I agree that the effect should be minimal but it appears to be there. And it is possible to eliminate it almost entirely, which is the point of software like xxHighEnd, which manipulates all the underlying OS operations to create a benign an electrical environment as possible.
The subtlety of the interactions is such that the operation of that media player had been optimised for Windows 7; then Windows 8 turned up, and the users of the software started complaining that the SQ took a nosedive. So now the writer of the software is going flat out adjusting parameters to compensate for the different "pattern" of activities that are intrinsic with the new version of the OS.
Frank
Just marrying the two concepts "aspacial" and "time" has my head spinning. Still I was hoping there might be some insights hiding under the marketing.
I was a business owner for 13 years, and while moderately successful, at the end of the day it was not for me. I just could not lie about the product and services I offered. My employer, just prior, was a master at that, and very successful.
YesI sound a little naive, but I still find it surprising people go out to outright lie in their marketing, as opposed to product puff or floating a bona-fide if ill-founded theory.
Robert F:
Tesco's 100% Beefburgers, made from the finest british beef!
Fas 42, they cannot cahnge windows though and I believe having worked on such systems that a decent PC is not as bad as many think, and if worried about the computer noise the ONLY way is full galvonic isolation, not some stickong plaster solution.
Done a bit of research on xxhighend, IMO more stuff for gulibble people, here is a link tio the requirements:
00a | Prerequisites
a lot of people complained that it would not run on older systems due to the lack of raw computing power and memory, requireing a dual core does not sound like software that is going to ease the system noise, sorry I think this is more BS.
Tesco's 100% Beefburgers, made from the finest british beef!
Fas 42, they cannot cahnge windows though and I believe having worked on such systems that a decent PC is not as bad as many think, and if worried about the computer noise the ONLY way is full galvonic isolation, not some stickong plaster solution.
Done a bit of research on xxhighend, IMO more stuff for gulibble people, here is a link tio the requirements:
00a | Prerequisites
a lot of people complained that it would not run on older systems due to the lack of raw computing power and memory, requireing a dual core does not sound like software that is going to ease the system noise, sorry I think this is more BS.
CD and hard drive basics
CD drives have an important difference from Hard drives. CD-Audio drives achieve Constant Linear Velocity (CLV) by changing the rotational speed of the disk depending on whether you’re accessing the outer or the inner tracks. When you skip from track 2 to 10, say, you can hear if your ear is close, the platter spin down. They try to keep the rate of data read by the laser the same by keeping the line under the laser passing by at the same centimeters per second speed. They play from inner to outer, the opposite of vinyl. Still clockwise though. I don’t believe the original, 80s audio CD drives had buffers at all. The data went to what passed for a DAC back then, and out the RCA connectors.
A hard drive is a constant angular velocity (CAV) device. Regardless of which track is being read, the platter (usually platters plural and always at least 2 heads, above and below the disk), revolves the same number of times a minute (RPM). In this way the rate changes with every different position of the heads. The rate is much faster than a CD drive. You couldn’t listen to music without a buffer.
I can easily see how there could be data rate concerns with CD drives. They are dependent on a mechanical device, and to keep the listener from waiting too long for the next piece, barely wait for the drive speed to be correct for that track. And, as the laser reads the data, the speed is changing all the time. If it is perfect to the point of inaudibility, I doubt an old drive, a drive in a Car or discman would be that good. So I’ll buy the concept of jitter there.
With hard drives, you’re really getting data from the buffer or cache. The cache gets the information from the drive and gives it to the port, speed corrected. The response time of electronic memory is measured in nanoseconds. Any delay is inaudible. The data rate a multiple of the system clock, much slower than it actually. The system clock is extremely accurate because the computer itself transfers data at millions of cycles a second, and each section of the motherboard has to be in synch or the computer would crash: input/output sections, memory transfer sections, graphics processor, CPU and more. So CD music on a hard drive is locked at 150kiBs/second. If there is variation, I don’t buy that it’s audible. The computer is better timed than the conscious mind.
CD drives have an important difference from Hard drives. CD-Audio drives achieve Constant Linear Velocity (CLV) by changing the rotational speed of the disk depending on whether you’re accessing the outer or the inner tracks. When you skip from track 2 to 10, say, you can hear if your ear is close, the platter spin down. They try to keep the rate of data read by the laser the same by keeping the line under the laser passing by at the same centimeters per second speed. They play from inner to outer, the opposite of vinyl. Still clockwise though. I don’t believe the original, 80s audio CD drives had buffers at all. The data went to what passed for a DAC back then, and out the RCA connectors.
A hard drive is a constant angular velocity (CAV) device. Regardless of which track is being read, the platter (usually platters plural and always at least 2 heads, above and below the disk), revolves the same number of times a minute (RPM). In this way the rate changes with every different position of the heads. The rate is much faster than a CD drive. You couldn’t listen to music without a buffer.
I can easily see how there could be data rate concerns with CD drives. They are dependent on a mechanical device, and to keep the listener from waiting too long for the next piece, barely wait for the drive speed to be correct for that track. And, as the laser reads the data, the speed is changing all the time. If it is perfect to the point of inaudibility, I doubt an old drive, a drive in a Car or discman would be that good. So I’ll buy the concept of jitter there.
With hard drives, you’re really getting data from the buffer or cache. The cache gets the information from the drive and gives it to the port, speed corrected. The response time of electronic memory is measured in nanoseconds. Any delay is inaudible. The data rate a multiple of the system clock, much slower than it actually. The system clock is extremely accurate because the computer itself transfers data at millions of cycles a second, and each section of the motherboard has to be in synch or the computer would crash: input/output sections, memory transfer sections, graphics processor, CPU and more. So CD music on a hard drive is locked at 150kiBs/second. If there is variation, I don’t buy that it’s audible. The computer is better timed than the conscious mind.
Don't. There is exactly zero data to support that notion. When there's a failure, it's transient and gross, not an overall change in sound that's reported anecdotally.
The only jitter that counts is that present at the DAC.
Where do you think they put the raw data while they perform the de-interleaving, decoding and error checking and correction? You have read about those, haven't you, before reaching an opinion?Scott6113 said:
Surprise! Exactly the same for a CD drive, except that a CD drive cannot function without a buffer whereas I suppose at least in theory a hard drive could.
This myth really does need to be killed. Apart from issues around inadequate power supplies and grounding, otherwise known as poor design, CD data jitter does not depend on how good or bad the actual physical drive is. No matter how many people tell you otherwise. Provided the drive can provide enough valid bits in a sufficiently short time for the de-interleaving, decoding and error correction to work then the data bits will be perfect and the timing is a matter for the crystal clock. Any drive which can't meet this requirement needs to be repaired or replaced by an identical (but working) drive.
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About where primitive CD drives put things:
I was only thinking back to technology of the very first CD drives, what was available to them then, early 80s.
No, I can't see how a hard drive could function as an audio playback component without a buffer and a lot of management.
The thrust of what I was trying to get at is to disabuse people of the notion that original CDs could ever provide audibly better sound. Looks to me like a modern PC has all that beat.
I was only thinking back to technology of the very first CD drives, what was available to them then, early 80s.
No, I can't see how a hard drive could function as an audio playback component without a buffer and a lot of management.
The thrust of what I was trying to get at is to disabuse people of the notion that original CDs could ever provide audibly better sound. Looks to me like a modern PC has all that beat.
No they always had a FIFO buffer and the motor speed is adjusted depending on its
filling level.
It's all about the DAC and following analogue stages being sensitive to electrical interference. Yes, "perfect" design should mean that those areas are impervious to any noise being generated elsewhere, for any reason and via any path to the the key areas, whether it be grounding, power supply modulation, whatever. And, yes, different techniques will work: noisy source, and extremely well shielded, isolated DAC, etc will do the job. But if the reality of consumer level electronics doesn't guarantee that, then the fun begins ...
Whatever works, works. Super clean source is another method, the xxHighEnd approach. His slightly unusual slant is to say that high speed oversampling in the DAC area itself is not the best appoach, so his ideal is for full strength oversampling to take place in the PC, and the result fed raw to a high quality DAC with no intrinsic oversampling -- keep the high speed processing well away from the analogue area.
Frank
Whatever works, works. Super clean source is another method, the xxHighEnd approach. His slightly unusual slant is to say that high speed oversampling in the DAC area itself is not the best appoach, so his ideal is for full strength oversampling to take place in the PC, and the result fed raw to a high quality DAC with no intrinsic oversampling -- keep the high speed processing well away from the analogue area.
Frank
The idea of a clean PC
I think the same effect could be achieved by toslink more cheaply. I'm from Missouri though on the reality of source noise (in the broadest sense) changing the DAC's sound.
I do agree that clean power is important. Depending on the quality of the electric service and the home (or other venue), it can be really awful. In my day job trying to keep networks up our three greatest enemies are storms, heat and dust. That's after sourcing the most reliable components experience has taught me while still trying to eke out a profit. Some places I give up on line current to the point of using dual conversion active UPS systems: maintenance hogs themselves, expensive and heat generators too, but with such the equipment is essentially running off the battery at all times. Reliability downstream has been great in the worst environments I have. One place swings from 120 to 147 volts. Can't make the customer fix it, so I have to correct it or equipment lasts less than a year, with all the field service and equipment expense entailed.
I'd encourage anyone with a substantial investment in audio to protect themselves with one of these: Surge Protectors, UPS Systems and Voltage Regulators | Brick Wall. It also cleans up the line a bit. Don't neglect the incoming internet line either, whether DSL or cable. Just so they don't fry. With so many retail components drawing standby current, having them off during a thunderstorm isn't good enough.
As far as noisy electrical downgrading sound, that seems reasonable, but I can't say I've ever heard it, whether in source, DAC amp or whatever.
I think the same effect could be achieved by toslink more cheaply. I'm from Missouri though on the reality of source noise (in the broadest sense) changing the DAC's sound.
I do agree that clean power is important. Depending on the quality of the electric service and the home (or other venue), it can be really awful. In my day job trying to keep networks up our three greatest enemies are storms, heat and dust. That's after sourcing the most reliable components experience has taught me while still trying to eke out a profit. Some places I give up on line current to the point of using dual conversion active UPS systems: maintenance hogs themselves, expensive and heat generators too, but with such the equipment is essentially running off the battery at all times. Reliability downstream has been great in the worst environments I have. One place swings from 120 to 147 volts. Can't make the customer fix it, so I have to correct it or equipment lasts less than a year, with all the field service and equipment expense entailed.
I'd encourage anyone with a substantial investment in audio to protect themselves with one of these: Surge Protectors, UPS Systems and Voltage Regulators | Brick Wall. It also cleans up the line a bit. Don't neglect the incoming internet line either, whether DSL or cable. Just so they don't fry. With so many retail components drawing standby current, having them off during a thunderstorm isn't good enough.
As far as noisy electrical downgrading sound, that seems reasonable, but I can't say I've ever heard it, whether in source, DAC amp or whatever.
It's one of those things, that when you effectively eliminate it from the situation that you can realise that the effect had been there all the time; one has just learnt to live with it. Subtle, the thin film of muck on a window type of thing, nothing that stops you from seeing everything on the other side, but if one were to go quickly from one situation to the other then it's obvious that there's a loss, or difference ...
Frank
There could be some merit in that argument. It might even mean that people can have oversampling combined with a simple NOS DAC! Of course, the oversampling will probably include a brick-wall reconstruction filter, otherwise images will be faithfully 'reproduced' by the DAC.fas42 said:
Toslink has a reputation for introducing more jitter than an SPDIF cable.Scott6113 said:
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