Clocks on an Amanero board are buffered by the CPLD, thus jitter is not well minimized. Also, the clock power supplies might could be better.
Might it have been changing out the last two remaining ceramic bypass caps (for MCLK signal path ICs) and replacing them with MU caps?
Also, just wondering if you tried the Iancanada clock in the new V15 board yet? IIUC it helped significantly for the previous version board?
Yes, it is possible that the MU caps had an effect. Plus I'd removed the inverter that was previously in the clock line to the D flip-flips
I have not yet had chance to switch the Ian Canada scPure XO over to the v15 board - I have a few parallel activities going on so juggling things to get all run-in and ready for a less chaotic comparison.
However, I have kept my DAC1 unit going continuously without touching it since the scPure was installed about 2 weeks ago. This is my primary source of music all day in my home office.
I can honestly say the scPure is a big step up on the Crystek. At first switch on it sounded similar to the Crystek but I knew the recommendation from Ian Canada was not to listen for 3 days, however I ignored that. 😏 Fast forward to around 2-3 days and at that point I noticed a step-change. A quite obvious improvement. From that point it continued to improve but with more subtlety.
Sound-stage has gone wider and deeper (although I didn't think it could!) Everything just seems more realistic and more holographic. I'm thinking that both the HF and bass are still improving.
Once I get the v15, scPure and the "correct" filter board together in one place I am expecting great things! At that point I can also experiment with splitting the v15 and moving the clock part away from the USB and possibly screening it, etc.
I have not yet had chance to switch the Ian Canada scPure XO over to the v15 board - I have a few parallel activities going on so juggling things to get all run-in and ready for a less chaotic comparison.
However, I have kept my DAC1 unit going continuously without touching it since the scPure was installed about 2 weeks ago. This is my primary source of music all day in my home office.
I can honestly say the scPure is a big step up on the Crystek. At first switch on it sounded similar to the Crystek but I knew the recommendation from Ian Canada was not to listen for 3 days, however I ignored that. 😏 Fast forward to around 2-3 days and at that point I noticed a step-change. A quite obvious improvement. From that point it continued to improve but with more subtlety.
Sound-stage has gone wider and deeper (although I didn't think it could!) Everything just seems more realistic and more holographic. I'm thinking that both the HF and bass are still improving.
Once I get the v15, scPure and the "correct" filter board together in one place I am expecting great things! At that point I can also experiment with splitting the v15 and moving the clock part away from the USB and possibly screening it, etc.
Only one thing I would comment on with respect to the impressive changes with SCPure, holographic sound stage, a big step up, etc., is that there is another whole big step up possible with Acko oscillators and better squaring circuitry. Yet again more holographic than someone accustomed to SC Pure would probably imagine to be possible. This is part of what makes me think these @MarcelvdG RTZ DSD dacs have the potential to compete with some of the best dacs in the world.