ES9038Q2M Board

Jump to Latest
M

Mikett

Member
Joined 2003
Mikett said:
Hey at $99, one filter of the 7 could fit all. There could be a default operation. Remember that could be room for developers through the VIM interface. I know not about VIM.
Click to expand...

As I've discovered early on, if you listen carefully even with the cheap early 9038q2m board even without the mods there is but one filter that stands out from the rest. It is the slow rolloff min phase. Looks like cdsgames is now starting to listen carefully and now finds with his latest mods that that filter or the next best is the one to use. That indicates to me that the apodizing filter previously recommended was covering something grossly out. Well glad they started sorting that out but this tone board could be chomping on their behind. Sure hope they did their homework on the revision because my first comment on Mark's review was that they might have hit a performance plateau and the extra costs in the super implementation chosen might have yielded little in real performance. That as Mark has been eluding to, might require some DSP and some more conversion. Or, despite the low measured jitter, the nature of the jitter matters to the analog stage. That is what my ears told me. That op amp differences are really small compared to a good low jitter feed. Even before my Crystek arrives, with the XMOS feeding my DAC, the differences in op amp rolling are in reality small. When the jitter was higher, somehow the differences in op amps was magnified. Benchmark uses an XMOS as well. How they use it? Dunno.
My advise to potential modders, if you are not sure you have a great hi end digital transport, use USB as the source, you won't regret it or else you could be spinning your wheels during your mods.
So when this tone board was brought to our attention by occip yesterday it coincidentally appeared with what I had found on the prior weekend. That for most people Asynchronous USB needs to be put in place first before the mods begin and the widely chosen way to get that is XMOS at this moment.
That is the approach I would have taken if I were to design a performance low cost DAC. Get the bits in properly at the right timing and then do textbook design thereafter and see what falls out. Then the refinement process begins. But as Mark has pointed out and I discovered the design is holistic or else you could be spinning your wheels. Fix one part, then another comes out, fix that the previous is not as good. This is where the sum of the parts does not always equal the whole. It looks like Khadas for example took four cracks at board layouts etc. It is a laborious and tricky process and not always deterministic. Do not forget costly and time consuming. That is actually how hi end audio works. You never know what the real result will be despite proper engineering efforts. Experience might guide you in a general sense.

If you don't know it as a DIYer. When you build something, it can be a one stroke of luck that you got everything right and it is optimized. Someone else using the same circuit laid out differrently and with the same parts could get a different result. Hey that is the fun of the hobby. It is your baby that you slowly nurture to sound better. To a manufacturer that is the horror when the same design on the same board starts sounding different over time....due to supplier parts variances.
 
Last edited:
M

Mikett

Member
Joined 2003
matt_garman said:
If I get one of these, I think the first "mod" will be simply using one of those "Y" USB cables that split the power and data. Cheap, simple, non-destructive, and a good chance of bringing some benefit. Every serious DIY'er has a few good 5V power supplies hanging around, right? ;)
Click to expand...

Thanks for the idea. YEAH I DO have one of those from an old IDE external case.!
 
O

occip

Member
Joined 2018
matt_garman said:
If I get one of these, I think the first "mod" will be simply using one of those "Y" USB cables that split the power and data. Cheap, simple, non-destructive, and a good chance of bringing some benefit. Every serious DIY'er has a few good 5V power supplies hanging around, right? ;)
Click to expand...

I've done it with a usb power bank, no improvements in noise level, maybe i've to try with a linear supply.
 
O

occip

Member
Joined 2018
Mikett said:
OK, sounds like you already have it hooked up to windows. How does it compare to the modded board soundwise? That is the big question.
Click to expand...

Hi,

This is the very good question:
I've connected the tone board to raspberry pi (volumio) wifi connected only. My amp is a tpa3255 3e-audio board with old infinity alpha speakers (tweaked filters).
I'm playing flac from qobuz (44.1k) with upsampling at 176,4k .
Unfortunately I've no golden ears :), I would say it is more analytic than my modded es9038q2m board, but I have to do more listening sessions (without kids ...)
 
M

Markw4

Member
Joined 2016
Please be aware that power bank type devices are good for preventing ground loops through the power supply, but they still use switching regulators to set the output voltage. Since they are typically intended for charging phones more than for hi-end audio use, the manufacturer may not have much incentive to keep electromagnetic switching noise at the output connector very low.
 
M

Markw4

Member
Joined 2016
Normal USB power is current limited. If you parallel two outputs, and if their voltages are slightly mismatched, and if the load isn't pulling them down the exact same voltage then the output of one supply will likely flow *into* the output of the other supply. Most computer USB ports seem to be fairly tolerant of such things, but there is in general no guarantee something can't get broken by playing such tricks. Certainly risky to try it with random 5v power supplies patched up to supply 5v through USB connectors.
 
A

androa76

Member
Joined 2007
Ohh ohh guys you do stupidity. Mark4 is tottaly right. Power bank is good for supply decoupling but not so good for audio powering. Inside are buck converters that convert 3.7 lion into 5v. I measured noise. Very bad. I dissasembled power bank and disconected 5v output to usb plug. I connected it directly to lions. I left charging connection. So after carging i get 3.9v enough for 3.3v lines. For now i use it for xmos or Amanero in dacs.
 
M

Mikett

Member
Joined 2003
Markw4 said:
Okay, that way should be fine. I have seen cables that parallel USB port power to external computer devices that may need more current than one USB port can supply. Those I would be careful with if anyone were to consider using them other than as intended by the manufacturer.
Click to expand...

I was researching some and read that one can use a powered hub.
It gets more interesting because I took apart a USB 2.0 hub that I had lying around. It is a powered one.....but some generic one from the far east. Looked at the board and the hub chip itself was excapsulated in epoxy but I was able to follow the input and the power lines and they are all in parallel. 4 ports, input and the 5 V input are paralleled. I also have a Compaq USB hub as well as a 7 port Dlink hub that is fairly new. They all have their LED lit even though I don't have them powered. I suspect that those are possibly also paralleled from all 5V lines unless there is a disconnect switch when the power plug is inserted.

The cable mod makes sense and is easy. I was thinking along the same lines but the LED behavior on the hubs got me confused as it must be receiving 5V from the host despite not being powered and sure enough they are.

The Y cable for old portable drives are definitely paralled on the power side 5V and Ground but not so on the data side.
 
M

Markw4

Member
Joined 2016
@system54, Good to hear you are happy with your dac. Could be some folks are more difficult to please, but we have things they can try too.

Also, if you try soldering up some really small SMD parts for your dac, your eyes might give you even more trouble after that. Rolling could be the least of it. :)
 
Last edited:
J

janos_904

Member
Joined 2009
@system54, Please see my previous post here:
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/digital-line-level/314935-es9038q2m-board-143.html#post5455700
I am getting closer to the magic of shiga using AP-linux + SOtM tX-USBexp Audiophile PCIe to USB 3.0 Card & external power supply
tX-USBexp – SOtM – English
But shigaclone is still my favorit one.

system54 said:
with linear suplieded cd transport and clean spdif signal the dac board sounds amazing! deep,seperation,vocal,musicality,emotion,room......

Reading about harshness here I can only roll my eyes. Trash your computers!
Click to expand...
 
Last edited:
P

pentajazz

Member
Joined 2015
this su5 unit has a remote, so this "black hole" on the front is a sensor for this.
So, if this remote looks like the same with the other boards, there might be a chance that there are some additional functions there like filter selection etc. Go figure!

Anyway if someone has this remote and can decode its infrared commands, maybe those could be shared here.

NEW SU5 ES9038Q2M DAC HIFI XU208 DSD TPA6120 Headphone audio Amp Bluetooth 5.0-in Digital-to-Analog Converter from Consumer Electronics on Aliexpress.com | Alibaba Group

but... this one says that it supports "apple remote", I do not know what this is supposed to mean.
ES9038 ES9038Q2M DAC Decoder board Support IIS DSD DOP 384KHz with Amanero USB-in Amplifier from Consumer Electronics on Aliexpress.com | Alibaba Group

So it might be the same.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom