the Dave thread on head-fi, but thanks for the heads up.  I'm sure it's definitely important when listening on speakers.  I haven't tried the Dave directly to my power amp (Sanders Magtech).  I've only tried it in DAC mode to my Audio Research Ref5SE.

[austinpop]

I peeked at the DAVE thread on head-fi, and - hoo, boy - quite a minefield. Let's definitely not bring that discussion here.

 

Suffice it to say that it appears to be an amazing DAC. I would need to spend way longer to get the full measure of it. 

 

Let's focus this discussion to what this thread is about - Roy's incredible trailblazing findings. What I can say is that the improvements we heard with the sub-$2k Ultra trifecta was way more dramatic than the improvement we heard going from the Codex to the DAVE DAC. No judgements - this is just what 2 of us both heard.

 

Which I think should be great news, as only a tiny fraction of us are in the market for a $12k DAC, but it is heartening that even more dramatic improvements can be realized with a fraction of the investment upstream of the DAC in this fashion!

[austinpop]

3 hours ago, mozes said:

Very interesting findings @austinpop, happy that the ultra trifecta works so well for you.

In my system, I expect that the ISO-Regen will make a positive impact as I don't have the SOTM clock in front of it. In my chain, I only have the tX with the sCLK-EX, so probably there is more potential for the ISO-Regen than in my system.

 

Do you connect the SMS-200 ultra directly as recommended in this thread, if this is the case then the switch is adding a lot of improvement even in the direct mode

 

 

Yes, it is direct - in the sense that the music server is bridged, and the direct connection from the bridge is going into the Zyxel (modded) switch, along with the sMS-200 "ultra."

 

In my simplistic way of thinking, this "ultra" switch's role is nothing but an Ethernet "regen" with the ultra clock.

[romaz]

Wow, I took a few days off to tend to other things and came back to see that lots has happened!  Lots of great reporting.  Thank you, Rajiv and everyone else!  I am enjoying reading everyone's experiences.

 

Yes, it seems consensus is building that clocks do matter and can make a huge difference regardless of the DAC.  The impact seems much greater within the "direct connection" pathway because when I break up my bridged LAN configuration and revert back to the traditional method, the impact of my reclocking switch is significantly less and so the impact of these devices, I believe, is conditional.  Bridging still matters and matters even more.  The question remains whether straight USB can sound just as good.  Also, it remains to be seen at what point does adding more clocks no longer make a significant difference and will replacing all the bad clocks in a motherboard require as many reparative downstream devices.

 

For those looking for high value, as Rajiv has also found, a cheap switch thrown in can make a huge difference.  Perhaps, the MVP of the group given how its low cost is the switch.  I'm thinking that an sMS-200 Ultra with 2 switches could be a better value than an sMS-200 Ultra, tX-USB HD and switch.

 

Just a couple of comments...

 

First, I'm not sure anyone yet knows just how good the clock implementation in the ISO Regen is compared against SOtM's new clock and so no assumptions should be made.  Personally, I am expecting the ISO Regen to be fantastic and am open to the possibility that it could be better or at least it could do some things better than the tX-USB Ultra and that possibly the two devices could even be complementary in a pure USB setup, especially if your DAC's USB input has no GI at all.  If it turns out the Cyrstek clock is not at the same level as the SOtM clock, I could see the combo of music server > ISO Regen > tX-USB Ultra > DAC being something worth considering, especially given the ISO Regen's excellent price point.  I guess we'll see soon enough but I love having all these great options.

 

Second, regarding the DAC, I still find this to make the greater difference, at least in my setup although a DAC can only be as good as the source that feeds it and will also be limited by the amp that follows it.  It has been said that the Chord DAVE is the most transparent headphone DAC in the world when headphones are directly connected to its headphone output and I believe this to be true.  With speaker setups, much of DAVE's bandwidth, speed, noise floor, dynamic range and time resolution is lost or buried by the speaker amp that follows it because no speaker amp in existence can match its characteristics and so DAVE will sometimes fail to distinguish itself as readily in speaker setups although there are those of us who use DAVE to directly drive speakers (without the use of a speaker amp) and this is something I've been doing now for nearly a year.  

 

Because of DAVE's ultra low output impedance of 0.055 ohms and because it can output 2 watts at 8 ohms via its RCA outputs, DAVE can directly drive high efficiency speakers (>95dB sensitivity) without having to use a separate speaker amplifier to astonishing levels of resolution and transparency, so good that I pretty much listen only to speakers these days.  Later this year, Rob Watts will be releasing the first of his digital amps (where DAVE will connect to these amps via digital and not analog connectors) and these amps will have the same transparency as what I am listening to now in case there are those who are intrigued by what this level of resolution and transparency sounds like and don't use high efficiency speakers.  The first amp will be 20 watts per channel (or 70 watt monoblocks) and will scale to as high as >200 watts in future releases.  The point of aspiring to such transparency in your downstream components is that the quality of the upstream source begins to really matter all the more and it now appears that there is so much still to be gained by paying attention to your source.

[romaz]

On 5/7/2017 at 9:57 AM, gsquared said:

I'm late to the party here and I am just now trying to direct link my uRendu with my Mac Mini.

 

I am having difficulties though and I think I did something wrong in my Network and interfaces setup. I'm running El Capitan and I read through the instructions provided by @romaz and @Superdad and others, but I still cannot seem to get my Thunderbolt bridge to connect to my network.

 

I have the ethernet port going directly to the uRendu and it shows as connected, and I have the Thunderbolt adapter connected to an ethernet cable that connects to my network. And that is the one that is I am not able to get to connect.

 

I've tried deleting the new virtual interface I created and re-doing it, restarting the Mini with no luck.  I can't seem to figure out what step I missed. Attached are some screenshots. Can anyone think of what I'm missing?

 

Thanks!

 

P.S. This thread is incredible! I've been following along and reading all the great tips, advice and suggestions people have contributed, but I never got around to direct connecting my uRendu to my Mac.

 

 

I'm not sure if you've figured it out yet or not.  It seems to be easier to create a bridge on a Mac than on some PCs.  In your case, trying turning off your WiFi and establishing a connection to your router via your wired Thunderbolt ethernet connection.  Once this has been established, then try bridging this connection with your other LAN connection that is connected to your mR.

[rickca]

6 hours ago, romaz said:

First, I'm not sure anyone yet knows just how good the clock implementation in the ISO Regen is compared against SOtM's new clock and so no assumptions should be made.

I'm so glad you brought this up.  It may be possible to get some very exciting results without the 'ultra' expensive SOtM clocks.  At what point does a clock upgrade become overkill relative to overall design and implementation?

[ElviaCaprice]

33 minutes ago, rickca said:

I'm so glad you brought this up.  It may be possible to get some very exciting results without the 'ultra' expensive SOtM clocks.  When does a clock upgrade become overkill relative to overall design and implementation?

 

Yes, but we already know what the clock is going to be.  Implementation will be huge.  But I greatly doubt that this clock will be superior to the sotm new clocks.  So it will come down to system configuration.  DACS without GI in USB streaming only will benefit if the ISO Regen is implemented upstream of any sotm new clocking components.  If your not using any of the Sotm new clocks, then the ISO Regen will be a benefit with or without the GI.

 

Or even better may be replacing the crystal clock in the ISO Regen with one of the four s-clk ex clocks.  We shall find out soon!!!

[rickca]

2 minutes ago, ElviaCaprice said:

But I greatly doubt that this clock will be superior to the sotm new clocks.

I'm not saying the Crystek 575 is going to beat the SOtM clock modules.  I'm just saying that at some point a more expensive clock becomes overkill.  There's a huge price gap between these clocks, so it's an interesting question.

[ElviaCaprice]

4 minutes ago, rickca said:

I'm not saying the Crystek 575 is going to beat the SOtM clock modules.  I'm just saying that at some point a more expensive clock becomes overkill.  There's a huge price gap between these clocks, so it's an interesting question.

I'm not sure that's been proven yet.  One would think there is a diminishing point if a clock exceeds the DAC clock.

[rickca]

8 hours ago, austinpop said:

In my simplistic way of thinking, this "ultra" switch's role is nothing but an Ethernet "regen" with the ultra clock.

Now that is really interesting insight!  Maybe Uptone can design something even more effective than a switch with an upgraded clock or passive network isolators like Emo. 

 

How about it @Superdad and @JohnSwenson? 

[ChrisG]

12 hours ago, austinpop said:

 

If you have some recommended tunings on the DAVE, please do let us know.

 

A lot of my collection is DSD64, and we definitely found the SQ improved by switching from the PCM+ to the DSD+ mode. But please note - neither of us know the DAVE well at all, so it's possible we may not be using it optimally.

 

Please advise the best settings for:

• DSD64 tracks
• 24-bit 48/96/192 PCM

We'll be doing another sessions's at Eric's later this week.

It's pretty straight forward - PCM+ for PCM, DSD+ for DSD...oh, and make sure you have the HF on

[ChrisG]

11 hours ago, austinpop said:

We're not doing conversion - at least not intentionally. Here is what the DAVE manual says:

 

 

Based on this, we felt DSD+ was the safest mode to run in. I guess we could toggle to PCM+ every time we switched to a PCM track, but we didn't do that.

yes, toggle back and forth for the best sound. It's actually a pretty dumb set-up...there should be an option for it to automatically switch since most owners think that the PCM+ setting is best for PCM and DSD+ is best for DSD. Same with the High Filter setting...even Rob Watts says that it sounds best with it in the "on" position, so why is it even an option?

Big warning here - if you used cross-feed during your headphone session, make sure you turn it back to zero when you use it with a speaker system because if it is "on", it is active on all outputs, not just the headphone jack. And you'll need headphones available to access the menu for this.

 

Yet another dumb design choice with the DAVE. And, unless you have headphones plugged in, this setting doesn't come up in the menu nor the display, so you don't even know it is on. This isn't mentioned in the owner's manual either. I don't use headphones and my unit was new, so not a problem, but quite a few guys over at HF just discovered that they've been listening (unintentionally) to cross-feed with their speaker systems

[Always.Learning]

11 hours ago, austinpop said:

Let's focus this discussion to what this thread is about - Roy's incredible trailblazing findings. What I can say is that the improvements we heard with the sub-$2k Ultra trifecta was way more dramatic than the improvement we heard going from the Codex to the DAVE DAC. No judgements - this is just what 2 of us both heard.

Agreed. And thank you for reporting your impressions -- this is indeed good news on the affordability front.