Innuos Zenith Mk3 or OpticalRendu + separate server?

[Blackmorec]

Roughly a year ago I set out to establish a system for local and remote streaming from CD rips and  Quboz.  I intended to use Roon as I valued its ability to manage libraries and find new music. After a lot of evaluation I decided on the Zenith Mk2 but the SE was announced just before I ordered so that’s what I bought. 

The system arrived and within a few hours was producing magic, basically the best sound quality I’d ever heard. The installation was entirely straightforward, the Roon integration is absolutely solid and the OS is robust and very easy to use. 

 

The Zenith’s power supply is a major contributor to its great sound and the designers have paid a lot of attention to EMI and vibration control so both noise and jitter seem to be very low.

 

I found that plugging the Zenith into my system’s dedicated mains supply benefitted SQ, but plugging in another device’s SMPS had a seriously deleterious effect so I concluded that the Zenith was injecting very little noise to disturb the D to A conversion. 

 

The Quboz integration is seamless and response times virtually as fast as a local GUI when network  performance is adequate. 

 

In the year I’ve been using the Zenith the only single issue I’ve had was the loss of the entire internet connection during an electrical storm, otherwise not a single glitch

 

[Blackmorec]

The problems with discussions like these and with digital audio in general is that you get the theory and you get the practice and in my recent experience they don’t necessarily match up perfectly. 

The problem with digital audio is that unlike the past, where hi-fi could be easily isolated from other household appliances, streaming has to co-exist with a number of other clients, so designing a truly optimal network is a lot more complex given that the same network needs to serve UHD Video streaming, gaming maybe and a host of fixed and roaming clients. 

When I designed my original system I initially used a lot of the theory in my decision making....for example clock accuracy (and therefore jitter) does’t matter for asynchronous systems;  high frequency noise is not an issue in optical or fully isolated systems etc. 

What I found in practice is that these things may not matter until you measure them in terms of sound quality, then they do.  An example is asynchronous USB. In theory an asynchronous DAC discards the embedded clock signal and uses its own internal clock so the quality of the clock signal arriving at the DAC is in theory irrelevant. However, I and a significant number of audiophiles have found that reclocking the signal before the DAC has a very positive impact on SQ.  A product like the Innuos Statement has 2 USB outputs...one on the mother board and the second with its own OCXO 3 ppb clock and dedicated LPS. My DAC is asynchronous so the 2 USBs  should in theory sound the same yet the OCXO USB is utterly superior in terms of SQ. 

 

Theoretically an optical system will sound better than wired ethernet because of the full isolation of electrical noise. In practice, the optical system needs to convert, transmit, receive and reconvert the data stream and while noise may be reduced, jitter probably isn’t, so SQ gains made in reducing noise could well be lost through increased jitter.  What this swings and roundabout situation means is that there really isn’t a one-size-fits-all formula and theory doesn’t necessarily align with practice when SQ is the arbiter. 

As a result, audiophile consumers should not rely only on theoretical benefits without confirming that they indeed translate into actual sound quality benefits. Many of the improvements I made to my network flew directly in the face of what theoretical logic would dictate....for example vibration control of the router,  improved DC quality to modem and router etc. 

In light of the above its also important to treat manufacturer’s claims with a reasonable degree of scepticism. I implemented an audiophile switch where the manufacturer clearly stated that their SMPS was fully optimised and could not be improved upon.  This turned out to be be incorrect and while their SMPS sounded perfectly adequate, the aftermarket LPS I implemented brought jaw dropping improvements in practically every sonic area valued by audiophiles....improvements so profound it led me to implement LPSs elsewhere in my network.

 

[Blackmorec]

4 hours ago, vortecjr said:

There are people with all in one servers solutions and people with a server and endpoint solution. Clearly Sonore's approach is the latter. In our solution we are trying to keep things as simple as possible so you can use a regular computer or NAS as a server. In the all in one the emphasis is in improving off the shelf hardware. In our solution the emphasis is on a well designed endpoint that doesn't need improvement. There are going to be people on both sides of this argument...to each his own!  

I have to say that I disagree with your summary. The ‘one box’ servers I’ve had experience with, namely from the Innuos range have been extremely well designed and optimised,  offer SOTA sound, and are extremely easy to use, requiring neither regular computer nor NAS.  Practically any device these days uses off-the-shelf parts, as no audio companies manufacture SSDs, CD drives, memory chips, oscillators etc. 

[Blackmorec]

I agree 100% with Alan’s post. The USB output of the Zenith direct into my DAC provided the absolute best sound I’ve every heard from digital. I also agree that avoiding noise in the first place is superior to trying to remove it later on.  Why do I say that? I use a wireless connection between my router and server which should fully isolate the hi-fi, yet everything done at the modem/server level, for example ps improvements clearly reflects in the sound quality. Its as I said in a previous post...theory doesn’t always match practice in digital audio when the criteria is sound quality

[Blackmorec]

23 minutes ago, matthias said:

 

Did you compare USB output to Ethernet output of your Statement into your Devialet?

Thanks

 

Matt

No, I haven’t done that yet. If you look at the interfaces on the Statement, both USB and Ethernet have OCXO 3ppb clocks and dedicated LPS rails so much of the differences reported could be down to cables and interfaces on the DAC side. 

 

I’m just waiting for for my last DC3 PS to run in....once it has I’ll give an ethernet cable a try and report back. I have a spare Meicord lying around so while its not quite up to the SR standard, it isn’t chopped liver either. 

[Blackmorec]

23 hours ago, barrows said:

My only comments in this thread refer to the opticalRendu and Signature Rendu optical.  Both products which you could not possibly have any experience with.  While wired (say CAT 6A) Ethernet connections do allow some noise to couple through ( while still providing a great deal of isolation), optical Ethernet connection is a different thing entirely.  When one uses an optical Ethernet connection one does not "introduce" any noise to downstream components, any noise from the upstream server, router, switches, modems, whatever, does not travel on the optical connection.

 

Additionally,  Rendu products are not deigned to "remove" noise, indeed they are created to be as noise free as possible intrinsically.  And optical Ethernet connections do not "remove" noise either, they just cannot transmit electrical noise from the server (be it a NAS, a standard commercial computer, or an "audiophile" server) to the Renderer.

Given that we are comparing actual products (Servers) with future Sonore products which are currently unavailable and therefore not tried by anyone, the entire discussion is theoretical and fairly pointless. As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, in digital hardware the actual performance doesn’t always follow what’s predicted in theory so its always important to listen to products before buying.  During the building of my current system I tried a number of networking and isolation strategies and the very best I found was wi-fi based on LPS DC supplies throughout, feeding an Innuos Server to my Devialet 440s.  Despite the total electrical isolation achieved, several other steps like vibration isolation and selection of both upstream and downstream cables made a difference, so the conclusion I would reach is that complete isolation, while helpful, isn’t the entire solution. I also reclock the data stream before the server, yet ameliorating vibration still improved sound quality. 

Going back to the OPs question,  an Innuos Zenith server fed by an optimised wi-fi stream is in my experience and my installation the best sound quality I could achieve while being extremely straightforward to install and robust in operation

 

[Blackmorec]

By way of feedback I found this whole thread rather uncomfortable. 

What I really don’t enjoy is  a manufacturer or its representatives rubbishing a competitive genre of products with implied criticism based on set-up shortcomings while presenting an ideal case for his own products. I find this ‘tilting of the playing field’  very manipulative, especially when they’re prefaced with ‘holier than thou’ platitudes. As an example, take the claim that any product with wi-fi is a compromise. In fact, the problem, as presented is simply one of limited bandwidth, which is problematic for streaming over any medium, optical included. 

[Blackmorec]

There are a few things going on here I believe. Let’s look at the logic. 

 

When you isolate your hi-fi system’s data stream from its upstream components, such that no electrical noise is transmitted nor measured, but a change in upstream components has an impact on sound quality,  the conclusion is simply that the changes have nothing to do with the noise that was isolated and confirmed absent by measurements.   Claiming that no change in upstream components can have an effect due to the isolation is simply denying that other factors may be influencing SQ with absolutely no logical grounds for making that claim.  

Isolating electrical noise is not going to influence factors like jitter, crosstalk, data errors,  data distortions etc etc.  

Isolation will prevent electrical noise reaching downstream components but will do absolutely nothing for anything that modifies the actual data stream. 

Further, the components used to execute the isolation could themselves be introducing negative impacts on the SQ that are unrelated to electrical noise. 

In my experience, the more resolution I squeeze from a system, the more profound the losses due  to set-up shortcomings. Conversely, the less resolving a system, the less prone it is to reveal set-up deficiencies or changes. 

In my system I have complete electrical isolation via a wi-fi link but changing cables, power supplies and routers and modifying the vibration reaching  or produced by the upstream components all have a clear influence on SQ which obviously has nothing to do with electrical noise.   

[Blackmorec]

3 hours ago, vortecjr said:

We are not ignoring that part of things. Bit perfect playback be it original content streamed as such or content re-sampled arriving bit perfect is a prerequisite. To quote an industry colleague who works on one of the popular audio player projects, "you can't get better than bit perfect".     

Would that be ‘Bit Perfect’ with 20ns of random jitter or ‘Bit Perfect’ with 1ps?  Both would be Bit Perfect as far as I know, but one would sound a lot different to the other without some reclocking.  

[Blackmorec]

15 hours ago, wwc said:

As a tech-illiterate audiophile, his tear down came across as convincing to me.

 

Is this motherboard truly "custom" or basically off the shelf?  

 

If you do a search and compare internal photos of some other audiophile servers, the Zenith would appear to be lacking.  For example the Taiko SGM and Lucas Audio Lab.  I can't locate internal pics of the Statement which is in the price range of the Taiko SGM, but would be curious to compare...

 

I believe this is on-topic to the original thread and it does seem that if you're going to say that Powell's criticisms have no basis, it would be helpful to back it up.  Help out the illiterates among us.

I use a wi-fi extender to get a clean, fast, isolated ethernet stream into my hi-fi room. The wi-fi extender is a modified TPLink RE650. The standard unit plugs into a 230V wall socket, converts the 230V AC into 5V DC using a small inbuilt SMPS that fits easily into the palm of your hand.  So how is it modified?  The SMPS is completely removed, as is the 230V plug. The output cable from a 5V 3A LMPS is connected directly into the RE650’s electronics, so functional circuitry, heat management, functionality,  cosmetics and safety are all entirely preserved. The 230V plug is actually what mounts the RE650 on the wall, assuring the as-designed orientation of the antennae. In order to preserve this orientation, a single mounting ‘button’ was attached to the RE650 case in exactly the same place as the 230V plug. This button provides a single point attachment to a custom made (perspex mounting plate with  4 o-ring suspension and ethernet cable management) anti-vibration mount.  Essentially what this customisation has achieved is the following:

1. Removed all high frequency SMPS noise

2. Removed the sonic characteristics of an ultra-cheap SMPS and replaced with high quality Sean Jacob’s DC3 sonic characteristics

3. Removed the LF noise and vibration coming from 230V 50Hz

4. Removed the AC - DC conversion noise and vibration

5. Isolated the mechanical vibration coming from the wall 

6. Removed the pollution that the 5V SMPS injects into mains and radiates into nearby cables and components

7. Removed several cheap connectors from the DC line 

8. Because the SMPS is gone, the DC3 can now be powered from my dedicated mains supplies

9 The DC3 can be placed on anti-vibration mini-racks for further isolation.

10 I can use a CHC Black IEC or any other power cable for further improvement 

 

So what do we have here? A customised ethernet extender or a modified off-the-shelf unit?  It would be easy to rubbish the mods, ala Powell, but let me tell you.....as you would suspect, the SQ difference is night and day and the extensively modified extender sounds altogether more natural, pure and musical, making the unmodified version sound a little crude and slightly flawed.  Do you think I could make a superior extender if I started from scratch? Of course not. What I did was take something that works well as an extender and that sounds good compared to others, but that still has some serious limitations in terms of SQ and I removed all those limitations and design flaws to create a sonically superior extender...almost certainly better than anything else commercially available. How do I know this? Because the standard TPLink already sounded superior and all commercial units have exactly the same sonically relevant design flaws. 

Let’s also look at pricing...a standard RE650 costs in the region of £120. The ‘customised’ or ‘modified off-the-shelf’ unit costs around £150 and several hours to modify, but that’s not the end. Add the improved PS that the extender uses, the better power cord, the anti-vibration rack for the PS and you come up to around £1220 all in.  So now, we’re comparing a £120 extender with a £1220 customised unit.....which Mr Powell would lightly dismiss as a modified off the shelf unit that customers are being dramatically overcharged for 

[Blackmorec]

2 hours ago, barrows said:

I would not be so sure of the above conclusion.  What would make you think the only limitations were in the power supply design?  As this unit runs on a 5 VDC supply, certainly there are on board, noisy, DC-DC converters to produce the 3.3 VDC and 1.2 VDC that it likely requires to operate at the board level.  Additionally, there is likely a very standard clock with a higher phase noise than a good, purpose built for audio, unit could employ.  Any commercial product like this, built to be as affordable as possible, has design compromises vs. a well engineered, high end product designed for audio. 

Although I get the approach of using WiFi for isolation, I am very skeptical that WiFi is the best approach.  Certainly putting an RF generator anywhere near the audio system is a questionable approach at best; although it would require very sophisticated RF measurement gear to objectively determine if the RF generated by the extender was effecting the audio components.  One other potential compromise of WiFi is that there are almost certainly more Ethernet packet errors via WiFi, and hence more re-sends resulting in increased processor noise. 

Hi Barrows, I listed all the changes I made, so you know what my conclusion was referring to.  To be honest I didn’t even see the circuit board as its buried under a casement-filling heat sink and anyway I know jack sh1t about modifying circuit boards and nowhere near enough to start modding clocks. The circuit board has 3x5V and 3x0V inputs which serve the whole board. If there are noisy DC-DC converters, they are now less noisy on the principal of less in, less out.  And I would hope that the clock is appreciating an altogether better class of DC. The goal of the project was clear...the result exceeded expectations and sounds clearly superior to a direct ethernet cable of SR level quality, so its doing something right. These days most components have some sort of wi-fi capability so designers obviously don’t share your concerns. The only output from the extender is along an ethernet cable. The 2.4GHz band is switched off and the 5Ghz band is dedicated to receiving signal from one of the router’s 5GHz bands, which itself is dedicated to the extender. Tons of bandwidth and no interrupts or sharing so packet errors are very unlikely.  I didn’t mention the rest of my network, which has also been modified in a similar fashion. 

Frankly its good to hear that there may be other areas that could be improved. Maybe one day someone will, but ‘til then I can thoroughly, heartily recommend the mods I made. 

 

[Blackmorec]

4 hours ago, barrows said:

Absolutely not the case.  Sonore does not have WiFi on any of their Ethernet related products specifically for performance reasons.  Additionally, dCS, while it does have WiFi capability, recommends against using WiFi if one is pursuing best sonic performance.

 

I do not doubt  that adding a competent linear power supply made for an improvement, my only point is that only adding a linear supply does not address all of the potential shortcomings of commercial (built to the lowest possible price point) networking gear.  I do not know if you are experiencing more packet errors, but reports of people using WiFi and experiencing even audio drop outs in with high resolution playback are numerous (despite there nominally being plenty of bandwidth)-the only way for you to know for sure would be to do Network analysis during playback and compare the results to a wired/optical connection.

The other thing to test would be sound quality vs. distance of the extender from the audio system...  It would make the most sense to keep the WiFi extender as far as possible from the audio system. I would not be comfortable with a WiFi transceiver within any less than few meters of the audio system (and hopefully the extender is powered from a different AC line as internally generated noise will make its way back onto the AC line, linear supply or not)

As I already mentioned, I compared the wi-fi extender to a direct ethernet cable between router and network switch because a direct cable was my initial solution of choice. The extender was better, even before the mods. Also, plugging the DC3 into the hi-fi’s dedicated mains circuit brought a small improvement vs having it plugged into the standard house supply, whereas the non-modified extender robbed the system of some of its magic when the SMPS was plugged into the system’s dedicated mains.  I hear what you say....however I have not heard any downsides to implementing high quality wi-fi but plenty of fairly major improvements. 

As I’ve already explained, my capabilities don’t extend to completely rebuilding a commercial networking product. However the mods I made brought substantial gains in SQ and as there’re no commercial extenders that I am aware of with your preferred properties, I don’t really see the point of this dialog, which is airing theoretical problems that I didn’t  actually encounter in practice.  For me, implementing high quality wi-fi based on fully optimised power supplies, cables and vibration control brought only solid improvements. It beat a really high quality Ethernet cable, was dead simple to install and once modified is delivering absolute SOTA performance 

[Blackmorec]

7 hours ago, barrows said:

Of course, because you have not tried better (isolation) solutions.  Just because you heard an improvement with the isolation provided by WiFi, does not mean that this approach is still not compromised in the ways I have pointed out.

Because the isolation provided by Wi-fi brought me massive improvement vs all the other strategies I tried, including a direct cable, I was pretty darned delighted with the results.  Its not just wi-fi, its fully optimised wi-fi, with SOTA power, SOTA cables, extensive vibration control and a dedicated 5Mhz band.  In this scenario the sound is stunningly good with the most drive, listener involvement and  cohesiveness of presentation I’ve frankly ever heard. As regards electrical isolation, I’m not sure how you’d do better than radio waves over a 10m air gap. There is of course optical, but that comes with its own set of problems and compromises, including the need to run a physical connection (a real PITA) and jitter from the sender and receiver.  Using optical isolation is no guarantee....it would need to be fully optimised optical, and the need for a physical connection never goes away. What I’m talking about is getting absolute SOTA sound from commercial, freely available networking products, which you can pick up at any electronics store, are dead easy to install and configure, require no cabling over long runs and can be optimised to within an inch of its life to give a dedicated, high bandwidth,  ultra stable, zero interference connection to your hi-fi resulting in a UI that is so fast it feels local and sound quality the likes of which I have not previously achieved or frankly heard anywhere else.  I’m guessing your agenda is promoting some sort of optical connection, but dissing wi-fi in the process is a mistake.....even with the compromises you mention (which you’re theoreticising  are present) it can be STUNNINGLY good if you’re prepared to set it up as carefully as you would any other piece of hi-fi.  Fully optimised optical will almost certainly beat an ISP provided wi-fi set-up...no argument;  but take the time to optimise the wi-fi’s power supplies, cables, vibration control and bandwidth and I wouldn’t necessarily bet on optical because it would mainly depend on how well and how thoroughly it has been optimised.

[Blackmorec]

1 hour ago, barrows said:

"Jitter" from an optical connection is a non-problem, certainly in comparison to WiFi!

 

The reason I am responding here is because you are advising people that WiFi is THE solution, and that is not the best advice for folks to hear, WiFi has compromises and ignoring these compromises is a problem.

 

I am a bit confused by your response though, at first you mention how important it is to optimize your WiFi set up in order to achieve good results, then you appear to criticize an optical connection because it needs to be optimized?  Cannot we agree that any approach needs to be optimized to achieve best performance?

 

I’m not criticising Optical...all I’m saying is that it will need to be well optimised if its going to improve on what wi-fi can deliver when power, connecting cables, vibration control and wi-fi quality are all optimised. 

As for ignoring compromises, I’ll let the music testify to how detrimental those compromises are....personally speaking I’m not hearing too many so I’d vote we think of them as yet=to-be-realised improvements. 

I’d be interested to understand why jitter with optical is a non-problem i.e doesn’t matter.  Its a concept with which I’m not familiar. Thanks

[Blackmorec]

4 hours ago, Summit said:

 

Don’t take this the wrong way, but if wi-fi brought you massive improvement over wired LAN it likely mean that you have some weird thing going on upstream, I believe.

How very perceptive of you! I actually did have a weird thing going on upstream. It was called a Virgin Superhub router. Not the best router around by any stretch and certainly not when powered by its little Chinese power brick. My first evaluation compared direct ethernet cable between Superhub and AQVox vs a TPLink RE650 extender dedicated to the router’s 5GHz band on the receiver end and  to an ethernet output to the AQVox, with no wi-fi clients on the output side and the 2.4GHz band switched off.  Getting rid of the power brick brought enhancements, adding a new TPLink Archer AC5400 router and demoting the Superhub to a modem function brought improvements. Adding a better internet cable between modem and router brought improvements, as did placing the TPLink Router on an Atacama mini-rack. 

[Blackmorec]

4 hours ago, barrows said:

The reason to use an isolated approach to Networked audio is that it renders what is going on upstream, in terms of noisy commercial computer gear, a non-issue (whether copper Ethernet wire, optical based isolation, or WiFi)-this is a good thing, as upstream tweaks become unnecessary and make no difference (for the most part).

This is simply not correct. With wi-fi in place and functioning flawlessly, you could still clearly hear the improvements brought by better routers, placing the router on an anti-vibration platform, implementing superior ethernet cables and improving the power supply to modem and router.  My conclusion would be that electrical noise transmitted along ethernet cables is not the only issue/parameter affecting sound  quality. Believing this will bog you down with an inferior front end that will impact your final sound regardless of the isolation employed. 

[Blackmorec]

35 minutes ago, barrows said:

I have asked this question before, but statements like this require that it be asked again:

 

What mechanism/parameter, do you suppose, is at work which improves your sound quality, within the context of a galvanically isolated Network connection (WiFi or optical), when you, for instance, place your router on a vibration control platform?  I am not trying to be smart here, i am honestly curious.  So far I have never heard a single, even highly speculative, theory on how things like this could possibly make a difference in sound quality.  @Nenon, as you appear to be an expert in Networking, I am interested in your take on this as well: "when every nanosecond matters" do you pay attention to vibration control of Network hardware?

 

As a secondary question: If vibration control of every switch or router in the chain makes a significant difference, what does this mean for music files distributed streamed from sources like Tidal and Qobuz? 

‘Fraid I can’t help you with the physics; in fact i hardly believed it myself. The only reason i installed a mini-rack is because the router looked strange sitting on the floor. I was as surprised as anyone when i heard clear improvements that i wasn’t expecting. Indeed i wasn’t expecting any changes. In addition, I don’t know why ethernet cables help improve SQ, but they do, even those installed before any isolation. 

[Blackmorec]

Barrows, I’ve been around hi-fi for more than 40 years chasing the dream of reproducing music that my brain is able to process without identifying any hi-fi related anomalies like frequency shifts, coloration,  room nodes, smearing, loss of detail, hardness, harshness etc.  I want to get completely involved in the music, without my brain identifying shortcomings. Its taken me the best part of 40 years to reach this goal. 

 

Over that time I’ve learned a couple of major lessons

1. Space and time are critical elements in music reproduction. If music isn’t differentiated spatially, as it would be in nature, it often sounds muddy and confused as frequencies overlap and either mask or colour and distort one another. As soon as similar frequencies are differentiated spatially and in time,  it becomes far easier to hear individual strands and the music sounds a lot more pure, realistic and undistorted. 

2. The better and more refined my system has become over time, the better resolved the detail but the more coherent the music has become,  2 seemingly polar opposites that are in reality highly complementary. Essentially the big picture becomes more meaningful when it contains more well resolved detail.

 

OK, so where I’m trying to get with my hi-fi and music should be clear. I’m looking for a highly resolved signal that does a perfect job in presenting and conveying the big musical picture, with huge listener involvement and no sonic contradictions.  Instruments and voices with accurate tonality and natural timbre, accurately portrayed in space, with super precise timing that underpins the rhythmic interplay between musicians. When it all works well, the music grabs my soul and doesn’t let go.  Changes to my system are easy to hear in this context because the music is either more involving and enjoyable or less. I can analyse the detail of what has changed but that’s of purely academic interest, far more important is how I’m reacting to the music my system is producing. 

Obviously no 2 recordings are the same. Some offer listening-room-expanding accurate portrayals of the recording venue or what the recording engineer has created as a recording acoustic, with acoustically active,  related space in between that places all musicians in the same acoustic venue. Old recordings often portray very beautifully recorded instruments in a left, centre, right configuration, with ‘dead’ space in between...ie no.  acoustic ‘whole’ that places all the musicians in the same venue. Beautiful but old, less sophisticated recordings.  Yet others from the bygone era used simple miking techniques to get the whole thing more or less right, recording the artists and the venue acoustics ‘as one’ 

 

So, how does this all relate to the topic of vibration control etc. Simply this. When you isolate network components from structural borne vibration and/or provide a way to ‘drain’ internally component generated vibration,  the music reproduced by the system moves in the desired direction; sometime a little and sometimes more. Adding vibration control of network components was never stunning in terms of improved SQ, but it did deliver useful increments of sonic improvement. The Sean Jacobs power supplies would better fit the stunning description, especially when used together with SR cables throughout the network. 

 

I’ve no doubt that my system still includes compromises, especially in the network, which uses cheap, consumer grade electronics. Good, I’m glad that’s the case. It means that despite the stellar results I’m getting by optimising power, signal transmission and vibration control, there are still further Improvements to come. Brilliant.  In the meantime, for anyone who uses remote streaming, they need to know that refining the front end of their network is just as important in terms of sound quality as refining their DAC, server or loudspeakers.  They also need to know that a well set up and optimised Wi-fi that provides excellent isolation can deliver stellar results. When I started out with digital streaming, I believed that wi-fi was a massive compromise and avoided it like the plague, but refinement after refinement,  Wi-fi has proven to be a great tool  in the search for sonic excellence. 

Can optical be better?  I hope so. But optical in its current state will require just as much optimisation as wi-fi and I’m not seeing speciality stores crammed with optical networking for me to try. So until someone bring out a fully optimised optical networking, I’ll stick with what’s freely available and capable of delivering stellar sonics. 

When you finally release whatever it is you’re working on,  I’d be more than happy to try it and if it beats what I currently have, more power to you. Anything that advances the SOTA is most welcome 

In the meantime though, its worth remembering that optimised Wi-fi is a pretty damned good solution and is not chopped liver, as some would make out.  

[Blackmorec]

57 minutes ago, Nenon said:

@barrows 

Drops can occur at many different levels. But once you build out a reliable network, it just doesn't drop any packets. We process many millions updates per second. The network devices don't drop any packets. It's a piece of cake for most network devices to transport packets from point A to point B. They can do it reliably all day long at different speed and utilization without a need for error correction. 

If something goes wrong, such as a bad transceiver or dirty cable, for example, you see CRC errors. Those appear at the Data-link layer. The network device does not try to correct them. It's up to your application or the protocol your application uses to correct those errors and recover the missed packets. If you use TCP for example,  the dropped packets would be recovered via retransmissions. It's part of the TCP specification. If you use multicast, however, the dropped packets would not be recovered. In that case you can build something in your application to take care of the recovery. Any type of retransmission/recovery obviously causes latency. But as I mentioned above, typically in a well designed network you don’t see drops. So that’s not really an issue. 

 

Although we call our networks low-latency and sometimes even ultra low-latency, we measure the latency at nanosecond granularity. Our brain is amazing. I think we are capable of hearing picoseconds latency (that’s a speculation on my part) when we listen to our highly resolving systems. If that’s the case, then everything I know about “low-latency” network goes out the roof. And we probably need to look at what is happening at a micro level (I.e. the actual physical layer where the electrical signal is converted to digital).

 

How the ethernet PHY chips deal with jitter at a hardware level is unfortunately not my area of expertise. I will do some reading on the topic, because I think this is most important part for high-end audio.

 

[This entire paragraph is pure speculation]

I am guessing that our brain is sensitive to the jitter that happens at this layer (picoseconds?). If the electrical signal arriving to the PHY is degraded, the PHY would need to use some methods to correct it. Occasionally (depending on how compromised the signal is?), it may take a little longer to correct the compromised signal. That delay might be what impacts the sound quality… the way I imagine it is data (our music) coming at a steady rate, and all of a sudden you get a delay (some type of recovery) and then going back to its steady rate. Although this is at a micro-level / picoseconds, our brain can catch that delay during the recovery. And this is where better clocks, better cables, and cleaner power can help. So maybe that's why you hear an improvement when you upgrade the ethernet clock. Maybe a better clock reduces the number of those "signal breakouts". That would also explain why ethernet cables work (deliver cleaner signal - less "signal breakouts") or even vibration treatment works (helps the clock remain more stable, resulting in less "signal breakouts"). That would also explain why changes upstream of the optical isolation work - the optical isolation isolates the electrical noise and probably smoothens the "signal breakouts" but does not completely eliminate them. Actually the more switches you have in the chain, the more you will smoothen the upstream "signal breakouts"... the problem, though, would be that every switch in the chain has the potential to generate more new "signal breakouts"... There are quite a few reports that adding two SOTM switches is better than having just one - here you go, they have good clocks, good power, potentially do well on not creating too many additional "signal breakouts", but because you have two of them, they smoothen the upstream "signal breakouts". This theory does not even conflict with "bits are bits" - yes bits are bits, they are exactly the same, but when you have uneven time gaps between them ("signal breakouts"), your brain can catch it.

 

That’s exactly the kind of information I hope to find, that makes trawling through some of these threads worthwhile. I appreciate that a lot of what you say is speculation, but its logic seems really solid, so while it may not yet be proven by measurements and experimentation,  it sure sounds reasonable and does a great job of scratching the itch caused when subjective results don’t vibe with commonly held and stated views. Nice post!

[Blackmorec]

5 hours ago, Blackmorec said:

deleted

  

 

[Blackmorec]

2 hours ago, Paul R said:

 

Well, I wanted to answer this when you first wrote it, but it took a little while to spec something similar out from Chinese suppliers. But it sure wasn't that hard. "Custom" case and all. 

 

Anyone really wants one of those, my cost would be $416 + shipping, so figure on a U.S. sale cost of about $799-$859, delivered.  Oh wait, I forgot this is the audiophilne market.  Make that $1999, delivered with a one year warranty. I'll keep a few extras on hand to swap out if there are any issues.

 

I specced in quantity 10, but in higher quantity, the price is significantly lower. So yeah, that ZENith machine probably cost the seller less than $300, delivered. 

 

So, I thought he was being crazy rude in his video --  there are a lot of better ways to present that. However, I don't necessarily see that he was inaccurate. 

 

Why is everyone throwing shade at the guy? So he sells expensive custom stuff, so do a lot of people here. So he sells an expensive chair? Up to you if you want to spend your money that way. But "facts is facts" - we audiophiles are ripped off all the time.  And not just by "ElectroCream",  ruthless cable salespeople, or MQA! 

 

I am not against making money mind you, I am against paying an extreme premium cost for mediocre gear. Not even in pretty bling! 

 

 

 

 

If you ever set up a manufacturing company, one of the things you’ll almost certainly end up doing, if you want to make a profit at all, it to prepare a spreadsheet for all the costs that go into your product. What you’ll immediately discover is that the unit cost of materials is only one of many lines on the spreadsheet. While it will be an important factor in the overall cost of your product, you’ll soon figure out that as a percentage of the total selling price its not that high. What you’ll also figure out is that the number of cost contributors to your price is a lot higher than you initially suspected. Let me give you some of the contributors:

Premises

Heating and air conditioning

Building maintenance and cleaning

Cleaning materials 

Insurance

Business rates and local property taxes

Security 

Packing materials

Industrial design, outsourced services and consulting 

Prototyping

Testing

Production facilities and machinery

Warranty costs, repair bench and test rigs

Marketing costs....marketing collateral, trade shows, advertising, displays, 

Postage and shipping

Travel and hotel costs

Certification costs

Accounting costs 

Employee salaries, insurance and benefits

Own salary

Taxes (Value added tax, corporate tax, income tax)

New product R&D 

Software development costs

Phones and communications

Licenses and permits

Transport

IT and networking infrastructure

Production stock

Finished goods inventory 

Credit costs

Listening room and test rig

Water

Documentation

Dealer and user support

General supplies (tea, coffee, toilet paper, cleaning materials, 

 

The above would be for a small company. Add lots of employees and costs skyrocket. 

Quite frankly, adding up the component costs of a unit and using only those costs to make  inferences about margins really only demonstrates a lack of understanding about manufacturing and business accounting. 

As for purchasing everything in China, you’ve probably got a bit to learn there too. Firstly, if you simply go after price, its almost 100% sure you’ll have quality issues. In low cost Chinese manufacturing there’s no such thing as vendor loyalty or quality control. Cheapest ‘to-spec’ supplier wins....so expect to see the components in your Chinese products change on a regular basis. If you want to manage quality, then China is no different to any other region. Quality costs. 

Then to get the quantity breaks, you’ll need to order any custom, made-to-measure components in rather large quantities, pushing up you inventory costs substantially.

Quality is also an issue if you want to avoid pissing customers off with DOA products, so you’ve got to find ways to at least control and maybe improve the product quality of what comes out of China....not a trivial task.  Lots of travel and time involved there. 

In summary, when you know what goes into making a product,  when you value performance and you value quality products and excellent customer support you’ll realise that prices for something like the Innuos Zenith are entirely fair and reasonable and that no one is getting ripped off. Quite the opposite. Making and distributing hi-fi equipment is an expensive business with lots of cost elements

[Blackmorec]

6 hours ago, Paul R said:

 

Honestly? Your post shows a very good ability to crib from the internet, but a rather uninspired understanding of the costs of doing business.. Anyone who owns or runs a small successful professional business is quite aware of all the costs involved, and how to price their services to survive and thrive with the necessary costs of doing business. 

 

Your conclusion, that $4200 for a device with a fully delivered cost probably around $300 is “fair and reasonable” is - nuts. It is purely an attempt to price something so high people believe it is a elite product. Snob marketing, we call it. You can spend whatever you want on it, but you will still only be getting $300 or so worth of equipment.  $800-850 per unit is a much more reasonable cost. If you add in service and support, maybe $1k, but for that, it had best be real service and support. 

 

I suggest if you need that kind of markup to make your business successful, you are not running it very well at all. Otherwise, it is just another of the thankfully few high end ripoffs that are still around.  And yes, there is such a thing as a global just in time inventory, and yes, it can be carefully used to control costs. 

 

Please stop wasting my time. Putting words into my mouth then criticising them is a game but not one I want to join in with. 

[Blackmorec]

42 minutes ago, lateboomer said:

 

Hi Blackmorec. Thank you very much for sharing details info on how to implement good wifi networking for audio streaming. It helps me a lot to grasp the technical details how to do it. Much appreciated.

You’re very welcome. I will be the first to admit that we probably can’t explain in physical terms precisely all that is going on that allows vibration control, better cable isolation and transmission and improved power supplies on the network to improve sound quality. Just know that at this point in remote digital streaming, they still make a very big, positive difference to how streamed music sounds. Maybe sometime in the future they won’t matter, but we’re not there yet. 

[Blackmorec]

6 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

 

 

Paul, Tubes and Vinyl just go together like Bonnie and Clyde!  Captain and Tennile!  Stephen Colbert and Bill O'Reilly!

 

😉

I would think a better fit may be Laurel & Hardy, Morecambe and Wise,  Lucy and Ethel.  Classical performances and the right era