HOLO Audio MAY DAC

[GoldenOne]

16 minutes ago, ted_b said:

Thx.  Your description of your new NUC sounds like you are using it as BOTH a roon core and an NAA.  Is this at the same time (NUC -> HQPlayer server -> NUC -> May), or can be used either (the same time thing has me baffled :)  ). ?

 

 

 

 

The NUC is just a small PC so it can be configured in any way the user likes.

Personally I have it running windows, which then has the roon core and HQP NAA installed.
The HQP processing is actually being done on my main PC both because it's much more powerful and also cause then it's easier to quickly change settings.

So right now the chain looks like:

Roon (NUC) -> HQPlayer (Main PC) -> HQPlayer NAA (NUC) -> ifi iGalvanic -> Holo May

I'm sure the NUC would be able to handle PCM upsampling to 1.536mhz as it's one of the more powerful ones (8th gen i7 4core 8thread). But there's not really a need to do so.
 

[GoldenOne]

13 minutes ago, Toni-Mang said:

That is a good discussion, maybe a DDC or an islolator can add an additional noise performance to the Titanis section...(the section befor the isolated handover to the Dac)...as mentioned above PLL should handle the jitter...

In my case the DI20HE sounded different compared to a direct connection via USB. I am using a noisy and old Laptop with Jriver. The direct USB connection is wider in soundstage, but has not the dephts as the di20he via I2S...thats why i think about a galvanic isolator to compare...maybe the DI is obsolete than...

It could potentially. Even when connected to my gaming PC which is probably the worst possible source one could choose there was no detectable reduction of performance at all. So it seems the internal galvanic isolation is fine.
BUT, when spending up to $5k on a dac, an extra $300 for an iGalvanic perhaps isn't really a big worry regardless of whether it helps or not.

[ted_b]

I'm sorry, I wasn't questioning what a NUC is (I own one and have it configured currently as an NAA with Jussi's image but it's main configuration, when booted normally, is as a roon core).  What I wondered is how it does both, being that the typical NAA is a jack of ONE trade...being an NAA and nothing else.  So Roon's chatty serving of music files doesn't inhibit the NAA function?  Thx

[lpost]

1 hour ago, GoldenOne said:

Also just thought I'd post here in regards to USB sources for 1.536mhz for the may.

I was previously using an SMS200 Ultra, but couldn't do 1.536mhz from HQPlayer with it.
You have to use an intel device in order to reliably get 1.536mhz working. (Some other PCIe cards work on and off but intel is the only thing that works reliably).

This limits you to not massively ideal devices in terms of your source. I bought a NUC as I could then run a roon core on it, and also use it as a source for the may.
 

 

I've been super happy with the UP gateway based on Intel Cherry Trail SoC. Does 1.5MHz flawlessly and runs HQP NAA boot image perfectly. It's also on Jussi's recommended hardware list.

 

I run the $12 smps they offer as a companion and there is zero difference compared to using the iFi iPower Elite I evaluated for 30 days.

 

https://up-shop.org/up-gateway-atom-x5-z8350-w-4g-memory-32g-emmc-board-w-vesa-plate.html

 

They even include the emissions testing data allowing one to compare the noise emitted (RF) to others that give such readings. I suppose they all have to test for FCC and Euro regulations but may not make the data so easy to access.

[The Computer Audiophile]

I keep seeing people suggest that Intel chipsets are a requirement for 32fs playback. This isn't true. As I type this, I'm listening to 32fs through a Sonore signatureRendu SE optical. 

 

[ted_b]

4 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I keep seeing people suggest that Intel chipsets are a requirement for 32fs playback. This isn't true. As I type this, I'm listening to 32fs through a Sonore signatureRendu SE optical. 

 

You are not using a Holo May, Chris.  That Intel 32fs limitation does not exist for the Terminator.

[lpost]

7 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I keep seeing people suggest that Intel chipsets are a requirement for 32fs playback. This isn't true. As I type this, I'm listening to 32fs through a Sonore signatureRendu SE optical. 

 

 

Good not know! I wonder which USB chipset the Rendu uses? (edit: Chis is using a Denafrips not Holo May)

 

I had no luck with AMD USB nor with the plethora of cheap PCI-e USB boards on Amazon. None would do 32fs even at 16-bits. But I've heard some have had RPi4 do 32fs and others, including myself, not. All combined with May dac.

 

Jussi recommends 20-bit for the May to allow the noise shaper to do it's best job. Running at 32-bit is of no advantage and I guess he would argue a disadvantage vs. 20-bit.

[The Computer Audiophile]

Just now, ted_b said:

You are not using a Holo May, Chris.  That Intel 32fs limitation does not exist for the Terminator.

Very true Ted. 

 

Does anyone know why there is a difference between Intel and non-Intel hardware, if someone is running Linux and using built-in Linux drivers?

[The Computer Audiophile]

2 minutes ago, lpost said:

 

Good not know! I wonder which USB chipset the Rendu uses?

 

I had no luck with AMD USB nor with the plethora of cheap PCI-e USB boards on Amazon. None would do 32fs even at 16-bits. But I've heard some have had RPi4 do 32fs and others, including myself, not.

 

Jussi recommends 20-bit for the May to allow the noise shaper to do it's best job. Running at 32-bit is of no advantage and I guess he would argue a disadvantage vs. 20-bit.

It comes down to a combination of chipset and drivers. Using Windows on CAPS 20.1 as an endpoint, I couldn't get 32fs working. Switching to Linux NAA image, it worked flawlessly. Intel hardware didn't change, only software changed. 

[barrows]

@The Computer Audiophile, Thanks Chris for clearing this up.  At Sonore we have not ever been able to test our Renderers (Signature Rendu, microRendu, ultraRendu, opticalRendu) at rates above DSD 512 and PCM 768 as we have not ever had any DACs on hand capable of higher rates.  So our official rate limits only state up to the levels we have tested and confirmed to work.

As Chris has noted, he has his Signature Rendu SEoptical working with his Denafrips test DAC at PCM 1.5xxx MHz, which is news to us.  It does appear that the Holo Audio DACs have very specific USB requirements to meet these very high rates-this is appears to be an issue of the Holo Audio USB code, and not a specific limitation of the Sonore Renderers.

As for what is required with the Holo Audio May specifically, as some have noted, it appears that they need a USB source which uses a very specific USB hardware architecture.  Please note that there are very specific reasons to choose one USB chip over another (performance reasons for sound quality) and at Sonore we choose the USB chip specifically for performance reasons.

Please understand we cannot test with every possible DAC available, and there are only a very small selection of DACs at this time which work at input rates this high.

[Zaphod Beeblebrox]

1 hour ago, Quadman said:

Ted,  The PGGB website under dacs has this info...  It appears they recommend 16 bit at 32fs.

• Holo Audio May DAC (16FS/20bits** or 32FS/16bits***)

I had put that recommendation based on some issues that early testers were having with the firmware. I believe with the right firmware you can do 32FS/20bits now. I recommend 20bits if you are able to play it without any issues

[GoldenOne]

28 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

It comes down to a combination of chipset and drivers. Using Windows on CAPS 20.1 as an endpoint, I couldn't get 32fs working. Switching to Linux NAA image, it worked flawlessly. Intel hardware didn't change, only software changed. 

It seems to be super hit or miss and a combination of factors.

On the may, raspberry pi 4 with NAA image: Music plays fine, but at half speed
With ropieee or other image, music plays at regular speed but sounds glitchy and awful

I also have two raspberry pi 4's which are seemingly identical. Same spec, same USB controller, and yet they behave differently when trying to play 1.536mhz. And my friend has the same pi which DOES do 1.536mhz

On the Ares 2 I simply couldn't get 1.536mhz to play at all on anything other than the intel machine. 
So I'm not sure what the culprit is. Some people have managed to get 1.536mhz working fine on some pcie hifi cards and others even with the same card had no luck.

So it seems that whilst intel isn't "required" per se, it's basically the only way to guarantee that you won't be pulling your hair out :P
It's unfortunate as I'd really have liked to keep using my sms200 ultra :(

[lpost]

7 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

It comes down to a combination of chipset and drivers. Using Windows on CAPS 20.1 as an endpoint, I couldn't get 32fs working. Switching to Linux NAA image, it worked flawlessly. Intel hardware didn't change, only software changed. 

All of my various hardware trials where all done with Jussi's images, either HQPe with just NAA daemon loaded (for easy bridge network support) or NAA. Apparently what we're asking the USB hardware to do is out of spec but clearly not a bandwidth issue.

[scintilla]

For the record, I am quite happy with DSD 512+fs, DSD 512 into May.  It is likely that there will be no advantage to going to PCM 1XXX over 768k anyway and once again the mignons are chasing asymptotes. How about you guys spend some time listening to music and stop trying to make everything "perfect."  There truly is a "good enough" point where you can stop.  Really.  Disengage the analytic mind, drink something tasty and just enjoy your investment.  I know I sure am.  So can you.

[mrkoven]

Looks like Jussi has a new filter in hqp 4.11 release today. poly-sinc-ext3. So far i think it sounds great with pcm1.536 lns15 👍

[Extreme_Boky]

Even though I like native sampling rates and May working in NOS, over anything upsampled, the 1.536MHz sounds better to me, compared to 768kHz (LNS15, poly-sinc-lp).

 

On the other note (the "good enough" point, where one should stop)... I have been playing recently with minute variations with the way the common returns in my Aleph J are wired - with some truly remarkable results. 

 

I think I'll never stop :)  But, I strongly believe that only one thing should be changed, at any point in time. AND, the change should be evaluated over the long period of time (a week at least). AND the best way to see if something sounds better, is to do your daily work while the music is playing in the background, and see if you are able to do your work, or you simply have to stop and listen... 

 

It is always desirable to have a reference point (it does not need to be better than what you are evaluating); for example an extra DAC and an extra AMP, just to be able to confirm, by comparison, that you are not going off the tangent at an inappropriate angle. 

[scintilla]

Almost 30 years ago, I bought a cutout cd out of a discount bin: Leni Stern, Ten Songs. Turns out it was Mike Stern’s ‘91 band backing his wife. German producer that I once emailed regarding the incredible sound quality of this disc asking for a hirez version. So, tonight I can say that this is the best I have ever heard it. I played this on a WAMM and Krell Audio Standard system out in Sliverdale. Bigger soundstage, yes. Not better than this though. Percussion and bells, chimes, tabla. This is the realist deal. Depth. Tails. Jump factor. Wow. May rocks. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

4 hours ago, scintilla said:

For the record, I am quite happy with DSD 512+fs, DSD 512 into May.  It is likely that there will be no advantage to going to PCM 1XXX over 768k anyway and once again the mignons are chasing asymptotes. How about you guys spend some time listening to music and stop trying to make everything "perfect."  There truly is a "good enough" point where you can stop.  Really.  Disengage the analytic mind, drink something tasty and just enjoy your investment.  I know I sure am.  So can you.

How about you focus on you and be happy when others are happy doing whatever brings them enjoyment?

[Schafheide]

First of all I have to say that I listen exclusively via Blue Hawaii/Stax SR009S headphones.

With my previous dac (Schiit Yggdrasil) the sound stage was nothing special.

Now, with May KTE it is very special - but.

On some recordings the sound stage is wide and evenly spread.

On others it is more centralised.

On others it is unevenly divided ie lots on the left, lots on the right , with a little in between.

In otherwords the May is extremely critical regarding the sound stage - it does not improve what is not there.

What I am saying is that on the best recordings the sound stage is superb, but on most, this is not so.

Do other folk hear this as well?

[Hiker]

2 hours ago, Schafheide said:

First of all I have to say that I listen exclusively via Blue Hawaii/Stax SR009S headphones.

With my previous dac (Schiit Yggdrasil) the sound stage was nothing special.

Now, with May KTE it is very special - but.

On some recordings the sound stage is wide and evenly spread.

On others it is more centralised.

On others it is unevenly divided ie lots on the left, lots on the right , with a little in between.

In otherwords the May is extremely critical regarding the sound stage - it does not improve what is not there.

What I am saying is that on the best recordings the sound stage is superb, but on most, this is not so.

Do other folk hear this as well?

There was a time everything sounds like it was produced in the same studio or venue by the same recording engineers with only slight differences in tone and clarity , that wasn’t too long ago .
 

Digital playback today for me the sound quality has profoundly changed and now with the purchase of the May KTE dac clearly provided another step up in sound quality performance . Only having the May for a few days listening to familiar well recorded music it brings more to the experience and pleasure then my previous choice of dac the Denafrips Terminator including a PS Audio Direct Stream senior dac using the same music server for all three dacs.

 

I use headphones also at times however when it comes to soundstaging there are clear differences with different recordings however I think the May is special in this department.

[dsyzling]

I would certainly prefer a playback mechanism that varied the sound stage between recordings, why should a studio recording sound the same as a live close mic-ed recording in different venues (hall, church, stage)? If they do homogenise the sound stage then surely something in the chain is imparting or losing something along the way.  This is all assuming you can recover some kind of sound stage from a recording into a stereo playback mechanism. 

[Hiker]

1 hour ago, dsyzling said:

I would certainly prefer a playback mechanism that varied the sound stage between recordings, why should a studio recording sound the same as a live close mic-ed recording in different venues (hall, church, stage)? If they do homogenise the sound stage then surely something in the chain is imparting or losing something along the way.  This is all assuming you can recover some kind of sound stage from a recording into a stereo playback mechanism. 

I’m fairly new using digital playback after a long time with vinyl though it was only in the past few years using vinyl as my primary source I enjoyed it more then at any other time simply because I could afford much better stuff .

Getting ready to retire made me re-think everything I enjoy and not so much with this hobby , deciding to move on from vinyl to the ultra convenience of using digital no more fussing , storage of Lps and management of music I’m happy and content with digital playback finally.

 

Sound staging using speakers the illusion of the players appearing out of thin air with music and sounds feet out front and away from the speakers and as wide as the room for me is very pleasurable experience however what I really get a kick out of is a touch of a screen selecting what I want to listen to while sitting in my chair ,,.

 

[Toni-Mang]

Imho the May is capable of full 3D, if the mastering/recording is 3D...

The reproduction of the Soundstage is the magic ability of this DAC, together with the tonal accuracy...If you are a soundstage freak, like me, and your system is already well setuped, this is the way to go...

but it does not replace my vinyl...

 

[Flextreme]

Recently rediscovered the DSD filter in HQplayer. Love the gigantic (almost overly audiophile) liquid/plastic presentation of Sinc-L/ASDM7/@DSD256 on my AMD 5900x/RTX 3090 pc sourcing a May KTE.

 

Love to try ASDM7EC, but at DSD64 it barely works, higher DSD rates are constantly drop out, even with multicore DSP and Cuda enabled (and working, verified this). My guess my AMD x5900 is the limiting factor (processor or usb limitations?).

 

Did all recent  ZEN 3 platform updates for USB issues, but the fast MAY firmware (30.12) still does not work for me.

 

Anyone here got the May with 30.14 firmware running ASDM7EC at DSD256x on a AMD ZEN3 platform?

[MichaelHiFi]

4 hours ago, Schafheide said:

First of all I have to say that I listen exclusively via Blue Hawaii/Stax SR009S headphones.

With my previous dac (Schiit Yggdrasil) the sound stage was nothing special.

Now, with May KTE it is very special - but.

On some recordings the sound stage is wide and evenly spread.

On others it is more centralised.

On others it is unevenly divided ie lots on the left, lots on the right , with a little in between.

In otherwords the May is extremely critical regarding the sound stage - it does not improve what is not there.

What I am saying is that on the best recordings the sound stage is superb, but on most, this is not so.

Do other folk hear this as well?

Yes I hear what you've been experiencing. 

 

I haven't heard a bad setting through the May, just different. And when scrolling through the settings, the first thing of note is how the stage changes. But there are so many factors involved in this, not just the May.

 

Since I lost my music servers motherboard, I also received my BMC amp that has been broken for many years. And it won't play with my Ushers full range (bass bins) but plays with the to monitor section. So we played and compared the BMS with my Kinki Studio M1+ thinking the Kinki will best the old BMC. The May got dumbed down (dumbed down?) to Roon core on a SGC linux box uRendu USB in to May. We listened 44.1 NOS. No HQP. 

 

2 things were discovered. First was that the BMC schooled the Kinki. I use the Kinki as a preamp and noted that the BMC was simply better rooted, cleare but in a very natural way. The soundstage was the widest we've heard going well outside the boundaries of the speakers. Bass was so taut, so ah, delicious wow and just through the monitors. Now of course it's so subjective because not having big woofers in the mix will change how the sound is perceived. Still, my wife (who is so very picky on music) sat a very long time last night playing all types of music, and very loud!

 

So Roon, 44.1 NOS, uRendu. Will it get better with the return of the server and HQP now that the BMC has returned home? Probably yeah. But the May doesn't have a better setting that I see, just different settings one can play with and tune to their gear. Very cool.