Hi Bumpei,
Well - you need not wait unless you choose to.
This year has been one where my time for my audio hobby has been curtailed by a number of things. A new career position, deaths in my family, and taking care of a parent who is now alone.
I have myself gone through a couple of prototypes - so I am not idle - just not yet satisfied.
I basically have started from scratch again last month when XMOS contacted me about their new chip which is now optimized for this application - including an on-chip PHY and power management. This is a very big departure from my initial plan, but much better.
At the moment I am actually waiting on XMOS for some particulars regarding firmware and drivers. This will be a better solution than any of the existing XMOS implementations.
Jan. 1 can't come soon enough - time for a new - much better - year.
Cheers!
Russ
Well - you need not wait unless you choose to.
This year has been one where my time for my audio hobby has been curtailed by a number of things. A new career position, deaths in my family, and taking care of a parent who is now alone.
I have myself gone through a couple of prototypes - so I am not idle - just not yet satisfied.
I basically have started from scratch again last month when XMOS contacted me about their new chip which is now optimized for this application - including an on-chip PHY and power management. This is a very big departure from my initial plan, but much better.
At the moment I am actually waiting on XMOS for some particulars regarding firmware and drivers.
This will be a better solution than any of the existing XMOS implementations.Jan. 1 can't come soon enough - time for a new - much better - year.
Cheers!
Russ
The long and cherished board
That leads to your sounds
Will never disappear
I've seen your post before
It always leads me here
Lead me to your sounds.
The weird windows side
That the gain dashed away
Has left a pool of pears
Twisting for the day.
Why leave me standing here?
Let me know the way.
Many times I've been thrown
And many times I've cried,
Anyway you'll never know
The many ways I've tried.
But today they lead me back
To the long, cherished board
You made me thinking here
A long, long themes are go
Don't blame me for raving here
Lead me to your sounds.
That leads to your sounds
Will never disappear
I've seen your post before
It always leads me here
Lead me to your sounds.
The weird windows side
That the gain dashed away
Has left a pool of pears
Twisting for the day.
Why leave me standing here?
Let me know the way.
Many times I've been thrown
And many times I've cried,
Anyway you'll never know
The many ways I've tried.
But today they lead me back
To the long, cherished board
You made me thinking here
A long, long themes are go
Don't blame me for raving here
Lead me to your sounds.
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Thanks...
For the update Russ. I am taking my time with my new B-IIIse build, to get it "perfect" and to build it integrated with the new USB interface. I will be patient and listen to other stuff in the mean time.
I hope that you will allow for Trident(s) for the oscillators modules on the USB board, this will likely be a popular option, especially for those of use who prefer to run the B-IIIse synchronously...
Best to you for a great 2013!
For the update Russ. I am taking my time with my new B-IIIse build, to get it "perfect" and to build it integrated with the new USB interface. I will be patient and listen to other stuff in the mean time.
I hope that you will allow for Trident(s) for the oscillators modules on the USB board, this will likely be a popular option, especially for those of use who prefer to run the B-IIIse synchronously...
Best to you for a great 2013!
USB2 high speed mode galvanic isolation
This might be interesting for a future version of this adapter. The research from Silana has apparently resulted in a workable device.
USB ISOLATOR INTEGRATED CIRCUIT WITH USB 2.0 HIGH SPEED MODE AND AUTOMATIC SPEED DETECTION - THE SILANNA GROUP PTY LTD
Cheers
Thomas
This might be interesting for a future version of this adapter. The research from Silana has apparently resulted in a workable device.
USB ISOLATOR INTEGRATED CIRCUIT WITH USB 2.0 HIGH SPEED MODE AND AUTOMATIC SPEED DETECTION - THE SILANNA GROUP PTY LTD
Cheers
Thomas
Thanks for the heads up. I wonder if/when it will be a commercially viable product?
Sounds interesting, but at some point one must finally choose which compromises to accept and push development without looking back. For me, there is no interesting program material above 192kHz, but the multi-channel aspect might be interesting paired to a Buffalo III 8 channel. I need 6 minimum - three 2-channel XMOS boards seems a little power-hungry... but doable.
There doesn't have to be material to use sampling rates above 192 Khz. Software upsampling to higher rates can make other material sound better.
This is a debatable point. Check out the graphs on pages 10 and 11: http://www.ti.com/lit/ds/symlink/pcm1794.pdf
These are "just numbers," but higher THD and lower S/N Ratio at higher sampling rates.
I am not stating a conclusion, just food for thought.
Debatable or not, as many options as possible should be available. Sampling rates are increasing. DSD is becoming popular. Seems like DXD is starting to approach the point of diminishing returns. DSD 256 is the point where the quantization noise moves out of the audio band. So higher the better as far as I can tell.
Having spent time in real project studios I can tell you this only applies when the media is initially digitized. Upsampling after the fact gets you nothing. You simply cannot put back what was never there.
I think the reported increase in performance is more to do with the DAC filters employed for higher-bitrate material, not that there is more detail in the data.
Yes...
As Brian mentions, possible improvements in sonic performance by oversampling in software are the result of the digital filters used by the OS algorythm. For instance, take a 16/44.1 file, and oversample it to 24/352.8 in software and send the oversampled data to the B-III. Now, the B-III will still apply additional oversampling, but any of the oversampling done by the B-III will result in no additional audible artifacts, so what one hears, will be the results of the filtering/oversampling done in the computer. The advantage of this approach is that one can easily try many different types of digital filters, and decide what they think sounds best, rather than being limited by the filters incorporated in the ESS chip. This approach opens up all manner of apodizing and minimum phase approaches, all different filter slopes, etc.
Will it sound better... that is for the user to decide, but it certainly does allow for a lot of options and it is much easier to apply those options in the computer. Some software players, like HQplayer, XXHighend, and Audirvana already have a pretty good selection of different filtering approaches to choose from, and these options are only going to grow in the future.
As Brian mentions, possible improvements in sonic performance by oversampling in software are the result of the digital filters used by the OS algorythm. For instance, take a 16/44.1 file, and oversample it to 24/352.8 in software and send the oversampled data to the B-III. Now, the B-III will still apply additional oversampling, but any of the oversampling done by the B-III will result in no additional audible artifacts, so what one hears, will be the results of the filtering/oversampling done in the computer. The advantage of this approach is that one can easily try many different types of digital filters, and decide what they think sounds best, rather than being limited by the filters incorporated in the ESS chip. This approach opens up all manner of apodizing and minimum phase approaches, all different filter slopes, etc.
Will it sound better... that is for the user to decide, but it certainly does allow for a lot of options and it is much easier to apply those options in the computer. Some software players, like HQplayer, XXHighend, and Audirvana already have a pretty good selection of different filtering approaches to choose from, and these options are only going to grow in the future.
I think higher is better when it's done right. But like I've said before, I think there is a point of diminishing returns. But that point is debatable. Logically it would seem to be 352/384 for PCM and DSD256.
However, Robert Watts of Chord Electronics says 768 kHz recordings sound better than 384 kHz and not because of frequency response. He says the brain can detect differences of microseconds in transients. Thus he thinks the number is somewhere around 1 Mhz.
Also one must remember that the DAC actually measures worse in terms of both noise and distortion as the sample rate goes up... Dustin actually mentioned this himself.
I too am actually not very interested in stuff above 192Khz. Partly because there is so little of it to begin with, and a lot of that is actually not as good as more widely available material.
So in my book support for > 192Khz is still something I am interested in but is not a huge priority.
The new board is coming along well. I am so glad XMOS is still in business and designing better and better parts. This new chip is *far* better in many ways to the old one.
I too am actually not very interested in stuff above 192Khz. Partly because there is so little of it to begin with, and a lot of that is actually not as good as more widely available material.
So in my book support for > 192Khz is still something I am interested in but is not a huge priority.
The new board is coming along well. I am so glad XMOS is still in business and designing better and better parts. This new chip is *far* better in many ways to the old one.
Maybe you're right and I'm not debating but too many people see or hear things that are in their heads... Trust me there's many examples.
I bet you take that the same song have it well converted over from 24/768 to 24/192 make them hear then take the same song again without them knowing and tell them that it is the 768 version and all of a sudden there's more magic or the other way around and now it is not as good but the same 768 file twice!
Just saying
Do
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