How about plug your idsd into your gold amplifier or into your speakers setup to know exactly what give direst stream vs I dsd as a dac?

The advantage to I dsd is the battery. Ac cord change the sound and we never sure we have the most efficient ac cord for our setup. Price have no role in the sound quality for ac cord.

x838nwy said:

  MBP->iTunes->BitPerfect->iDSD->V-Moda M100 = pretty dark amazing. The XBass is a lot more tastefully done than I feared. The 3D cross-feed is also very pleasant and interesting but for some reason I prefer to have it off with this set-up. I think V-Moda tuned these to have an artificially large head stage and the 3D probably doesn't work so well with this sort of thing.
 
What's the verdict on the filters, people? Can't really say much with the M-100's as my cans. Bit-perfect seems to be a shade more lethargic and minimum phase seems to a lot of energy/edge to it. Standard seems to somewhere between the two with a little more rounded sound. I'd say it's closest to "big hifi" sound and the least fatiguing to my ear.
 
 

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Since I have my iDSD connected directly to my LSR305 my more or less final opinion on the filters as follows. I find that that bit perfect is more rounded and less edginess on some sounds which in turn sounds more natural like for vocals as an example. The minimum phase is better for some older recordings and seems to help to bring out the details from the higher background noise level. I will again state that I find the 3D effect more useful with monitors/speakers. I was listening to one of my Blu-ray Aix Records recordings and the high strings of the violins really sounded right in my face. That tells me that the 3D is more than a simple cross feed.  I am back to enjoy my adventurers for the day. 

x838nwy said:

   
What's the verdict on the filters, people? Can't really say much with the M-100's as my cans. Bit-perfect seems to be a shade more lethargic and minimum phase seems to a lot of energy/edge to it. Standard seems to somewhere between the two with a little more rounded sound. I'd say it's closest to "big hifi" sound and the least fatiguing to my ear.
 
 
One fun thing I did was to hook it up to my airport express via an optical cable. The iDSD seems to occasionally drop the signal while my audio engine D1 doesn't. May be it's something to do with the signal just during those couple of hours, or may be the AE just doesn't care as much about jitter or something…?
 
Overall, I cannot be happier with this. I cannot wait to try the iTube with it...

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I *think* the preferred filter is bit-perfect. To me its the smoothest and most analog sounding. But to each their own.
 
When is it dropping the optical signal? Is it in the middle of playback? The device goes to sleep if it is not sensing any inputs and it takes just a second or so to fully come back to life when an input is applied. I have played with the iDSD and my Squeezebox Touch through the SPDIF input and didn't have any problems. 

The Airport Express is well known for its inferior SPDIF timing.

technobear said:

The Airport Express is well known for its inferior SPDIF timing.

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Here we go again.
I have two AE and one AppleTV, all three provide me with hundreds and hundreds of hours that I enjoyed and keep enjoying my music. Yes, once in a while one of them misbehaves, but when I remember people have all kinds of issues, noise, hiss, background with their systems, these are rear occurrences. With all the bad rep audiophile snobs gave apple devices, IMHO they are the most reliable and best sounding.
iPad to Micro-iDSD is just fantastic!
AE to my NADs built in DAC is very comparable to iDSD's dac. The strength of Micro is its versatility and very nice sound.

bikutoru said:

  Here we go again.
I have two AE and one AppleTV, all three provide me with hundreds and hundreds of hours that I enjoyed and keep enjoying my music. Yes, once in a while one of them misbehaves, but when I remember people have all kinds of issues, noise, hiss, background with their systems, these are rear occurrences. With all the bad rep audiophile snobs gave apple devices, IMHO they are the most reliable and best sounding.
iPad to Macro-iDSD is just fantastic!
AE to my NADs built in DAC is very comparable to iDSD's dac. The strength of Macro is its versatility and very nice sound.

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whoah, did ifi release an XL sized idsd, aka, the "macro"?

kugino said:

 
whoah, did ifi release an XL sized idsd, aka, the "macro"?

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Micro-iDSD, my bad and first they need to fix the micro, so it can be the Hugo killer as everyone dreams of at least price-wise

kmanchu said:

I *think* the preferred filter is bit-perfect. To me its the smoothest and most analog sounding. But to each their own.

When is it dropping the optical signal? Is it in the middle of playback? The device goes to sleep if it is not sensing any inputs and it takes just a second or so to fully come back to life when an input is applied. I have played with the iDSD and my Squeezebox Touch through the SPDIF input and didn't have any problems. 

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Not entirely sure what it is. May be even my home wifi traffic or whatever. I'll give it a better shot later. Sadly now that i've buried my w4s remedy, behind my tv i don't want to dig it out again otherwise it'd be more definitive as to whether or not it's the jitter.

Afaik, airport express jitter really depends on the model of airport express in question, but yes, for many applications, it's super convenient and it doesn't sound half bad.

pompon said:

How about plug your idsd into your gold amplifier or into your speakers setup to know exactly what give direst stream vs I dsd as a dac?

The advantage to I dsd is the battery. Ac cord change the sound and we never sure we have the most efficient ac cord for our setup. Price have no role in the sound quality for ac cord.

Click to expand...

Did this today. JRiver playing the same track (Christina Perri, burning gold) to both. The idsd hooked up through it's pre-out and in direct mode using nordost blue heaven cables. The idsd has iusb and gemini cables as a little leg-up plus a tellurium q black diamond usb cable before the iusb.

The DS is on JPS labs AC-X cable and connected via its bridge which is roughly a CAT5 -> i2s input. It then goes into the amp via tellurium q black xlr cables.

The comparison is interesting as i could switch between the two easily. The ds was noticeably more 3d. More life like. More "solid". Her voice sounded more like it came from a head rather than a recording. Better focus? The level of details is similar in quantity, but the idsd sort of throws everything at you in one pancake flat mass at what appears to be the same volume be it a voice or a keyboard. But then again, this is where the ds excels imo - it digs up vast amounts of information and presents it in a really delicate manner that lets you examine it all at your own leisure - so the idsd did awesomely well to keep up. Yes it's more shouty and fuzzy, but a great deal less than it has any rights to.

Okay, so most people would say the results are obvious, but i think it speaks volumes for the idsd that up against arguably one of the best dacs of 2014 costing $6k, the above were really the only OBVIOUS differences. There are many others, but i expected it to be a much bigger gap between the two. If you think about it, the little idsd is portable, works with your phone, has an amplifier, and can actually do usb->s/pdif if needed for something like 5% the price, it's quite startling.

Now my little session is *very* casual and no, i didn't level-match and i know i can buy one idsd for each room of the house for one ds so please put away your pitchforks and torches. The idsd is awesome value however you look at it. I'm seriously thinking of comparing it to my gingnir (which it kindda reminds me of).

Just placed an order for the iUSB Power Supply and a Gemini USB Cable... Should have it in a few days... 
 

“Pop” goes DSD? Why does this happen?
 


Hi all, this has been copied in from here:
http://ifi-audio.com/audio_blog/pop-goes-dsd-why-does-this-happen/

 
But as it is so brief, we have put the whole piece in here.

 

Question: Some iFi and non-iFi customers have asked – Why during DSD playback is there a “pop” sound?

 
Short (layman) answer: This is an inherent characteristic of DSD that is unavoidable.
 
Long (technical) answer: Please see below.

 
1. PCM can produce a true zero (silence) output in an instant. When the data stream stops, the DAC is then reset to “zero” for PCM.
 
2. As DSD only records the difference in level between each sample and during track changes (or a switch from PCM to DSD), the Player no longer sends DoP markers.
 
3. As a result, the DSD’s output levels (via DSD-DoP) of the DAC output can ‘stick’ at any possible level (almost anything but rarely zero) between the two extremes.
 
4. When the next song commences, the DAC suddenly receives a new DAC value (usually this new value is zero), which has no relevance to the previous sample- hence the ‘pop’.
 
5. The only way to reduce this ‘pop’ is to run a small period of silence during these changes. In other words, the playback software must handle this correctly and play a short silence before it stops sending DoP markers.
 
6. For example: JRiver v19 or higher has this under WASAPI hence no ‘pop’ between changes.

7. Another example: there is no pop when using DSD (native) under JRiver.
 
8. Onkyo HF Player doesn’t have this feature and hence the pop sound.
 
We hope you found this useful.

iFi guys,
 
I hate to be a drag, but ...
 
I have been using the micro iDSD in USB powered mode and tried leaving it on for the last 3 days hooked into the iUSB Power. The LED just started flashing red intermittently. I have been using it in Eco mode purely as a dac with no headphones attached for intervals of a few hours followed by many hours or non-use with the computer turned completely off. From what I understood, the battery should not have run down. Rather, SmartPower should have been modulating it to keep it right at 80%. What gives?

Switch on the Micro iDSD only after you have connected to the chain and have it all running. Have you tried it? Correct me if I am wrong

Same thing happening with this Micro iDSD user... http://www.head-fi.org/t/728236/ifi-idsd-micro-dsd512-pcm768-dac-and-headphone-amp-impressions-reviews-and-comments/405#post_10807370
 
I agree with your statement, Quote... "Switch on the Micro iDSD only after you have connected to the chain and have it all running."
 
Since mine arrives on Thursday,I am very concerned...

billsonchang007 said:

Switch on the Micro iDSD only after you have connected to the chain and have it all running. Have you tried it? Correct me if I am wrong

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That is exactly how I am using it. I *think* I may have figured it out though. We had a brief power outage two nights ago lasting 10 minutes during which time the iDSD was still switched on but suddenly the iUSB Power lost its supply power. So maybe the iDSD switched to battery power and then never converted back over. At any rate, I turned it off last night and the LED switched to Blue chargin and is still on 6 hours later. Hopefully it will be off by the time I get back from work tonight and all will resume normal.