Telstar said:
No, I've never done a comparison between the two, just the PCM1798 which was a pretty big improvement in conjunction with the WM8804 over the CS8416/AD1852 combination in the Zhaolu 2.5A, which in term clobbered a PSA Ultralink II with PMD-100 and ultra analog dac and receiver hybrids.
The PCM1794A is a noticeable improvement over the PCM1798A - imaging is much more precise, the nice tonal presentation of the cheaper chip is preserved, and there seems to be a bit more sound stage depth as well. Low level detail is significantly better, and things seem more resolved, it handles difficult program material without sounding confused or muddy - you know how some things sound good with very simple music, well these devices manage to stay composed with very complex material, and I can clearly hear further into the music.. All of this is subtle, but not hard to notice either.
Telstar said:
The Zhaolu 2.5A doesn't have TG Link, I used the coaxial input most of the time.
In my limited experience the WM8804 is a great receiver, but I have not experimented with the TI/BB DIR9001 which is definitely reputed to be in the same league. I don't think the CS8416 is as good, but it is easily employed and gives good results.
The PMD200 is an HDCD digital filter chip, not a receiver, and these days apparently refers as much to the specific algorithm used as to the chip as it apparently is implementable in several different audio dsp chips, and the chip itself no longer appears to be available. (You need a very expensive license from Microsoft to be able to get and use the algorithm.) The PMD100 which is also regarded as one of the best digital filter chips is still somewhat available in China. (You can buy it on eBay.)
AK4115 (On chip Word Sync DIR)
Dear all, please note this new DIR
http://www.asahi-kasei,co.jp/akm/en/ product/ak4115/ak4115.html
Dear all, please note this new DIR
http://www.asahi-kasei,co.jp/akm/en/ product/ak4115/ak4115.html
kevinkr said:
Hi Kevin!
I confirm your listening impression in regard to PCM1794A vs PCM1798.
I have two TP PCM1798 COD, I upgraded just one to PCM1794A and I performed a very quick comparison.
PCM1794A brings more details and especially focus and image, the sound is generally better than PCM1798.
regarding ASRC I'm using SRC4192 connected to PCM2707 usb receiver..on the PC I stream via foobar+ASIO non lossy material (16bit/44.1) flac, ape, wav
probably because of the usb, I prefer to use ASRC.. upsampled to 96khz.
I tried upsampling to 192khz without luck..sound became way too digital not very easy to listen
Ciao!
Vale
Valeriano said:
Hi Telstar!
according to datasheet, SRC4192 supports three resampling freqs : 48Khz, 96Khz, 192Khz.
would you please tell me how to do that?
Thanks!
ciao
Vale
ah-ha. Probably it won't work then. But you can always try.
Put 88.2k in the SRC foobar plugin and see if you can hear any sound coming from the dac.
percy said:
Yes, I actually have seen that thread, and I acknowledge the concern is a valid one, it is one of the various reasons I chose the WM8804 over the DIR9001. Data sheets are however a double edged sword, being no better than the quality of the work represented in them, comparisons of data that are not about half an order of magnitude or more worse are difficult to make if the devices being discussed were measured by two different individuals of differing experience levels with non identical test equipment under non identical test conditions. In the case of low frequency jitter a simple change in the PLL loop filter constants can have a drastic effect on jitter spectrum not to mention capture and lock ranges - it is hard to know what trade offs were made in each physical implementation. In some instances the engineer in question will choose a specification that can be met with a mediocre implementation in the majority of cases whilst another may choose the specification that can only be met with meticulous care in implementation. Two different jitter measurement devices may very well report slightly differing results and a decision as to what represents acceptable correlation of results would then have to be made. The only way to know with absolute certainty would be to test both chips under the exact same conditions with the exact same test equipment. I haven't done any of this with these chips. (Don't have time to do hobby oriented experiments at work, and do not have a wenzel jitter measurement system at my disposal at home or work at this point.)
Valeriano said:
Hi Vale,
Good to hear the confirmation on the 1794. One of the things I appreciate is that some of the flatness (regarding depth and imaging) seems to have been improved significantly. I guess I have not learnt to hear all of the warts with the new converters yet, I'm sure they're there, but they are obviously a bit more subtle. I am assuming that most of the improvement is due to the much better FIR filter implementation in the '94 as compared to the '98. The apparent extra bit of resolution on the bottom end might be contributing something too, but I can't be sure. I am using them mono-strapped so the snr at least is about 6dB better than what the '98 achieves in the same mode.
I player a lot of higher rez material so I have avoided USB as the standard range of usb codecs don't seem to work above 48kHz, and those that do require proprietary drivers that I don't have access to. I'm currently using coaxial spdif, but I am limited to 96kHz sample rate due to the M Audio Audiophile 2496 pci card that I am currently using. Actually the WM8804 in hardware mode is kind of annoying above 96kHz anyway - can't operate at 176.4kHz sample rate without a micro-controller to reconfigure it. It will operate at 192k.
The old PCM1798 sounded a bit odd at higher sampling rates IMO (96kHz and above) not sure whether the 1794 will sound better or not. (Strained?)
Telstar said:
pcm2707 is limited to 44/16
it seems that right now there is no easy way to stream via usb faster than 44/16
TAS1020b requires firmware coding and it is limited to usb audio 1.0 specs (upto 24/96). i.e.usb dacs from wavelenghtaudio.com use it
usb audio 2.0 is supported only on the MacOS and I don't recall any ready to go receiver for it, too
Thanks
Vale
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