USB audio cracked... finally!

[manisandher]

Enough. Let's get back to USB audio...

 

Mani.

[jabbr]

21 minutes ago, Speed Racer said:

If you and all the folks that gave a reputation to this post don't see that, you are deluding yourselves.

 

Excuse me. Go back and read the post (which I gave reputation to). Mani is very upfront and transparent about his personal impressions and opinions. That is his right. It is also my right to interpret his statements as I see fit. Its my right to interpret any subjective impressions as I see fit, as well as interpret the veracity of objective measurements as I see fit.

[PeterSt]

Hi Rick - I wonder, did you just receive a couple of notifications ?

[Speed Racer]

40 minutes ago, jabbr said:

 

Excuse me. Go back and read the post (which I gave reputation to). Mani is very upfront and transparent about his personal impressions and opinions. That is his right. It is also my right to interpret his statements as I see fit. Its my right to interpret any subjective impressions as I see fit, as well as interpret the veracity of objective measurements as I see fit.

 

As it is my right to do so as well......

[rickca]

1 hour ago, PeterSt said:

Hi Rick - I wonder, did you just receive a couple of notifications ?

I think I recently got some notifications that I should have gotten yesterday.  

[PeterSt]

LOL (depending how one reads that)

[rickca]

I mean they were notifications about responses that I already saw yesterday.  I'm saying I think the notifications are late.

[rickca]

On 7/24/2017 at 7:42 AM, PeterSt said:

I hope we can stay on-topic !

 Thanks for your very helpful answer.  I don't know where you come up with names like Blaxius and B'ASS, but that is also off topic.

[PeterSt]

38 minutes ago, rickca said:

Thanks for your very helpful answer.  I don't know where you come up with names like Blaxius and B'ASS, but that is also off topic

 

For such an on-topic topic (thread) ? Some side steps are allowed, maybe.

 

Like with Lush, just envision what the name would express for sound. This is really what I try to put in the names and usually what comes to mind within seconds after a first listen.

 

Blaxius : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blaxploitation with a wink to underground Jazz or something.

It is about how such Jazz emphasizes the bass (I think synth or at least electrical).

 

B'ASS : Bad Ass Bass.

At concerts I got intrigued by how electrical bass players are able to produce their fat bass sound, which is unfair because they have their own amplification and merely loudspeaker and how in the world to mimic this at home.

Well, add a few amperes to a DAC Gain stage and control that speaker (driver) !

 

Both must be seen in relationship with the all so fragile sound the NOS1a carries and which is the opposite of this. So the art has been really to combine the two phenomena : fragile airy sound with really punchy bass (or fundament in everything, as we may say over here).

 

 

 

 

 

[PeterSt]

59 minutes ago, rickca said:

I'm saying I think the notifications are late.

 

I did that.

So what I wanted to work, worked.

Secret.

[elcorso]

5 hours ago, PeterSt said:

 

Hi Roch,

 

I assume you mean the customs underway to the rainforest ? I mean, your Lush was delivered on the 21st just outside the rainforest. 

 

Regards,

Peter

 

Yes, the Lush arrived on time to my forwarding address in Miami, Fl.  No problems there and the same day was sent to my Rainforest, where it is stalled by customs formalities. But that's normal here. Such is life in the tropics where the banana grows 

 

Best,

 

Roch

[Jud]

11 hours ago, elcorso said:

Such is life in the tropics where the banana grows 

 

But you have bananas!

[PeterSt]

Dear people,

 

I'm afraid that today has to be the last day of "high service" so to speak, were it about working at full speed and full time on USB Cables.

 

I envision that all orders from now are queued and dealt with one day per week with the hope for you that the backlog does not grow and grow.

 

I explicitly like to thank you all for your trust and in the end the orders.

Regards,

Peter

[bibo01]

On 7/24/2017 at 11:57 PM, mmerrill99 said:

Yes that would be excellent - is the broadband radio receiver JK uses a difficult build & the technique to connect to scope? Maybe if that was detailed some others could do the same measurements.

 

My post of JKs measurements of USB cables got no interest here so maybe there isn't a desire to do these type of measurements?

Unfortunately, right now the device that JK used is at Fermilab in Chicago. I doubt that it is easy to replicate it, although he has a simpler, homemade one at the moment.

He told me that he will let me know when he gets it back. So I will wait for possible measurements of Lush and eventually Clarixa..

 

[mmerrill99]

3 minutes ago, bibo01 said:

Unfortunately, right now the device that JK used is at Fermilab in Chicago. I doubt that it is easy to replicate it, although he has a simpler, homemade one at the moment.

He told me that he will let me know when he gets it back. So I will wait for possible measurements of Lush and eventually Clarixa..

 

Thanks, look forward to any measurements

[elcorso]

7 hours ago, Jud said:

 

But you have bananas!

 

Hi Jud,

 

Bananas, pineapples (it is growing a lot) and all the crops that pollute the environment. I'm scared for our incredible Rainforest.
Coffee, our traditional and source of income for the country and my family since 1890 is stagnant. I am no longer in any crop, only with (Lush) Bonsais.

 

These days the main source of income for my country is tourism, which although they say it is an industry without chimneys, I have my doubts ...

 

Best,

 

Roch

[fas42]

On 26/07/2017 at 7:55 AM, PeterSt said:

B'ASS : Bad Ass Bass.

At concerts I got intrigued by how electrical bass players are able to produce their fat bass sound, which is unfair because they have their own amplification and merely loudspeaker and how in the world to mimic this at home.

Well, add a few amperes to a DAC Gain stage and control that speaker (driver) !

 

I've looked with quite some bemusement at people who want "impressive bass", and add staggering numbers of monster drivers to get this - the result, to me, is a blubbering mess, which is miles from anything that one hears live ... capable amplifiers and stable, conventionally sized speakers will reproduce the visceral impact that the bass instruments or sounds in the track can deliver.

 

I have a ZZ Top CD from their heavy use of synthesizer years, which has very intense, subterranean bass effects in it - I have yet to hear another system do a decent job of getting this right, no matter how impressive their subwoofers appear to be.

 

[PeterSt]

6 hours ago, fas42 said:

I've looked with quite some bemusement at people who want "impressive bass", and add staggering numbers of monster drivers to get this - the result, to me, is a blubbering mess, which is miles from anything that one hears live ...

 

Maybe come look over here then ? 

 

For starters, subwoofers are out of order. They only distort (and not the least at it). So my speakers (of my own design - see sig) produce no audible distortion at 89dBSPL and 19Hz. 100Hz - 19Hz is +/- 0.5dB (and not any useless +/-3dB number - do you know how much audible even 1dB is in that regions ?).

I am pretty sure that no speaker exists that can do this, as no speaker is tuned like this. So we made this like it was a DAC (by THD numbers). And "no distortion" means that when you play this 89dBSPL at 19Hz, you hear totally nothing. And not because nothing moves so be careful that your hair remains in position.

 

Notice the 1/12 oct and thus hardly any smoothing in this plot.

 

The 19Hz is because this (or 20Hz) really happens with "ambient roll". Happens in a church, but also happens in a larger room and when the kickdrum is used. Always. Sadly many CDs are 30Hz highpassed because they origin from LP where this was necessary (or the needle would jump out). Also, all is matched so a kickdrum will be rendered as a real kickdrum, which is about feeling it in the stomache. Do this with 6dB or so less and it doesn't work any more, or do this with distortion which starts at ~25 Hz and it also doesn't work any more (you won't be hearing a real kickdrum).

 

While the speaker is tuned to show undistored 19Hz at 89dBSPL, it does the same at 27Hz but then 120dBSPL. Thus, when no frequencies are present below 27Hz, again nothing audibly distorts but now at 120dBSPL. Try it in your room and see what happens with Stanley Clarke et al. 

 

The speaker also exhibits 118dB efficiency which could be a world record. And might you look into the link in my sig, the amplifiers are built in there (4 per speaker).

 

So today I am selling speakers.

Anything else ?

haha

 

 

[PeterSt]

Small addition to my previous post :

 

The 67.74 you see in the left margin says nothing. It is just a (dB) number relative to the setting of the plot. But if you shift the vertical line (tagged 19 (Hz)) to the left, you can envision the horizontal line going down. Now, the line is at the average of the +/- 0.5dB and thus if you drop it 3dB will be at a point of +/- 3dB. So the 67.74 will be 64.74 and the horizontal line will show just under 17Hz.

So the speaker does undistored 17Hz when rated "+/- 3dB" which would be the normal rating as how every manufacturer does it. But as I said, this is useless and when it would really work like that at these levels and you'd sweep very slowly then the differences you will hear will be crazy. It's 6dB in total !!

 

All in other words ... I try ...

[Speed Racer]

Let's see. So far you have the best DAC in the world, the best USB decrapifier in the world, the best USB cable in the world, and now the best speakers in the world.

 

Yet, somehow, I am not surprised......

[PeterSt]

6 minutes ago, Speed Racer said:

Yet, somehow, I am not surprised......

 

OK, apologies. That is now how I want to come across. The message could be, though, that once you start to have a very good reference of a few elements, you can build up from there. "Good" for me is always "neutral" and I guess it is supposed to work like that or otherwise not everybody may like the product. So it shouldn't be subjective to what I hear and like myself, as long as I am able to judge for neutrality.

 

So say that you were able to "build" that top notch system and which indeed is the most neutral, how difficult would you think it is to create a good USB cable from there ?

With some creativity and knowledge this is not difficult at all. Not any more.

 

I think I must say that all starts with the D/A converter. And that was made to be 100% neutral (in the long run this means that completely nothing is allowed to sound the same or show a flavor). So once you have that (and which btw is all based on measurement), it is not difficult any more to change amps and hear right away how it sounds hence what's wrong with it. The start of this is, logically, very very difficult; at first you have this massive chicken-egg problem.

 

Thanks,

Peter

[Jud]

3 hours ago, Speed Racer said:

Let's see. So far you have the best DAC in the world, the best USB decrapifier in the world, the best USB cable in the world, and now the best speakers in the world.

 

Yet, somehow, I am not surprised......

 

He hasn’t made comparisons to particular products (except to praise UpTone but say he doesn’t think one of their older products will benefit his DAC with the new cable), just told you what his design principles are and backed them up with a couple of measurements.  Yeah, he likes his products and goes to some lengths to try to fulfill his design principles when making them.  Ever meet an audio manufacturer who didn’t like his or her own products?

 

If his explanations favorably impress you, fine.  If not, well, I guess he won’t be selling you a pair of speakers.

[Speed Racer]

4 minutes ago, Jud said:

He hasn’t made comparisons to particular products.....

 

No he hasn't. Because no other products compare......

[fas42]

5 hours ago, PeterSt said:

 

Maybe come look over here then ? 

 

For starters, subwoofers are out of order. They only distort (and not the least at it). So my speakers (of my own design - see sig) produce no audible distortion at 89dBSPL and 19Hz. 100Hz - 19Hz is +/- 0.5dB (and not any useless +/-3dB number - do you know how much audible even 1dB is in that regions ?).

I am pretty sure that no speaker exists that can do this, as no speaker is tuned like this. So we made this like it was a DAC (by THD numbers). And "no distortion" means that when you play this 89dBSPL at 19Hz, you hear totally nothing. And not because nothing moves so be careful that your hair remains in position.

 

 

Would be impressive to "hear" that lack of distortion at 19Hz - extremely hard to do at the lowest notes, because everything conspires against one, especially the sensitivity of the ear ...

 

I see that you're doing it by making the speakers extremely sensitive - good tactic! I use conventional speakers, but make the electronics driving them behave themselves; and don't worry about the lowest frequencies - I find the ear/brain fills in the gaps sufficiently in that region when the spectrum higher up is decent enough.

[PeterSt]

Just now, fas42 said:

good tactic! I use conventional speakers, but make the electronics driving them behave themselves;

 

Indeed.

 

Just now, fas42 said:

and don't worry about the lowest frequencies - I find the ear/brain fills in the gaps sufficiently in that region when the spectrum higher up is decent enough.

 

That is a different story. Point is : you don't know what you are missing. OK, so all is fine. Haha.

 

1 minute ago, fas42 said:

Would be impressive to "hear" that lack of distortion at 19Hz - extremely hard to do at the lowest no

 

FYI : This is the most easy thing to do, if you're only under the frequency you can still hear. Thus say that we can't hear 20Hz, then the tone at 20Hz or lower, should remain inaudible at the desired SPL. When it is not, then it is distortion, with the 2nd harmonic as the first. And thus you will hear 40Hz (and possible also 60).

 

If this is understood a little, AND we understand how far far better we hear - for example - 44Hz compared to 22Hz (I now assume we all can hear 22Hz), then anywhere where 22Hz is playing, we'd hear a loud 44Hz instead - we nicely created our own synthesizer.

 

Listening to this requires re-learning the listening. This is because we are all used to listen to the distortion and we all learned to listen to our famous tunes as how they are. So if ZZ Top uses a synth and that synth plays in that distorting region, you perceive a frequency which was not played. But how do you know ...

Letting the "ambient roll" alone, normal instruments play to about 32Hz. Synths though go anywhere the artist wants and this can be e.g. 27 Hz. Well, most speakers reach that but all distort there. So 27Hz is played and you hear 54 (and louder than the intended 27). But you won't know, because you can't know what was played (unless you are the artist). In the worst case you run into a 32' organ pipe recording, and perceive a nice 32Hz (because your speaker still makes sound at 16Hz which the 32' produces) and you hear a nicely low 16' of 32Hz. Maybe with some warbling tones and the thing does not sound straight. You will think all is normal ...

 

It is really another world.