OAudio Posted December 18, 2020 Share Posted December 18, 2020 1 hour ago, ray-dude said: I suspect there will be a part 6 to my Extreme review at some point (one year in type of thing), once the tweaks and updates accumulate a bit more. It's a great review serise, looking forwards to part 6 ! ASRMichael 1 OAudio Ltd. OAudio Supreme - music server. OAudio RealStream - digital audio components. Link to comment
kyoya78 Posted December 19, 2020 Share Posted December 19, 2020 9 hours ago, Nenon said: You should try Windows LTSC and ProcessLasso. I will be publishing a guide for tweaking Windows for this motherboard sometime next year. Planning to share everything I've learned since April. I am also working with Emile from Taiko on testing some of his technology that will most likely treacle down to the DIY market sometime next year. This coming year will be very exciting for DIY. Thanks for your advice. I will try Windows LTSC and ProcessLasso. I am also looking forward to the publication of your guide for tweaking Windows. 8 hours ago, ray-dude said: I have been having a LOT of fun with this combo on my Extreme. My recommendation is to carefully study the block diagram. All the answers are there, and become VERY obvious as you play around with CPU affinity, memory affinity, I/O affinity, etc, and balance priorities. Stunning what an impact even the smallest tweaks make to SQ. As a hint, pay very close attention to which PCIe slots have affinity to which CPU, the UPI channel between CPUs, and the affinity of built in I/O to CPU1. As you get to next level, pay attention to the affinity of memory to each CPU. This block diagram is the roadmap to design and balance processing and playback. Thanks for the block diagram of WS C612E SAGE. I will be doing some careful research and tweaking myself. Learning how the sound changes is going to be a lot of fun. 6 hours ago, OAudio said: @ray-dude great points. The sage archtecture diagram or equivalent for other dual CPU motherboard are very important inputs to working up affinity strategies. Another hint @kyoya78would be not to forget that that LTSB's kernel threads, many SW device drivers and other OS owned services cannot have their CPU affinities set by user performance tuning tools. These OS processes are scheduled by the OS across available cores on both CPU sockets, which can be challenging and needs consideration. Attaching your critical replay hardware (eg OS disk, USB ports) and setting core affinities to pin your music endpoint software to CPU socket 0 / NUMA node 0 is a good place to start for SQ. Setups that relay on the USB output audio stream being transmitted across the UPI channels don't sound so good. Using CPU socket 1 / NUMA node 1 to handel with less time dependant data in the replay chain such as reading in of music media from local storage and running the audio players UI can be useful. This removes the processing load of these functions from CPU 0 allowing it to better service realtime audio streaming to the USB port. Hours and hours of fun working through all this 😉 Thanks for your hints. I will try to set up Windows OS with your hints. Link to comment
Darryl R Posted December 20, 2020 Share Posted December 20, 2020 On 12/18/2020 at 11:15 AM, Nenon said: You should try Windows LTSC and ProcessLasso. I will be publishing a guide for tweaking Windows for this motherboard sometime next year. Planning to share everything I've learned since April. I am also working with Emile from Taiko on testing some of his technology that will most likely treacle down to the DIY market sometime next year. This coming year will be very exciting for DIY. Last I checked it would be a little tricky for individual DIYers to license W10 LTSC. Has that changed? Link to comment
Nenon Posted December 20, 2020 Author Share Posted December 20, 2020 1 hour ago, Darryl R said: Last I checked it would be a little tricky for individual DIYers to license W10 LTSC. Has that changed? There is a trick. You need to sign a Volume Licensing contract and buy 5 licences. They can be for something cheap (i.e. $10 licenses) and you get the option to purchase Windows LTSC. I have to review the exact process and will put it in the guide. In the meantime, there is an evaluation version that can be used. Industry disclosure: https://chicagohifi.com Dealer for: Taiko Audio, Conrad Johnson, Audio Mirror, and Sean Jacobs Link to comment
seeteeyou Posted December 20, 2020 Share Posted December 20, 2020 https://buy.advantech.com/968TW19HL0-968TW19HL0/968TW19HL0/model-968TW19HL0.htm https://audiophilestyle.com/forums/topic/59727-windows-ltsc-install-for-music-server/?tab=comments#comment-1063212 On 6/25/2020 at 7:10 PM, dminches said: After that I purchased an LTSC high-end license which was required since I am running a Ryzen 3700. They have to mail the license to you since the CLA agreement requires you to put a sticker on the case. Cost was about $150 in total. Or simply do a search on Google etc. Link to comment
Darryl R Posted December 20, 2020 Share Posted December 20, 2020 13 hours ago, Nenon said: There is a trick. You need to sign a Volume Licensing contract and buy 5 licences. They can be for something cheap (i.e. $10 licenses) and you get the option to purchase Windows LTSC. I have to review the exact process and will put it in the guide. In the meantime, there is an evaluation version that can be used. Thanks. I was wondering if some were still buying from the guys on Ebay who sell a key half a dozen times until MS shuts it down. Link to comment
MarcelNL Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 I wonder if anyone here has experimented with power supplies? I am quite sure that any switching supply with lower ripple and igher power rating is cosmetic dabbling, I'm not yet so concinced that ultra low ripple is more important than a stable voltage. Making a whopping 12V C-L-C PSU should prove doable, def more doable than a high current lineair well regulated low noise PSU. Ideas, pointers, links are welcome? ISP, glass to Fritz!box 5530, another Fritz!box 5530 for audio only in bridged mode on LPS, cat8.1, Zyxel switch on LPS, Finisar <1475BTL>Solarflare X2522-25G, external wifi AP, AMD 9 16 core, passive cooling ,Aorus Master x570, LPSU with Taiko ATX, 8Gb Apacer RAM, femto SSD on LPS, Pink Faun I2S ultra OCXO on akiko LPS, home grown RJ45 I2S cable, Metrum Adagio DAC3, RCA 70-A and Miyaima Zero for mono, G2 PL519 tube amps. Link to comment
RickyV Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 1 hour ago, MarcelNL said: I wonder if anyone here has experimented with power supplies? I am quite sure that any switching supply with lower ripple and igher power rating is cosmetic dabbling, I'm not yet so concinced that ultra low ripple is more important than a stable voltage. Making a whopping 12V C-L-C PSU should prove doable, def more doable than a high current lineair well regulated low noise PSU. Ideas, pointers, links are welcome? https://www.custom-hifi-cables.co.uk/home. He also sells his dc3 and DC4 regulator and rectifier with clc buffer capacitor configuration. Just email him. In the “novel way to......” thread are a few review comparisons of power supplies. Meitner ma1 v2 dac, Sovereign preamp and power amp, DIY speakers, scan speak illuminator. Raal Requisite VM-1a -> SR-1a with Accurate Sound convolution. Under development: NUC7i7dnbe, Euphony Stylus, Qobuz. Modded Buffalo-fiber-EtherRegen, DC3- Isoregen, Lush^2 Link to comment
OAudio Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 2 hours ago, MarcelNL said: I wonder if anyone here has experimented with power supplies? I am quite sure that any switching supply with lower ripple and igher power rating is cosmetic dabbling, I'm not yet so concinced that ultra low ripple is more important than a stable voltage. Making a whopping 12V C-L-C PSU should prove doable, def more doable than a high current lineair well regulated low noise PSU. Ideas, pointers, links are welcome? DC ATX supplies can put in good performances but PC's are current driven devices and at the current levels required DC ATX and other switched / buck supplies will only take you so far. Linear is perhaps the best route but it's a significant task developing them for ATX supplies as an application. CLC is attractive but can occupy a lot of space and needs to be carefully designed but can be done. We have gone for multiple linears with a list of special features in the supplies. Performance even at high(ish) currents is good and it shows in SQ achived. If you can find specs or if you build try to target the measured performance recommended here (see link below). Measured PSU performance is not everything but this is one of the rare areas in hifi where good figures do come through into SQ. (As an aside the current figures for our supply have been re-rated. From 10amp to 15 amp contunuous and 22 amps sustained peak per module / rail. These levels are not really needed but its nice to know that the headroom is there.) https://audiophilestyle.com/forums/topic/58164-building-a-diy-music-server/?do=findComment&comment=1086986 OAudio Ltd. OAudio Supreme - music server. OAudio RealStream - digital audio components. Link to comment
The Computer Audiophile Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 48 minutes ago, OAudio said: DC ATX supplies can put in good performances but PC's are current driven devices and at the current levels required DC ATX and other switched / buck supplies will only take you so far. Linear is perhaps the best route but it's a significant task developing them for ATX supplies as an application. CLC is attractive but can occupy a lot of space and needs to be carefully designed but can be done. We have gone for multiple linears with a list of special features in the supplies. Performance even at high(ish) currents is good and it shows in SQ achived. If you can find specs or if you build try to target the measured performance recommended here (see link below). Measured PSU performance is not everything but this is one of the rare areas in hifi where good figures do come through into SQ. (As an aside the current figures for our supply have been re-rated. From 10amp to 15 amp contunuous and 22 amps sustained peak per module / rail. These levels are not really needed but its nice to know that the headroom is there.) https://audiophilestyle.com/forums/topic/58164-building-a-diy-music-server/?do=findComment&comment=1086986 Hi @OAudio, I just want to make sure you are still just a DIY'er and don't have a commercial offering yet? Founder of Audiophile Style | My Audio Systems Link to comment
OAudio Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 4 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said: Hi @OAudio, I just want to make sure you are still just a DIY'er and don't have a commercial offering yet? Hi Chris, No commercial offerings yet but the situation could change moving into next year so I will pm you for guidance. The Computer Audiophile 1 OAudio Ltd. OAudio Supreme - music server. OAudio RealStream - digital audio components. Link to comment
MarcelNL Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 thanks all! I once upon a time built a Le Monstre 7W class A amp by Jean Hiraga, I have something akin to that PSU in mind as the general idea is the same, having enough headroom with large current swings at low voltages requires plenty capacitors to store enough Joules in the PSU. ISP, glass to Fritz!box 5530, another Fritz!box 5530 for audio only in bridged mode on LPS, cat8.1, Zyxel switch on LPS, Finisar <1475BTL>Solarflare X2522-25G, external wifi AP, AMD 9 16 core, passive cooling ,Aorus Master x570, LPSU with Taiko ATX, 8Gb Apacer RAM, femto SSD on LPS, Pink Faun I2S ultra OCXO on akiko LPS, home grown RJ45 I2S cable, Metrum Adagio DAC3, RCA 70-A and Miyaima Zero for mono, G2 PL519 tube amps. Link to comment
Popular Post lmitche Posted December 23, 2020 Popular Post Share Posted December 23, 2020 2 hours ago, MarcelNL said: thanks all! I once upon a time built a Le Monstre 7W class A amp by Jean Hiraga, I have something akin to that PSU in mind as the general idea is the same, having enough headroom with large current swings at low voltages requires plenty capacitors to store enough Joules in the PSU. There has been a lot written about PC PSU choices in these pages. I will attempt a quick summary. There are few commercial choices of LPSes at 10 amps or more for powering servers with motherboards using ATX 24 pin power inputs. Three major manufacturers are successfully used by many people here, Hdplex, Paul Hynes and Sean Jacobs but there may be others. Use of a 19 volt DC to DC ATX supply can be used to split out and derive the various voltages used for the ATX connector. These DC to DC supplies can be used to power the ATX connectors only, or to power the 12 volt CPU/EPU input as well. Most of my machines use split 12 and 19 volt power with one (multi-rail) or two (single rail) supplies. Hdplex makes 3 different models of DC to DC ATX supplies. There are also several new models from a variety of vendors under development. Hdplex also make a power supply with ATX outputs with long cables and connectors to connect to the 24 pin and 8pin inputs. There are as many different opinions about the best approach, and related SQ, as there are members on this forum. Beware! LPS discussions can get a bit heated as people are passionate about what works for them. Generally the consensus appears to be that the more you spend, the better things sound. Exocer, OAudio, MarcelNL and 2 others 4 1 Pareto Audio aka nuckleheadaudio Link to comment
MarcelNL Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 thanks! I am looking for the combination that makes it 'work', I get that low ripple is sortof important (and becomes a challenge the larger the current draw is), stable voltage is another, max current/headroom is likley another. I was hoping someone had played around with the variables enough to know what the main players are. Same for power to the Mb versus power to the CPU, I imagine that both have impact, it would be nice to know which has more impact (or what impact which PSU has). I plan on starting with a PSU for the CPU, just found a 3000VA transformer that could be a promising start... ISP, glass to Fritz!box 5530, another Fritz!box 5530 for audio only in bridged mode on LPS, cat8.1, Zyxel switch on LPS, Finisar <1475BTL>Solarflare X2522-25G, external wifi AP, AMD 9 16 core, passive cooling ,Aorus Master x570, LPSU with Taiko ATX, 8Gb Apacer RAM, femto SSD on LPS, Pink Faun I2S ultra OCXO on akiko LPS, home grown RJ45 I2S cable, Metrum Adagio DAC3, RCA 70-A and Miyaima Zero for mono, G2 PL519 tube amps. Link to comment
Popular Post Nenon Posted December 23, 2020 Author Popular Post Share Posted December 23, 2020 19 minutes ago, MarcelNL said: thanks! I am looking for the combination that makes it 'work', I get that low ripple is sortof important (and becomes a challenge the larger the current draw is), stable voltage is another, max current/headroom is likley another. I was hoping someone had played around with the variables enough to know what the main players are. Same for power to the Mb versus power to the CPU, I imagine that both have impact, it would be nice to know which has more impact (or what impact which PSU has). I plan on starting with a PSU for the CPU, just found a 3000VA transformer that could be a promising start... Can I say this? EVERYTHING MATTERS! Even in a cost no object LPS design, just changing one resistor, or one capacitor (of the same value) makes a pretty audible difference in a resolving system. Even changing one wire makes a difference - for a different length of the same wire or for a different wire of the same length, or with different geometry or shielding. Sean Jacob's PCB regulator boards for example sound different when you just route some of the grounding traces a few mm away. I've made some of the Sean Jacobs DC4 linear power supplies. We follow a blueprint. Every wire is cut to an exact length (within a millimeter of the specs) and every regulator is mounted on a specific spot to spread the heat in a specific way. And every board has specific vibration treatment. Those are some of the very fine details that are not necessarily shared - but every small detail matters! And those are all super small things, not even getting to major things like ripple, voltage regulation, impedance, etc. Everything matters. Take a look at this: BTW, a 3000 VA transformer may not necessarily be better than a smaller (i.e. 400VA or 600VA) transformer. Good luck with your project, but keep in mind if things were that simple, good power supplies would not cost a small fortune. dminches, StreamFidelity and Exocer 2 1 Industry disclosure: https://chicagohifi.com Dealer for: Taiko Audio, Conrad Johnson, Audio Mirror, and Sean Jacobs Link to comment
Popular Post Nenon Posted December 24, 2020 Author Popular Post Share Posted December 24, 2020 Merry Christmas to everyone! As some of you may already know, I am evaluating some of Taiko's technology and working with Emile pretty much on daily basis. Impressive stuff, as you may expect. He is willing to share some of his technology with the DIY community to speed up some of the research and development. What a great idea! And I have made a commitment to help him evaluate what would be most suitable for DIY. No financial interest on my side. It's purely passion-driven, and it's an honor for me that he trusted me to do that. There is a specific process we need to go through that involves several rounds of tests, tweaks, redesigns, and repeats. Some of the exotic components he is using are not suitable for DIY, so they have to be replaced with good sounding but more affordable and more accessible parts. Exactly what is being tested would remain private until some more decisions are made The plan is to come up with a generic DIY recipe that includes a list of everything you need - chassis, passive cooling, hardware components, OS, software, power supply recommendations, tweaking, etc. There is a big chance that he might be able to make his USB card and more importantly his TAS software available for this particular DIY hardware, but there is still a lot of things to be decided. In any case, 2021 would be exciting for DIY music servers. Looking forward to it! RickyV, Pablooo, Gavin1977 and 13 others 9 7 Industry disclosure: https://chicagohifi.com Dealer for: Taiko Audio, Conrad Johnson, Audio Mirror, and Sean Jacobs Link to comment
MarkusBarkus Posted December 24, 2020 Share Posted December 24, 2020 Happy Holidays, @Nenon. Looking forward to some good new DIY and more excellent reading! Mark I'm MarkusBarkus and I approve this post. Link to comment
Exocer Posted December 24, 2020 Share Posted December 24, 2020 Excellent news Nenon. I am hoping the power supply I just received after months of waiting will be on the list of recommended power supplies! I like the idea of this technology trickling down to the DIY community! It will be interesting to see how the DIY community will have a somewhat similar foundation for these builds, and how the discovery of new tweaks/adjustments will take the sound in different directions to synergize with different DACs, Speakers, cables etc. A wonderful time to be a DIYer! Will start saving my pennies now 🤑 ASRMichael 1 Link to comment
Downtheline Posted December 24, 2020 Share Posted December 24, 2020 4 minutes ago, Nenon said: generic DIY recipe Nenon, this is great news! I'm wondering if this will all be for the Sage dual cpu motherboard, or will single cpu recipes be involved? Either way I'm excited to see what you bring! Link to comment
ASRMichael Posted December 24, 2020 Share Posted December 24, 2020 20 minutes ago, Nenon said: Merry Christmas to everyone! As some of you may already know, I am evaluating some of Taiko's technology and working with Emile pretty much on daily basis. Impressive stuff, as you may expect. He is willing to share some of his technology with the DIY community to speed up some of the research and development. What a great idea! And I have made a commitment to help him evaluate what would be most suitable for DIY. No financial interest on my side. It's purely passion-driven, and it's an honor for me that he trusted me to do that. There is a specific process we need to go through that involves several rounds of tests, tweaks, redesigns, and repeats. Some of the exotic components he is using are not suitable for DIY, so they have to be replaced with good sounding but more affordable and more accessible parts. Exactly what is being tested would remain private until some more decisions are made The plan is to come up with a generic DIY recipe that includes a list of everything you need - chassis, passive cooling, hardware components, OS, software, power supply recommendations, tweaking, etc. There is a big chance that he might be able to make his USB card and more importantly his TAS software available for this particular DIY hardware, but there is still a lot of things to be decided. In any case, 2021 would be exciting for DIY music servers. Looking forward to it! Santa has just come early knowing this....have great xmas everyone! Exocer 1 Link to comment
GUTB Posted December 25, 2020 Share Posted December 25, 2020 Okay guys, I've run into a MAJOR snag with my audio PC. Just to recap: i7-7700k + passive heatsink Common motherboard, has LEDs on it. Paul Pang V3 controller powered by a common 5v charger battery pack. SSD power line is isolated to a separate common 5v charger battery pack using a USB-SATA splitter cable. TeraDak 380W linear power supply sitting on top of the case. Win10 + Fidelizer Pro, Roon Core (not currently using HQPlayer). 15-ft USB cable from Supra I setup a new CD transport from China the other day. It's apparently a Wadia clone. I just spun up a King Crimson HQCD and was immediately impressed by the strong soundstage and imaging. The highest image I've ever heard out of my system. Solid floating images and a contiguous soundstage from left to right. I was really impressed right away with the CD. Why can't any of my other albums show such performance? So, to test the transport I switched the DAC (Yggdrasil Analog 2) over to the USB and played the same album from Tidal (I'm not sure if they are literally the same as the HQCD version). The soundstage was MUCH weaker, more what I expected! In fact I had always worried about the soundstage, I figured it was just a room issue that needed fixing...but what it looks like now is that my audio PC has a weakness! What is it?? What could be killing my soundstage and imaging performance? The only difference in the chain is a Supra toslink from the transport vs a Supra USB cable from the audio PC. Could a different mastering REALLY cause such a major change in soundstage and imaging? Link to comment
DuckToller Posted December 25, 2020 Share Posted December 25, 2020 6 hours ago, GUTB said: What is it?? First of all, Merrry Xmas GUTB, have a safe & sound festive season! - Did you recently update Win10? - What about ripping the CD to you audio PC's SSD and test again? - Did you upgrade the Yggy's USB stage to the latest? - Check out that the PP USB card (controller?) is not faulty and has the drivers updated. - Check out if it had been the same mastering? Perhaps you heard a MQA version of the recording? - OTOH, it is rare that I have read someone reporting TIDAL as sounding better than other sources ... - Before investing into a new dedicated audio machine you may want to test an RPI4 fed by ethernet as ROON endpoint, its 100$ and many have made good experiences with that solution - Finally, if Tidal doesn't sound as good as you new China toy, you could reflect on expectation bias ... I am happy to hear that you have had a proper performance in your system, did you use your new PuRiFi amplifier to get there ? best, Tom MarcelNL 1 Link to comment
MarcelNL Posted December 25, 2020 Share Posted December 25, 2020 I'd say you should never make the mistake to compare TIDAL to an HQ CD, apples and oranges IMO. Rip that HQ CD with EAC at highest settings, play it from your computer rig at the optimal settings and then see what gives. sandyk 1 ISP, glass to Fritz!box 5530, another Fritz!box 5530 for audio only in bridged mode on LPS, cat8.1, Zyxel switch on LPS, Finisar <1475BTL>Solarflare X2522-25G, external wifi AP, AMD 9 16 core, passive cooling ,Aorus Master x570, LPSU with Taiko ATX, 8Gb Apacer RAM, femto SSD on LPS, Pink Faun I2S ultra OCXO on akiko LPS, home grown RJ45 I2S cable, Metrum Adagio DAC3, RCA 70-A and Miyaima Zero for mono, G2 PL519 tube amps. Link to comment
Popular Post Nenon Posted December 25, 2020 Author Popular Post Share Posted December 25, 2020 11 hours ago, GUTB said: Could a different mastering REALLY cause such a major change in soundstage and imaging? Absolutely yes. Compression, loudness, and lousy mastering techniques can easily turn a magical recording into unlistenable. As suggested above rip the CD to a file, and you will most likely have better results. 11 hours ago, GUTB said: The only difference in the chain is a Supra toslink from the transport vs a Supra USB cable from the audio PC. Hmm, I always assume that people reading and participating in this thread have passed the "bits are just bits" saying long time ago... Your comment is a bit surprising. You have two completely different sources. Sources can have even bigger impact than the DAC (not always). It's not just the cable but also everything upstream of that. Regardless, I expect nothing good from a 15-ft USB cable, no matter who makes it. I would definitely change that with a better / shorter cable. I use Sablon myself. Changing the USB cable and ripping the CD may only narrow the gap just a little bit. It takes a lot of work to make a server/streamer sound as good as ot better than a good CD player. There is a lot of info on these pages about tweaking servers - better power supplies, better USB cards, better RAM, better storage strategy, and a lot of optimizations are described here. From the list of components you've listed the only thing I may consider keeping is the CPU. Most people here improve their sources incrementally. In your case, I would start with the USB cable, then add a USB PCIe card, then look into better power supplies, motherboards, RAM, Optane, etc. But do the easiest thing first, which is to rip the CD. And then get a better/shorter USB cable to audition. And evaluate where that takes you. That would be my advice. MarcelNL, mriguy and Exocer 3 Industry disclosure: https://chicagohifi.com Dealer for: Taiko Audio, Conrad Johnson, Audio Mirror, and Sean Jacobs Link to comment
Popular Post fas42 Posted December 25, 2020 Popular Post Share Posted December 25, 2020 17 hours ago, GUTB said: What is it?? What could be killing my soundstage and imaging performance? The only difference in the chain is a Supra toslink from the transport vs a Supra USB cable from the audio PC. Could a different mastering REALLY cause such a major change in soundstage and imaging? The story of digital playback is that the slightest, absolutely slightest, lack of integrity in some area of the chain can wreck the presentation - mastering can change things, but the real loss of subjective SQ occurs because some part(s) of the circuitry is not performing as well as it needs to. Which part? ... How long is a piece of string ... 🤪 As people have replied, consider everything. The good news is that eventually the underlying culprit(s) can be all tracked down, and resolved - my guess, straight off the top of my head, is the USB link ... ASRMichael and MarcelNL 2 Link to comment
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