Why don't you try it - if its good enough you will hear it. If not, well...
Are you pursuing this from a technical perfection point or do you seek tangible, real audible results?
I mean if you cant tell the difference by listening....
Do you have measurement ability? I.e. a sound card?
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Are you pursuing this from a technical perfection point or do you seek tangible, real audible results?
I mean if you cant tell the difference by listening....
Do you have measurement ability? I.e. a sound card?
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To be honest it’s pretty hard for me to make physical changes now. The extended pin headers are poorly made and practically unremovable. Last time I had to desolder all the pins to put on the caps... cleaning up the solder wasn’t easy...
With my current abilities I’m afraid the technical route is the only one available. Of course, I’ll still be the final judge of whether a change is audible, but beyond that I can do much at this point. Maybe I’m underestimating my abilities. But I also don’t fancy collecting test tracks and spending time tuning my ears, not that they cant possibly be justified in some circumstances.
And there’s the issue of time
But honestly getting reasonable simulation results shouldn’t be costly to Soren at all. I don’t understand why he’s so reluctant. Once we have the numbers it will be a much lower risk project. I don’t think we’ll-thought out simulations would be unreliable in this case. Maybe Soren can persuade me otherwise
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Okey. I hope that you can find balance in your endeavour. My take is that you probably have a quite good DAC there and that if you are not happy with your system performance, you need to seek improvement elsewhere in the chain. A clean and orderly build with good solder joints is a prerequisite for a good result.
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That is a lot more fair comparison. Interestingly, i rate it higher than a very nice 4495 and an even nicer 9018, both of which cost several times more in parts and power supplies. Of course, your implementations may still be better. Or we may value different aspects of sound.
My only quibble is i wish the hardware was better documented. It is after all a product meant for modding. Cannot understand why the secrecy about stuff that can, with some work, be reverse engineered anyway. Out lives would be so much easier and happier
Asking for simulations from the designer... well, I still don't think it's fair. Modifying is a game outside the purchase contract where the "modder" is completely on his own. I think actually Sören showed a surprisingly high level support to almost stupid mistakes by the users. But given this is a DIY community I think he has done his fair share. I wish he didn't promise things he don't deliver on - thats bad form.
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This thread is very much alive again, great. I am always a little bit sceptical concerning subjective listening impressions, because even the most sensitive ears are easily deceived. And all those night and day differences are easily claimed, but usually a controlled blind listening scenario puts things into perspective.
But anyway, I just put some extra capacity on a ref.4 board and there might be a smoother presentation, but as I said...
I think the ladder power supply seems pretty good these days, what worries me more is, that i hear a clear difference from either a toslink source or a raspberry i2s source. A battery powered amanero sounds different again. That should not be the case. There is a fifo and isolation. What could be going on there?
But anyway, I just put some extra capacity on a ref.4 board and there might be a smoother presentation, but as I said...
I think the ladder power supply seems pretty good these days, what worries me more is, that i hear a clear difference from either a toslink source or a raspberry i2s source. A battery powered amanero sounds different again. That should not be the case. There is a fifo and isolation. What could be going on there?
Isolation is galvanic isolation it e.g. breaks ground loops. However it can not block all noise as it can not "distinguish" between noise and the signal if they are both in the "pass trough frequency band".
You must be new to this
These differences are not eliminated by fifo or galvanic isolation. In any dac, not just in the DAM. Among the mountains of stuff that is heard but not fully understood. Blame science, not the DAM
1: capacitor in feed back, was first 330pF, later on changed to resistor.
2: power decoupling, 1uF 25V.
You must be new to this
These differences are not eliminated by fifo or galvanic isolation. In any dac, not just in the DAM. Among the mountains of stuff that is heard but not fully understood. Blame science, not the DAM
They should really and if not - there is something wrong with the implementation. It's therefore I would like to know how often there is a need for a frequency change.
But maybe you have a technical description to why they are not?
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I'll stick to that a DAM connected to Toslink is technically the best setup one can do. For me it also sound good. I brought my "mono-power-DAC"s using 5 meter toslink each to a friend that doubted "Toslink" but it played the **** (ok - shaijt) out of his Mark Levinson stuff he did not say anything negative which of course means he agreed
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he did not say anything negative which of course means he agreed //
Toslink sounds kind of soft compared to a i2s connected raspberry. Battery fed amanero is closer to toslink, but sounds fresher in a, for my ears, positive way. Sounds like transient behavior to me, i have of course no idea what is closest to reality, but raspberry sounds somewhat wrong and tiring.