who said mine is bigger opinion than yours ? No one. It seems in what I wrote many share my opinion. Your testimonial was interresting as I said.
All the pleasure is measurable which is a synergy of all what is made technicaally or maybe not (aesthetism and personal are hard to measure and we read ridicullous assertions like : sound is real, my soundstage is made to cope with reality, etc that is more saying about the writer than his technical skill often ? We see always the same things in measurements : noise floor, square waves output. Many dacs pass the tests but still there are big difference in sounding qualities measurements are not representatives. Makes me think of positivism with ASR blog that class the DAC by SINAD numbers putting Topping that sounds so so almost on the top.
Uncontroled measurements with musicians.... good luck, yes my tests are not controlled by a law man with a movie and a magician to control there are no trap !
People drug themselves by literrally flooding the threads with huge measurements that are below what they can hear and when it pass the subjective test it often sounds no so revolutuonnary !
Are your last pcbs for self testing public (your 4 I/V stage and MarcelvdG pcbs, you didn't answer ? Story to share opinions ?!
All the pleasure is measurable which is a synergy of all what is made technicaally or maybe not (aesthetism and personal are hard to measure and we read ridicullous assertions like : sound is real, my soundstage is made to cope with reality, etc that is more saying about the writer than his technical skill often ? We see always the same things in measurements : noise floor, square waves output. Many dacs pass the tests but still there are big difference in sounding qualities measurements are not representatives. Makes me think of positivism with ASR blog that class the DAC by SINAD numbers putting Topping that sounds so so almost on the top.
Uncontroled measurements with musicians.... good luck, yes my tests are not controlled by a law man with a movie and a magician to control there are no trap !
People drug themselves by literrally flooding the threads with huge measurements that are below what they can hear and when it pass the subjective test it often sounds no so revolutuonnary !
Are your last pcbs for self testing public (your 4 I/V stage and MarcelvdG pcbs, you didn't answer ? Story to share opinions ?!
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Certainly true in principle. Not always true in practice. @1audio has on occasion spoken of things that are very difficult to measure, to say the least.
One thing that could be measured using FFT techniques and some extra math, is accuracy of amplitude envelope reproduction (the analytic function, IIRC). That includes measurement of accuracy of amplitude variations that can't be measured or interpreted very well with typical spectral analysis. Too many new frequencies are produced by changing test signal amplitude during one acquisition.
Also many people perform blind listening tests using ABX or similar protocols. However its mostly for internal use. What they are doing is not at the level of publication quality.
Moreover most people don't bother with ABX or other blind protocols in cases where gross differences are audible to anybody and everybody.
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Since you often praise Mola Mola Tambaqui maybe you should read what Bruno Putzeys has to say about measurements:
"What helped massively is that as I became more conventional (i.e. measurement driven) in my design approach, the stuff clearly started sounding better too. I'm now very much in the "meter reading" camp. And indeed as mentioned somewhere, I haven't based amp design decisions on listening tests for a long time. Anyway, listening tests should only serve to refine one's measurement procedures, not the actual designs directly."
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...hes-out-to-the-subjectivists.1349/post-238251
IIRC, Bruno also once said that if he knows there is a problem with his design he won't bother to try to fix it until he has a way of measuring it and understands all the related math.
So some problems he knows about may never be fixed. To me it means he is like other manufacturers: They will tell what's good about their products but not what's wrong with them. Its up to you to figure out that latter part yourself.
BTW, I don't know that I praise Mola dacs exactly. Mainly I use them of an example of an expensive dac designed by someone not known for selling snake oil. If not snake oil, then they must be expensive to make for good reasons.
So some problems he knows about may never be fixed. To me it means he is like other manufacturers: They will tell what's good about their products but not what's wrong with them. Its up to you to figure out that latter part yourself.
BTW, I don't know that I praise Mola dacs exactly. Mainly I use them of an example of an expensive dac designed by someone not known for selling snake oil. If not snake oil, then they must be expensive to make for good reasons.
You should not make up quotes if you cannot provide a direct quote. This is what he stated in an interview:
"Usually, where theory and practice deviate, it just means that your theory hasn’t gotten into enough theoretical detail. So far, I have not yet bumped into anything in terms of audible differences that I, or anyone with me, could hear that did not at some point connect with established theory and known physics -- by which I mean ordinary street-level physics, none of your fancy quantum stuff. You really do not need to invent laws of physics from a parallel
universe to explain things. And you don’t have to excuse yourself to say that theory does not connect with practice. If you look close enough, you will find [the connection]."
https://www.soundstageultra.com/ind...s-of-mola-mola-hypex-and-grimm-audio-part-one
some may critic you for that and say it is blah, etc... but I won't (as some pointed their fingers on me with such dishonest accusations) !If you feel it is good it has a price. I shared a two layers but keep for me the 4 layers cause costed me in time and monney to test mulltiplle iterations.
As for Mola Mola, one could be good technician but poor marketer sometimes, each time I look at this name it makes me think to Molllah Mollah then I am suspicious.
From a dialectic point of view it is not because my Vacum cleaner has good reputation because the name that means it is the better vacum cleaner. It is a Miele but a Philips may be better for instance. You need a benchmark and not a visit card to know!
Miro1360 did a good job with his 2 layers designs and shared them. Bravo to him. Those chips have stilll something to say, to my ears it can sound like a high end Vynil platine.
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Some of the old interviews with Bruno and Lars are no longer existent out there. IIRC, Bruno admitted it took awhile to find the hysteresis distortion problem, and even after he measured it he didn't do anything until he worked out new math for amplifier modulator feedback stability using the hysteresis noise/distortion to clock the modulator in a self-excited way. Again, this is to the best of my recollection. In any case, between the time he knew about the problem and the time he announced it was fixed, I don't recall any warnings on the Purifi website that there was a known problem. Never.
Also, I did not quote Bruno. What I said was more like what a reporter might write in news article, which is to say it included my recollections and my opinions. If direct quotes are included in such writings then they are enclosed in quote marks (sometimes I use italics if a direct quote includes quote marks within it, or otherwise to clarify when there is a direct quote). The propriety of such writings for the purposes of news reporting is well established in law. A newspaper reporter doesn't have to write direct quotes, and I don't see why we need to be held to a higher standard here than is long established practice in most of the world for reporting on past events.
It other cases I may talk to someone via personal communications. There may be no website to link to. Similarly, in the case of the Bruno and Lars interviews, there is no longer a website to link to. That doesn't mean it didn't happen.
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I think whatever a good technician is, at the moment when he talks to a commercial magazine related to sound reproduction. Your language elements are adapted and simplified in order to serve your own business adventure.
Quatting such guys here has no sense, as the level is higher than what is said for general readers that are customers.
It is way better when they annswer directly on such a forum where the people are averagly more skilled than the average customer.
Quotting magazines as the last word to end a conversation is risky. At least you can quote them to start a dialogue. IMHO & YMMV....
Quatting such guys here has no sense, as the level is higher than what is said for general readers that are customers.
It is way better when they annswer directly on such a forum where the people are averagly more skilled than the average customer.
Quotting magazines as the last word to end a conversation is risky. At least you can quote them to start a dialogue. IMHO & YMMV....
Nothing to do with price or time and money. My PCM1702 DAC I/V hats can only be directly used with my mainboard which in turn uses PMD100. So they are not very useful to e.g. this thread. My MarcelvdG's RTZ dac board is very complicated to assemble (I use reflow oven) and uses different components than the original. I don't have the time to assist other members in purchasing components or assembling the boards. And there already is the original which is much easier for DIY.
Greetings! Is anyone using a waveIO USB to I2S interface with the TDA1541 dac? I am trying to connect the two together using the isolated headers of the waveIO but not having luck. The isolated outputs require 3.3V or 5V power, when I connect +5V and GND to that (from a separate PSU, not the DAC's PSU), the miro PSU X2 rail LED lights up and I'm measuring 3.3V across that. Any tips on connecting the waveIO with the TDA1541 miro dac would be well appreciated.
You have to be more specific in your query, there are two TDA1541 boards posted by miro1360, I think one with logic gates and the other one without logic gates.
I'd assume you are using the one with logic gates, now for WaveIO first change the J12 settings from external to USB powered., you can change it later.
next connect DT from WaveIO to data pin on the DAC, LR to LRCLK, BC to BCK or BCLK, you can ignore the MCLK for now.
+5v on J6 with +5v digital (X2) on the DAC board and isolated ground with the ground.
If however, you are using the DAC board without logic gates then you'll need the CPLD in-between the USB interface and the DAC board.
As mentioned in the waveIO datasheet
"Attention: There will be NO signals at J5 pin-header connector (Isolated I2S Outputs) if there's no voltage applied on the V+ and Isolated-GND pins (usually 3.3V but 5V is also accepted - please see IL715 datasheet for more information)."
If the connections are good you should be able to hear sound at the DACs output.
I'd assume you are using the one with logic gates, now for WaveIO first change the J12 settings from external to USB powered., you can change it later.
next connect DT from WaveIO to data pin on the DAC, LR to LRCLK, BC to BCK or BCLK, you can ignore the MCLK for now.
+5v on J6 with +5v digital (X2) on the DAC board and isolated ground with the ground.
If however, you are using the DAC board without logic gates then you'll need the CPLD in-between the USB interface and the DAC board.
As mentioned in the waveIO datasheet
"Attention: There will be NO signals at J5 pin-header connector (Isolated I2S Outputs) if there's no voltage applied on the V+ and Isolated-GND pins (usually 3.3V but 5V is also accepted - please see IL715 datasheet for more information)."
If the connections are good you should be able to hear sound at the DACs output.
"you can make these dacs as high end as possible"
Really? So, why do you think NOS dacs remain a tiny niche in the high end dac market?
Somehow tiny niches do make for great diyers' obsessions and cult threads 🙂 How many of these have you witnessed over the years?I have certainly partaken in at least a dozen.
Don't get me wrong, i really enjoy this thread and especially the fpga lessons Miro has gifted the community. I even like the sound of a nos 1862, but recognise its limits, especially for classical music.
And NOS is the elephant in the room, not the i/v, clocks, power supplies, number of pcb layers. If left untreated in the analogue domain it leads to audible HF loss and unpredictable interaction between ultrasonic noise and downstream components
They remain a tiny niche because they are no longer produced. And people get a hardon for numbers (see the other forum). And NOS can be very well handled with proper analog stage if one decides to get some filter action.
Why they are not produced, oh well, new tech can get really small in size. Very low power, and as said very appealing by numbers.
As for classical music, these dacs beat the s$it out of chinese ess bollocks, whose filters are amazingly great for masking ans mudding the sound. If you're worried about NOS issues, use another great diy product made by @abraxalito , his filter is very very good.
Why they are not produced, oh well, new tech can get really small in size. Very low power, and as said very appealing by numbers.
As for classical music, these dacs beat the s$it out of chinese ess bollocks, whose filters are amazingly great for masking ans mudding the sound. If you're worried about NOS issues, use another great diy product made by @abraxalito , his filter is very very good.
Sir, since I listen mainly to classical music, what DAC are you using for that?
If the miro1360 board as ufl inputs pads, you can also use the non isolated side of the Wave i/o both to check if the problem is a piwer supply one also because it sounds better than this old isolator chip.
Hello Art,
Did you check and make sure that the i2s signals are connected correctly to the inputs of the dac? did you connect isolated ground from WAVEIO to DAC i2s ground pin? If you can show some good pics of how you have connected them, it would be easier to see if there is any errors .
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The HF loss, I can't hear it between NOS and upsampling and post filter reconstruction. That downstream thing should indeed alert us as it can "down stream" low enough in the audio band (> 10 K hz ; even lower ?). The ultrasonic part I can not hear it, I think my ears low pass it. Yeah that's more the downstream that could arm but how do you experience it when playbacking chamber music for instance ?
But how for you it is translated from a point of view of sound description. Do you hear less informations ? More harshness ? Modified soundstage ? Tonal change ?
I often experiencd in the CD players that have all this filters, a thinner sound in the high mids that lakes weigth and mat sound, a little too shiny and sorta ligth (no "meat"... sorry hard to describe and corelate when talking about sound). That mostly arms me with acoustic instruments. But it may be a bias shortcut indeed. Most of the time I solve that with a better choice of passive parts and also in the PS and decoupling to try as far I can to find the good tonal equilibrium.
I may be wrong but I do not feel a lack of informations in NOS mode. It is certainly a little off topic here as the author centred his work for the moment on NOS DAC. But I'd like to have your feedback if you may via PM, I know also like me your are also focused on passive parts quality according the particular needs of the circuitry in the sounding rendering result.
cheers
Edit : It must have a positive effect as if I understood tthe basic, in ZRT DACs, the axiom is to upsample the playback material to DSD levels. Do not have experienced one, stilll have to build Marcel's ZSR DAC. More refreshing than to try to make sounds better a TDA1541A with an oyster's brain 😉 ... under the threshold of bats ears ultrasonic levels!!
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