UpTone Audio EtherREGEN Listening Impressions

[HumanMedia]

15 hours ago, LowMidHigh said:

Has anyone tried this?

ER -> Mac Mini (or PC) -> DAC.

 

I wonder if feeding the Mac Mini the ER would make a SQ difference.

I think that might defeat the purpose of the ER.  RFI-noisy general purpose computers are some of the things the ER is meant to separate your DAC from. You could attach it to the B side of the ER with your DAC on the A side which would work well. But since computers transmit airborne RFI as well, I would also try and keep the computer as far away physically as possible.

[HumanMedia]

On 12/9/2019 at 11:13 AM, cat6man said:

for what its worth, i remember reading years ago that the ear is exquisitely sensitive to delay, way beyond the inverse of highest frequency

(e.g. 1/20khz)........and classical conductors were reported to be able to discriminate in tests between absurdly low level of audio delay, which suggests that very small correlations and/or errors in sound between channels are important.

Exactly, Rob Watts the designer of the Chord DACs, believes we are more sensitive than that and attributes part of the success of his upscaling products to providing 1.3us accuracy.

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/hugo-m-scaler-by-chord-electronics-the-official-thread.885042/page-503#post-15076324

 

And what characterises his products? Clean accurate soundstage with delicate reverb and transients. The descriptions I hear of the EtherRegen are remarkably similar to the benefits of Chord products. He is often quoted as saying high sampling rate is mostly about transient accuracy and resultant reverb and soundstage as opposed to frequency response.

 

And would microsecond precision between channels be shown in those gross low resolution charts over at ARS? Of course not.

So my opinion is that part of what the EtherRegen does is removes noise or influences that affect timing of the reproduced analog signal downstream.

[HumanMedia]

How would people characterise the changes they experience in sound over 200 hours burn-in?

What changes and when?

[HumanMedia]

@Lucie

Very interesting. I have similar findings. I’m only day 5 in burning in, but I found that initially the ER added an exaggerated spatiality due to pushing the midrange and highs forward.

 

I knew there were changes from burning in so I’m sitting tight and almost relieved that the tonal balance is becoming more normal and the spatiality is less sound effecty.

 

Ive held off tweaking too much until things settle but have tried powering it with a JS-2 and LPS 1.2. These did add some improvements in treble but had a more congested mid range. With the LPS it’s like the bass information was pulled up into the midrange, not in a good way. The JS-2 had promise but I will come back to that when things settle a bit. My current preference is the stock supply, on a circuit separate from the audio system. I’m still having unnatural highs, but so have others until later in burn in process.

 

Overall it’s a definite improvement, but comes with some exaggerated negatives at least initially. Not trying to be negative, just objective amongst almost universal praise.

[HumanMedia]

Thermal issues, or non-issues, aside, do people find that specific voltages sound different/better? From the same supply even?

I seem to remember John mentioning that different voltage/power supply combinations could sound better. Maybe that was a microRendu thread? Or was it the EtherRegen, or both?

 

One poster indicated a feeling that a 7 volt Farad supply had a slight edge over the 12v Farad. Has anyone else noted a audio quality preference for difference voltage inputs?

[HumanMedia]

Just a quickie, finally plugged something else into the A side. Hooked in my Apple TV 4K which feeds my AV system. Didn’t notice any video improvement, but the audio is definitely smoother. It’s had a roughness that iv e noticed since upgrading my receiver 12 months ago. Now noticeably smoother sounding.

[HumanMedia]

On 5/9/2020 at 2:27 AM, audiojerry said:

 

BTW, I should note that in addition to the amazing increase in SQ from the ER, I also heard an improvement from the ER when I replaced a generic ethernet cable on the 'B' side of the ER with a better quality ethernet cable (1 meter of Cable Matters SFTP Cat8 Ethernet Cable). Thanks to the Uptone community for that Amazon recommendation.

System synergy YMMV etc. I found the exact opposite. I found the Cable Matters CAT8 on the B side constrained and flattened the sound. Going back to a ‘generic’ Blue Jeans Cat6a opened the sound up considerably. Maybe that Blue Jeans Cat 6a shouldn’t really be considered stock though.

 

Edit: oops sorry, just read Superdads, don’t post about ethernet cables AFTER I posted.