[PatOMalley]

Which is why I like the 2008 version with the heatsink.

The PCB is in contact along the groove with the chassis wehre it is slid in so damping the chassis looks to be the trick. You can get vinyl damping pads or that 3M damping stuff and place it on the bottom of the chassis. I used heatsinks on the top which also damp the chassis via the thermal tape. Also some nice new rubbery feet from EAR damped damped the shassis as well.

Quote:

Originally Posted by zzodhi /img/forum/go_quote.gif Has anyone worked with vibration control pads/grommet on the dac board? Pulling it tight with the case doesn't seem the best. Vibration from the trans can still transfer from the connections going to the board. Also I've been doing a lot of research on the cap replacement. As you all know SMT caps, if they're very good, will yield better results than through hole organic types in this application. Maybe its better and more elegant to find hi-end SMT caps as a replacement for what's there.

 

[zzodhi]

EAR makes many difference types that are more exotic.

Bill. 470? That's a thought. I ordered the caps before I read they should be 220s Crap. More S/H.

 

[zzodhi]

Quote:

Originally Posted by TeraDak /img/forum/go_quote.gif No ! Can you try it again?

ok, yes it has a red LED. Also has 330 Ohm i/v resistors. There are now some type of silcone/heatsink pads between the dac chips and case. Aside from what I mentioned earlier that's all I see.

Oh, it did come with a hundred dollar bill stuffed inside the case. Is that new?

 

[adam2434]

Quote:

Originally Posted by zzodhi /img/forum/go_quote.gif There are now some type of silcone/heatsink pads between the dac chips and case.

Could you please post a picture of that if you get the chance?

Thanks

 

[zzodhi]

I was checking lead spacing for caps so good timing. Unfortunately one strip ripped when I slide the board out.

 

[zzodhi]

Hey Bill!!

Pop a 470uF in your control dac for the reg and let us know. I have no way to a/b here.

 

[Carlter]

Hi
Swapped out those 3 power cap with BG 1000uf /25v @@ (bought the wrong type but what to do ) now i can't close the top cover anymore . while i was doing the power caps i measure them and seems to link together , so do they count as 3000 uF ? so maybe we can have something bigger at the reg cap ??

thx

 

[Carlter]

ZZodhi those look like thermo tape for ram to me

 

[zzodhi]

I'm tending to agree with Carlter. I don't have experience with the rule of 5 but if we're just supplying the regulator and there's a good low impedance 330uF in there now then I would tend to go up not down. I looked at the spec sheet for the LG caps. While listening is the key they're far from junk. BGs might be better (after 1000 hours). Filtering and reserve is key here.

Thanks for IDing the tape. Others might give it a try.

 

[adam2434]

zzodhi, thanks for the pic of the tape.

 

[Bill Allen]

My thoughts about vibration control are two-fold. First Cryo treat the DAC to relieve all the stress in the metals. Next step, completely eliminate the A/C transformer from the equation by using battery power supply.

Engineer's generally design power supply's to meet their math equations. The bold ones will overbuild the power supply by 10-20% ... ooohh.... big deal! I say yes do the math, but most important listen carefully, and then overbuild the power supply by 100%.

Same goes when they add battery power. Using their "golden rules" they shoot for the smallest battery possible then make up for dynamic shortfalls with "just" the right size capacitor. There are engineers out there who make a living doing just that. Yawn! That's fine with cell phones, radio's and GPS devices, but definitely not of interest for quality audio components.

What we audiophiles want is the biggest fastest battery we can get your hands on. The Blackgate FK of Battery's. Optima Red Tops Battery's with its AGM (Absorbent Glass Mat) technology looks promising. The biggest hurdle is stepping the voltage down to 8 Volts to run the Dac. We could use a resistor but more elegant would be to de-couple 2 cells inside this 6 cell battery. I tend to nod in agreement with "almost “everything on this website.
Mother Of Tone presents: The Altmann BYOB Site

In fact "I have a dream" of an Ultimate Stacked Chip DAC. (USCD)

Eliminate all the filter caps, the voltage regulator and even the caps on the DAC chips themselves. Just a gigantic battery in the DAC Chip power supply path, and get this ... a single resistor and silver wound transformer on the analog output. That's what I'm talking about. The battery is the cap! If even more speed is required perhaps something like this would do the trick. Soundstream SCELL600 - Soundstream 600 Amp Battery/Capacitor Cell Combination [SCELL600] - $251.09 : CarJamz.com, Inc., International Mobile Audio Wholesaler

Is this possible, well not if you ask an engineer armed with rules and measurements to support them? Understand they "live in a box" governed by rules, yet these very rules can be bent, broken or even discarded. They tend to use way too many parts to achieve their goals. I say let's engineer these extra parts out of the equation for better sound. Myself I subscribe to the Audio Philosophy that "one thing" is usually better than "many things" and the sound of the Master Tape is the ultimate goal.

25 years of hopelessly buying and trying gear I finally arrived at point where if you want something to "sound right", keep it simple, and whenever possible ... do it yourself. This hobby is supposed to be fun!

My primary tools consist of my ears and what's in between them. Call me crazy!

 

[PatOMalley]

Really. If you read the hype and then open the chassis you are left with the "What the f .." syndrome on most anything to see in audio magazines. And I love looking at BAT equipment.

All at the same time it is hard to not want to tweak the hell out of something until it looks like barnacles are growing off it. All too human.

This VALAB is very friendly in response to regulator cap changes, output cap changes, it returns the effort. /even weird stuff like the grounding Litz wire made a nice change in calming focus.

And the big thing is that this is fun. No need to grow up.


Quote:

Originally Posted by Bill Allen /img/forum/go_quote.gif 25 years of hopelessly buying and trying gear I finally arrived at point where if you want something to "sound right", keep it simple, and whenever possible ... do it yourself. This hobby is supposed to be fun! My primary tools consist of my ears and what's in between them. Call me crazy!

 

[r8833]

Hey Bill,

would a 8v sealed lead acid battery work?

Power-Sonic 8V/3.2AH Sealed Lead Acid Battery w/ F1 Terminal

Rich

 

[Bill Allen]

Rich-Nice find on the 8V battery, it's not going to run very long at 3.2AH but it will work. As an experiment you could wire this bad boy right to the DAC Board and take a listen. This is a start in the right direction. The more people helping discover the secrets to better sound the better.

At the moment my USC Dac is a fantasy, it only works in my mind. Reality will have it's own input on the subject.

For an experiment I will try a regular 12V car battery hooked up pre & post the three 1000uf filter caps. The regulator should drop the voltage down to 7.8 volts no problem. However it sure would be nice to loose that regulator.

Pat- any progress on the Cine-Mag output transformer???

 

[Bill Allen]

Here is a fine example of what happens when you set an engineer loose inside a Dac.

Pacific Valve & Electric Company Audio gd DAC3SE

Of interest is their claim they lowered the jitter to 20 ppm using the DIR 9001 receiver chip. I was taking a look at the 9001 Data Sheet and there is a provision for adding a 24.576 external clock (and only a 24.576 mHz clock). This frequency is for 96/24 input, not sure what kind of monkey motion happens inside the chip if you feed a 44.1/16 bit signal using this clock.