New AK4396 DAC board design support needed

[rsdio]

I'm looking for an AK4396 kit that is exactly that: a kit. Only the SMD parts would be soldered in on the pcb, as they are the harder to do right with a DIY solder pen.

You have the option of hiring an assembly shop to place the SMD parts for you. I live in Seattle, and there are almost a dozen places that do this. One is even within walking distance of my office and workshop. There have been many times when I spent as little as $60 to get some work done that would be too tedious for me, would require equipment that I cannot justify purchasing, and they even completed the work within an hour.

I suppose that takes some of the fun out of DIY, but unless you make the chips yourself there will always be some part of the task that is always done by the professionals.

 

[qusp]

i actually disagree, there are some parts that are actually impossible to solder by hand (without customized part patterns) due to powerpads on the bottom of the part, or leads on the underside (some of these can be accommodated by placing a via in the middle of the pad and soldering from underneath the board) but otherwise i feel that many people are just afraid they wont be able to do it and thats the biggest obstacle. for me, smd is actually far quicker to do than pth.

all the same sometimes its just easier to get it done somewhere and you get a guaranteed neat/clean result with optional flying probe testing

now of course, your experience is your experience, but if you havent really given it a good try yet i recommend you do before deciding you cant do it

 

[Bunpei]

Thus, my conclusion is;
Using master clock frequency 22.5792 MHz and I2S signal of 352.8 kHz/24 bit, high frequency components above 50 or 60 kHz can't be played correctly on AK4399. Particularly, near 176.4 kHz component is played as incorrect low frequency audible sound. This might be recognized as "hiss noise" in actual plays of DXD recorded sources.

I tried feeding master clock frequency 45.1584 MHz and I2S signal of 352.8 kHz/24 bit to AK4399 and got a very clean audio output without any hiss noise for playing 2L (genuine) DXD sources. I also observed a wave form and confirmed a typical sine wave throughout the full frequency range up to 176.4 kHz. (Of course, at near 176.4 kHz region I observed "aliasing noises".)

My conclusion is that the reason why SunRa got "hiss noise" on 2L DXD source play is not a problem of 2L DXD sources but an "underclocking of master clock" for AK4396 DAC chip.
I think, however, that SunRa's discovery is very great because he eventually found a good "Genuine/Fake Detector for DXD sourcres".

Bunpei