Hello to all,
any users of the Khadas Tone Board in this forum?
It measures very well and i own the standalone version of it,
which is called "Generic". Great sound!
Review and Measurements of WesionTEK Khadas Tone Board DAC | Audio Science Review (ASR) Forum
The "Generic" version is powerd by USB an receives the signal through SPDIF. No USB input.
The VIM Edition is controllable via PC and allows USB, SPDIF In/Out and much more.
I have one problem with the Generic version:
As far as I understand the description, alternate connecting should be possible via the 40-pin FPC socket.
Khadas Tone Board User Manual | Khadas Docs
I.e. pin 13 on the FPC socket receives SPDIF, and pins 1&2 receive 5V
But using a voltmeter I do not measure any physical connection
between the SPDIF Jack and FPC pin 13 or the USB-Voltage input and FPC pins 1&2.
Does anyone know why?
All the best,
Salar
any users of the Khadas Tone Board in this forum?
It measures very well and i own the standalone version of it,
which is called "Generic". Great sound!
Review and Measurements of WesionTEK Khadas Tone Board DAC | Audio Science Review (ASR) Forum
The "Generic" version is powerd by USB an receives the signal through SPDIF. No USB input.
The VIM Edition is controllable via PC and allows USB, SPDIF In/Out and much more.
I have one problem with the Generic version:
As far as I understand the description, alternate connecting should be possible via the 40-pin FPC socket.
Khadas Tone Board User Manual | Khadas Docs
I.e. pin 13 on the FPC socket receives SPDIF, and pins 1&2 receive 5V
But using a voltmeter I do not measure any physical connection
between the SPDIF Jack and FPC pin 13 or the USB-Voltage input and FPC pins 1&2.
Does anyone know why?
All the best,
Salar
You're a little bit out with your descriptions. Both Generic and VIM boards are electrically and electronically identical. The ONLY difference between the two is that the VIM edition has the pin headers already soldered in place ready for attachment to the VIM 1 or 2 Khadas SBC. If you solder the pin headers that you were supplied with with your Generic board you effectively have a VIM edition.
As such, both versions accept both USB (power and signal) and SPDIF input as supplied. It is only when attached to a VIM 1 or 2 that SPDIF output can be achieved.
Perhaps that is why your continuity tests do not give results that you expect, as it is the VIM SBC that 'completes' the circuit.
I do have one, initially connected to my RPi 3A+ via USB, and now powered via USB, but connected to an IQAudio Digi+ via SPDIF. I'm impressed so far...
Hi, Thanks to your reply
To make a long story short:
I do use the board standalone right now. Power over USB,
SPDIF Signal over the SPDIF-Jack. No connection to a PC.
But now I want to use the FPC pin headers for voltage and SPDIF inputs.
But as I wrote there does not seem to be any physical connection to USB (Pins1/2 of FPC) or SPDIF (Pin13 of FPC)
when testing the pins with a voltmeter. That there is no physical connection to SPDIF might be logical
because of an electrical switch/logic triggered by the VIM
But the power lines should be physically connected, as there is
probably no "powerless" logic available yet to make the connection, right?
Reason why: I want to "upgrade" my CD-Players from the eighties
with this small board. But for proper casework inside the players
the USB Jack and SPDIF Jack are in the way
To make a long story short:
I do use the board standalone right now. Power over USB,
SPDIF Signal over the SPDIF-Jack. No connection to a PC.
But now I want to use the FPC pin headers for voltage and SPDIF inputs.
But as I wrote there does not seem to be any physical connection to USB (Pins1/2 of FPC) or SPDIF (Pin13 of FPC)
when testing the pins with a voltmeter. That there is no physical connection to SPDIF might be logical
because of an electrical switch/logic triggered by the VIM
But the power lines should be physically connected, as there is
probably no "powerless" logic available yet to make the connection, right?
Reason why: I want to "upgrade" my CD-Players from the eighties
with this small board. But for proper casework inside the players
the USB Jack and SPDIF Jack are in the way
Last edited:
Ok, looks like thing cannot being "beeped through" i.e as SPDIF
is pulled to GND when power is off. But Pins 1 & 2 of the 40pin connector are
connected, they receive +5V. Pin 21 is GND.
is pulled to GND when power is off. But Pins 1 & 2 of the 40pin connector are
connected, they receive +5V. Pin 21 is GND.
I also purchased the khadas toneboard for my rig in the living room. I power it over usb and also use the spdif and my transport is a hifiberry digi + pro. I'm very impressed with the sound so far.
Connecting pin1 to +5V and pin21 to GND on the J1 header should work. pin13 is VIM_SPDIF and wont work. You could try the I2S pins in combination with your CD player.
Connecting pin1 to +5V and pin21 to GND on the J1 header should work. pin13 is VIM_SPDIF and wont work. You could try the I2S pins in combination with your CD player.
Khadas publish the schematics for the Tone Board, so you can see exactly what should be connected to what.
Hardware Documentation | Khadas Docs
The VIM and USB 5V connections each have a diode in series, so you won't see continuity between them. There's switching logic between the VIM spdif pin and the spdif rca, so again you won't see continuity.
Hardware Documentation | Khadas Docs
The VIM and USB 5V connections each have a diode in series, so you won't see continuity between them. There's switching logic between the VIM spdif pin and the spdif rca, so again you won't see continuity.
Great value
A DIYAUDIO friend brought the Tone board to my place. He just wanted someone else to hear it. He wanted to know if he was imagining that is was a very good sound for very few $.
We listened to a few tracks on my system, then the same tracks with the Tone board driven by USB from a Win10 laptop. I was surprised at how good it was. Clear, clean sound with no digital edge that I could detect in a few minutes of listening. Obviously in a different league IMO than the benchmark we compared it to, thank heavens. (my best diy effort). We swapped out the commercial RCA IC and plugged in my short diy connectors and the sound opened up. I really like the fact they publish the full circuit diagram. You could happily use this as supplied from USB, or have a bunch of fun playing around with I2S and PS.
It really does punch way above its pay grade.
A DIYAUDIO friend brought the Tone board to my place. He just wanted someone else to hear it. He wanted to know if he was imagining that is was a very good sound for very few $.
We listened to a few tracks on my system, then the same tracks with the Tone board driven by USB from a Win10 laptop. I was surprised at how good it was. Clear, clean sound with no digital edge that I could detect in a few minutes of listening. Obviously in a different league IMO than the benchmark we compared it to, thank heavens. (my best diy effort). We swapped out the commercial RCA IC and plugged in my short diy connectors and the sound opened up. I really like the fact they publish the full circuit diagram. You could happily use this as supplied from USB, or have a bunch of fun playing around with I2S and PS.
It really does punch way above its pay grade.
I'm confused why there are the two versions (Generic and VIM). Could I use the VIM board standalone too?
(I want to set up a RasPi with a VIM board, but would like to use the Khadas board as USB DAC too.)
Regards, Sebastian
(I want to set up a RasPi with a VIM board, but would like to use the Khadas board as USB DAC too.)
Regards, Sebastian
Sebastian
As I wrote in my earlier post:
So you can indeed use the 'VIM' version as a standalone board.
As I wrote in my earlier post:
So you can indeed use the 'VIM' version as a standalone board.
Yatshushiro, thanks, I missed that part somehow.
But when the VIM board can do both, why is there a generic version? The prices are same.
But when the VIM board can do both, why is there a generic version? The prices are same.
I hope there is successful case that use generic tone board and apple camera adapter to connect iOS device to archive external dac playback.
Just get a cheap used android phone, USB player pro and an OTG cable and you can do it yourself 🙂
Only 44.1 kHz supported on Android, says datasheet
https://www.audiophonics.fr/en/index.php?controller=attachment&id_attachment=952
https://www.audiophonics.fr/en/index.php?controller=attachment&id_attachment=952
Not if you use USB and USB Audio Player Pro: USB Audio Player PRO
The app bypasses the crappy Android implementation and drives the USB interface directly - supports DSD as well 🙂
The app bypasses the crappy Android implementation and drives the USB interface directly - supports DSD as well 🙂
Have you tried that app? Does it work well? Bugs? Does it sound better than just plugging in headphones and playing CD-res WAV or FLAC files?
I use it with my external USB DAC stick when I travel and so far the only somewhat negative thing is the UI - it's easy if you just play an album and enjoy but if you want to pick tracks and do your own playlists it can be cumbersome.
It does have a lot of settings you can adjust related to all kinds of things including sending bit perfect stream directly to the DAC. It also does upsampling to DSD but that can kill your battery in no time and I'm sure it hogs the CPU. It does get updated very regularly so if there are bugs they must be getting fixed, I haven't hit any myself but I just use it to play music present on the phone, no streaming or any other fancy features.
I think it sounds better than the phone's DAC but I don't have one of those phones with Sabre DACs in them.
I don't think the app is useful without an external USB DAC.
And it's cheap compared to any audio equipment out there 🙂
It does have a lot of settings you can adjust related to all kinds of things including sending bit perfect stream directly to the DAC. It also does upsampling to DSD but that can kill your battery in no time and I'm sure it hogs the CPU. It does get updated very regularly so if there are bugs they must be getting fixed, I haven't hit any myself but I just use it to play music present on the phone, no streaming or any other fancy features.
I think it sounds better than the phone's DAC but I don't have one of those phones with Sabre DACs in them.
I don't think the app is useful without an external USB DAC.
And it's cheap compared to any audio equipment out there 🙂
Good to hear. I figure if you install a big uSD card and have a USB DAC that can be powered from its own power supply (like one of those Anker power banks) then you could put together a pretty nice little portable setup with that app. Nice!
I guess if you will never have a need for the connectors they are just in the way and another point for something to short across (especially if you haven't put it in a case.)
I've actually seen the VIM version cheaper than the generic a couple of times in the past.
I use one of these but there's probably ones based on the newer generation chips by now: Retrospect by DEEP s.r.o. No need for another power supply and it's very light 🙂 I do have to recharge my phone more often...
I guess now there is this: Mobile Phone USB DAC OTG ES9028Q2M DSD Audio Decoder HiFi Digital Analog Wandler | eBay newer chip and maybe lower power consumption.
I guess now there is this: Mobile Phone USB DAC OTG ES9028Q2M DSD Audio Decoder HiFi Digital Analog Wandler | eBay newer chip and maybe lower power consumption.
Got myself a Toneboard and can report that it beats my Mamboberry and VIM2 implementation by a margin. Top end is more extended and detailed without been strained - which helps to give definition to the bass. Bought the Audiophonics case for it which makes for a nice compact stand alone DAC.
A interesting comparison is the excellent DAC built into the N2, good but not as good as the Khadas.
Shoog
A interesting comparison is the excellent DAC built into the N2, good but not as good as the Khadas.
Shoog