AudioQuest Dragonfly Review : Affordable, Outstanding, Tiny DAC / Amp | Page 80 | Headphone Reviews and Discussion - Head-Fi.org

Grind · Jul 15, 2013 at 1:00 PM

Purchased DF couple months ago. Love the sound but afraid to use it

Been using Koss DJ pro 100 with it, other night tried it with IEM and almost lost my hearing because i´ve had these irritating snacks, crackles and pops from the first day of having it. Didn´t think they would be so LOUD in my ear with IEM. Sweet Bezesus!! using Win 7 Ultimate, turned of all eco modes, tried different usb-ports and been using smallest buffers available. Think i´ve tried every trick from the book but no luck getting the extra sounds of. Don´t want tinnitus because of this thing so all the help is appreciated.

Whippler · Jul 15, 2013 at 2:27 PM

put it on a usb extension cord, and avoid all movement on the usb connection!

Grind · Jul 15, 2013 at 2:42 PM

Will try that, thanks. Another one from Finland, morjens

edit. Yep, seems that usb ports in my Silverstone case are little bit on a loose side, swinging like crazy. That´s what you get with kids ripping off every cord they get their hands on

Let´s just hope that V-Moda M-100 coming next week will survive even couple months..

RUMAY408 · Jul 15, 2013 at 10:27 PM

Quote:

grind said:
Will try that, thanks. Another one from Finland, morjens

edit. Yep, seems that usb ports in my Silverstone case are little bit on a loose side, swinging like crazy. That´s what you get with kids ripping off every cord they get their hands on

Let´s just hope that V-Moda M-100 coming next week will survive even couple months..

I agree with the two above posts and would add an amp, even a cheap one to that usb extension just to further stabilize that off chance of a loud noise coming off the DAC.

Krutsch · Jul 16, 2013 at 8:15 AM

Quote:

grind said:
Will try that, thanks. Another one from Finland, morjens

edit. Yep, seems that usb ports in my Silverstone case are little bit on a loose side, swinging like crazy. That´s what you get with kids ripping off every cord they get their hands on

Let´s just hope that V-Moda M-100 coming next week will survive even couple months..

In the event that a loose cable connection was NOT the problem, I've had issues with Windows 8 and recurring clicks and pops, using JRiver Media Center. I had to play around with the buffer size settings to fix the issue. For me, 250ms was the magic number.

jaywillin · Jul 16, 2013 at 8:41 AM

i joined the dragonfly club, kind of my accident/luck
i won an ebay auction , paid $107 for my dragonfly, like new condition
works perfectly !
i'm using just as a dac mostly, my amps are the fiio e09k, indeed g3, and a LD I+
my headphones are the alessandro ms2
i must say, i'm quite impressed with the dragonfly !!

Grind · Jul 16, 2013 at 12:44 PM

Quote:

krutsch said:
In the event that a loose cable connection was NOT the problem, I've had issues with Windows 8 and recurring clicks and pops, using JRiver Media Center. I had to play around with the buffer size settings to fix the issue. For me, 250ms was the magic number.

I quess i still haven´t find my magic number ´cause clicks and pops are still an issue, i´ll just have to continue hunting the right way to get it right

Just a guess, could my Spitfire II Dac plugged in my optical output have some kind of interference with Dragonfly? I use that for my AudioEngine A5 monitors. There are not used at the same time but..who knows.

RUMAY408 · Jul 16, 2013 at 2:16 PM

Quote:

grind said:
I quess i still haven´t find my magic number ´cause clicks and pops are still an issue, i´ll just have to continue hunting the right way to get it right

Just a guess, could my Spitfire II Dac plugged in my optical output have some kind of interference with Dragonfly? I use that for my AudioEngine A5 monitors. There are not used at the same time but..who knows.

Try the DF on another computer if it is still happening I would assume its a defective DF.

jaywillin · Jul 16, 2013 at 2:40 PM

Quote:

grind said:
Purchased DF couple months ago. Love the sound but afraid to use it

Been using Koss DJ pro 100 with it, other night tried it with IEM and almost lost my hearing because i´ve had these irritating snacks, crackles and pops from the first day of having it. Didn´t think they would be so LOUD in my ear with IEM. Sweet Bezesus!! using Win 7 Ultimate, turned of all eco modes, tried different usb-ports and been using smallest buffers available. Think i´ve tried every trick from the book but no luck getting the extra sounds of. Don´t want tinnitus because of this thing so all the help is appreciated.

what media player are you using ? i i have jriver, i had the same problem with the hrt microstreamer, and msII, the solution there was decreased buffering, where most dacs its increase the buffering, have you tried that ??

Krutsch · Jul 16, 2013 at 11:59 PM

krutsch said:
In the event that a loose cable connection was NOT the problem, I've had issues with Windows 8 and recurring clicks and pops, using JRiver Media Center. I had to play around with the buffer size settings to fix the issue. For me, 250ms was the magic number.

Sorry, but I spoke too soon... I went back to my Windows 8 laptop and tried my Dragonfly, after posting this. Now, no combination of settings / disabling other audio devices / whatever will eliminate the ticks and pops. The distortion is horrible. FWIW, it's far more evident with 96/24 tracks, as opposed to AAC or MP3 files that playback just fine. FLAC CD rips are in the middle - fewer pops, but they are there.

I've already received a replacement DF from Audioquest (I had an early model with the line-level out issue). Works great on my Mac Book, but not so with my Windows 8 laptop. To be fair to Audioquest, they warn about Windows 8 on their web site. However, I have none of these issues with my desktop rig with the same laptop, files and media player.

Hopefully the previous poster can figure something out; it's a great DAC/amp, if you can hear it without the ticks and pops. For me, I am just going to pull out my Mac Book and forget about it.

RUMAY408 · Jul 17, 2013 at 8:17 AM

Quote:

krutsch said:
Sorry, but I spoke too soon... I went back to my Windows 8 laptop and tried my Dragonfly, after posting this. Now, no combination of settings / disabling other audio devices / whatever will eliminate the ticks and pops. The distortion is horrible. FWIW, it's far more evident with 96/24 tracks, as opposed to AAC or MP3 files that playback just fine. FLAC CD rips are in the middle - fewer pops, but they are there.

I've already received a replacement DF from Audioquest (I had an early model with the line-level out issue). Works great on my Mac Book, but not so with my Windows 8 laptop. To be fair to Audioquest, they warn about Windows 8 on their web site. However, I have none of these issues with my desktop rig with the same laptop, files and media player.

Hopefully the previous poster can figure something out; it's a great DAC/amp, if you can hear it without the ticks and pops. For me, I am just going to pull out my Mac Book and forget about it.

I have a Mac which the DF runs great on and Windows 7 at the office also no problem. I have not tried Windows 8. Has anyone had a good experience with Windows 8? The tech people at work said stay away from Windows 8 so when we "upgraded" from Vista we went to Windows 7. Totally off topic but I actually liked Vista better than 7.

Krutsch · Jul 17, 2013 at 9:16 AM

Quote:

rumay408 said:
I have a Mac which the DF runs great on and Windows 7 at the office also no problem. I have not tried Windows 8. Has anyone had a good experience with Windows 8? The tech people at work said stay away from Windows 8 so when we "upgraded" from Vista we went to Windows 7. Totally off topic but I actually liked Vista better than 7.

I have done a fair amount of reading on the topic of Windows 8 and DF on other forums (especially the JRiver site); others are having this problem, but many say it all works great with Windows 8. For me, it comes and goes - as I posted earlier, it was working for a while and then I started having problems, again.

If you search around, you can find a technical description that seems to point to a USB audio issue with Windows 8.

OT: my job forces me to learn and "appreciate" whatever Microsoft, Google and Apple come out with. To be honest, Windows 8 is a lot of "change" and it's too much for an average user (reminds me of the public's reaction to the Microsoft Office "Ribbon" toolbar). However, a while back my MacBook died and, while I was sourcing a new one, I was forced to exclusively use Windows 8. After a few weeks, I learned to like and appreciate what they are trying to accomplish with the Metro or Modern UI.

gidgiddonihah · Jul 21, 2013 at 2:33 AM

Quote:

whippler said:
put it on a usb extension cord, and avoid all movement on the usb connection!

If it having problems like this you have a defective unit. One of my 3 or 4 models did this and progressively got worse until it was unbearable. I would suggest getting a replacement under warranty.

krutsch said:
I have done a fair amount of reading on the topic of Windows 8 and DF on other forums (especially the JRiver site); others are having this problem, but many say it all works great with Windows 8. For me, it comes and goes - as I posted earlier, it was working for a while and then I started having problems, again.

If you search around, you can find a technical description that seems to point to a USB audio issue with Windows 8.

OT: my job forces me to learn and "appreciate" whatever Microsoft, Google and Apple come out with. To be honest, Windows 8 is a lot of "change" and it's too much for an average user (reminds me of the public's reaction to the Microsoft Office "Ribbon" toolbar). However, a while back my MacBook died and, while I was sourcing a new one, I was forced to exclusively use Windows 8. After a few weeks, I learned to like and appreciate what they are trying to accomplish with the Metro or Modern UI.

My dad has Windows 8 on his laptop and anything from MP3 to FLAC CD rips to High Rez downloads runs fine through Mediamonkey, iTunes, and my modded/WASAPI foobar2000 setup I put on it.

Grind · Jul 21, 2013 at 4:42 AM

Quick test with Sony Vaio laptop shows no problem with Dragonfly. Sony is on Win 8. But this was just a quick test with couple of songs through Winamp and Youtube.

I´ve tried countless of different variations of buffer sizes with my own computer with no luck, it´s definitely better with small buffers but problem doesn´t go away. Now running latency test with my PC, somebody talked about this on Jriver forum.http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=78555.0

Search continues

Grind · Aug 2, 2013 at 8:18 AM

I just don´t get it. Absolutely perfect sound on Vaio so it seems theres something really badly wrong with my own computer. I updated every driver i found and it seems to help little with the click and snaps but no way it is perfect, still really annoying to use. Now there is a new problem, randomly sound just vanishes and and i have to touch the Windows master volume just a click up or down to get the sound back. Ok if just listening music but really annoying if playing some game or watching film. Loosing my mind

On a bright side got my V-Moda M-100 couple of days ago and couldn´t be happier

. Absolutely perfect except for little size problem with my ears, lets hope the XL sife pads will be available soon.

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