EtherREGEN: The long development thread. [Some Gen2 dev. pics and update starting on page 92.]

[audiojerry]

The USB Regen provided a marvelous improvement to my Oppo Sonica dac. Then the ISO Regen and LPS-1 increased the sonic benefits by the same degree over the USB Regen. Since then, I was able to move into a PS Audio DirectStream. To my ears, I was no longer able to hear the easily noticeable improvements from the ISO Regen and LPS-1.

 

But knowing how effective Uptone's products have been in the past, and how terrific Uptone treats its customers, I will not hesitate to give the new Ether a try.    

[R1200CL]

9 minutes ago, audiojerry said:

But knowing how effective Uptone's products have been in the past, and how terrific Uptone treats its customers, I will not hesitate to give the new Ether a try.    

 

.....Just wait until you hear the price ?

 

I’m afraid we may pass $500.

[Superdad]

39 minutes ago, austinpop said:

Very interesting Alex. I know some people get their knickers in a twist at the benefits from clocking stuff, and that's their problem.

 

I have never been wedded to a single approach, and have always gone where my ears told me. I have long felt that our empirical findings with better clocks (lower phase noise), better PSUs, and better isolation have all been related, and centered around eliminating analog noise that rides along the digital chain.

 

Therefore if you are hinting that John has had a breakthrough that ties these concepts together, and that he has engineered a solution that is immune to things like lower-phase noise external clocks, then color me intrigued! That would be revolutionary.

 

Okay, now that the day's shipments are out the door I can take a breath and give a reasonable response to your very reasonable post. 

 

It is not that we don't think excellent clocking is not worthwhile--in an Ethernet switch or elsewhere.

 

[As you know, John is working hard on a measurement system that may finally provide visual proof (of what many hear) of the "phase-noise finger-print" of clocking of packet data interfaces.  He has a strong theory on the why (a lot to do with ground-plane bounce and clock edges), but we want to show it visually--at the output of a DAC!]

 

And absolutely the key is in doing everything well. Power supplies, isolation, and clocking.  

It is just that so far, the "audiophile" switches on the market are just adding good clocks to a stock switch, or doing that plus adding passive Ethernet transformer isolators and ancillary passive parts (one of you reported that SOtM's engineer said their isolation is based on their iSO-CAT6 product).

Since what we are doing is more sophisticated--in each of those three areas--I am just wishing folks would not get hung up on the clocking--which will be excellent and which yes, can even be disciplined with an external 10MHz master for those who wish to carry it that far.

(It feels a bit like when we first announced the UltraCap LPS-1 and everyone got hung up talking about what AC>DC converter it could be charged with--rather than about all the really cool aspects of the design.)

 

Of course I realize that in the absence of our providing more detailed information about the design of the EtherREGEN (still trying to figure out what elements to reveal), people will chat about the areas they know of and whatever first comes to mind. 

I get that...

[Superdad]

27 minutes ago, R1200CL said:

I’m afraid we may pass $500.

 

You do not know that!  So why say that?

 

Truth be told, neither do I at the moment.  We are starting to add up the BoM, but at the moment I am more concerned with availability of of every part.  Some chips have multi-month lead times! 

 

 

[bobfa]

10 minutes ago, Superdad said:

 

Okay, now that the day's shipments are out the door I can take a breath and give a reasonable response to your very reasonable post. 

 

It is not that we don't think excellent clocking is not worthwhile--in an Ethernet switch or elsewhere.

 

[As you know, John is working hard on a measurement system that may finally provide visual proof (of what many hear) of the "phase-noise finger-print" of clocking of packet data interfaces.  He has a strong theory on the why (a lot to do with ground-plane bounce and clock edges), but we want to show it visually--at the output of a DAC!]

 

And absolutely the key is in doing everything well. Power supplies, isolation, and clocking.  

It is just that so far, the "audiophile" switches on the market are just adding good clocks to a stock switch, or doing that plus adding passive Ethernet transformer isolators and ancillary passive parts (one of you reported that SOtM's engineer said their isolation is based on their iSO-CAT6 product).

Since what we are doing is more sophisticated, I am just wishing folks would not get hung up on the clocking--which will be excellent and which yes, can even be disciplined with an external 10MHz master for those who wish to carry it that far.

(It feels a bit like when we first announced the UltraCap LPS-1 and everyone got hung up talking about what AC>DC converter it could be charged with--rather than about all the really cool aspects of the design.)

 

Of course I realize that in the absence of our providing more detailed information about the design of the EtherREGEN (still trying to figure out what elements to reveal), people will chat about the areas they know of and whatever first comes to mind. 

I get that...

 

Alex you are both "Teaser and Firecat". Let's hope that everyone can stay on the "Peace Train" until you can start telling us more.  

 

Everyone I talk to in the electronics industry are talking about parts shortages and delays.  I hope it all works out.

 

And besides I need new speakers first so I can wait!  I hope,....  (putting the credit card back in the freezer now).  

 

Bob

 

 

[One and a half]

1 hour ago, Superdad said:

 

You do not know that!  So why say that?

 

Truth be told, neither do I at the moment.  We are starting to add up the BoM, but at the moment I am more concerned with availability of of every part.  Some chips have multi-month lead times! 

 

 

After the wait, to find out the chips are counterfeit will not please anyone. How do you safeguard against that, buy lot numbers from the likes of TI?

[Superdad]

6 minutes ago, One and a half said:

After the wait, to find out the chips are counterfeit will not please anyone. How do you safeguard against that, buy lot numbers from the likes of TI?

 

An odd question--and a non-issue for us--but it's the end of the day and I'll indulge it :

 

a) We order most everything from the major authorized distributors (DigiKey, Mouser, Arrow, etc.), and they all obtain parts factory-direct. I know of no instance of counterfeit with them.

 

b) When any of the devices we are using are not well stocked with the majors or require long lead times (switch chips, clock synthesizers, speciality isolators, PHY, high-speed flops), then orders are placed directly with the manufacturer.

 

c) Once in a while there will be a part that we use thousands of but which is out of stock with the regular distributors.  Sometimes we'll get lucky and one of the reputable China wholesalers will have some crazy quantity on hand.  [Since most of the world's PCB manufacturing takes place in China, some of the wholesalers there (the sort we never hear of in the west) have huge surpluses of parts from cancelled or end-of-run orders.]

An example:

For an UltraCap LPS-1 production run early last year we needed 5,000 pieces of a Toshiba optical isolator (10 per board).  Out of stock everywhere, but a place in China (maybe it was Hong Kong) had 75,000.  We usually pay Mouser $1.13/pc., but the Chinese agent offered to us at $0.89/pc.  They claim first quality, factory stock, but this being my first buy with them I was of course a bit nervous.  But they sent me photos of the reel (5,000/reel) sealed in Toshiba factory foil bag with fully detailed Toshiba labeling, as well a copy of some purchase paperwork.  The parts were fine. And we saved some $.

Also, a couple of times we were forced to buy Linear Tech LT3042 and TI regs on the spot market.  Nobody is counterfeiting those things (it's pretty hard to do).  Sadly it is not so much fun to spot order Linear Tech parts.  Linear controls their distribution so tightly that spot market pricing is the same--or higher!--than though the USA distributors.  And what gets me even more is that not only are stock levels poor on the LT3042/45, but Linear Tech per-piece pricing is the same for 100 pieces as it is for 10,000 pieces.

 

d) Most worrisome these days is that there is a worldwide shortage of MLCCs (multi-layer ceramic capacitors).  It has been bad this past year but it looks like it is going to get worse for about another year:

https://www.sourcetoday.com/supply-chain/capacitor-shortages-continue-least-another-year-executives-say

This shortage is a killer for quality digital designs as we use loads of these tiny, precision, low-ESR, specially thermal/voltage rated (X5R, X7R) parts all around the power supply pins of processor chips and LDO regs--keeping inductance down, etc. 

I can't tell you how many times I have gone through a large BoM at night, checking stock and tracking down acceptable in-stock substitutes for a bunch of MLCCs (Murata are our favorite because they publish curves for each individual value/variant), turning it in that night to our turnkey board house (they take care of ordering/kitting most of the small parts for us)--and by morning when they go to order the caps are out of stock!  Has happened even for values where there were 40K when I checked, then less than the 1,000 we needed by the morning.

 

Fun and games.  But to paraphrase my wife: It's audio not Syria! 

[Cxp]

@Superdad

thank you for the update and all your hard work  

[Cxp]

Obviously everything isn’t finalized but what will likely be the compatible voltage  range? 

[Arpiben]

For curiosity, is it possible to disclose which ADC will be used for measurements purposes ?

Thanks.

[Superdad]

1 hour ago, Cxp said:

Obviously everything isn’t finalized but what will likely be the compatible voltage  range? 

 

7V-12 volts for sure, might even accept a few volts higher.  Working hard to keep total current draw under 1 amp.

Because of the design details performance won’t be heavily dependent on having a super power supply, but I’m sure a lot of folks will use something nice anyway. 

[Superdad]

1 minute ago, Arpiben said:

For curiosity, is it possible to disclose which ADC will be used for measurements purposes ?

 

That’s very much a separate topic—and when we are ready I’m sure we’ll post photos of John’s whole elaborate rig with details.  For now all I’ll say is that the ADC board is a custom one with very high-speed 32-bit SAR chips.

[JohnSwenson]

 

19 hours ago, austinpop said:

 

Come on... TedAlex. This is not an attack. We're just asking for a reasonable option. There are constraints for customers too.

1. older Cybersahfts have only 50Ω outputs
2. SOtM OCX-10 impedances have to be selected at time of purchase
3. Ref 10 has 6x 75Ω and 2x 50Ω

For any number of reasons, including the cables they own, customers may want to select the impedance of the input on the EtherRegen they buy. The competition provides that option too: http://www.sotm-audio.com/sotmwp/english/shop/snh-10g/

 

I know @JohnSwenson is more aware than laypeople that impedance matching involves BNC connectors as well as the internal and external cable, which is why we would trust you guys to do it right. Is an impedance switch such a bad idea? And it would save you from building and stocking 2 different versions.

 

If Cybershaft can implement an impedance switch, I'm sure John can too.

The problem is that in order to have both a 50 and 75 external input you need both a 50 and 75 BNC jack. There is no way to properly electrically implement both with one jack. Any such approach will degrade the signal, I have a feeling those that want to use multi thousand dollar external clocks will NOT want to have the circuit deliberately degrade the signal! Thus in order to do it we will need to have both jacks. The big problem is there is no room for both jacks on the case we have been planning for, to do it would mean going to a larger enclosure which will cost more money, not just for the extra parts, but for the enclosure and larger board.

 

There is a good possibility that traces on the board will wind up being longer because of the larger board, possibly slightly degrading performance.  Is it worth it?

 

My personal leanings are against it, when we go with a different case we have not used before, there are ALWAYS several iterations of case and board that have to be done in order to get everything just right. This adds a lot of development cost AND a couple months to the delivery time. Do you guys REALLY want that?

 

John S.

[One and a half]

@Superdad,thanks for the explanation, so counterfeit devices won't make an appearance ?

[BigAlMc]

1 hour ago, JohnSwenson said:

My personal leanings are against it, when we go with a different case we have not used before, there are ALWAYS several iterations of case and board that have to be done in order to get everything just right. This adds a lot of development cost AND a couple months to the delivery time. Do you guys REALLY want that?

 

John S.

 

Thanks John for the detailed explanation.

 

I'd think that no one wants to delay it a couple months.

 

I'd also guess that 50ohms is the way to go as I got the sense previously that I was in the minority with my 75ohm clock.

 

I guess I'll wait to see if you guys knock it out the park sufficiently to render the clock input unnecessary.

That or whether it plays nicely before or after my potential SoTM switch ?

 

Cheers,

Alan

[mansr]

How difficult would it be for someone reasonably skilled to replace the connector and termination resistor?

[R1200CL]

2 hours ago, mansr said:

How difficult would it be for someone reasonably skilled to replace the connector and termination resistor?

 

Very ?

 

All these parts shall fit into the same box as LPS and UltraRendu is using. 

I don’t expect normal resistors to be used.

 

It’s  these miniature components. Whatever they are called.

 

If John or Alex was capable of doing a few 75 Ohm boards manual, at a extra cost of, let’s say $200. (Yes quite high), and if they had the time in addition, (which it seems they haven’t), yes probably, but my understanding is it’s almost impossible to do this kind of work.

I think John built his own machine for assembly prototypes. It’s described in another tread with video. 

 

But you will probably find someone willing to try. I think similar has been done with the Singxer SU-1 modification.

 

Is it worth the effort before someone has tested this out with a very good master clock ? And very expensive cables as well. 

[Arpiben]

2 hours ago, mansr said:

How difficult would it be for someone reasonably skilled to replace the connector and termination resistor?

Much reasonable to use this:

 

[mansr]

13 minutes ago, R1200CL said:

Very ?

 

All these parts shall fit into the same box as LPS and UltraRendu is using. 

I don’t expect normal resistors to be used.

 

It’s  these miniature components. Whatever they are called.

Surface mount parts in 0402 size (1x0.5 mm) or bigger are easy to solder. 0201 parts are trickier but not impossible. I've never attempted anything smaller. For modifying this device, I'd be more concerned about the disassembly required to access the relevant part of the PCB. If parts are held in place by adhesives or fragile plastic tabs, it gets annoying.

[charlesphoto]

Man, you clockers sure are a tough lot.  At the end of the day, if I were Uptone I’d just do what feels right vs trying to pander to a small minority, many of whom would probably find something wrong with it no matter how many kitchen sinks are put into it.

 

Personally, I’m very curious to find out how it compares to my newer 16 port 1gb Cisco 2960 Catalyst I picked up on ebay for $155. It blows away any consumer switch with or without JSGT, and is even better than a seven year older 100mb 2960. Of course if the Catalyst is same or better, I’ll just keep that finding to myself, in appreciation of Uptone and what they do. I know you got a Catalyst in house and was impressed- any takeaways or impressions you or John have of it in relation to what you’re accomplishing with the EtherRegen? 

[austinpop]

10 hours ago, JohnSwenson said:

 

The problem is that in order to have both a 50 and 75 external input you need both a 50 and 75 BNC jack. There is no way to properly electrically implement both with one jack. Any such approach will degrade the signal, I have a feeling those that want to use multi thousand dollar external clocks will NOT want to have the circuit deliberately degrade the signal! Thus in order to do it we will need to have both jacks. The big problem is there is no room for both jacks on the case we have been planning for, to do it would mean going to a larger enclosure which will cost more money, not just for the extra parts, but for the enclosure and larger board.

 

There is a good possibility that traces on the board will wind up being longer because of the larger board, possibly slightly degrading performance.  Is it worth it?

 

My personal leanings are against it, when we go with a different case we have not used before, there are ALWAYS several iterations of case and board that have to be done in order to get everything just right. This adds a lot of development cost AND a couple months to the delivery time. Do you guys REALLY want that?

 

John S.

 

You're the manufacturer. It's up to you to decide what you can deliver, and what tradeoffs you need to make to do so.

 

Obviously, as customers, we want the best performance AND ultimate flexibility. That doesn't make us bad people. It's what customers do!

 

If you can deliver only one impedance, then pick one (take a poll, for example) and do it - and accept the fact that perhaps some customers will regard that as a showstopper. That's life. You're not going to able to please everybody.

[austinpop]

43 minutes ago, charlesphoto said:

Man, you clockers sure are a tough lot.  

 

The decision to offer a reference clock input was made unilaterally by Uptone. Nobody asked for, let alone demanded, it.

 

If they can deliver the best SQ among all the switches without it, I'd be more than happy.

[BigAlMc]

3 hours ago, charlesphoto said:

Man, you clockers sure are a tough lot.  At the end of the day, if I were Uptone I’d just do what feels right vs trying to pander to a small minority, many of whom would probably find something wrong with it no matter how many kitchen sinks are put into it.

 

FWIW I originally posted that no 75ohm option would probably preclude me given my outlay on a 75ohm clock.

 

Alex then patiently explained that clocking was a small part of the value prop.

 

After conceding to John that Uptone should probably go 50ohm (as seems more prevalent to me at least) I indicated I might buy one anyway.

 

I'm a big fan of Uptone and am rooting for them to knock it out of the park. Moreover I'd be delighted if the EtherRegen causes me a rethink and change in direction. Part of the journey and fun.

 

Not sure what's so tough about that. I have the consumer right to take my business elsewhere but meantime I'm hoping to be an early adopter and providing hopefully useful feedback. That's supportive in my book ?

 

Cheers,

Alan

[Ralf11]

a 50 vs. 75 poll is a good idea - and a likely guess is that many of the potential buyers are on this site...

 

or a quick market analysis of which DACs have which only have one that are likely candidates could be done

 

- the latter is something a biz school intern could do...

[BigAlMc]

38 minutes ago, Ralf11 said:

a 50 vs. 75 poll is a good idea - and a likely guess is that many of the potential buyers are on this site...

 

or a quick market analysis of which DACs have which only have one that are likely candidates could be done

 

- the latter is something a biz school intern could do...

 

I vote 75.

 

But then I would. Being in the minority does not diminish my democratic right.

 

Like I voted against Brexit.

 

Like I'd have voted against Trump.

 

Er, eh, well.....

 

It's nice to be asked I guess ?