XXHighEnd

Ultimate Audio Playback => Your thoughts about the Sound Quality => Topic started by: Flecko on October 14, 2010, 10:34:01 am



Title: With RAMDisk and Special Mode: Scheme 3 or Scheme 2 ?
Post by: Flecko on October 14, 2010, 10:34:01 am
If you have gained sound quality with RAMDisk and the use of Special Mode, this might be interesting for you:

Since Scheme 2 is a little bit brighter than scheme 3, scheme 3 was the choice before the use of RAMDisk. But now, as things changed I experimented with the schemes and found, that with scheme 2 it seems to sound better. Especially the air between the instrumets is rendered finer. You have more the impression of instruments, playing in the same room. With scheme 3 the stage falls appart, compared to scheme 2.
What do you think?

Edit: The bass seems to be better with scheme 3, more punchy and clear.


Title: Re: With RAMDisk and Special Mode: Scheme 3 or Scheme 2 ?
Post by: PeterSt on October 14, 2010, 10:55:14 am
At trying for 30 sconds ... Ha ! it looks you are right !

Must listen longer for judgeing the bass to be less good, but it certainly is "less".


Title: Re: With RAMDisk and Special Mode: Scheme 3 or Scheme 2 ?
Post by: Flecko on October 14, 2010, 11:05:12 am
I am not sure too. Bass seems really better with scheme 3 and dynamics too. Scheme 4 has more the Bass/dynamics as scheme 3 and might be worth to be listened to again.


Title: Re: With RAMDisk and Special Mode: Scheme 3 or Scheme 2 ?
Post by: Flecko on October 14, 2010, 11:37:40 am
I might was wrong on this. It seems more, that scheme 2 softens the sound in a way that made me think it is finer. Tight bass should be a sign of low jitter, so this is a plus for scheme 3.


Title: Re: With RAMDisk and Special Mode: Scheme 3 or Scheme 2 ?
Post by: PeterSt on October 14, 2010, 05:17:07 pm
Well, many hours of listening further on this side, Scheme-3 keeps on doing it for me. I must say, it varies a bit per album, but the highs are somewhat more "nasty" with Scheme-2. A Sax wants to be a trumpet more, that kind of thing.
Also, bass is more tight with Scheme-3.

People, this will be very much depending on your PC. So just keep on listening for yourself.
Peter


Title: Re: With RAMDisk and Special Mode: Scheme 3 or Scheme 2 ?
Post by: Marcin_gps on October 14, 2010, 09:33:04 pm
Confirmed, Scheme-3 is the best!

:offtopic:
BTW.
I disabled some more hidden devices in device manager and applied the most recent optimisation from cics' site - the one responsible for reducing USB polling and guess what happened? I had to reduced the SFS to 50 MB, cause I found the sound too smooth and washed out of details. Now it's just great. I don't know if Mani's drivers work so much better that they don't interfere with other stuff or mine are hopeless. Anyway, this one is big, try (http://cicsmemoryplayer.com/index.php?n=CMP.07Optimisations#Step7)!


Title: Re: With RAMDisk and Special Mode: Scheme 3 or Scheme 2 ?
Post by: Josef on October 14, 2010, 09:52:50 pm
:offtopic::offtopic:
> I disabled some more hidden devices in device manager and applied the most recent optimisation from cics' site - the one responsible for reducing USB polling

Could it be you did _both_ of them at same time?
'USB polling fix' seems to be a known 'does nothing' thingy:

http://www.techradar.com/news/software/operating-systems/10-windows-speed-tips-that-don-t-work-686087?artc_pg=2



Title: Re: With RAMDisk and Special Mode: Scheme 3 or Scheme 2 ?
Post by: Marcin_gps on October 14, 2010, 10:04:06 pm
:offtopic::offtopic::offtopic:
> I disabled some more hidden devices in device manager and applied the most recent optimisation from cics' site - the one responsible for reducing USB polling

Could it be you did _both_ of them at same time?
'USB polling fix' seems to be a known 'does nothing' thingy:

http://www.techradar.com/news/software/operating-systems/10-windows-speed-tips-that-don-t-work-686087?artc_pg=2



Yes, I did both at once so I don't know which was responsible for improvement. I'll update my topic once I'm done with disabling everything... haha, just kidding

PS
I wouldn't search for it, just try, it takes few minutes and you'll know. No harms done


Title: Re: With RAMDisk and Special Mode: Scheme 3 or Scheme 2 ?
Post by: Josef on October 14, 2010, 10:51:27 pm
:offtopic::offtopic::offtopic::offtopic:
>I wouldn't search for it, just try, it takes few minutes and you'll know

By reading about it I was able to ignore it straight-away as the consequence is apparently a disabled C3 CPU state which I have measured earlier and know to be active for 99% of time when XX is playing in my setup :)

But, (also found by reading :) ) if you have a Logitech gamer's mouse (or any similar 'ultra responsive' mouse) _maybe_ you indeed have a problem - Good thing is, you can prove or disprove experimentally by running this small utility: http://www.filefront.com/14309831/dimr.exe/

It will show you how often your Logitech (or any USB) mouse is being polled - If you get 1ms without registry tweak and 5ms with it then that would validate the tweak (or invalidate it :)



Title: Re: With RAMDisk and Special Mode: Scheme 3 or Scheme 2 ?
Post by: Marcin_gps on October 14, 2010, 11:47:58 pm
:offtopic::offtopic::offtopic::offtopic::offtopic:
yep I'm using Steelseries Xai-latest & greatest @ 1000Hz... I wouldn't have suspected that mouse is anyhow related.


Title: Re: With RAMDisk and Special Mode: Scheme 3 or Scheme 2 ?
Post by: Flecko on October 21, 2010, 04:07:31 pm
Quote
Well, many hours of listening further on this side, Scheme-3 keeps on doing it for me
Sorry you spend so much time on this. I am using scheme 3 again too. But thanks for helping to disprove this!
It realy depends on the music. With some track I thought it would be better with scheme 2 but at the end this is not "true". Tight bass and dynamics is better with scheme 3 and that is one hearable criterion for a better digital source, that's my experience at least. !

 :offtopic:
@Marcin and Josef
I tried the tweaks on ciscs site about some month ago but meanwhile I have a new installation. If I want a pure-audio-setup I start with "msconfig" the debug mode. Very nice because most things are deactivated and you don't have to tweak your whole system. With dimr I get peak 2ms, I have a Logitech G5 ;) But if the mouse rests it goes down to very differnt values (5-30ms).
Does the ciscs tweaks go further than the debug mode?