Jump to content
IGNORED

Chords New M -Scaler


Recommended Posts

5 hours ago, Miska said:


Last time I checked they had just 120 dB stop-band attenuation, which in my opinion is not enough, or in other words I don't see reason why not do more. That's why I use 192 dB so that it matches at least 32-bit resolution... But anyway, I think there are so many aspects in a filter design, that single parameter like number of taps is pointless without all the other information...

 

 

 

Can I ask how do you check? You got Blu2 or Dave?

Link to comment
4 hours ago, Miska said:

Is M-Scaler offering a more wonderful user interface?

 

No. But M-Scaler never pretends to offer any user interface. From day 1, it means only hardware.

 

Anyway, I concur auricgoldfinger, your HQP interface sucks big time. I gave up your software long term ago because of sound quality and user interface.

Link to comment
7 hours ago, ecwl said:

This is based on your measurement of Mojo. It's been pointed out to you that newer Chord products use better noise shapers.

 

Yes, and that is what I said. I didn't say it covers all products. If I happen to see DAVE around, I can measure it too, no problem. Not going to buy one just for sake of measuring though.

 

7 hours ago, ecwl said:

You believe that it is just the same technology as all other DACs, including yours. When I tried to explain what I suspect Rob Watts meant for constant switching, and the rationale behind switching the same number of elements to reduce switching noise and improve jitter immunity and noise floor modulation, you were dismissive and said

On 7/25/2018 at 2:59 AM, Miska said:

Regardless how many values you want to represent, this is generally nice property of thermometer code (scrambled unary coding) used with SDM; you can represent the same value in many ways.

 

How is this dismissive comment at all? Why would I say something dismissive of something I used myself. I more tried to express that this is common feature of SDM DACs in general.

 

7 hours ago, ecwl said:
On 8/2/2018 at 12:29 AM, Miska said:

Ahh, and of course use extremely short filters (with only few taps) - completely opposite of Chord's while doing so. And then force feed that to everyone without choice.

 

I'm sure Rob Watts will love that idea.

Sometimes, just because there is a difference in approach to short filter/DSD vs long filter/PCM, there is just no need to make it personal by saying people are force feeding anything.

 

This in turn is clearly about MQA which is trying to do exactly that, by tying content to their filters and trying to get all record labels to release content only in MQA format and by doing so also enforce everybody to use their choice of filters.

 

I don't like that and I doubt Rob Watts would either because it would prevent use of his filters.

 

7 hours ago, ecwl said:

Once again, I am not sure where your 120dB stop-band attenuation comment comes from. Rob Watts did mention that DAVE's WTA filter typically has stop band attenuation at 140dB (worst case 120dB). He said he was surprised that when he turns on the HF filter on DAVE, CD's still sound better. So he recognizes that for reasons he doesn't understand, 140dB stop band attenuation was insufficient. He also said that he may change this in the future. Not sure if it is incorporated into M-Scaler. I think he did because he says he can no longer hear a difference between whether the HF filter is turned on or not when you run M-Scaler into DAVE.

 

Maybe that is the case, based on how many people have like poly-sinc-xtr where I bumped the attenuation to 240 dB... But I personally believe it is due to other aspects. But since DSD modulator technically had enough SNR, why not use it?

 

Signalyst - Developer of HQPlayer

Pulse & Fidelity - Software Defined Amplifiers

Link to comment
6 hours ago, Adyc said:

Can I ask how do you check? You got Blu2 or Dave?

 

It is based on what Rob Watts has said elsewhere and what Chord specs have stated. I have Mojo and I can get Qutest just for the sake of measuring it. Not gonna buy DAVE for that, but maybe I can get loaner unit for listen and measurements.

Signalyst - Developer of HQPlayer

Pulse & Fidelity - Software Defined Amplifiers

Link to comment
14 hours ago, ecwl said:

Once again, I am not sure where your 120dB stop-band attenuation comment comes from. Rob Watts did mention that DAVE's WTA filter typically has stop band attenuation at 140dB (worst case 120dB).

For reference, this is the frequency response of a Kaiser-windowed (beta = 0.9) sinc filter with 1M points for 16x upsampling:

jaws-1m-kaiser-0.9.thumb.png.5ad3cccae0eeead2f07138030a2f93a5.png

Link to comment

OK Guys - Let's try something, if you're up for it. I enabled a new Off Topic reaction similar to the Upvote, Like, and Thanks reactions. 

 

Given that it's very hard for me to read every post in the context of the entire thread, I often think stuff is off topic or on topic that really isn't. Are you guys willing to mark posts as Off Topic, so I can go through and select them easily to move to another thread? If not, no worries.

 

In addition the Off Topic reaction will be available everywhere else on the site. 

Founder of Audiophile Style | My Audio Systems AudiophileStyleStickerWhite2.0.png AudiophileStyleStickerWhite7.1.4.png

Link to comment
3 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Are you guys willing to mark posts as Off Topic, so I can go through and select them easily to move to another thread? If not, no worries.

I just found out I can’t mark my own posts as off-topic. They’re usually posts that are in response to off-topic comments. I’ll see what else I can do with them

Link to comment
7 hours ago, Miska said:

 

It is based on what Rob Watts has said elsewhere and what Chord specs have stated. I have Mojo and I can get Qutest just for the sake of measuring it. Not gonna buy DAVE for that, but maybe I can get loaner unit for listen and measurements.

How about testing the Mojo using the optical input running on battery? The mojo is very sensitive to noise on the USB input, as many other USB DACs....

Link to comment
20 minutes ago, hmartin said:

How about testing the Mojo using the optical input running on battery? The mojo is very sensitive to noise on the USB input, as many other USB DACs....

 

I have read in this one thread that Chord's hardware is less susceptible to jitter than other manufacturers' equipment, and that at least one Chord hardware product is very sensitive to noise on the USB input. This seems contradictory to me. Is it just this one product that is sensitive and not the M-Scaler or any product likely to be used with it? If I remember correctly, the "jitter immune" thing comes from a Rob Watts quote, though I haven't seen measurements.  Where does the information about noise sensitivity of the Mojo come from?

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

Link to comment

@ecwl, I see you have great enthusiasm for the new off topic button.  :)

 

I am not sure how the potential noise/jitter susceptibility of the M-Scaler and Chord DACs that will be used with it are off topic in this M-Scaler thread, and hope you will let me know why you think so. 

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

Link to comment

 

54 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Given that it's very hard for me to read every post in the context of the entire thread, I often think stuff is off topic or on topic that really isn't. Are you guys willing to mark posts as Off Topic, so I can go through and select them easily to move to another thread? If not, no worries.

I tried marking things that are Off-Topics. I tried not to be biased, even though I know I’m biased because I own multiple Chord products. I basically marked things that are clearly not related to M-Scaler. That leads to some oddities because for example, M-Scaler does convert DSD to 705.4kHz 24-bit PCM so I left those discussions as On-Topic. I definitely tried to Off-Topic everything that are specifically about DAC designs after the initial upsampling filter. The bigger issues I find when I started labelling the posts is that some posts have lots of great content that is on topic, mixed in with things that are off-topic (usually about DAC designs and measurements not related to M-Scaler). Moreover, once you remove the Off-topic threads, you kind of lose track of why people are making on-topic comments or criticisms of the off-topic threads. I’m also generally pro-free speech so it’s better err on the side of leaving things in.

I almost wonder if we should just leave all the posts in and let people see what is marked as off-topic. But I also worry that people will get upset when their posts were labelled off-topic and then this becomes a debate on why things should or should not be off-topic. Let’s see how it goes. I’m curious whether people concur with my perspective of what’s on-topic and what’s off-topic.

Link to comment
3 minutes ago, Jud said:

@ecwl, I see you have great enthusiasm for the new off topic button.  :)

 

I am not sure how the potential noise/jitter susceptibility of the M-Scaler and Chord DACs that will be used with it are off topic in this M-Scaler thread, and hope you will let me know why you think so. 

I think in general, on this thread, there are lots of interpolations about M-Scaler based on other Chord DACs and while some are valid, some are probably not. Noise/jitter susceptibility of the M-Scaler has nothing to do with noise/jitter susceptibility of Chord Mojo. Noise/jitter susceptibility of course can be due to Pulse Array DAC design, PLL design and USB receiver design. Mojo’s USB receiver design is completely different than M-Scaler so I thought it was off-topic. As are our discussion here.

Link to comment
1 hour ago, Jud said:

 

I have read in this one thread that Chord's hardware is less susceptible to jitter than other manufacturers' equipment, and that at least one Chord hardware product is very sensitive to noise on the USB input. This seems contradictory to me. Is it just this one product that is sensitive and not the M-Scaler or any product likely to be used with it? If I remember correctly, the "jitter immune" thing comes from a Rob Watts quote, though I haven't seen measurements.  Where does the information about noise sensitivity of the Mojo come from?

I have a Mojo and it is a pain in the behind to get USB to sound as good as the optical input. For example, if you connect an iPhone to the USB input there is audible noise in the headphones, especially if the iPhone is using the 3G/LTE radio. This noise has nothing to do with jitter.

Link to comment

I would expect the M Scaler to include Chord's isolated USB interface which they use in their non-portable products (Qutest, Hugo TT2 and DAVE) vs the non-isolated interface used int eh Mojo.  My understanding is that RW feels the portables do not need the isolated interface as they will be hooked up to a portable player/computer running on batteries.

 

Bottom line, I think we can be confident the M Scaler will have a very good USB interface, as does DAVE and Qutest.

SO/ROON/HQPe: DSD 512-Sonore opticalModuleDeluxe-Signature Rendu optical with Well Tempered Clock--DIY DSC-2 DAC with SC Pure Clock--DIY Purifi Amplifier-Focus Audio FS888 speakers-JL E 112 sub-Nordost Tyr USB, DIY EventHorizon AC cables, Iconoclast XLR & speaker cables, Synergistic Purple Fuses, Spacetime system clarifiers.  ISOAcoustics Oreas footers.                                                       

                                                                                           SONORE computer audio

Link to comment
3 hours ago, ecwl said:

 

I tried marking things that are Off-Topics. I tried not to be biased, even though I know I’m biased because I own multiple Chord products. I basically marked things that are clearly not related to M-Scaler. That leads to some oddities because for example, M-Scaler does convert DSD to 705.4kHz 24-bit PCM so I left those discussions as On-Topic. I definitely tried to Off-Topic everything that are specifically about DAC designs after the initial upsampling filter. The bigger issues I find when I started labelling the posts is that some posts have lots of great content that is on topic, mixed in with things that are off-topic (usually about DAC designs and measurements not related to M-Scaler). Moreover, once you remove the Off-topic threads, you kind of lose track of why people are making on-topic comments or criticisms of the off-topic threads. I’m also generally pro-free speech so it’s better err on the side of leaving things in.

I almost wonder if we should just leave all the posts in and let people see what is marked as off-topic. But I also worry that people will get upset when their posts were labelled off-topic and then this becomes a debate on why things should or should not be off-topic. Let’s see how it goes. I’m curious whether people concur with my perspective of what’s on-topic and what’s off-topic.

I like your reply and it is opening my mind to something new about DACs' design so please leave it as it is.

Link to comment
4 hours ago, ecwl said:

I almost wonder if we should just leave all the posts in and let people see what is marked as off-topic. But I also worry that people will get upset when their posts were labelled off-topic and then this becomes a debate on why things should or should not be off-topic. Let’s see how it goes. I’m curious whether people concur with my perspective of what’s on-topic and what’s off-topic.

 

That may be the best way forward. 

Founder of Audiophile Style | My Audio Systems AudiophileStyleStickerWhite2.0.png AudiophileStyleStickerWhite7.1.4.png

Link to comment
10 hours ago, mansr said:

I've upsampled part of a CD track 16x using a variety of filters. If you don't mind, I'd like to randomise the order and get some impressions without anyone knowing what's what. I'll post a link once the upload completes.

I am afraid unless your ears and your system is capable of hearing into -200Db differences....0_0.  I have seen that claims 

Link to comment

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now



×
×
  • Create New...