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346  Ultimate Audio Playback / Your thoughts about the Sound Quality / Re: The strangest sound ever, or ? Q5= ... on: December 04, 2013, 12:31:48 am
Since this "discovery" of Q5 =1 with low Q1 and very low SFS i've had some excellent windows 8 listening sessions.

On some instruments I percieve a slight loss of dynamics (like on the piano) while this is not reflected in the presentation of the "big picture". Music is communicated and the soundstage has more width than I ever heard on this OS. Instruments and voices are less dense than before, more like win7, but different. Best thing is that it sounds very natural and fares well with all kinds of music.

Time to leave win7? Well, win7 has still the edge on the emotional connection and "wholeness", though the latter may just be due to less fuzzyness in win8.

Regards, Coen
347  Ultimate Audio Playback / Phasure NOS1 DAC / Re: USB Clock Upgrade My Experiences (so far) on: December 04, 2013, 12:14:59 am
Thanks for the review Paul I believe you and Nick are on to something...

This is unfortunately a rather expensive upgrade. From the newclassd site the neurronstar is 430 euro and the psu 215 euro. But then again it makes much more sense to spend you x-mas bonus on two clocks than on any other part (like an expensive usb cable) if you feel to spend it on audio.

Keep the good stuff coming!

Regards,  Coen
348  Ultimate Audio Playback / Chatter and forum related stuff / MRAM on: November 26, 2013, 12:26:00 pm
I just stumbled on this announcement to make MRAM memory a mass market reality in three years:

http://www.mram-info.com/20-chipmakers-japan-and-us-co-develop-mram-hopes-replace-dram-within-3-years

This developement will have a drastic impact on how PCs and software wll be developed in the future (if they still exist then...). I consider this good news for our pc based playback systems!

regards, Coen
349  Ultimate Audio Playback / Chatter and forum related stuff / Re: Hunting for noise on: November 26, 2013, 12:17:34 pm
With the two changes above in place XX software settings are not nearly so sensitive as before but at the same time different settings are needed. Next step is to tune the software parameters suit the new response of the "down stream" system.

Hi Nick,

I think this is most interesting. It could be for better or for worse that the sound is less "tunable" by the PC. "Better" is not allways for the better Wink in my experience!
I would suspect that the clock in the DAC contributes most to this effect. Did you try if there is a difference?

Looking forward to more reports about thise clockreplacements,

regards, Coen

350  Ultimate Audio Playback / Playback Tweaks and Source related subjects / Re: Great PC Tweak - A Bert "Must Have" on: November 19, 2013, 09:44:27 pm
Hey Coen,

Maybe it could be nice (well for me) if you can more clearly talk about what you see. For example, your "the former" seems to refer to two (!) read wires while I think you mean one of them, which now makes not much sense (to me).
Also, you might put some attention to
"i can see that the former is connected to a (one) film capacitor which in its turn is connected to one of the old xtal pcb islands."
which to me seems wrong in the first place. Not sure, but I'd say that this "former" needs to be connected to the old xtal island which from there goes to ground through the cap. Or ?

This is all not crucial of course, and it seems that I try to help you which I don't think is necessary at all. However, I am always eager to find messed up things (designs) and this seems to be one.

Btw and might that help, an active osciallator (not voltage controlled assumed) has "inputs" for voltage and ground, and for output the one clock wire;
Running the output through a transformer might not be the best idea for the signal itself (I keep on saying that any analog device is too slow for this) but may imply groundloops again (somewhere at the other side). But the supplies (gnd and V) can sure go through the transformerS.
For real isolation it needs three transformers, but I'd still wonder what happens with the still not-isolated ground at the other side.
We (or I) can also say : this never can work unless far (!) more complicated schemes are applied, and they won't lend themselves to apply on existing designs. That's what I think of it.
Mr. Pang (I think is his name) may have found himself for the same half-decisions. Any good for the better ? I again don't think so because the result will be out of (veryfiable) control ?

Peter

Sorry for being so cryptic about the clock signal isolation transformer.

If you still want to byte into it here's the deal:

In short the clock isolation transformer has:
- a primary winding with one leg connected to the clockboard ground and
- a secondary winding with one leg connected to the clockboard ground.

There is also:
- a black wire form the isloation transformer that is probably connected to the shielding of the transformer. It is soldered to clockboard ground.

- the second wire of the primary is connected to the output of the crystal oscillator (wich is dc decoupled by a small capacitor first).
- the second wire of the secondary is connected (via a film type capacitor) to - only - one of the connections where the original crystal has been on the USB3 board near the NEC chip.

The groundplane of the clockboard is connected to the USB board ground ONLY via the ground of the 5V supply (the twisted silver and red wire).
This was kind of a relief since now it is NOT an alternative groundpath of the regular USB card circuitry.

In short primary, secondary and shield all share the same clockboard ground. I think in this case clocksignal return currents have to travel however via the 5V ground wire. This must be some kind of trade off since I think the way that Nick solders both secondary wires to the original clockmounts (don't you Nick?) would be the way to go...

As far as I have been able to investigate the 5V is supplied via the MOLEX and is filtered by a pi filter with a "big" HF choke (top of the board) before being offered to the pins. Marketing rap says this will increase the quality of the data transfer (less loss, higher speed). So forget about a similar noise spectrum here....

I'm gonna let this brew in my head for a little while.

regards, Coen


p.s. before anyone overlooks it: the above is NOT how to create galvanic isolation (if one should want to persue that). Your batteries and special 5V clock supplies will be connected to the USB board ground anyway.
351  Ultimate Audio Playback / Your thoughts about the Sound Quality / Re: Windows 8.1 on: November 19, 2013, 09:13:20 pm
So much for backwards compatibility....Grin!

Is this the end of Xx on Windows as we know it? What are the other eggs in the basket to move forward on:

Windows 8.2/9? (pray for an audiophile CEO)
optimised Linux/Ubuntu?
OS/X?
XXHigh-End OS?

regards, Coen
352  Ultimate Audio Playback / Chatter and forum related stuff / Re: A Visit to Nicks on: November 17, 2013, 09:20:51 am
Hi all,

Thanks for the reports!

As Anthony allready posted, I have the feeling that Nick and Paul have been hearing a similar effect in the bass with the ppa v2 card as I did. It would be very interesting to compare the two cards. I wonder what would be so complicated about the v1 card. They are using the same clockboard if I'm correct...


Though the PC is a relatively easy place to tweak, the NOS1 usb clock mod is expectedly the most important for sq. I hope Peter will have a report on that (NOS2?!). 
Nick I was wondering: how do you power the NOS1 clock?

Regards, Coen


353  Ultimate Audio Playback / Playback Tweaks and Source related subjects / Re: Great PC Tweak - A Bert "Must Have" on: November 16, 2013, 12:31:38 pm
Hi Nick,

You're well Ahead of us but we're catching up!

As far as I can see now the ppa transformer does NOT galvanically isolate the clock. Two red wires are attatched to the clock output ports where one is connected to the ground. Peeking between the clock and usb board i can see that the former is connected to a (one) film capacitor which in its turn is connected to one of the old xtal pcb islands. The other island seems not connected. There is a black wire from the xfomer to the clockboard ground. This is either a screen or shield or the second leg of the x- former output. I think the latter so no isolation... Why then use an x-former? Bandwidth limitation? Voltage adaption?

I'll take off the clock board tonight and see whats really below it.

Regards, Coen
354  Ultimate Audio Playback / Playback Tweaks and Source related subjects / Re: Great PC Tweak - A Bert "Must Have" on: November 15, 2013, 07:26:37 pm
I originally wondered about the Molex on the pcie card. I think this has to do with cost savings to provide for a powerfull USB3 spec 5V line (X2).

On second thought this introduces an undesirable architecture.
Now the PCIe will only provide for 3.3V, 12V and Ground. Connecting the molex a second 12V and Ground path are introduced only to harvest the 5V. Not good.

So ideally the molex is not connected. So can the card do without the 5V? The NOS1 can. We can use a separate molex adapter to feed the xtal with a "star" 5V since it is galvanically isolated. I am not shure of the latter however since three wires of the xfirmer are terminated on the clockboard.

Anyway i makes sense that the effect of the card is psi and motherboard dependent and that the mod could and should be modded!

Regards, Coen
355  Ultimate Audio Playback / Playback Tweaks and Source related subjects / Re: Great PC Tweak - A Bert "Must Have" on: November 15, 2013, 10:15:42 am

In the mean time, right at this moment we're applying the 24.xxx audio oscillators on USB ... See if Nick's failure on this happens here too ...

Peter

If you want it to work with an VCXO if it doesn't I think you will have to make the voltage slightly adjustable to stay within the USB chips timing tolerances...

regards, Coen
356  Ultimate Audio Playback / Playback Tweaks and Source related subjects / Re: Great PC Tweak - A Bert "Must Have" on: November 15, 2013, 12:04:06 am
Hi all,

Thanks for the replies. I genuinely feel that there is very little positive to report especially now my regular card is working out splendidly.

Re-reading your experiences it sounds like something is wrong. It's really the opposite  of what I would have expected. Of course is could be that you existing set could just have an excellent USB port setup at the PC and the new card is just not a good !

Anyway I'm looking forwards to hearing Paul's PP card and we will report back on what we hear.

Its not what I expected either, but somehow this doesn't work out.
I allready have an (rather cheap) IBM OEM USB3 card with similar TI chip. It does draw its power from the PCI-bus and not from a separate Molex and it has bigger on board buffer caps. The crystal seems some generic type in a cylindrical container. Maybe its just a lucky combination in my setup.
Perfect? Well it does work particularly well, but I can identify areas that could be improved upon. I consider archieving these improvements a bonus rather than a neccessity. With the PPA card the sound was and remained unacceptable.

Anyway I am also interested in the findings of others about this card especially when used as intended so power from the psu and no batteries and stuff for the clock.
An "improved" clocking still seems like a good idea though Peter may have run lately into the limits of lowering the noise (like the phase and amplitude noise in the clock signal). At present time does not permit experimenting with clocks in the NOS1. I am not surprised sound differences are more profound there.

Wrt the working of USB2/3 likely the datasheets of the chips will state the tolerance between the masterclock and the external clock. Internal circuitry of the USB transciever will lock in if you stay within these limits. The main benefit of a better clock is a lower (phase) noisefloor IN the substrate of the chip translating into less (phase) noise on the datalines and thus in the DAC chips. Something like that, because the DAC clock signals are generated by separate clocks.

Though we can reason out a lot only the experiment will tell what it practcally means. Keep up the good work guys!

Regards, Coen

357  Ultimate Audio Playback / Playback Tweaks and Source related subjects / Re: Great PC Tweak - A Bert "Must Have" on: November 14, 2013, 01:54:27 pm
I forgot to post some ponderings about this experiment.

1) an "improved" clock at the pc side does NOT make the influence of XX settings powercords etc inaudible. Actually they have the same effect.
The PC "noise" is still able to slip through. Maybe for the better Wink.

2) the perfect clock signal and its alledged beneficial effects may be ruined at its implementation. To me the x former is highly suspect, it is able to pick up any noise in the PC since it is unshielded.

3) I think this "better" clock needs to be at the other side of the USB cable ie in the NOS. First any good clock gets noisy again as it passess the USB link (pcb, contacts, plugs, cable, etc). Second the USB mode of operation (async) sets the timing on the receiving end.

Some food for thought for those who are experimenting with clocks. I am looking forward to your findings!

Regards,  Coen
358  Ultimate Audio Playback / Playback Tweaks and Source related subjects / Re: Great PC Tweak - A Bert "Must Have" on: November 14, 2013, 11:32:50 am
Now I've had this card in my system for 300 hours and I am sorry to say that it doesn't deliver the goods.

The burn stabilised at about 200 hours as indicated by PP.
I've noticed a mounting issue late in the process, but fixing that didn't bring the sq forward.

The card deliveres a smooth subtle kind of sound where all sharpness has been tweaked out. The tone can be described as natural with lots of details. However, the low end is unfortunately completely gone as is the impact of the fundamentals, leaving the sound robbed of dynamics and musical momentum. Also I've noticed "strangeness" for lack of an adequate description in echoes and instrument decay. Note that most listening was with win7.

Other XX settings did not bring any relief.
Furthermore I've found that the sound was somewhat inconsistent, sounding better or worse at times even after burn in.

Installing the old card again, the sound becomes much more interesting and instruments have real body again. This is especially noticable on the sound developement (attack, decay etc) of keystrokes on the piano.

Regards,  Coen
359  Ultimate Audio Playback / Your thoughts about the Sound Quality / Re: Windows 8 disappointment. on: November 10, 2013, 01:41:14 am
Hi Alain,

Did you observe less intelligability of voices with win8 compared to 7? To me all seems a bit too "concentrated" in windows 8, paradoxically leading to less structure and musical detail.

Fwiw I have my n-th rebound to win7. This was unintentional, just wanted to listen to some music while developing RAW photofiles (win7 setup only). There is something in that sound that I really like, haven't listened to win8 since while that doesn't sound nearly that bad now as it once did.

Regards, Coen
360  Ultimate Audio Playback / Orelino / Orelo MKII Loudspeakers / Re: My definition of Ambience on: November 05, 2013, 02:31:23 pm
Peter,

It is quite correct what you state: high efficiency reduces cone motion for a give sound level. Especially horns provide a very high resistance towards movement of the cones (like a short circuit). The more efficient the horn, the less movement of the diaphragm.

For the low end where horns become very big towards the impractical, big and paralelled drivers is the way to go.

There are some High Eff related benefits like an underhung voicecoil that improve on the linearity.
Anyway from all angles you should design a speaker for a minimum of cone movement.
Dispite the complexity one optimised driver per decade would be more "practical" than one per octave. Kinda like the Cat's setup Happy.

I wonder though how you legally can get 3 dBs more efficiency out of your drivers (that is 3dBs worth of less diaphragm movement while retaining the same sound level). A longer horn?..

regards, Coen

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