ISO REGEN Listening Impressions (kicked off with some measurements)

[Superdad]

11 hours ago, sig8 said:

In this case data is flowing from HDD to PC via Iso. Does Iso improves signal integrity in this scenario as well (I am not minding it, but just trying to understand)?

 

Glad to know you are enjoying the results.  While I am tempted to say they are strictly due to the galvanic isolation feature of the ISO REGEN, in the past some folks reported similar results with the original USB REGEN--which does not have any GI.

 

I is really hard to say why what you are doing works (not that it should not function, just that the reason for its sonic impact is unclear).  The improved signal integrity/impedance match from the REGENs is specifically to aid a DAC's USB input PHY and ground-plane.  Even that is hard to measure (at the DAC output; SI beforehand is obvious) but easy to hear--though John is making progress there  We make no claims beyond that.

 

Happy New Years everyone!  Thanks for making 2017 such a banner year for UpTone.   We promise that new product announcements (but none that supersede the terrific ISO REGEN) will be made very soon!

 

--Alex C.

[Superdad]

24 minutes ago, sandyk said:

Thank you once again for all the pleasure you have given me with this innovative little device that you sent me as a gift several years.

 

You are always very kind Mr. K.  

I wish you the best of heath and music for 2018. 

[Superdad]

On 1/6/2018 at 9:56 AM, Cbjb said:

A question regarding an upgrade path. I currently use a mini>dragonfly>Corning USB>generic usb adaptor>Regen>directstream dac. Was thinking about the iso Regen and LPS1 combination. Would an extra uspcb adaptor replacing the generic usb adaptor be of benefit or be redundant in this upgrade?

 

Hi:  Sorry to be slow in reply.  

I'm not entirely following your chain.  The Audioquest Dragonfly is a DAC, but of course you don't have a DAC at each end of the chain.   And does not the Corning Optical USB cable have full-size standard USB 'A' and USB 'B' plugs at its ends?

 

If the great length extension of the Corning is not needed, then you will get the best performance but going:

Computer > standard USB cable > ISO REGEN > USPCB Adapter > Directstream DAC.

 

To more generically answer regarding the USPCB A>B Adapter: There is nothing magical about it.  It is an impedance-controlled 4-layer PCB meant to be used in place of a USB cable (primarily to preserve signal integrity and impedance match between the ISO REGEN and the DAC). Adding it to end  or middle of some other cable/adapter chain it will have no beneficial effect.

 

Hope the above helps. 

 

Cheers,

--Alex C.

 

[Superdad]

2 hours ago, simorag said:

Hello everybody, especially @Superdad :-).

I have been a happy user of the ISOregen + LPS-1 + USPCB combo since several months now.

I have just got a Chord DAVE DAC, and I am not being able to use the IR in combination with it.

 

Hi Simone:

 

Thanks for posting.  It is puzzling since we do have quite a few other ISO REGEN>Chord DAVE users, so it should work.

 

Can you (or did you already) try having everything hooked up and powered on EXCEPT the ISO REGEN--and then apply power to the ISO REGEN last.

 

Clearly--since you have no trouble with your other DAC with the same computer--Windows is seeing the ISO REGEN, and the downstream port of the ISO REGEN is functioning properly.

 

The other thing to try is to completely uninstall the DAVE drivers.  Then with the ISO REGEN in place and everything powered on (again, for this I would power the ISO REGEN last), reinstall the DAC driver s/w.  This is actually your most likely solution as I think your Windows machine/DAVE drivers are not "seeing" the DAC through the path of the hub (ISO REGEN).

 

We look forward to reading the further results of your testing based on the above.

 

Cheers,

--Alex C.

[Superdad]

6 minutes ago, simorag said:

 

I am glad to report that the first of your suggestions (powering up the IR last) has worked fine!

 

I am very happy it did work, because I am now addicted to the goodies that the IR brings, I am glad to have them back :-)

 

 

That's great Simone!  ENJOY!

[Superdad]

3 hours ago, sdube said:

Fingers crossed and shall keep you informed, but what gives?

 

Hi Saurabh:

 

At this point, for your system, I really do not have any idea what is causing the variabilities you have been reporting.  We know it is not your sample of ISO REGEN, as we replaced it for you many months ago.

Something in your system--or even with other appliances and lighting on your electrical system--may have changed.  It is known that the Berkeley Alpha UBS>S/PDIF--with its floating/bus-powered USB input--is rather sensitive to even the slightest signaling disturbances.

 

Full galvanic isolation with USB can be a tricky thing.  So at this point, for your system, if the problem comes up again, you may have to live with using the ISO REGEN with the isolation defeated.  That aspect of the device still accounts for only about 15-20% of its overall "greatness" in my opinion.

 

Do keep us posted though. (And maybe look around at your system and household devices.  I seem to recall you saying that in your location you have some general power problems.)

 

Best,

--Alex C.

[Superdad]

A very nice gentleman in Oregon just sent me a review he wrote for another forum (https://www.audioaficionado.org), and he gave me permission to repost it here:

---------------------------

 

Test Driving the UpTone Audio ISO REGEN

---

Short-and-Sweet Summary for the TMI-averse: Bozhe moi!

Background: If you’ve followed the nearly year-long morphing of my laptop-based bedroom audio system from “secondary” to for-all-practical-purposes primary listening venue, you know that I’ve employed what amounts to a nickel-and-dime approach to tweaking it since treating its walls and corners with a bevy of GIK bass-trap and scatter-plate panels that have rendered it a visual Stonehenge. 

It’s an approach appropriate to a fixed-income-retiree’s budget, and each successive baby-step investment (in Wireworld Electra 7 power cords, a Walker-modded Luminous Audio passive line stage, and an Uptone Audio LPS-1 power supply for the REGEN USB-stream regenerator affixed to my TEAC digital-to-analog converter) has kicked the system’s perceived-to-these-ears sonic performance up several notches. 

I’d already achieved big performance gains with two enhancements to the entry-level purchased-in-2015 REGEN—the $35 USPCB A>B Adapter (far superior in sonic terms to a six-inch USB cable), followed late last year with Uptone’s LPS-1 linear power supply. The improvement evident with the latter was so huge (comparable to what I’d experienced with the upgraded-connector Electra 7s) that I wondered if the ISO REGEN with its upgraded hub chip and galvanic isolation could achieve a near-comparable performance bump. And you know what happens when an audiophile begins to “wonder”.

Here’s Uptone’s plain-English description of the ISO’s galvanic isolation function: The ISO REGEN creates a “moat” to isolate the power and signal grounds from computer/stream USB sources before your DAC. This “moat” blocks leakage currents and other low level interference from the source. What you should hear, Uptone adds, is more accurate bass, the unmasking of microdynamics, and more air and space around instruments and performers.

Only one way to find out if this was true, so I ordered one. It arrived a couple of days later via Two-Day Priority Mail.

Hookup:
As is suggested by the comparative size of its USB ports, the ISO REGEN is as diminutive as its entry-level sibling. The dip switch in the red area on the input side allows the user to switch galvanic isolation “on” or “off”. The default “down” position is “on”, and that’s how I leave it configured for normal operation. 

A semi-rigid USPCB A>B adapter is included as standard with the ISO REGEN. The “A” connector is inserted into the the regenerator’s output, the “B” into the TEAC DAC’s input (circled in red).

Installing the ISO REGEN leaves its chassis bottom suspended about 1.25” above the shelf top, with its only support the semi-rigid USB adapter inserted in the DAC. Not a good idea, in my view, given the downward force gravity and the ISO’s power supply and USB input cables exert on the device’s rear. So, as I’d done with the original REGEN, I cut a 1.25”-high piece of .75”-thick oak to support the ISO.

Listening: 
Right off the no-settling-time bat, the ISO REGEN demonstrated that it had earned its keep. And, with galvanic isolation enabled, a whole lot more.  

I added the “galvanic isolation enabled” qualifier because I hear a distinctly audible difference between the “on” and “off” modes. Don’t get me wrong. Even with the isolation function disabled, the sonic presentation with the ISO REGEN installed is more open and more transparent than what I hear with the original REGEN. I’d call it an incremental improvement. But enable galvanic isolation, and, with anything resembling a halfway-decent recording…

To begin the audition, I loaded Leonard Bernstein’s reading with the New York Philharmonic of the fourth movement of Bela Bartok’s Concerto for Orchestra (Columbia/Sony 16/44 rip, recorded 1959 at Brooklyn’s St. George Hotel) into JRiver and clicked “Play”. And shook my head almost immediately. (I also let fly with a juicy exclamation at that point, but since this is polite company…) 

Yes, the soundstage widened more than a tad to extend itself fully wall-to-wall, it deepened considerably farther behind the front wall boundary, the overall spatial sensation was even “airier”—by a considerable margin--than it had been following the Walker-mod Luminous Audio passive line stage upgrade, bass was tauter, and instrumental tonality struck me as purer—or, if you’d like, more accurate. But that was just for starters.

If you’ve glanced at my last couple of reviews, you know that I’ve alluded to the progressively increased sensation of being able to “reach in and touch someone” in the soundstage. Well, in listening to the Bartok with the ISO in place, that paradigm flipped. The performers—or rather their instruments--were reaching out and touching me. It’s not that their physical locations had moved forward. Their now more fully-fleshed-out images remained firmly rooted in the more expansive space they occupied. But the output of their instruments was, for want of a better word, energizing the listening room space (including, I suspect from the enhanced sense of in-room ambience, the scatter plates fronting my rear-corner GIK traps) in a manner that communicated “live” in spades.  

A couple of months ago, Serge initiated a thread asking if any of us had experienced a sensation tantamount to room pressurization initiated by a recording. If what hit me with the Bartok was not quite measurable in isobars, it was nonetheless way ahead of whatever’s in second place. 

A one-off? I next put on a rip of the Buddha Records CD reissue of Henry Mancini’s score for “Peter Gunn”, with Mancini conducting a not inconsiderable array of jazz talent. Originally released by RCA in 1959, this is a “Living Stereo” recording in the best sense. With the ISO REGEN installed I could feel Dick Nash’s trombone, Pete Candoli’s trumpet, and the key strikes of pianist Johnny Williams to a far greater degree than what I’d heard pre-ISO. More than that, I was darned near sitting in with them.

A round of now-more-dimensionally-layered choral embedded in the Emil Tchakarov-conducted “Polovtsian Dances with Choir” from Borodin’s Prince Igor (Sony 16/44 rip) continued the “good grief, they’re in the room” hot streak. And it’s kept rolling since during more than 100 hours of listening to rips and hi-rez downloads of classical, filmscores, jazz, opera, and vocals. Not that the ISO will render pan-potted-to-death studio recordings, Phase 4s, and the like step-into-them holograms, though in every one of those instances where I’ve listened to such the output is noticeably more resolved top-to-bottom across the frequency spectrum. 

I’d read a review of the ISO REGEN on another website where the reviewer stated that while he heard greater clarity and a more silent background with the unit in the loop, he sensed a diminution of pace, rhythm, and timing. That’s not the case here, as I haven’t detected a single PRaTfall from a recording fed through the ISO. Quite the opposite. The ISO delivers on its promise of unmasking microdynamics, and in my listening that achievement--and the concurrent unmasking of previously under-the-radar inner voicing, a sharper delineation of attack, sustain, and decay, and the fleshing out of instruments and voices energizing the space around them--facilitates a more enhanced perception of PRaT.

Conclusion: The ISO REGEN is enough of a transformative game-changer in the bedroom system that I don’t expect to muck around with any more upgrades there. But I have started to save my pennies for an ISO REGEN to install in the living-dining-room system.

__________________
Jim T., Corvallis, OR

Living-Dining Room: Win 10 AMD A12 laptop/JRiver Media Center 22 audio player, with music fed by 3TB external drive; Wireworld Starlight 7 USB cable; TEAC UD-501 DAC; upgraded SOTA Sapphire III; Origin Live Encounter Mk3c/Ortofon 2M Black, Graham Slee Era Gold V; McIntosh MR77; Oppo BDP-83; conrad johnson Premier 17LS (6922EH); conrad-johnson MF2500; Paradigm SE-3. Wireworld Equinox 6 ICs, Blue Jeans/Belden 5T00UP SC. PS Audio Dectet, Wireworld Electra 5/2 PCs (PR17LS, Dectet), Hubbell HBL5362 duplex outlet. GIK standard 244 and scatter-plate 244 and Monster traps.

Home Office: Win 10 PC/JRiver Media Center 22 audio player, with music fed by 4TB external drive; Uptone Audio REGEN via USPCB A>B Adapter; TEAC UD-501 DAC; Luminous Audio Axiom Mk. II passive line stage; c-j Sonographe SA250; Paradigm SE-1. WW Equinox 6 IC, Blue Jeans/Belden 5T00UP speaker cable, Shunyata Hydra PLC, Wireworld Electra 5^2 power cord from PLC to UD-501. 

Bedroom: Win 10 i7 laptop/JRiver Media Center 22 audio player; Wireworld Silver Starlight 7 USB cable to Uptone Audio ISO REGEN via USPCB A>B Adapter; Uptone Audio LPS-1 power supply; TEAC UD-501; Luminous Audio Axiom Mk. II Walker Mod passive line stage; c-j Sonographe SA250 w/Vampire input jacks and Cardas binding posts; stand-mounted Paradigm Studio 20 v.5. WW Eclipse 7 ICs; Blue Jeans/Belden 5T00UP speaker cable; Blue Circle Thingee FX 0e PLC; upgraded-connector WW Electra 7 power cords (from wall to PLC and from PLC to UD-501); PS Audio Power Port; Stillpoints Ultra Minis under laptop, LPS-1, and SA250; GIK 244, 244 Scatter Plate, 224, and Monster traps, DIY 4"-thick 12"x15" traps.

 

[Superdad]

1 hour ago, sdube said:

Whatever, with Isolation turned sound is super and no glitches for (almost) a week now. Fingers still crossed, but the sound from my new Margules Orpheus (ceramic driver speakers) is brilliant.

 

Nice set-up Saurabh!   

Very glad to know that things are working well for you.

--Alex C. 

[Superdad]

24 minutes ago, InegoMontoya said:

I love the way this company rolls.

 

Wow, thanks for ALL that! Really glad you are enjoying our products in your system.

 

As for how we roll, well, as Inego Montoya's nemesis would say, any other way for us would be inconceivable!  

 

[Superdad]

21 minutes ago, Bigbwb said:

will the mean well power supply that comes with the LPS-1 work safely to power the ISO Regen?

 

Most definitely!  

 

But just to be clear about the other direction: The 22W Mean Well SMPS that comes with the REGENs (and with the original UltraCap LPS-1) is not sufficient to power the new generation LPS-1.2., which requires the 36W charger we ship ship with it.

 

Have a great weekend everyone,

 

—Alex C.

[Superdad]

On 3/9/2018 at 12:15 PM, jimtranr said:

I'd add that after a few hundred hours' operation, the output I hear with the ISO REGEN/LPS-1 in place exhibits the ease and flow I associate with well-recorded analog, while maintaining the dynamic reach and punch of digital. I'm surprised at how liquid and venue-spacious ripped CDs (mostly large-ensemble classical and jazz) I'd considered marginal pre-IR/LPS 1 sound.

 

Gentleman Jim (), 

Thanks for posting your impressions.  Indeed it seems that there is lots of life and nuance--ease and flow as you put it--still to be found on the humble CD.  We are happy to be a contributor to folks getting more satisfaction from their music collection.

ENJOY!

 

--Alex C.

[Superdad]

22 minutes ago, str-1 said:

Sorry if this question has been asked before.  Can I safely run my ISO Regen off 5V if my dac (Chord DAVE) only needs the 5V to recognise a usb input?

 

Sure, that's fine.

 

The 4 ultra-ultra-low-noise LT3042 voltage regulators on the the downstream side of the ISO REGEN--powered by whatever external DC supply you have attached--at all set to 3.3V for the various circuit elements (2 for the USB 3.1 hub chip, 1 for the Crystek 575 clock, 1 for the downstream side of the isolator chip).  So 5V in, 3.3V out gives the regs plenty of drop to regulate in.

 

Now the 1-amp TI TPS7A4700 that we dedicate to producing very clean 5VBUS power does normally need to be feed more than 5V to regulate to 5V.  With just 5V in the VBUS output won't be regulated.  But two factors in your circumstance make this not a big deal:

 

a) You indicate your DAC really only needs VBUS for a handshake, so getting 4.9 volts instead of a full 5V is no big deal--as your DAC is not presenting much(any?) load pulling that unregulated voltage down lower;

 

b) I seem to recall that you are using one of our UltraCap supplies to power the ISO REGEN, and since that is already VERY clean power, it is not a big deal if it essentially is passed through for the VBUS.

 

All that said, please remember that the ISO REGEN itself does need 5VBUS coming into its USB 'B' input jack.  It sips about 15mA of VBUS to power the upstream side of the isolator chip.  (And that is where the 5th LT3042 is used--to make 3.3V for that side of the isolator instead of using the chip's noisy internal 3.3V regulator as others do.)  Even if your DAC does not need VBUS power to operate, the ISO REGEN does. (That's a common question we receive, so I mention it here.)

 

Best,

--Alex C.

[Superdad]

4 hours ago, RamDawg said:

Alex- is there a longer replacement cord for the one between the ISO Regen and the LPS 1 so I can move the LPS 1 further from my devises?  My LPS 1 that powers my IR is now sitting on my small desk along with my Concero HD dac and Schiit Jot. It seems the LPS 1 may be causing some interference making my headphones way brighter than normal. I cannot move the LPS 1 off of my desk with the lack of cord length and where the IR is positioned now. Please advise.  I am powering the Concert HD with a aqvox USB power supply.  I am running the power from the LPS 1 to the IR at 5V now after the aqvox install. I also have the galvanic iso off at the IR. This never has never worked in my system for any longer than 30 minutes before losing signal. 

 

Hi Paul:

 

While we offer (not on our web site yet) our Oyaide/Belden 15awg star-quad shielded DC cables, the 1.5m length we stock always has a 5.5mm x 2.5mm plug at at least one end (for JS-2)($75).  The one we stock with 5.5mm x 2.1mm plugs both ends is just 50cm (20-inches, $70)--shorter than the 27-inch stock 16awg coax cord you have.

Ghent Audio in China offers a DC Cable made with lighter gauge Canare star-quad and the lighter Oyaide plugs--and they sell a 1.5m length at a very reasonable price (http://www.ghentaudio.com/part/dc01.html).

 

Another way to go would be to get some of these screw-terminal>barrel CCTV DC plugs (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01ER6QWAY) and some 16-18awg per conductor wire pairs and make your own to whatever length you wish.

 

With regards to being able to use the ISO REGEN with galvanic isolation activated, please send me a message--through our web site contact page please--with some details of your system: Computer>USB cable>ISO REGEN>DAC>Preamp.  

I suspect you either need to do some additional grounding, or that your Aqvox USB power injector is somehow making the GI difficult.  Have you tried setting the LPS-1 to 7V and letting the ISO REGEN's 5VBUS output power your DAC?

 

Also, you mention the Schiit Jotunheim.  I am guessing you are not using it with its USB DAC input module (likely the Concero HD is a much better DAC).

 

We'll get this sorted out for you!

 

Best,

--Alex C.

[Superdad]

14 hours ago, RamDawg said:

Also, I had read in this forum that if the dac is powered separately from the USB connection to the IR (which the Aqvox unit provides), the LPS 1 can be set to 5V to power the IR. With testing even the 3.3V setting is powering the IR. Please advise what's optimal with my setup. I just switched back to 7V for the time being. 

 

7 volts is fine.

[Superdad]

37 minutes ago, sdube said:

Golly, the drop-outs came back after I switched the amplifier onto its separate, dedicated circuit (itself occasioned by the Audience Power Conditioner tripping again and again):  first I switched the isolation off of course, but since this morning have it back on again: only two failures in over an hour. Might try the grounding trick again.

 

Saurabh:  Given all the various electrical issues you seem to have had at your location (power conditioner tripping?) over the years, and the sensitivity  of your Berkeley Alpha USB (if I recall), I am not sure that reliably running the ISO REGEN with full galvanic isolation will ever be possible for you.  Very sorry about that, but you can still enjoy its benefits as an über-REGEN. 

[Superdad]

On 3/16/2018 at 11:10 AM, Excommunication said:

I have a problem with my ISO REGEN. Whenever I have the IR connected to my microRendu to feed either my Devialet or my Mutec MC-3+ USB, Roon does not identify the microRendu as an end point. Without the IR in the chain, sometimes Roon is a bit shaky and is not finding the MR, but a restart of Roon identifies my microRendu quickly. However whenever the microRendu is feeding the IR, it looses contact with Roon within ~6 hours, so for a session of listening the dropout is not a problem. But the next playing session I need to switch on my Devialet, select USB-input, and after that remove the power from my microRendu, and then insert the power cable to the microRendu, wait, and then have it shown up in Roon. It feels like the IR is in the middle meddling and not always having the contact between the MR and the DAC. On the fault returnred IR unit I ran from the computer, and in those cases it was also a bit flaky to identify the DAC. 

 

Hi:

Leaving aside that microRendu does not support "hot-swapping" of USB hubs--meaning the hub (ISO REGEN) must be present and powered on at the time the microRendu boots--let's look at some angles.

 

Duesto the strange vagaries of providing true galvanic isolation with USB (and the Silanna isolator chip we use is not 100%perfect),

it is likely that you have a mild grounding issue in your system (not uncommon).  It is a bit challenging to explain—but sometimes easy to fix once identified--so please let’s just start by putting the red switch of the ISO REGEN into the up (“ON”) position and then letting it play for a while.  I think you will find that stoppage/disconnection will cease.

Please try that and report back.  If you would like more detail—as well as a look at what I suggest (to allow you to put the switch back in the full isolation position assuming you find that defeating it works), then you can read this post:

https://www.computeraudiophile.com/forums/topic/31877-iso-regen-listening-impressions-kicked-off-with-some-measurements/?do=findComment&comment=714912

 

Thanks and regards,

--Alex C.
 

[Superdad]

9 minutes ago, Excommunication said:

This is a keeper, as the last dealbreaker is gone, if this good performance continues.

 

Hey, that's great!  Hope you continue to enjoy the ISO REGEN in your music system.  Just let us know if we can be of further assistance at any time.

 

--Alex C.

[Superdad]

19 minutes ago, Excommunication said:

You just gave me an idea to switch out the USPCB entirely and add my Nordost Blue Heaven. I did that 3 minutes ago and likewise the music plays, and mR was found effortlessly. We might have pin pointed the problem in this instance, ie the USPCB between the ISO REGEN and the DAC.

 

Actually, I think you will find the issue was not the USPCB between the ISO REGEN and DAC; Rather I bet that the ISO REGEN did not take kindly to having the QED Reference USB cable between the microRendu and the ISO REGEN.  Try putting the QED cable before the ISO REGEN again to see if the problem returns.  Then you may have an answer.  

[Superdad]

3 minutes ago, Em2016 said:

So in this case both the USB DAC and the computer USB audio source are connected to the same #1 ground, so the ISO REGEN's ground isolation will do nothing? I know the ISO REGEN does a lot of great things other than isolation (signal integrity etc), but just sticking to isolation.

 

Easiest way to know if the ISO REGEN's galvanic isolation is still in effect is to simply take any multimeter/continuity checker and touch the probes to the USB shells of both the input and the output jacks of the ISO REGEN.  If you don't get a beep then the GI has not been defeated. 

[Superdad]

4 minutes ago, ambre said:

What happens if you don't use the AC safety ground in a wall outlet. The   "third pin" so called the "earth" connection.

Does dis help avoiding / help avoiding leakage?

 

Leakage is still there!   To quote what John said:

"Leakage current comes from a power supply (any AC connected power supply), it is created from the hot and neutral and goes through the negative pin of the supply. It has nothing inherently to do with the safety ground (third pin)."

[Superdad]

3 hours ago, bds3151 said:

When the IsoRegen is in the chain with Libreelec Kodi 17.6 in and Intel NUC, sound stops when I switch between Exodus and PSVue. It doesn't happen every time but very often. I can restore audio by dropping power, disconnecting and reconnecting the usb cable, or reinstalling my RUR in place of the Uptone. I have tried the ground switch and grounding the usb output to no avail. The Recovery is rock solid in place of the IsoRegen. Any ideas?

 

Not surprising.  LibreELEC, being a Linux variant, does not support "hot-swapping" of USB hubs, so connection is lost when you switch inputs.

 

The original USB REGEN and the W4S Recovery cheat a bit as far as the USB VBUS standard--in that both devices maintain 5VBUS output regardless of computer-side status, and their USB2.0 hub chips are not changing state much.  The ISO REGEN on the other hand, with its USB3.1 hub chip and Silanna isolator before it, must conform more closely to USB-spec standards for VBUS turn-on and overall state conditions (it's complicated, and even I get confused when John tries to explain it to me, hence my less than precise explanation/translation).

 

If I recall, the solution is either to just power of/on the ISO REGEN, or have everything powered up and reboot the Linux box.  Plugging/unplugging of USB cables should not be required.

[Superdad]

1 hour ago, bds3151 said:

Just so I this is clear, I'm switching between add ons in Kodi and not physically changing inputs. So this is a Linux issue that the OS is not usb 3 compatible ? Not much of a "solution" to reboot every time or power off devices. 

 

Oh, I thought you were switching sources or something with hardware.  I really don't know Linux well or what might be going on in s/w to interrupt the connection.  Still likely some interruption during the s/w change. Some DACs are quite sensitive to that and will drop the connection.  What DAC are you using?

[Superdad]

17 minutes ago, bds3151 said:

I wonder though if it may be hardware related with the Libreelec NUC as it only has 3.0 usb ports. The Win 10 has a combination of 2.0/3.0 with the DAC being plugged into a 2.0 port. 

 

Nah, I think it is a Linux s/w thing...  But keep experimenting and let us know what you figure out. 

Thanks,

--Alex C.

[Superdad]

6 hours ago, bds3151 said:

The dropouts continued with Win10. Well, the solution to this issue was simple, drop the input voltage to 5.5v. I was feeding it 8v and apparently the heat was causing the TPS7A4700 in the Iso to protection mode.

 

Very glad to hear that you got it working well.

But I am not sure that I agree with your diagnosis of the cause. While the Mojo does draw some USB 5VBUS power, I don't think the Modi draws much.  And even with VBUS current being drawn from the ISO REGEN, we have had no problems with it being powered with up to 9V (though at 9V with a DAC drawing a LOT of VBUS current the ISO REGEN will run quiet warm/hot).  The TI TPS7A4700 is a 1 amp regulator, so you could not be remotely near putting it into overcurrent protection mode.  

 

Cheers,

--Alex C.

[Superdad]

Sorry, but you are incorrect about the regulator.  The PCB and the case are the heatsink for it.  We have tested the ISO REGEN, powered by 9V, powering the 100% bus-powered iFi micro iDSD DAC/headphone amp (a 480mA VBUS draw)--with 768kHz audio data running through a USB analyzer for 3 hours--with zero bits dropped.  I can send you photos of the set up.

 

If you feel that your unit is defective, you are welcome to return it to us for testing.  Please contact us directly to arrange such.

 

Thanks,

--Alex C.