Popular Post manisandher Posted September 18, 2020 Popular Post Share Posted September 18, 2020 I have a gorgeous Taiko Extreme in the house, on kind loan from the UK distributor, Kog Audio. I'll share my experiences here shortly... Mani. spotforscott, NanoSword and Exocer 3 Main: SOtM sMS-200 -> Okto dac8PRO -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Tune Audio Anima horns + 2x Rotel RB-1590 amps -> 4 subs Home Office: SOtM sMS-200 -> MOTU UltraLite-mk5 -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Impulse H2 speakers Vinyl: Technics SP10 / London (Decca) Reference -> Trafomatic Luna -> RME ADI-2 Pro Link to comment
manisandher Posted September 19, 2020 Author Share Posted September 19, 2020 13 hours ago, Exocer said: I see you have the Phasure Mach III server as well. Will you be comparing the two? Also, are there any DIY builds in-house for comparison's sake? It wasn't really the intention, but I think it's inevitable that I'd be comparing the Extreme with what I already have. No, I don't have any DIY builds here worth writing home about. I stopped trying as soon as I received my first Phasure Mach II (which I still have), let alone the Mach III. Having both the Phasure and Taiko here, it's clear that I couldn't get anywhere near the performance of guys who actually know what they're doing. (What is it about The Netherlands and music server know-how?) Mani. Exocer 1 Main: SOtM sMS-200 -> Okto dac8PRO -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Tune Audio Anima horns + 2x Rotel RB-1590 amps -> 4 subs Home Office: SOtM sMS-200 -> MOTU UltraLite-mk5 -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Impulse H2 speakers Vinyl: Technics SP10 / London (Decca) Reference -> Trafomatic Luna -> RME ADI-2 Pro Link to comment
manisandher Posted September 20, 2020 Author Share Posted September 20, 2020 18 hours ago, Exocer said: Did you go with the 14/28? Yes, my Phasure has a 5120 14/28 CPU. More on the Extreme to follow... Mani. Main: SOtM sMS-200 -> Okto dac8PRO -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Tune Audio Anima horns + 2x Rotel RB-1590 amps -> 4 subs Home Office: SOtM sMS-200 -> MOTU UltraLite-mk5 -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Impulse H2 speakers Vinyl: Technics SP10 / London (Decca) Reference -> Trafomatic Luna -> RME ADI-2 Pro Link to comment
Popular Post manisandher Posted September 23, 2020 Author Popular Post Share Posted September 23, 2020 Firstly, a massive thanks to Paul at Lounge Hifi (UK dealer) and Tim at Kog Audio (UK distributor) for arranging a home demo of the Extreme for me. I was expecting to get a few hours or so with the Extreme, but had it for pretty much a whole week. Awesome service! Right from the off, it was clear that the Extreme was like no other computer audio front end I had heard up to that point. It’s always hard trying to describe what one hears, but in the Extreme’s case, there are two things in particular. The first is a real ‘solidity’ to the sound, something I’d never suspected I was missing. I realise now that every other computer front end up to this point has sounded slightly ‘hazy’ and ‘diffuse’ in comparison. The effect is fairly subtle, but once you’ve cottoned on to it, it’s hard to let it go. The second is the life-like dynamics. Percussive instruments seem to have more force behind them, jumping out of the speakers. Transients have real attack behind them. Hypothesising, I suspect both of these effects could be due to a decrease in noise getting to and interfering with the DAC as it converts the bits into an analogue signal. (Although the bits themselves are actually analogue, of course 😊.) Who knows how these things really work? But it wasn’t all plain sailing. The Extreme seems to be as susceptible to the vagaries of network and USB setups as any other computer front end. Connected directly to my bog-standard ethernet switch, playing from local storage sounded better than streaming from my music server or Tidal/Qobuz. Streaming added a bit of ‘glaze’ or ‘sheen’ to the sound, making it sound slightly more artificial. I tried three USB cables in all. The first made the sound too ‘bright’ and ‘edgy’. The second dulled the sound too much. Only with my Lush^2 did things sound just right. (I would have tried the Lush^2 first, but it was a tad too short. I wasn’t going to move the Extreme, so I had to hang my DAC over the edge of its shelf to get the Lush^2 to fit.) Roon sounded good, but HQPlayer sounded better. I tried pretty much all the filters up to the sinc filters, but couldn’t get sinc-M to work with the Extreme. I settled on poly-sinc-lp as pretty much as good as any other filter. My DAC uses eight BB PCM1704U-K chips, so I used the recommended NS5 noise shaper. I had a great weekend listening to music. On Monday morning, Tim came to collect the Extreme. Was I sad to see it go? Sure. It’s a thing of beauty and sounds amazing. Anyway, I reconnected my trusty Phasure Mach III, and finally upgraded to the latest version of XXHighEnd (after a number of months of meaning to). I’ve been using Roon pretty much exclusively for the last few months because I’ve been playing around with its DSP, so it was really nice to get back to XXHE, which I’ve been using (along with HQPlayer) for over 10 years. What can I say? XXHighEnd is simply the best software player I’ve ever heard. It can do things other software players can only dream of. Full stop. Period. Perhaps the Extreme really is the best computer front end on the planet. But even after the Extreme, listening to the Mach III with XXHighEnd, I’m still smiling. Mani. FredM, RickyV, Exocer and 2 others 1 3 1 Main: SOtM sMS-200 -> Okto dac8PRO -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Tune Audio Anima horns + 2x Rotel RB-1590 amps -> 4 subs Home Office: SOtM sMS-200 -> MOTU UltraLite-mk5 -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Impulse H2 speakers Vinyl: Technics SP10 / London (Decca) Reference -> Trafomatic Luna -> RME ADI-2 Pro Link to comment
manisandher Posted September 23, 2020 Author Share Posted September 23, 2020 Oh, and a massive thanks to Emile too who spent quite a while with me getting things set up as well as possible with my quirky DAC. Mani. Main: SOtM sMS-200 -> Okto dac8PRO -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Tune Audio Anima horns + 2x Rotel RB-1590 amps -> 4 subs Home Office: SOtM sMS-200 -> MOTU UltraLite-mk5 -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Impulse H2 speakers Vinyl: Technics SP10 / London (Decca) Reference -> Trafomatic Luna -> RME ADI-2 Pro Link to comment
manisandher Posted September 23, 2020 Author Share Posted September 23, 2020 4 minutes ago, matthias said: I am wondering if it would be possible to run XXHE on the Extreme. Did you discuss this with Emile? Hi Matt, I suspect it'd be strongly discouraged because XXHE imposes its own rather 'strong will' on the OS. In its 'Unattended' mode, it grabs the music files, stores them in RAM, shuts down as much of the OS as possible (including the screen), and starts playback purely from memory. Furthermore, most XXHE users run the whole OS in RAM, with no SSDs or HDDs at all connected to the mobo. And in any event, the Extreme sounds mighty fine without the need of XXHE! Mani. Main: SOtM sMS-200 -> Okto dac8PRO -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Tune Audio Anima horns + 2x Rotel RB-1590 amps -> 4 subs Home Office: SOtM sMS-200 -> MOTU UltraLite-mk5 -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Impulse H2 speakers Vinyl: Technics SP10 / London (Decca) Reference -> Trafomatic Luna -> RME ADI-2 Pro Link to comment
manisandher Posted September 23, 2020 Author Share Posted September 23, 2020 5 minutes ago, austinpop said: The Extreme is quite something, isn't it Mani! I've had mine now for almost 2 months, and it still has the ability to astonish me. Hi Rajiv, yes it is. 5 minutes ago, austinpop said: I'm surprised by your inability to run sinc-M, as this is my go-to filter of choice, and runs with no issue for me. I assume you're referring to it in the context of PCM-to-PCM upsampling (Filter 1x and Nx), and not for DSD-to-PCM conversion (PCM conversion setting in DSD Source settings). Yes, PCM-to-PCM. Perhaps I should have qualified things a bit. The Phasure DAC is a quirky beast. No upsampling/digital filter. No delta-sigma modulator. But capable of accepting 768k, so perfect for HQPlayer, and of course, XXHighEnd. Best performance is achieved using Kernel Streaming - that's what all the XXHE users use. WASAPI works too, but ASIO is a no go. So using HQPlayer NAA is out. This no doubt limited what I could get to work with HQPlayer. Closed-form-M worked fine, but sinc-M wouldn't. (Interestingly, the Mach III is perfectly happy running sinc-M with WASAPI.) 5 minutes ago, austinpop said: As regards the effect of network and USB, please see my impressions here. Yes, I've already come across this. I don't think anyone has looked into these things in more detail than you have. Thanks for all your effort. Personally, I just don't have the will (or energy) to play around with stuff too much nowadays. Fortunately, I managed to get the Extreme to sound very good after just a little effort. But perhaps I never really heard it in its full glory? Oh well... Mani. Main: SOtM sMS-200 -> Okto dac8PRO -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Tune Audio Anima horns + 2x Rotel RB-1590 amps -> 4 subs Home Office: SOtM sMS-200 -> MOTU UltraLite-mk5 -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Impulse H2 speakers Vinyl: Technics SP10 / London (Decca) Reference -> Trafomatic Luna -> RME ADI-2 Pro Link to comment
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