Chords New M -Scaler

[austinpop]

DOH! @TheAttorney got his answer in ahead of me.

 

Dang lawyers always find a way to win! Just kidding!  

[ElviaCaprice]

11 minutes ago, austinpop said:

 I only see the true value of HMS as a companion to the H2, TT2, and DAVE DACs.

 

+ Qutest

[ecwl]

14 minutes ago, Confused said:

It will be interesting to see if anyone gets good results with the M-Scaler and a non Chord DAC.

It's funny because Rob Watts was just making some comments on this question on Head Fi.

Obviously if you're going to 384kHz with other DACs, you're using 500,000 taps so you'll get less out of HMS.

But he also mentioned that the other DACs architecture determines how accurately those DACs can generate the analog waveform from the 24-bit 384kHz signal. And that may be an important determinant on how much benefits the M-scaler offers with the other DACs.

Moreover, one thing he did not mention (which the dCS upsampler comment reminded me of) is that because Chord DACs by design are significantly more jitter immune than other DACs, M-scaler doesn't really bother to have the ultra-amazing clocks for the S/PDIF or dual BNC outputs. As a result, how HMS pairs with other DACs would also determine the jitter sensitivity of those DACs. Because it is not completely clear to me when dCS upsampler (or even the dCS bridge) is paired with various DACs, whether the sonic improvements are coming from the upsampling or whether the sonic improvements are coming from the lower noise and reduced jitter of the S/PDIF signals.

I have to admit for high-end DACs I can almost always tell the difference between Toslink (more jitter) compared to S/PDIF sources except with my Chord DACs (DAVE and Mojo).

 

[guiltyboxswapper]

2 hours ago, ecwl said:

I think system synergy sometimes matters more. With class D amplifiers, the switching frequencies are usually in the 400-1000kHz range. If DAVE's transient timing is more accurate because of the upsampling to 768kHz 24-bit, that transient timing accuracy is going to be slightly lost due to switching frequencies of the class D amplifiers.

 

Transient response doesn't have anything to do with the amps switching frequency themselves - see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vsOugSsANs for a good explanation on that matter.   

 

Output sampling frequency doesn't collide with the amp's switching frequency - otherwise I wouldn't hear much difference with the T+A running at 24.6mhz which ofcourse would enable an even faster rise-and-fall response than 768khz PCM.  I run it in poly-sync-xtr-2s , which is 2m+ taps, might be 4m who knows?  

 

It's hard to describe fully but under very complex musical pieces, the T+A in DSD 512 mode had an eerie stability, poise and coherence the DAVE couldn't quite match.  

 

Like I said - I was genuinely up for changing to the DAVE to really simplify things - really wanted to like it.

 

[firedog]

2 hours ago, mansr said:

If a cake recipe calls for vinegar, I suspect we can all say something about how it is likely to taste without actually eating it.

I guess you don't bake much. Lots of good cake recipes use vinegar or other similar tasting ingredients. It's all in the taste you get in the end from the combination of ingredients.

[guiltyboxswapper]

35 minutes ago, ecwl said:

 

I have to admit for high-end DACs I can almost always tell the difference between Toslink (more jitter) compared to S/PDIF sources except with my Chord DACs (DAVE and Mojo).

 

That's interesting as I found the DAVE really RF sensitive.  If I plugged in a USB feed straight from the motherboard's USB socket, I'd get a grainy treble response.  Much smoother (albeit searing on transient impacts) when fed through a dedicated USB card.

[mansr]

10 minutes ago, firedog said:

I guess you don't bake much. Lots of good cake recipes use vinegar or other similar tasting ingredients. It's all in the taste you get in the end from the combination of ingredients.

You can still predict something about the result just looking at the recipe. Things have known tastes that combine in known ways. In electronics, components behave in predictable ways. It is not necessary to listen to everything in order get some idea of how it might sound, especially when the question is simply whether or not a specific change will make an audible difference. It's how things are designed. Or did you think people like Rob Watts wire together a bunch of parts at random until they chance upon something that works?

[mansr]

1 hour ago, austinpop said:

So bottom line, while you could get HMS upsampling to 192kHz to most DACs, that only gives you access to 1/4 million taps.

Why can't the full filter length be used with lower output rates? That should be easier, not harder.

[barrows]

2 hours ago, ecwl said:

I think system synergy sometimes matters more. With class D amplifiers, the switching frequencies are usually in the 400-1000kHz range. If DAVE's transient timing is more accurate because of the upsampling to 768kHz 24-bit, that transient timing accuracy is going to be slightly lost due to switching frequencies of the class D amplifiers.

That point of view is well known to be nonsense.  Rise time of any decent class D amplifier well outstrips what is possible from the loudspeaker.

[rayl1234]

30 minutes ago, guiltyboxswapper said:

 

Transient response doesn't have anything to do with the amps switching frequency themselves - see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vsOugSsANs for a good explanation on that matter.   

 

Output sampling frequency doesn't collide with the amp's switching frequency - otherwise I wouldn't hear much difference with the T+A running at 24.6mhz which ofcourse would enable an even faster rise-and-fall response than 768khz PCM.  I run it in poly-sync-xtr-2s , which is 2m+ taps, might be 4m who knows?  

 

It's hard to describe fully but under very complex musical pieces, the T+A in DSD 512 mode had an eerie stability, poise and coherence the DAVE couldn't quite match.  

 

Like I said - I was genuinely up for changing to the DAVE to really simplify things - really wanted to like it.

 

 

Yes and no but for a different line of reasoning... E.g., class D amp has certain challenges if the rate of its pulses cannot provide transient accuracy you are trying to achieve...

 

This is one of the issues Chord intends to tackle with their future "digital" amps -- combine DAC+Amp technology stacks so you don't have a traditional class D amp nor pay the inefficiency for a pure A/B design.  But that's still futures for now, though it does inform the roadmap thinking into which MScaler fits.

[rayl1234]

9 minutes ago, mansr said:

Why can't the full filter length be used with lower output rates? That should be easier, not harder.

 

Latency... instead of ~0.65 secs, it becomes ~1.3 secs to do 1MM at 384....

 

But practically, probably bec as this is hardware (on FPGA), you would need to make a major fork in your circuit, test that, etc... and since the FPGA is already filled, this means adding another loader, requiring a cold boot of the chip to switch output rates, etc.....

[barrows]

I think it is all important to step back a second, and take a breath...  Ahhhh.

 

Now it seems to me that comparisons between the HMS and, say, perhaps HQP are a bit odd in the first place:

 

Rob Watts is clearly an advocate for PCM, and only begrudgingly added a DSD mode to DAVE (not available on other Chord DACs, which convert DSD to PCM).  He clearly designs his DACs to perform best using his filters/oversampling and with PCM. Those using Chord DACs are finding good synergy with blu and likely will with HMS in the same way.

 

Miska (Jussi) is clearly an advocate for DSD, and designed both HQPlayer and his DSC-1 DAC to get the best out of oversampled DSD.  The DSC-1 DAC approach is now available (or very similar approaches) from various DAC makers, and those using that approach have found superb sound quality using HQP to oversample to DSD 256 or 512, with a DSC-1 style DAC.  Also many chip based DACs with AKM and ESS hardware will likely benefit from high rate DSD input (I personally love dSD 256 into the ESS 9038 here).

 

To me it seems clear that HQPlayer's big strength is in DSD oversampling, especially when combined with a discrete DSD DAC, not to say that it's PCM oversampling approaches are weak.  And expecting the Chord DAC to do really well with DSD, when Rob Watts himself shows little interest in DSD performance seems a bit odd.  The same could be said for expecting HQPlayer style oversampling/filtering to work as well as m scaler with Chord style DACs.

 

So, just perhaps: HQPlayer is "best" for DSD oversampling into a DSD style DAC, and m Scaler is best for oversampling into a Chord DAC.

 

Clearly we have advocates for both approaches, and hey, choices are good.

 

[Jud]

Deleted - though it's a quote from this thread, I think it is probably off the M-Scaler topic. 

[firedog]

1 hour ago, mansr said:

You can still predict something about the result just looking at the recipe. Things have known tastes that combine in known ways. In electronics, components behave in predictable ways. It is not necessary to listen to everything in order get some idea of how it might sound, especially when the question is simply whether or not a specific change will make an audible difference. It's how things are designed. Or did you think people like Rob Watts wire together a bunch of parts at random until they chance upon something that works?

Wow. You made the silly and incorrect statement that you can basically tell that a cake recipe containing vinegar will taste bad. I corrected you, as you clearly are unaware of the many cake recipes that use vinegar and similar ingredients. You seem to have no issue making all kinds of sharp statements here correcting others whenever you think someone else is wrong about something.

Why the knee jerk defense of your incorrect statement and the move to a mini lecture about electronics?

 

You clearly got out of your knowledge zone talking about cake recipes. I corrected you but wasn't nasty. Maybe just accept you were incorrect.  

[mansr]

6 minutes ago, firedog said:

You made the silly and incorrect statement that you can basically tell that a cake recipe containing vinegar will taste bad.

Where did I say it would taste bad?

[ecwl]

19 minutes ago, barrows said:

So, just perhaps: HQPlayer is "best" for DSD oversampling into a DSD style DAC, and m Scaler is best for oversampling into a Chord DAC.

I think that is very true. But I think because the thread here is HMS, we have restricted the discussion to 1 million taps WTA filter (sinc-like/equivalent filter) for 16fs. I still don't fully understand how HQPlayer converts 1fs to DSD512. I have always assumed it was 1fs to 16fs (like HMS) then 16fs to DSD512.

But when you're using HMS+Chord DAC, what is really happening is 1fs to 16fs then WTA filter 16fs to 256fs then to 5-bit 104MHz then to 4 to 20-element PWM. So you are really doing 1fs to 16fs, 16fs to 256fs then 256fs to 4-20 times DSD2048...

[Albrecht]

6 hours ago, mansr said:

If a cake recipe calls for vinegar, I suspect we can all say something about how it is likely to taste without actually eating it.

Not really, - there may be something that works with or against the vinegar to make it taste excellent....

 

Of course, - with the Chord product, - it is decidedly NOT throwing something as incongruous as vinegar into the recipe.

[Albrecht]

On 7/26/2018 at 10:01 AM, mansr said:

Did that outburst make you feel better?

""outburst?"

 

LOL

 

Did your wild speculations make you feel better?

 

 

[Dr Tone]

http://www.geniuskitchen.com/recipe/mrs-scotts-chocolate-vinegar-cake-345943

[mav52]

30 minutes ago, Albrecht said:

Not really, - there may be something that works with or against the vinegar to make it taste excellent....

 

Of course, - with the Chord product, - it is decidedly NOT throwing something as incongruous as vinegar into the recipe.

 

No its the dual BNC connections

[firedog]

3 hours ago, mansr said:

Where did I say it would taste bad?

Give it up. You were wrong about something. Live with it.

[Ralf11]

are people using vinegar to clean the connections on the M-scalar?

[mav52]

2 minutes ago, Ralf11 said:

are people using vinegar to clean the connections on the M-scalar?

 

Not even relevant

[mansr]

47 minutes ago, firedog said:

Give it up. You were wrong about something. Live with it.

Food ingredients impart their flavour to the finished dish. That's all I said. Anything else is in your imagination.

[jabbr]

13 hours ago, romaz said:

I own HQPlayer.  I find it to be a powerful, versatile and affordable tool.  It definitely has merit.  I have heard many fine upsampling HQP servers with the SGM2015 perhaps being the best sounding of all.  I get together routinely with a group of audiophiles and we listen and compare different pieces of equipment.  With certain DACs, I'm happy to bring out my PC and upsample to DSD512 with HQP because it sounds better.  With other DACs, upsampling to high-res PCM sounds better.  And with Chord DACs, I find that HQPlayer doesn't add anything at all.  With poor recordings that are harsh and bright, I like what DSD does.  With well recorded music, especially unamplified acoustical recordings (i.e. large orchestral performances), I personally struggle with the softer transients of DSD and its relative lack of depth precision.  Go ahead and tell me I'm wrong.  I've listened and compared enough to know what I prefer. 

 

Some people prefer PCM and some DSD. In my experience, the various masterings vastly outweigh differences between the formats.

 

For PCM Chord DACs might be a fine choice, being primarily designed for PCM. Other folks prefer DSD and there are choices such as T+A that one would expect to perform better with DSD upsampling than PCM upsampling.

 

Another choice would be Phasure NOS1a and I would expect @PeterSt's excellent XXHE to outperform the Chord upsampler with his own DAC. Have you compared these two i.e. the "m scaler" with NOS1a? I haven't but would expect XXHE to be the best in this case -- obviously the two are made for eachother!

 

Comparing HQPlayer with Chord hardware is truly apples to oranges. My own listening does not find the faults with DSD that you find. I find that with a well implemented DAC, the output sections are very important, and to my own ear, vastly more important than the server hardware. That's to my own ear, and obviously YMDV.