Oppo`s BDP105 - discussions, upgrading, mods...

[Ric Schultz]

There are tons of stuff one can do to make the 105 sound better. The easiest and simplest thing to do is simply bypass the output caps. You don't even have to remove them. Just jumper a wire from the resistor leads closest to the caps on either side. You will hear more detail and dynamics. However, you will also hear more of the distortion from various non perfectly done things in the player. Another thing you can do is to remove the cover. It almost always sounds better to not have a steel resonating cover on a player. The 95 sounded way better without its cover. I am doing all my tweaking to the 105 without the cover and at some point will replace it and see what the sound difference is. Please read my website for info on the many things I do. I will have more info there on the advanced mods next week.

The toslink connector is an LED. LEDs create noise which modulates the power supply and wrecks havoc on the sound. You will get a larger soundstage and much more air and reality with the toslink connector removed (you simply break it off with pliers after removing the back panel). However, this is not a serious mod and your system has to be pretty pure and tweaky for you to hear just that mod alone. I had done a full all out mod on a guys 95 but he did not want me to remove the toslink connector. I listened to his machine and it just plain sounded wrong. I begged him to let me remove the toslink connector and he finally said OK. The sound returned to the glorious reference sound that I was used to. You would not hear that much difference without the whole machine being modded and my whole system being tweaky.

[zenelectro]

Originally Posted by Ric Schultz

The toslink connector is an LED. LEDs create noise which modulates the power supply and wrecks havoc on the sound. You will get a larger soundstage and much more air and reality with the toslink connector removed (you simply break it off with pliers after removing the back panel).

Ric,

I think that you should check this a bit further. LED's don't create noise and
infact some of them are very very quiet voltage references. This has been
measured.

I tried your theory years ago by replacing all LED's used as voltage
references in a DAC with 4148 VLN diode strings. Can't say there was much
in it - and yes it was a very high resolution system. Other mods made
much more difference.

I think maybe it's not the LED's per se but probably other associated
circuitry. I will re investigate this again in the future but so far a direct
link to the LED itself being a problem is hard to substantiate.

I would suggest re evaluating your experiemnts replacing LED's with 3 x
diodes and leaving the associated circuit still active to see if the LED is
really causing any issues. It may well be the drive circuitry that is the culprit
causing power supply corruption.


cheers

Terry

[Ric Schultz]

I am not talking about LEDs used as a reference for voltage. I have not tried this. I am talking about LEDs used as indicators or Toslink output connectors. I have removed them from lots of players/DACs/preamp/amps and always there is an improvement of sound. I don't care how you measure noise in an LED. My ears know the truth. Yours will too.

I first heard of this tweak from Jimmy Hughs....a reviewer for What Hifi (British Mag). In the early 80s he wrote an article in the magazine where he described removing the LEDs from a Threshold Preamp and Amp to good effect. A couple of years later when I had my first DAC (STAX Talent) I removed all the LEDs that were used as indicators and my jaw hit the floor. I told a friend who also had a modified STAX DAC to remove the LEDs without telling him what it would do.....his comments were "there is now air around the air".

I was listening to a dual mono amp from Reference Line at a friends house(two power cords even) and it had an LED on the front for each channel. I bugged him about it till he relented but saying "the amp takes days to warm up and sound its best".....well, 20 minutes later and no warm up time and no LEDs and he is sitting on the side of the room (I am in the hot seat)....and he says within 10 seconds of playing the last track we had heard before powering the amp off "I can hear it from here"......yup, it made that much difference. He never re-hooked up those LEDs.

Do not believe anything I say. Test it yourself. I only believe my own experience. My own experience is the only truth there is. When you experience the same thing over and over (like this LED thing) then and only then do you know it is REAL. You cannot know anything about what I am saying unless you listen. Every mod I do to the 105 has been tested over and over again and makes a sonic improvement (to me).

Some people might not hear an improvement with removing an LED. Read the reviews on AVS forum about the 95 versus the 105. Some hear absolutely no difference. Others say the 105 is very slightly better....yet others say it is night and day. What is the truth? It is what you experience with your ears.

Happy Listening!

[zenelectro]

Originally Posted by Ric Schultz

I am not talking about LEDs used as a reference for voltage. I have not tried this. I am talking about LEDs used as indicators or Toslink output connectors. I have removed them from lots of players/DACs/preamp/amps and always there is an improvement of sound. I don't care how you measure noise in an LED. My ears know the truth. Yours will too.

I first heard of this tweak from Jimmy Hughs....a reviewer for What Hifi (British Mag). In the early 80s he wrote an article in the magazine where he described removing the LEDs from a Threshold Preamp and Amp to good effect. A couple of years later when I had my first DAC (STAX Talent) I removed all the LEDs that were used as indicators and my jaw hit the floor. I told a friend who also had a modified STAX DAC to remove the LEDs without telling him what it would do.....his comments were "there is now air around the air".

I was listening to a dual mono amp from Reference Line at a friends house(two power cords even) and it had an LED on the front for each channel. I bugged him about it till he relented but saying "the amp takes days to warm up and sound its best".....well, 20 minutes later and no warm up time and no LEDs and he is sitting on the side of the room (I am in the hot seat)....and he says within 10 seconds of playing the last track we had heard before powering the amp off "I can hear it from here"......yup, it made that much difference. He never re-hooked up those LEDs.

Do not believe anything I say. Test it yourself. I only believe my own experience. My own experience is the only truth there is. When you experience the same thing over and over (like this LED thing) then and only then do you know it is REAL. You cannot know anything about what I am saying unless you listen. Every mod I do to the 105 has been tested over and over again and makes a sonic improvement (to me).

Some people might not hear an improvement with removing an LED. Read the reviews on AVS forum about the 95 versus the 105. Some hear absolutely no difference. Others say the 105 is very slightly better....yet others say it is night and day. What is the truth? It is what you experience with your ears.

Happy Listening!

Ric,

I understand the usual method of tweaking to get progressive improvement.
I've been in this game for long enough and don't require the long defensive
philosophical answer.

I'm not questioning that you heard an improvement, I'm trying to verify
where it came from.

Hence my simple question: Did you replace the LED's with equivalent string
of diodes to ascertain -where- the improvement came from, removal of noise
generated by the LED's themselves or the actual drive circuitry.

If you are just tweaking / modding, your methodology will certainly get
results. However, once you start designing from the ground up, a deeper
understanding of what is actually going on becomes more important.

[Ric Schultz]

An indicator LED and toslink do not have a replacement. You simply remove the not needed components and observe the sound difference. If I was designing a circuit that required a voltage reference then I could A/B LEDs, Zeners, low noise references and 4148 diodes strings and notice the sonic differences (this I have not done). Of course, you can try different power supplies to power the circuit you are testing. I typically use cascoded current sourced low impedance discrete shunt regulators.

A lot of indicator LEDs are simply powered by the raw power supply (as in all Pass Labs products). He puts a 1K resistor in series with the LED and runs it right off the raw supply that is powering the circuit. Simply disconnect the LED and listen. Takes a couple of minutes to remove the 1K resistor and listen.

The verification comes from listening again and again. Our ears are the best test instrument there is.

I am not just replying to you. I am trying to teach....er preach....as he said....Yoda I am. Trust your experience Luke/everyone. Trust yourself, you know what is real....it is what you feel....it is what you experience.....not numbers on a graph.

[Extreme_Boky]

Originally Posted by zenelectro

Ric,


I'm not questioning that you heard an improvement, I'm trying to verify
where it came from.

Me too...

Removal of the toslink diode would change the impedance loading at DOUT pin of DSP, as it would change the loading of the power supply rail. If the same rail is used for other IC’s / sections, the difference in sound could be (easily) perceptible. I am also not sure how the DOUT pin interacts with other sections inside the DSP – the DSP block diagram could tell more. The toslink diode, being infrared transmitter, could use “fair” amount of current and it could influence the power supply rail enough for the noticeable change in sound.

Unfortunately, the most important mod step is missing…. tracks to / from the removed toslink diode should be brought to the PCB ground potential. All unnecessary surrounding parts should also be removed and corresponding tracks soldered to PCB ground, if possible and safe to do so.

Boky

[Ric Schultz]

It is interesting that I have mentioned LED removal on a couple of different forums/threads and the info has been on my website for over 10 years.....and I have yet to see anyone remove an indicator LED or Toslink and comment on the sound. Some friends and fellow super tweaks have done it. But it is so simple. Is there an open minded experimenter out there? Can I get a witness? Amen!....it is Sunday, you know.

Instead of trying to "figure it out"......just try it. Forget the toslink.....just remove an indicator LED....takes five minutes. Will you try it? Will you tell us what you hear? Or do you have to have "proof" first? What you hear on removing an indicator LED is the same as what you will hear on removing the Toslink.....then you will understand....then you will "know". Maybe you will hear no difference.....maybe you will be amazed. But nothing ventured = nothing gained. And what I want to gain is better sound.

If you tell me that Bubble gum on your power cords makes the sound better and you have consistently heard this.....then the first thing I am going to ask you is "Which brand, chewed or not, etc.?".......I will not ask you to show me some measurement or theory as to why it does what it does. I will then try it and if I hear what you do......then I will start to think of possible reasons. I will not let "reasons" stand in the way of true knowledge (direct experience using my 6 senses). All brands of resistors, solder, wire, capacitors, etc. sound different from each other. There are reasons.....but we do not know all of them....so we have to listen for the truth. PRP made something like 8 different prototypes of their metal film resistor and had Charles Hansen of Ayre do listening tests to determine the winner (which is the one they sell now). Do you think these exact looking 8 prototypes measured any different? They measured the same resistance, inductance and tolerance....but they sounded radically different. PRP did not know which one would sound the best......they needed a tweaky dude to tell them.

The "sound" game is very very subtle. The more you know, the more you know...you know nothing. It is infinite.....just like life. We are finding out more and more but we still have a long way to go.

End of Sermon. Please deposit "yesterdays audio parts" in the coffer for distribution to the unenlightened masses. Please sing along as you leave: "Who want yesterdays resistors, who wants yesterdays capacitors?....nobody in the world"

Are we having fun?

[Joe Rasmussen]

The other "truth" is that a bunch of Dutch guys I know use strings of LEDs fed from a low noise current source to create low noise voltage references. I have seen as many as 24 Red LEDs in series - keep the current tight and the voltage across the LED will be constant.

I remember seeing an amp by Bruno Putzey, which had this amazing red glow from its insides, from an unknown quantities of red LEDs. He admitted to a love with LEDs. He thought they were great. The TentLabs Hybrid Amp has heaps of internal Red LEDs, using for voltage reference, and arranged on the main PCB arranged to look like the shape of the TentLabs Logo.

Me? I have an open mind - at least I like to think I do - but whose 'open mind' do I accept when it comes to LEDS.

Sigh. This search for the "truth" is not for the faint-hearted.

Cheers, Joe R.

[ashok]

Originally Posted by Ric Schultz

...... The more you know, the more you know...you know nothing.....

Awareness of what we haven't yet discovered is exponential ! The more we know, we discover there is even more ( much more !) we don't know . So the process of understanding and discovering will never ever end !

So when we find that different components sound different , the practical approach would be to restrict the 'search for better parts and imlementations' to a fixed time period and suit one's pocket and then sit back and enjoy all the music on the final system that we have made. Music is after all the reason why we are doing all this ...at least I think so!

I now spend more time ( and money!) than I used to ,to search for and buy music I like. My quest for a better ( maybe more satisfying!) system isn't over but isn't as intense as it was earlier.

[abraxalito]

That's a sign your system is perhaps into the 'long tail' of increasingly diminishing returns on SQ. As my system has gotten better I've also invested much more in software than in hardware