Addons, i.e. regen, reclock, isolate - are they needed?

[plissken]

Since you like your Benchmark why not stay within the family. 

 

I've seen one instrumented instance where a USB dongle improved a DAC's output and that was the Schiit Modi 2 that was measured with a ~$24,000 Audio Precision Analyzer over at audiosciencereview.com. 

 

Benchmarks engineering pedigree is well earned and I'm sure that their inputs are properly engineered and won't be improved upon by a USB dongle.

 

Be for warned that even USB dongles can introduce noise as UpTone audio's was shown to do. 

[plissken]

1 hour ago, kennyb123 said:

 

Properly engineered, eh?  

 

Benchmark themselves believed the DAC1’s USB input needed to be improved:

 

”The DAC2  delivers outstanding musical detail and precise stereo imaging. It employs an advanced high-headroom digital filter design, and a new high-sample-rate Asynchronous USB Audio interface. All inputs are fully isolated from interface jitter by Benchmark's new UltraLock2™ jitter attenuation system.”

 

And again improvements in the DAC3:

 

“All inputs are fully isolated from interface jitter by Benchmark's new UltraLock3™ jitter attenuation system.”

 

And very likely further input improvements in their next DAC.  

 

Even good, initial first designs, get refined over the years. 

 

The point being is that if even their GEN1 USB (2005) input does a better job than current USB dongles, then for  Benchmark they matter naught. 

 

Of course I would only be suggesting the current Gen3 hardware. They should also look at the RME ADI-2 for 1/2 the cost. 

 

[plissken]

14 hours ago, kennyb123 said:

You said it was “properly designed” but now you acknowledge that further refinement can be of further benefit.  And yet you won’t allow that a USB add on can help?  I’m shocked, shocked that you would place ideology ahead of common sense.  LOL

You may be confused. As USB standards have increased in throughput it looks like Benchmark is speaking to the part of their jitter suppression system which is being able to ASRC to higher and higher sampling rates. 

 

Back in the day it was 24/96, now we can do 32/768. 

 

For those of us that know what we are talking about, we know that the USB dongles have nothing to do with clock recovery. They simply are making attempts as isolation of the ground plane of the computer/source (i.e. the Moat every one talks about). It's all about AGND and DGND design (Henry Ott has some good technical write ups about this including the math for calculating the zip trace impedance values).  

14 hours ago, kennyb123 said:

I consider the Benchmark DAC 1 to have been the worst sounding piece of gear I’ve had in house

 

Everyone is welcome to their opinion. It could be that the 'worst sounding' part of it has nothing to do with it's inputs. 

 

I believe it was on the DAC1 where Benchmark midwifed a 100' digital line just flooded with errors and timing issues. But they still showed the measured output of their DAC unaffected and showed 100% reconstruction of the input signal. 

 

That's what I mean by they designed proper inputs that are robust to dealing with downstream issues.

 

I look forward to others who up-vote your post so I also know who else suffers from an information and knowledge deficit 

 

 

[plissken]

24 minutes ago, 4est said:

Those of us that know...? How pathetically pompous of you. I hope that works on some kids at least, and pray your partner never learns how long an inch really is.

 

About all that test really proves is that it sounds just as shitty with 100' as it does 3'. But it was a lie anyway. It locked on though, I have to give them that.  We (meaning myself and a few others) could readily hear the difference in sources, inputs and input cabling although they all did have that signature white-ish grey-ness to them. Ultralock should have been called Ultrabrite/Ultrawhite or something...

 

Anyone that reads our back and forth, that has any technical understanding, knows you've exceeded yours. 

[plissken]

1 minute ago, kennyb123 said:

 

I avoid technical and focus on the subjective experience.  Unlike you, I acknowledge that I don't have a complete understanding of the technical.  But I do know enough to see that you have a very simplistic understanding. 

 

What I understand is that you don't understand the difference between AGND/DGND solutions and Bench Marks clocking schema. 

[plissken]

42 minutes ago, SJK said:

 

In my experience the Regen/Jitterbug add-ons did absolutely nothing.  That was with either an Arcam SuperDAC FMJ D33 (comparable to your Benchmark I would think) and now with a Bryston BDA-2.  

 

I'm not saying there's anything wrong with those types of devices but would guess they have a greater chance of making an improvement with "budget" hardware that may not have all of the design elements and engineering that a more expensive unit should.

 

 

There is empirical data that shows they can improve poorly designed DAC's regardless of the cost. Engineers can design compromised hardware at either $200 or $20,000. 

 

At least that data is out there for people to make informed (or completely ignore it) decisions with. My advice is purchase a DAC that measures well, good linearity, good jitter suppression, good main's noise isolation, good channel balance...

 

The Topping DX7s at $500 and the RME ADI-2 at $999 represent best of class hardware and fidelity. 

[plissken]

1 hour ago, creativepart said:

Looking at my computer specs I don't see it now - and it's been a while - but my memory was that Toslink only supported 96k resolution on my iMac.

TOSLink as a spec supports 24/96 and it's simply a signalling rate limit. I've seen implementations that did 24/192 but those aren't official cannon. 

 

Quote

 

As a side note, I've read a number of times that jitter is more of an issue with Toslink.

 

Regardless, it didn't do anything great on my system.

 

Jitter is more of an issue because it's the sending side (far end of things) that also is the clock source. Where as USB sends out data in packets, and they aren't in real time, the receiver just scoops together all that data, lines it up, applies it's own clock and streams it all out in correct time. 

 

What you get with DAC's where engineers don't know what they are doing is proper separation of Analog and Digital Grounds. Some USB isolation devices even have the ability to defeat the proper measures that DAC designers have taken and inject noise. 

[plissken]

4 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Please watch your choice of words guys. Neither of you are helping anyone with your back and forth. 

 

Honestly I would rather let Benchmark ad copy lead this particular discussion. And this is for Gen1 hardware:

 

Quote

 

JITTER-IMMUNE ULTRALOCK™ CLOCK SYSTEM

Benchmark's proprietary UltraLock clock system achieves an unprecedented immunity to jitter. Many modern (and expensive) converters suffer from significant jitter-induced distortion, generating non-musical sideband tones and digital distortion. Benchmark's highly-regarded UltraLock™ clock system ensures that jitter is never a problem, even under extreme conditions.

 

Even in the presence of extremely high input jitter, no jitter-induced artifacts can be detected on the outputs of the DAC1 HDR (using state-of-the-art testing equipment by Audio Precision). UltraLock™ will block more then 12.5 UI of jitter (@ 1 kHz). The UltraLock™ clock system easily outperforms even the best-designed two-stage PLL designs.

The bottom line is this: Benchmark converters will consistently and faithfully deliver truthful audio without jitter-induced artifacts, no matter what variables are present.

ADVANCEDUSB™ AUDIO TECHNOLOGY

The USB interface of the DAC1 PRE operates with Benchmark's unique AdvancedUSB™ technology. Unlike many USB-equipped D/A converters, Benchmark's AdvancedUSB™ technology supports 24-bit audio at sample rates up to 96 kHz without the installation of any drivers or other special software. Benchmark's UltraLock™ clock system isolates the converter from the high levels of jitter that are found on USB interfaces. The DAC1 PRE achieves transparent, audiophile-quality playback through a true plug-and-play solution.

 

Audio streamed via USB is subject to significant amounts of jitter. The AdvancedUSB™ interface utilizes the UltraLock™ clock system. Consequently, the performance of the USB input is equal to the performance of the other inputs, regardless of the jitter present.

 

The DAC1 PRE is natively compatible with most Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android operating systems. As a native device, there are no drivers to install or configure.

 

 

 

 

And it's exactly as I said: Gen2 and Gen3  support higher sample rate inputs as a start. 

 

I'll stand by my position that some members here have simply exceeded their technical underpinnings in this regard. Lord know's I've exceeded mine here only to be corrected. The difference being I'm willing to admit such and learn. 

 

 

 

 

[plissken]

7 hours ago, Superdad said:

 

And yet here is a blind test in a recording studio with the original USB REGEN and the Benchmark DAC2 HGC:

http://www.realhd-audio.com/?p=5155

 

And we are way beyond that now...

 

 

I remember reading that and they "listened to the same track twice".... I could have rolled a dice. 

 

When are you going to blind A/B like you said you would at WBF?

[plissken]

30 minutes ago, Em2016 said:

 

Respectfully - what would that achieve? 

 

From what I understand John's working very hard making up testing gear to hopefully show (in measurements) the differences people have been hearing for a while.

 

I don't need that. We just need people that have been hearing for a while to have bias controlled testing corroborate their claims. 

 

Quote

 

Just personally, I couldn't care less if John himself failed a blind A/B test - his own hearing sensitivity is a completely separate thing to his Engineering knowledge and skills...

 

So his only options are to do instrumented design (which they don't have the gear to do as I last recall), anecdotal hear / say design.

 

It took a hobbyist with and A.P. unit and about 4 months of constant bickering to get Alex to fess up.  

Quote

I don't understand the obsession with getting Alex to do a blind test - even if he himself said he would, it doesn't achieve anything.

 

Actually it would achieve a lot and there in lies why it's never happened. 

 

[plissken]

19 minutes ago, creativepart said:

While these guys are going on and on, back to my original topic:

 

So, with everyone saying to try toslink I decided why not. So I'm trying it again.

 

As I remembered, my "Audio Midi" setup in the Mac OS High Siera 10.13.4 shows 24/48 as the highest output for optical. There are higher resolutions on the menu, but I can't select anything but 24/48.

 

I thought I read earlier that that's what Mac OS says but it will actually feed the dac higher resolutions. Is that so?

 

I double checked and since my iMac is a 2011 it seems it does not support higher resolutions via Toslink. Darn. I guess there is a reason toslink don't sound as good as USB when I tested it previously.

 

So that means that Apple is adhering to the 24/48 standard for TOSLink. I'm not sure with all the shortcomings of TOSLink why anyone would recommend it.

 

While we are at it you can still get 3.5" USB floppy drives.