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

[Johnseye]

2 minutes ago, John769 said:

I understand that. But I'm sure quite a few ER-X SPF users are also galvanically isolating further up the chain with their switches, so don't quite understand such a positive opinion towards the SFP model.  

 

I have the SFP module as well as two different switch models with SFP ports.  I isolate certain traffic, including WAPs with the fiber SFP.

From what I have read here that is the only reason.  It's a step to take to reduce noise which can travel over copper.

[dctom]

On 6/21/2020 at 12:03 AM, lmitche said:

 

Last year Emile sent me three Daiza vibration damping and control platforms of three different sizes. The big one is under my heavy Modwright KWA150 SE amp, one under an LPS1.2 powering an Adnaco USB hub, and the smallest under my DAC. All are made from Panzerholtz and have anti-vibration grooves cut into the bottom. Each is supported by three legs. Here is a picture.

 

https://taikoaudio.com/product/daiza/

 

They sound terrific! The DAC platform had the most impact here so start there. Highly recommended.

 

I like ASRMichael's use of Panzerholtz wood in his build. Way cool!

 

Larry

 

I have been using Panzerholtz for a while as a component in my turntable support it has produced a significant improvement. Have also implemented it in some diy supports for smaller components.

Besides being used in grand pianos Panzerholtz has some other, very interesting, properties as explained in this pdf.

 

https://www.delignit.de/fileadmin/downloads/produkte/Produktdatenblatt_Delignit_Panzerholz_Protect_EN.pdf

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Downtheline]

8 minutes ago, dctom said:

have been using Panzerholtz for a while

How do you source it?

[mikicasellas]

Has anyone compared the Cable Matters SFTP Cat8 Ethernet Cable VS Ghent Ethernet Cable ?

 

I have the Cable Matters being better than both the BJ Cat6A & Audioquest Cinnamon in my system

 

Any suggestions ?

 

 

[RickyV]

2 hours ago, dctom said:

Besides being used in grand pianos Panzerholtz has some other, very interesting, properties as explained in this pdf.

It’s always good  to know that if a grenade goes off in your room the turntable support will survive. 😀

Or maybe during a apocalypse you can protect yourself and your family with turntable support. 😀

 

Where did you order it from? Seriously. 
I may need some protection too in the near future, not serious again. 😀

[Exocer]

8 hours ago, Peter Avgeris said:

All serial switches need to be connected on the same ports. Pay attention :

Switch #1: input port 2, output port 1

Switch #2: input port 1, output port 2

Switch #3: input port 2, output port 1

Switch #4: input port 1, output port 2

 

5 switches were worse than 4, while 6 did not have any positive impact at all. 

 

Hope my comment helps a bit. 

 

I also want to note that the BS-GS2016(p) with stock amps sounds good with the Etherregen downstream.

 

Although I am curious how the combination of a BS-GS2008 and BS-GS2016 would work together...

 

On another note, I forgot I had an AQ Cinnamon laying around from the time I tried using it in my less resolving system. So, I have:

 

1. AQ Cinnamon

2. CableMatters Cat 8

3. Monoprice Cat 8

 

I will do some listening tests with each of them, going from Etherregen to server, for the person who inquired.

 

It is too early to tell how the Cinnamon will perform since I only used it for several hours at this point so I will wait for break-in prior to providing impressions. EDIT: I can also throw in Ugreen CAT 7 for comparison as I bought these to try POE to DC (more on that later).

 

Also, Parts-connexxion recently had a 50% off deal on Duelund caps so naturally I grabbed a pair of the .22uFs to replace the Audiocap Theta's I've meant to replace for years... (In my DIY speakers) And holy cow, the delicacy, smoothness and detail improvements were much more than what I was expecting, particularly in the high frequencies. I now wonder if my old caps were far off spec.

 

 

[shahed99]

On 6/30/2020 at 10:41 AM, flkin said:

I purchased he latest version from Max Townshend and in some ways I received good results, but mostly it was again negative. What a downer - the anti-vibration and isolation theory was sound but practically it didn’t play out. Mids too forward and harder. It was supposed to provide immediate improvements - and without any breaking in time!

 

When I got to this part, my reaction was "no way!" lol. I'm also a recent owner of Townshend Podium. I bought them to placate my downstair neighbor mostly. It didn't help much in that regard. But the sound improvement was immediate and satisfying. These are the keepers.

 

Then I read the rest of your post. What do you know, I have used DIY Duelund tinner wire in the past as my previous speakers internal wiring! But have been using Western Electric tinned copper wire everywhere (IC + SC) for few years now. Duelund hook up took the concept from W.E. popularized by Jeff Day's blog. Anyway, those DIY WE wire replaced my $2.5k worth of interconnect and speaker cables and it was an improvement. Haven't tempted to try any other brands of analog cable since then.

[Peter Avgeris]

10 hours ago, Downtheline said:

Hi Peter,  did you ever make this comparison? If so, did you try 2 units of the ER X SFP?

Hello!

Yes, I forgot to let you know.

Along with the Buffalos I had listened to the Ubiquiti router(s) as a plain switch(es).

Nenon had written the day before. He had listened to this thing.

 

Buffalo switches are a totally different story. They play miles better than Ubiquitis.

It seems that Ubiquiti is the best choice for routers and Buffalo the best for switches.

Imaging was far bigger with Buffalos, low & high frequencies were shockingly real. Ubiquiti was sounding a lot more harsh against Buffalos.

 

I have observed that the comments of Nenon are always in line with my own findings. He has gone through the path previously than me, so he already knows.

 

It is a real pity that Buffalos are discontinued and not available any more.

 

Go and get as many as you can, although I guess that the last pieces have already been completely vanished from the market. Either 8- or 16- or 24- ports, go grab them at any price. In quad version they offer a stratospheric sound quality. Last choice could be the commercial version of Melco although at a much increased price.

[flkin]

1 hour ago, shahed99 said:

 

When I got to this part, my reaction was "no way!" lol. I'm also a recent owner of Townshend Podium. I bought them to placate my downstair neighbor mostly. It didn't help much in that regard. But the sound improvement was immediate and satisfying. These are the keepers.

 

Then I read the rest of your post. What do you know, I have used DIY Duelund tinner wire in the past as my previous speakers internal wiring! But have been using Western Electric tinned copper wire everywhere (IC + SC) for few years now. Duelund hook up took the concept from W.E. popularized by Jeff Day's blog. Anyway, those DIY WE wire replaced my $2.5k worth of interconnect and speaker cables and it was an improvement. Haven't tempted to try any other brands of analog cable since then.

Ah how interesting! I got there with the Townshend Podiums eventually after switching to tinned copper. It wasn’t an immediate step up for me but took some rearrangement of cables to get there. 
 

Right now I’m finding a naturalness and correctness to the sound that I haven’t heard before with the tinned copper loom. But one thing unusual I noticed is the daily variations of sound seems to be more than before. One day, it’s spot on sound and another day bass gets fatter or soundstage is smaller. I suppose it’s to do with breaking in as it’s happening less over time. 
 

You say you’ve switched over to $2.5k wires, is this still tinned copper?

[BigAlMc]

3 hours ago, shahed99 said:

I'm also a recent owner of Townshend Podium. I bought them to placate my downstair neighbor mostly. It didn't help much in that regard

 

Brilliant 😂 

 

I came very close to buying the Townsend but went with the Gaia footers instead. Big increase in the SQ and focus of the image.

[dctom]

13 hours ago, Downtheline said:

How do you source it?

Obtained from http://www.ltlewis.co.uk/

[tgb]

21 hours ago, John769 said:

Yes, as I stated just a few posts up, @Nsxturbo compared SQ and found them 'equally good' (link below)

Thanks for the confirmation John.

After 24h "burning", the SQ of the GS2024 seems a bit better (long process for this big piece). It's going the right way. I admit I was quite desappointed with the top-harsh sound of the cold machine yesteday. Still using its internal SMPS, cause I don't have proper LPS yet for this unit.

 

Regarding the external power with 3 PS @ 1 - 1.5 - 3.3VDC, I'll have a try within 24hours & post the results (good or bad). 

Rgds

[R1200CL]

On 6/26/2020 at 8:59 AM, thm655321 said:

Not sure if I should pose this question in a separate thread or here but I thought I would start here anyways.

Maybe a good idea 😀

 

On 6/26/2020 at 8:59 AM, thm655321 said:

Have I successfully avoided the whole audiophile switch issue by doing the direct lan connection this way?

I don’t think so. If I understand you correctly you have bridge your QNAP. 
 

Also if I understand you correctly your PC has USB out to your DAC. If your goal is better SQ, I suppose the Iso Regen is the way to obtain some better SQ.

 

I personally think it’s best to keep the QNAP away audiophile system location. Adding the one or two optical module will probably help. Adding an etherRegen is better. 
 

You may like to try Roon on you QNAP ? Then your PC can act as an endpoint.

Or install (Roon) ROCK on your PC, move it to office location, buy a endpoint and insert the etherRegen in between. 
 

But I guess your question was how to obtain better SQ with your present gear 😀

[lmitche]

8 minutes ago, R1200CL said:

Maybe a good idea 😀

 

I don’t think so. If I understand you correctly you have bridge your QNAP. 
 

Also if I understand you correctly your PC has USB out to your DAC. If your goal is better SQ, I suppose the Iso Regen is the way to obtain some better SQ.

 

I personally think it’s best to keep the QNAP away audiophile system location. Adding the one or two optical module will probably help. Adding an etherRegen is better. 
 

You may like to try Roon on you QNAP ? Then your PC can act as an endpoint.

Or install (Roon) ROCK on your PC, move it to office location, buy a endpoint and insert the etherRegen in between. 
 

But I guess your question was how to obtain better SQ with your present gear 😀

Which Qnap? The Audiophile Qnaps are essentially the same as NUCs, often with some very noisy parts inside.

[R1200CL]

24 minutes ago, lmitche said:

Which Qnap? The Audiophile Qnaps are essentially the same as NUCs, often with some very noisy parts inside.

Exactly why I suggest him to reallocate his QNAP back to office location. As he had moved it to audiophile location. @thm655321 has to answer what QNAP. (Mine is 453-Pro). I use mine for store music library, Roon backup, and yesterday I added Roon extensions in docker as the implementation in the SonicTransporter isn’t working for the time being. Andrew is working on a fix. 

[bobfa]

8 hours ago, BigAlMc said:

 

Brilliant 😂 

 

I came very close to buying the Townsend but went with the Gaia footers instead. Big increase in the SQ and focus of the image.

I really like my Gaia footers.  I have used them  on two different speakers with rather nice results.  For the Kii Three BXT I had to unscrew the inserts in the bases that the spikes screw into.   The change in imaging is really surprising.  

 

Note I did not use the carpet spikes I put down 3/4in MDF platforms to start with.  I am working on speaker placement.

 

 

[thm655321]

1 hour ago, R1200CL said:

Exactly why I suggest him to reallocate his QNAP back to office location. As he had moved it to audiophile location. @thm655321 has to answer what QNAP. (Mine is 453-Pro). I use mine for store music library, Roon backup, and yesterday I added Roon extensions in docker as the implementation in the SonicTransporter isn’t working for the time being. Andrew is working on a fix. 

 

Thanks for the replies.  The QNAP is the TS-421.

[zacho]

13 hours ago, Peter Avgeris said:

Hello!

Yes, I forgot to let you know.

Along with the Buffalos I had listened to the Ubiquiti router(s) as a plain switch(es).

Nenon had written the day before. He had listened to this thing.

 

Buffalo switches are a totally different story. They play miles better than Ubiquitis.

It seems that Ubiquiti is the best choice for routers and Buffalo the best for switches.

Imaging was far bigger with Buffalos, low & high frequencies were shockingly real. Ubiquiti was sounding a lot more harsh against Buffalos.

 

I have observed that the comments of Nenon are always in line with my own findings. He has gone through the path previously than me, so he already knows.

 

It is a real pity that Buffalos are discontinued and not available any more.

 

Go and get as many as you can, although I guess that the last pieces have already been completely vanished from the market. Either 8- or 16- or 24- ports, go grab them at any price. In quad version they offer a stratospheric sound quality. Last choice could be the commercial version of Melco although at a much increased price.

This pushed me over the line and made me purchase 2 of the BS-GS2008

[Exocer]

3 hours ago, bobfa said:

I really like my Gaia footers.  I have used them  on two different speakers with rather nice results.  For the Kii Three BXT I had to unscrew the inserts in the bases that the spikes screw into.   The change in imaging is really surprising.  

 

Note I did not use the carpet spikes I put down 3/4in MDF platforms to start with.  I am working on speaker placement.

 

 

At risk of being slightly OT, has anyone tried these with stand-mount speakers? 

 

Trying to understand if both steps are required for optimum vibration control for stand-mount speakers:

 

1. Isolation feet between the speaker and the top of the stand.

 

and

 

2. Isolation feet between the stand and the room floor.

 

Thanks

[Confused]

12 hours ago, BigAlMc said:

 

Brilliant 😂 

 

I came very close to buying the Townsend but went with the Gaia footers instead. Big increase in the SQ and focus of the image.

+1 from me for the Gaia’s.  I thought that they would do very little for me running KEF Blades with opposed drivers.  My dealer lent me their demo set, I liked them so much I just bought them.

[afrancois]

3 hours ago, Confused said:

+1 from me for the Gaia’s.  I thought that they would do very little for me running KEF Blades with opposed drivers.  My dealer lent me their demo set, I liked them so much I just bought them.

Same here, I use the Gaia’s on tile flooring. The difference is quite noticeable on my Sopra’s. Now I also have metal Isoaccoustics under my CD player and turntable. It all started with the pucks under my amplifiers 🙂

[afrancois]

9 hours ago, lmitche said:

Which Qnap? The Audiophile Qnaps are essentially the same as NUCs, often with some very noisy parts inside.

Correct. My QNAP 872 XT is essentially a computer with 8 spinning disks in my case  and 4 TB of SSD’s, 3 NIC’s. Nothing you want to have close to your HiFi. Mine is 20 meters away and connected through fiber. Running Roon on the QNAP. Sounds better than my NUC with AL. Dedicated VLAN for music!

[austinpop]

Experiments with Vibration...

 

...Control. Minds out of the gutter, please! 😎

 

I have not played with vibration control much in my system for a couple of reasons. First — due to my reviewing activities, things are always in a state of flux. Secondly, I've subconsciously dismissed this aspect as less important in a headphone system, even an admittedly high-end one like mine.

 

Well, Daiza time and place for everything, and all this Daiza talk piqued my curiosity, so it seemed like a good time to try something new. I wanted to do a proof of concept, so I did not want to spend $$$ on this experiment. I recalled the good results reported with IKEA bamboo butcher blocks as captured in this article: The Best Things in Life Are (Almost) Free: IKEA's Aptitlig Chopping Boards, so I tried this path. 

 

I bought 4 of these APTITLIG butcher blocks:

 

 

and for rigid footers, I found these hardwood birch 1" cubes on Amazon:

 

 

Pro tip regarding contactless shopping at IKEA in the US and Canada. Home delivery is backed up for weeks, but you can do contactless curbside "Click and Collect" at your local store. If — that is — you can find a slot! That's where this nifty site comes in: https://ikea-status.dong.st/. Yep, we may be the laughing stock of the world when it comes to tackling the pandemic, but we're still the best and brightest at shopping, baby.

 

My system is a hodge-podge spread over 2 vertical racks. I have my PSUs in one rack, and then my digital gear rests on a giant Tranquility Base UEF XL on top of another rack. I deployed the Ikea boards and birch footers under the following:

• power conditioner,
• 3 big PSUs.

    

 

My digital stack was unchanged, and looks like this. I have MiG 2.0 footers under my REF10 SE120. I can't get the DAVE to balance on MiG 2.0's, due to the weight of the cables, so I need to work on that. 

 

 

I realize I still have a ways to go to do this comprehensively across all my gear, but I thought this was a good start to evaluate if it made a difference.

 

Listening Results

 

For a total outlay of under USD 100, I'll say it makes a difference! It's not earth-shattering, but it is noticeable. Keep in mind that it took a good 10-15 minutes to put the blocks and footers in place, so rapid A-B was not possible. But what I am hearing is similar to what Larry @lmitche described a few pages ago with his Daiza platform. Transients are crisper, there's a general deblurring, and upper bass lines in particular are better defined and easier to follow.

 

While I'm sure something like a Daiza platform with Panzerholtz or Stillpoints footers will take this to the next level, I'm happy for now with this inexpensive hack!

 

[Confused]

Are the LED’s on your REF10 too bright for you?

[Superdad]

2 minutes ago, Confused said:

Are the LED’s on your REF10 too bright for you?

 

I've always hated blue LEDs, and the intense ones may be a health hazard:

http://texyt.com/bright+blue+leds+annoyance+health+risks