[littlej0e]

Do it.

LOL. Ok then… I guess I will…

 

[]eep]

our ears are digital as far as receptors go. Out inner ear, the cochlea is shaped like a snail or mollusk with a rolled up tapered canal filled with a fluid. The tapering follows the fibonacci sequence (mathematical string of numbers) that is like logarithmic. In this fluid on the lining skin are tiny hairs that are exited by the fluid, the fluid resonates according to the resonance width of the channel on that point. On the root of those hairs are receptors that fire the connecting nerve. A connector fires an impulse above a certain level of exitation. So it is very digital. Every hair is a digit that is in 0 or 1 syate of firing. With this exception that it needs to reload.

The same principle goes for our vision. We don't actually see colors other than just 3; RGB. The rest is filled in. Only the sensitivity per frequency isn't as clearly seperated as our hearing and follows a Gauss bell curve (sort of).

Our body is a very cleverly well engineered machine with thousends of subsystems, machines on nanoscale to mechanisms like levers, resonators, sensors, wires, chemical electrical signal lines, garbage disposal, recycling, selfrepair systems, systems for combatting foreign intruders, selfreplication systems with error correction, redundancy, location sensitive diversification, afaptability etc, etc, etc... Audio is sooo simple in comparison.

 

[drjimwillie]

This is a great thread. Thank you for all of your effort,It is very entertaining.
I have a Holo Spring and I have been planning to get a May since they first came out. At first, no one was talking about the May so I’ve been following other threads. Now that I have come back to follow up on the May there is so much information and people are extremely excited, this is great!
I have a question, please: If I have the Pink Faun I2S card with the Ultra Clock, would I use the PLL Circuit? Would the PLL Circuit sink to the clock on the card? Would it keep up with it?
I would love to hear more feedback from listeners using I2S.
And more Comparisons between the I2S and the USB input. So far I am hearing that they are both good.
Thank you, djw

 

[sajunky]

I have a question, please: If I have the Pink Faun I2S card with the Ultra Clock, would I use the PLL Circuit? Would the PLL Circuit sink to the clock on the card? Would it keep up with it?

I2S is a feed forward only interface which means DAC can take it as is, or try to remove jitter with PLL, your choice. Whether it is helping, it depends on the clock quality of a source, you need user feedback in this particular case.

 

[]eep]

This is a great thread. Thank you for all of your effort,It is very entertaining.
I have a Holo Spring and I have been planning to get a May since they first came out. At first, no one was talking about the May so I’ve been following other threads. Now that I have come back to follow up on the May there is so much information and people are extremely excited, this is great!
I have a question, please: If I have the Pink Faun I2S card with the Ultra Clock, would I use the PLL Circuit? Would the PLL Circuit sink to the clock on the card? Would it keep up with it?
I would love to hear more feedback from listeners using I2S.
And more Comparisons between the I2S and the USB input. So far I am hearing that they are both good.
Thank you, djw

Funny that I have to read up on a product that is from a manufacturer that I can point out from my window next to me... wat is de wereld toch klein.

I think you could ask Triple M himself or just rely on your intuition. You already have a superb clock signal with the i²s. That would be preferable to multiple translations over usb. I doubt the PLL a little bit closer would really help much.

I know this is head-fi but I would think this would be rather moot placing a noisy computer so close to your music system.

 

[rkt31]

Brain has to do lot more work if the dynamics are more. Dacs sounding supposedly more easy to ears (and hence more analogish as per many ) are those which have much less bit depth linearity, specially many r2r ones. Some r2r even measured as low as 8bits (Asr ). no wonder these dacs sound easier to many. Now when you are coming from these dacs , and when you suddenly listen to a dac which measures very good, thus having good dynamics, sounds sharper to ears. Try reducing the bit depth of file to 8bits and play it in state of the art measuring ds dac and wow , your state of the art measuring ds dac starts sounding like r2r dacs.

 

[GoldenSound]

Brain has to do lot more work if the dynamics are more.

Not sure what this means

Dacs sounding supposedly more easy to ears (and hence more analogish as per many ) are those which have much less bit depth linearity, specially many r2r ones.

There isn't any evidence for this. And 'analog' sounding is a term that is used in all sorts of different ways. Its a very vague description.

Some r2r even measured as low as 8bits (Asr ).

Some r2r dacs do yes. So do some delta-sigma dacs, hell I've got one here that has an effective number of bits of 3.4 (22dB SINAD). There are good and bad implementations of most dac types.

Now when you are coming from these dacs , and when you suddenly listen to a dac which measures very good, thus having good dynamics, sounds sharper to ears.

I think you're misunderstanding the definition of "Dynamics". Dynamics and resolution are not the same thing.

Try reducing the bit depth of file to 8bits and play it in state of the art measuring ds dac and wow , your state of the art measuring ds dac starts sounding like r2r dacs.

Holo May has >140dB true dynamic range.

( https://www.superbestaudiofriends.org/index.php?threads/kte-may-technical-measurements.8933/ )

Many TOTL delta sigma dacs like the mola mola tambaqui don't even break 130dB.

Does that then mean that by your argument that you should choose the May instead?
I'm not sure why you're specifically so against R2R dacs. But I would recommend looking into the differences between THD/SINAD, SNR, Dynamic Range, Slew and other factors. As well as how various products in both categories perform. You're positioning it as if it is clear cut which it certainly isn't

 

[]eep]

you still have much to learn...
Later in the movie a young padawan discovers the planet 'that does not exist'. Then another famous quote by Yoda: 'truly wonderful the mind of a child is'

I aspire to keep that inquisitive mind of a child even though I'm half a century removed.

 

[Evolan]

I have a question for you @GoldenOne , I’ve narrowed down my Dac selections between the holo may KTE and a Chord TT2. What intrigues me about the TT2 is the x-feed implementation and curious if you have auditioned said feature on the chord?

From what I gather it’s a very good implementation of cross feed and in some accounts it has opened up the stage quite noticeably if some reviewers are to be believed.

I love sound stage and currently own a Diana V2 among others but I have been quite taken by the abyss sound signature that I’m interested in trying to push as far as I can since it’s rather intimate.

 

[GoldenSound]

I have a question for you @GoldenOne , I’ve narrowed down my Dac selections between the holo may KTE and a Chord TT2. What intrigues me about the TT2 is the x-feed implementation and curious if you have auditioned said feature on the chord?

From what I gather it’s a very good implementation of cross feed and in some accounts it has opened up the stage quite noticeably if some reviewers are to be believed.

I love sound stage and currently own a Diana V2 among others but I have been quite taken by the abyss sound signature that I’m interested in trying to push as far as I can since it’s rather intimate.

So I don't have a huge amount of direct experience with the TT2 (though I have auditioned it). But I did have the DAVE+MScaler for a few weeks alongside the may (as mentioned in original post). I preferred the May.

@Danmellinger recently moved from a TT2/MScaler combo to the May though so I'm sure he could provide some good feedback on his comparisons between the two.

In terms of xfeed, its just crossfeed, so you can do it with any dac if you have roon/audirvana (with more configurability too). Crossfeed is helpful in some situations, particularly if headphone listening to a track that is "hard-panned" for speakers.
But generally I find I much prefer no crossfeed. And if using speakers I don't think I'd ever use it

 

[Evolan]

So I don't have a huge amount of direct experience with the TT2 (though I have auditioned it). But I did have the DAVE+MScaler for a few weeks alongside the may (as mentioned in original post). I preferred the May.

@Danmellinger recently moved from a TT2/MScaler combo to the May though so I'm sure he could provide some good feedback on his comparisons between the two.

In terms of xfeed, its just crossfeed, so you can do it with any dac if you have roon/audirvana (with more configurability too). Crossfeed is helpful in some situations, particularly if headphone listening to a track that is "hard-panned" for speakers.
But generally I find I much prefer no crossfeed. And if using speakers I don't think I'd ever use it

Thanks so much for the reply, certainly appreciate it. Doesn’t seem I can’t go wrong with holo and admittedly curiosity is getting the best of me. Thanks again!

 

[Danmellinger]

I have a question for you @GoldenOne , I’ve narrowed down my Dac selections between the holo may KTE and a Chord TT2. What intrigues me about the TT2 is the x-feed implementation and curious if you have auditioned said feature on the chord?

From what I gather it’s a very good implementation of cross feed and in some accounts it has opened up the stage quite noticeably if some reviewers are to be believed.

I love sound stage and currently own a Diana V2 among others but I have been quite taken by the abyss sound signature that I’m interested in trying to push as far as I can since it’s rather intimate.

My comparison is mostly based on TT2 + HMS 768 kHz vs. May + HQplayer running at 768 kHz Sinc M Filter. No additional power mods or anything like that to either setup.

The amount of resolution the May is providing is besting my TT2 combo by a fair margin in my test tracks. The Holo is also particularly good at imaging and separation.

I could clearly differentiated two individual singers harmonizing and could tell where individual cymbals start and end. Listening to Jeff Buckley I could clear hear his voice above the acoustic guitar and had almost a sense of how it was oriented. It is quite spectacular.

I personally wasn’t a big fan of the crossfeed and found it to be fairly track dependent, so I never used it after the early experimentation stage when I first got the Chord stack.

 

[mammal]

I have a question for you @GoldenOne , I’ve narrowed down my Dac selections between the holo may KTE and a Chord TT2. What intrigues me about the TT2 is the x-feed implementation and curious if you have auditioned said feature on the chord?

From what I gather it’s a very good implementation of cross feed and in some accounts it has opened up the stage quite noticeably if some reviewers are to be believed.

I love sound stage and currently own a Diana V2 among others but I have been quite taken by the abyss sound signature that I’m interested in trying to push as far as I can since it’s rather intimate.

As a someone who used to own TT2 and Diana V2, I must say I was underwhelmed by Chord's crossfeed. Everyone was hyping it up, that it will make music sound like it is coming from speakers and the only thing I noticed was that the soundstage changed a bit. I did not like the change at all, sounded unnatural to me. I have never listened to Holo May, so can't comment on whether it is a good DAC or not. I have had MScaler as well and even though it did change the sonic characteristics, for EDM it made the songs sound softer and slower (albeit lusher and richer). I did not like that. The reason I recommend TT2 is that it is a fantastic dac/amp combo, but if you have different needs than me, perhaps not worth it to you.

One device I like it's crossfeed implementation from is dCS Bartók. It has regular boring crossfeed, but also new firmware added something they call Expanse. It really makes songs sound lik they are coming from speakers (all the reverb and the low end is there).

 

[alekc]

My comparison is mostly based on TT2 + HMS 768 kHz vs. May + HQplayer running at 768 kHz Sinc M Filter. No additional power mods or anything like that to either setup.

The amount of resolution the May is providing is besting my TT2 combo by a fair margin in my test tracks. The Holo is also particularly good at imaging and separation.

I could clearly differentiated two individual singers harmonizing and could tell where individual cymbals start and end. Listening to Jeff Buckley I could clear hear his voice above the acoustic guitar and had almost a sense of how it was oriented. It is quite spectacular.

I personally wasn’t a big fan of the crossfeed and found it to be fairly track dependent, so I never used it after the early experimentation stage when I first got the Chord stack.

As a person who have tested TT2 and played a bit with HQP (on different DACs) but never heard May I am wondering if you had opportunity to hear both setups side by side and have you done any blind testing?

 

[Danmellinger]

As a person who have tested TT2 and played a bit with HQP (on different DACs) but never heard May I am wondering if you had opportunity to hear both setups side by side and have you done any blind testing?

Unfortunately not. The TT2 + HMS was my primary setup for over a year and I sold it to help fund the Holo May. I used a Chord Hugo 2 for slightly less than a month between selling the TT2 and hooking up the Holo May.

I’m genuinely curious, do you set up assisted, double blind tests with your family or roommates helping when comparing products at home?