Oh, the pinapple with Bacon / Canadian Bacon / Ham / Cheese just goes together so nice!
Jean-Paul, what is wrong with XLR plugs? I like them as they are solid and easy to plug in/out. Sort of like speakon VS traditional speaker connectors.
Still I hope we do get an ASR like discussion here. In the MiniDSP Flex 8 channel thread everybody was asking for a balanced version while in the DM7 thread there was like 30 pages on how to convert to unbalanced. Argh.
But indeed, integration makes sense these days, given ultra low distortion and high SNR of newest DAC and amp solutions.
Anyone with hands-on experience with the DM7 here? Does it sound in line with its measurements?
Yes absolutely. Any balanced system can inherently cancel out even order distortion products and increase the signal to noise ratio.
Pineapple and hot peppers go together very well, along with other toppings. This is more related to music variety, expanded and diverse taste!
Just as I don't like speakon I also don't like XLR and TRS would be the very last I would try. First thing I do is to convert to unbalanced. Why (I asked myself many times) ?!?! Nothing technical as of course balanced is better but for me only when stuff is integrated in 1 device. Every person has peculiarities 🙂 but I notice not much people here use balanced except pro guys. I know I am not alone in this and I am curious what others say about why they don't use balanced. I think it is the simple reason that the connectors are large and clunky so non technical. Balanced never broke through in the consumer market either and probably never will as the decline of audio started. Maybe not being used to balanced and/or the technical benefits plays a role?! Maybe it has too much nerdiness?
Everything double thus more complex and often done with many opamps...more expensive volume control etc. Heard the same from quite some audio connaisseurs that they don't even think of using balanced. Balanced seems to be the gender neutral item in audio, we all know it and accept it but we don't become friends. Today even technical people detest cables and want everything wireless which does not help. I already have seen setups where devices were interconnected wirelessly while having "normal" inputs and outputs...
Now if balanced would have been done with Lemo connectors....
Everything double thus more complex and often done with many opamps...more expensive volume control etc. Heard the same from quite some audio connaisseurs that they don't even think of using balanced. Balanced seems to be the gender neutral item in audio, we all know it and accept it but we don't become friends. Today even technical people detest cables and want everything wireless which does not help. I already have seen setups where devices were interconnected wirelessly while having "normal" inputs and outputs...
Now if balanced would have been done with Lemo connectors....
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I think you would love pineapple pizza 😉
My issues with unbalanced:
- ground loops
- common mode more generally
- needs quality cables to produce acceptable results while even a 1 buck XLR cable will perfectly work, durability aside.
My issue with RCA: the ones I have are hard to get loose, especially without opening it up (they basically are designed to stay in place). I was also not so much into balanced until I started using (Hypex) class D amplifiers. Very nice stuff and they can be very silent (noise/hum wise).
Do you know you get banned if you start talking about pineapple pizza in an Italian village... ;-)
Do you know you get banned if you start talking about pineapple pizza in an Italian village... ;-)
In my own DIY efforts I use DSP via computer audio. There are lots of cheap SMPS supplies involved and therefore lots of noise sources nearby. Balanced interconnects are remarkably superior in this environment and I use balanced DACs and amplifiers whenever possible. In your DIY world, if unbalanced connections work well for you then it true that there is no good reason at all to "convert" to balanced ones, but for other people balanced line level connections are the best solution.
Mmm, ground loops with RCA is a first for me. And plugging in and out connectors with equipment being powered on is an unnecessary exercise easily avoided. Using balanced to avoid noise created by cheap SMPS is one of the nicer tries 🙂 I would avoid the noise alltogether and never choose stuff based with low cost as most important factor, that is culturally determined so I can't nor want to fight it. Anyway even though I know balanced is best I simply don't want it.
Will try the pineapple pizza within a few weeks from now (ordered with a made up name of course). BTW these pizze are ones created locally with a let's say a touch of dutch. All 3 are a mix of pizza and local snacks and quite horror:
https://www.dominos.nl/menu-pizza/pizza-frikandutchman-PFRI
https://www.newyorkpizza.nl/producten/sate-pizza-530
https://www.dominos.nl/menu-pizza/pizza-shoarma-PSHO
For the very cold blooded daredevils this is the ultimate (also in calories!). I present to you the "kapsalon" (hairdressers saloon):
https://www.meiningsen.de/haarstrang/kapsalon/
The recipe for "kapsalon" DIY:
https://www.ah.nl/allerhande/recept/R-R1188845/patatje-kapsalon
Will try the pineapple pizza within a few weeks from now (ordered with a made up name of course). BTW these pizze are ones created locally with a let's say a touch of dutch. All 3 are a mix of pizza and local snacks and quite horror:
https://www.dominos.nl/menu-pizza/pizza-frikandutchman-PFRI
https://www.newyorkpizza.nl/producten/sate-pizza-530
https://www.dominos.nl/menu-pizza/pizza-shoarma-PSHO
For the very cold blooded daredevils this is the ultimate (also in calories!). I present to you the "kapsalon" (hairdressers saloon):
https://www.meiningsen.de/haarstrang/kapsalon/
The recipe for "kapsalon" DIY:
https://www.ah.nl/allerhande/recept/R-R1188845/patatje-kapsalon
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All my digital amps that accept a balanced signal do sound better using it. As I also avoid active circuitry after the dac the extra power comes in Handy. For me there is no going back to SE.
Digital amplifers?
It is normal that balanced to balanced sounds good. The same with RCA to RCA. Issues start when mixing them.
It is normal that balanced to balanced sounds good. The same with RCA to RCA. Issues start when mixing them.
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Are you saying that you compared SE and balanced SQ using the same dac, and that dac offered both types of outputs? If so, the result could depend in part how SE is derived internally inside the dac. It often goes though a differential summing opamp that the balanced outputs don't pass through. In that case some of what you hear may due to the additional signal processing inside the dac and not exclusively due to SE verses balanced.
As I said I use no active circuitry. Neither on the dac side nor on the amp side.
Two coupling caps per channel straight to the input pins of the amps. With all my AKM dacs this consistently outperformed any active stage I tried including tubes.
Software volume control is all I used for the last eight or so years. I might try a differential volume pot in the future.
When I write input pins I mean the pins of the actual amp chip and not of the circuitry in front of it.
Okay, think I get it. While dacs are active circuitry and so are class-d amps, in your implementation there is no added active circuitry between dac chip outputs and power amp inputs. And presumably no Topping DM7, which IIUC uses I/V opamps after the dac chip. More or less correct, or maybe something different?
Hi Radian, may I know what kind of "digital amplifier" or chip you are using that can accept the raw audio signal straight out from a DAC?
Still no DM7 owners on DiyAudio!? Would like to hear some first hand experiences with the unit if possible...
OK just a hypothetical here... so someone claims they have bought one. Maybe they post a pic to prove it. They say they "love it" and that it sounds "liquid" or (insert your favorite audiophool adjective here). That somehow is more believeable than the audiosciencereview measurements??? If you can't believe that sort of in-depth review but you would rather go by "words", then you are really lost.
It is not necessarily about sound only, though it I think it is somewhat interesting to hear how the quality is perceived. But I would never solely rely on this. I am interested in observations in other categories, e.g. driver stability, build quality, any problems encountered (e.g. startup noise issues), integration issues etc. Sometimes you get to know some interesting things that you did not get from measurements or a review.
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