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

[MarcelNL]

9 hours ago, Lebouwsky said:

The Jcat Femto in my server used to be powered by the 5v sata output of the hdplex dc-atx convertor. Now it is being powered by an Uptone LPS-1. I want to upgrade the standard dc cable by a Neotech upocc 7N made by Ghent. It could sit right on top of the server case, close to the usb card, so a 30cm dc cable would be enough. Then again, I could also put it further away, lengthening the DC cable but reducing it's EMI influance.

 

May I ask what's the general consensus on this matter? Perhaps I'm overthinking this, let my wallet decide and go for the shortest length, some advice would be apriciated.

not sure about consensus, but in general I do not stack equipment *because of interference/EMI), so I'd go for a slightly longer cable rather than stacking the PSU on top of the server.

 

[MarkusBarkus]

...I have a strict "No Stack" policy, FWIW. Cheers...

[muski]

On 12/20/2022 at 10:29 AM, Always.Learning said:

The subject of this post is another mod from Sean Jacobs. Sean makes a small capacitor board that fits very neatly into the space formerly occupied by DAVE’s switch mode power supply. The idea is to lower impedance even further than the ARC6. The cost of the board is $500 and @Nenon helps put these together for Sean in the U.S. and sells them in the U.S. It requires some minor surgery on your DAVE but no soldering or other special skills. 

Great post, thank you. Can the Sean Jacobs capacitor board for the DAVE be purchased independently of the ARC6 -DC4?

[Always.Learning]

@muski:  I am almost certain that one needs to buy a Sean Jacobs power supply before or with the caps board. One reason is that it cannot be installed in the DAVE without first removing DAVE's original SMPS power supply. Another is that Sean Jacobs, and his U.S. helper, @Nenon, are doing this mainly as a service to existing DC4 ARC6 owners. I will say again, however, that the ARC6 is just incredible. 

[m.i.c.k.e.y]

Farad of Super3 has this Power Mod Assembly for Dave with connections to three power supplies of your choice (Dave makes use of 3 voltages): https://www.faradpowersupplies.com/product/dc-cable/level-2-silver-chord-dave-modification-assembly-80cm-gx16-4-to-molex-connector/

[erwinmitg]

Hello everyone, 

 

I have a question:

 

I installed a few time ago a solarflare sfn8522 in my AudioPC. 

That brought me really vorward, soundwise. Very good!

 

But is there anybody, who managed to supply it with seperate power? 

It still get it's power from the motherboard - not so good, as we all know. 

 

Any ideas? 

 

Have a nice day... 

Erwin 

[abase]

Happy New Year to all -
..the thread is very long and honestly I don't know if it is the correct place for my statement.
I updated my chaine with a melco s100 and PinkFaun update (UltraOCXO)
The work was done by PinkFaun Netherland...

My chain now:

MikroTik CRS305-1G-4S+IN, Intell Nuc over ADOT Media Converter to MikroTik, WAN over  ADOT Media Converto to Mikro TIK, glas fiber to SOT-10g, glas fiber to Melco s100 with Pink Faun Ultra OcxO, SOTM CAT7 to sotm sms-200 ultra neo, Tellurium SilverDiamond Digital-USB-cabel to Holo Audio Spring DAC, to spl director mk2, SPL S800 (bridged), Rockport Atria 1 - Plixir linear power supplys with statement dc cabel

 

[veggiefella]

Just a heads up for everyone using the Planet MGB-TLX transceiver modules... Out of curiosity, I decided to try the Planet MGB-TL40 transceiver modules to compare, I found them to be significantly better than the MGB-TLX. They are only a little more expensive, $8 more. Try them out, I would love to read your impressions. I don't know if playing around with other Planet modules would yield even better results. If you do decide to try others, I would love to read what you have to say. Remember that you do have to let the modules burn in a couple days to obtain best results.

I would also like to say that I have extremely great results using Audiophool's (Hans van den Barg) upgraded Meraki switches (basic + OXCO clock) and linear power supplies. I bought 2, one Meraki at the source coming into the house and then fiber run to the other Meraki where my system resides.

[BOBO]

out of curiosity, has anyone here focused on the Bios of the motherboard ?  there are a lot of hidden settings in the bios that can`t be edited normally, lots of power saving stuff, spread spectrum stuff, sensors, controllers that can be turned off.

[drjimwillie]

10 hours ago, BOBO said:

out of curiosity, has anyone here focused on the Bios of the motherboard ?  there are a lot of hidden settings in the bios that can`t be edited normally, lots of power saving stuff, spread spectrum stuff, sensors, controllers that can be turned off.

I would love to hear more about it.

What motherboard are you using?

 

Are these settings that are universal and can be modified in most systems?  
 

I am building a DIY server with the ASUS Sage motherboard. There are others doing the same. I would be interested in any information that can help with the set up of this server.
I am looking forward to it when we all start sharing our experiences optimizing this hardware and software. 
 

Thank you 

[BOBO]

at the moment i`m just using my gaming setup. mobo is an aorus gaming 5, its quite a bad mobo, very few settings are shown since it comes with a very bad bios , even among the hidden settings there is no way for me to set my BCLK to be fixed, it`s always variable.

 

 other motherboards might have a lot more settings/options than mine, keep in mind that you have to go through them 1 by 1 and see if you like or not what it does to the sound:

 

here`s a few of the hidden settings that i`m messing with, i have noticed though that other mobos have them shown in the bios by default and not have them hidden like on mine:

 

Native ASPM
PECI
ACPI Sleep State
Enable Hibernation
DMI Max Link Speed
DMI ASPM
DMI Link ASPM Control
AMT BIOS Features
Interrupt Redirection Mode Selection
Thermal Monitor
Enhanced C-states
Energy Performance Gain
Processor Thermal Device
Package C-State Demotion
Package C-State Un-demotion
Package C State Limit
HW Notification

ASF support
PCI Latency Timer
PCI-X Latency Timer
PCI Express Clock Gating
Legacy IO Low Latency
PCH Cross Throttling
LPDDR Thermal Sensor
PCI Delay Optimization
Pcie Pll SSC

[drjimwillie]

How did you know to find the hidden settings and how do you find them? 

 

How do you know what they do?
 

I commend your patience for trying each one to see if you like the sound.  
 

which ones did you like best and how did they change the sound. Are most of them on off or do they have a range to work with? 
 

I remember earlier in this thread, there was a lot of bios experimentation. You can probably search for it.

 

I remember a couple of people bricked their computers by modifying the wrong setting,  and then they became irreversibly nonresponsive. 😳

[BOBO]

i use "SCEWIN" to export/import the settings, then i just googled to get info about the ones that i found interesting.

i`m still testing the settings so i need more time to provide info about the changes to the sound.

 

the majority of the settings are just enable/disable, some have other values that you can change, you`ll see the options that can be modified.

from what i know, the software just modifies the current bios profile and not the default settings so if something happens you can just clear the CMOS, i did mess with many settings and i did encounter issues with the pc not booting but i just cleared the CMOS and it got fixed.

 

 

[rafa]

Hi guys, whats the best DDR4 non-ECC if not APACER? Any suggestions?

 

I was thinking to try some Hynix 2666, maybe Crucial 2400 on Micron chips?

[rafa]

Anybody tried Samsung ones?

[MarcelNL]

I heard folks say that Hynix can be good, the Apacer are using Samsung chips...why not go for the kill and order Apacer rather than having to work your way through several types of RAM?

 

 

[rafa]

15 hours ago, MarcelNL said:

why not go for the kill and order Apacer

My friend who owns Apacers will let me to test them in my system so I will know them.

 

15 hours ago, MarcelNL said:

rather than having to work your way through several types of RAM?

I like collect experience and knowledge

 

So far Crucial on Micron chips (2400 slowed down to 2133) improved SQ against GSkill. But they needs few days to "burn in"

[rafa]

On 10/6/2023 at 7:34 PM, MarcelNL said:

I heard folks say that Hynix can be good, the Apacer are using Samsung chips...why not go for the kill and order Apacer rather than having to work your way through several types of RAM?

 

 

So I found ones which I compared with Apacer directly and I like them more then Apacer :)

It is Samsung M391A1K43DB2-CWE DDR4-3200 ECC. The sound is similar but Samsung even more liquid and more come on high mids.

 

I tested only 5 different RAM modules and I thing was worth to do that.

Micron chips sounds the worst. Very sharp and digital. Most far away from anolog sound.

Hynix nothing special but better than above.

Standard Samsung UDIMMS nonECC I would say the best from the cheap ram.

[VegArchie]

On 11/15/2018 at 12:57 PM, austinpop said:

Science Experiment: Audiolinux Extreme on Zenith SE

 

Listening Impressions

 

Since I compared so many configurations, here's a handy table to keep track:

 

Config #	Nickname	Music Server				Player/Renderer
		HW	OS	SW	Music location	HW	OS	SW
1	SE native	Zenith SE	InnuOS	LMS	SSD	Zenith SE	InnuOS	squeezelite
2	SE RoonServer Local	Zenith SE	InnuOS	RoonServer	SSD	Zenith SE	InnuOS	RoonServer
3	SE RoonServer Remote Core	Dell XPS 8700	Audiolinux RAM	RoonServer	NAS	Zenith SE	InnuOS	RoonServer
4	SE RoonBridge Remote Core	Dell XPS 8700	Audiolinux RAM	RoonServer	NAS	Zenith SE	InnuOS	RoonBridge
5	AL-SE RoonBridge Remote Core	Dell XPS 8700	Audiolinux RAM	RoonServer	NAS	Zenith SE	Audiolinux RAM	RoonBridge
6	AL-SE RoonServer Remote Core	Dell XPS 8700	Audiolinux RAM	RoonServer	NAS	Zenith SE	Audiolinux RAM	RoonServer
7	AL-SE RoonServer Local	Zenith SE	Audiolinux RAM	RoonServer	SSD	Zenith SE	Audiolinux RAM	RoonServer

 

Wrap Up

 

In terms of SQ, my rankings in reference to the numbered configs in the table would be:

•  7 > 5 > 1 > 4 > 2

 

 

 

5 years later, how would you rate this setup compared to what is now available? What are you currently using? Would you recommend to a current Innuos ZENith MK3 owner this AudioLinux ram option for their Innuos ROON core+endpoint?

 

 

[austinpop]

On 12/28/2023 at 8:55 AM, VegArchie said:

 

 

5 years later, how would you rate this setup compared to what is now available? What are you currently using? Would you recommend to a current Innuos ZENith MK3 owner this AudioLinux ram option for their Innuos ROON core+endpoint?

 

 

 

Apologies, I can't answer this. I've moved on from the Innuos platform, so have no idea to what extent InnuOS and their player have evolved in SQ, relative to AudioLinux or Euphony. But it looks from the other thread that you posted that you tried this experiment and generated some interesting findings!

 

As to what I'm currently using, this article details my current setup: 

 

[VegArchie]

1 hour ago, austinpop said:

 

Apologies, I can't answer this. I've moved on from the Innuos platform, so have no idea to what extent InnuOS and their player have evolved in SQ, relative to AudioLinux or Euphony. But it looks from the other thread that you posted that you tried this experiment and generated some interesting findings!

 

As to what I'm currently using, this article details my current setup: 

 

If I'm reading correctly, you eventually changed your music server to the Taiko Extreme. How did this compare to what you had before?

[lmitche]

People say bad things come in threes. Sometimes good things come in threes as well. This fall, three long anticipated technology upgrades became available:

• Audiolinux support for custom kernels was extended to include ZEN4 specific builds
• Next generation PCIE5 NVME drives capable of write speeds of 9,500 MB/s and 1400K, Teamgroup Z5 is used here
• New 500 watt DC-ATX power supply from Hdplex replacing the prior 400 watt model

 

On my AMD ZEN4 build, individually each of these upgrades bring significant sound quality enhancement with improved transparency and a lower noise floor.

• Support for the ZEN4 micro-architecture on Audiolinux reduces CPU power consumption over the default kernel by 10% as measured by turbostat. Likewise, the reduced volatility of current demand is audible.
• The faster service times associated with the PCIE5 NVME drive reduces the length of time for the frequent and bursty write operations from music players during playback by a factor of three over PCIE3 drives. This shortens the noise window from these operations and is audible.
• The new HDPLEX 500W HiFi DC-ATX brings an immediately noticeable drop in the noise floor with SQ that further improves over the next 48 hour period as it opens up. It also accommodates power sources in a wider voltage range of 12V-48VDC enabling use with the unregulated power supplies favored by so many here.

 

In combination these components move sound quality to a new level revealing new details and clarity across musical genres. Highly recommended!

 

 

[austinpop]

On 1/3/2024 at 7:54 PM, VegArchie said:

If I'm reading correctly, you eventually changed your music server to the Taiko Extreme. How did this compare to what you had before?

 

Hi VegArchie,

 

I've written about this on this thread, so anything I say now would be repeating myself. If you use the search bar above and search back on this thread (topic) for "update" and limit the search to my user id, I think you'll find them easily enough. Updates prior to 2020 are also indexed in the first post of this thread. I stopped maintaining that index after that point. I can't swear this link will work in perpetuity, but this should give you the search I described in this paragraph: https://audiophilestyle.com/search/?q=update&quick=1&item=30376&type=forums_topic&author=austinpop&sortby=newest&search_and_or=and

 

Here is the post where I shared my impressions about the Extreme and my previous server: https://audiophilestyle.com/forums/topic/30376-a-novel-way-to-massively-improve-the-sq-of-computer-audio-streaming/?do=findComment&comment=1073467

 

 

Just to summarize my steps since I owned the Innuos ZENith SE, I progressed through:

• a low-power Pentium NUC endpoint running Audio Linux
• a Core i7 NUC NUC7i7DNBE/Plato X7D endpoint running Audio Linux and then Euphony
• an i7-8700T custom standalone music server running Euphony
• an i7-8700K custom standalone music server running Euphony
• to finally the Taiko Extreme.

[Downtheline]

1 hour ago, austinpop said:

finally the Taiko Extreme

Is olympus next?

[ray-dude]

Mine is ordered.  Looking forward to doing the full comparison with Extreme (and sharing learnings from this next step of the journey here)