Assembling my first DAC/headphone amp system. Need advice

[dougms3]

The PC generates alot of noise and contaminates the audio signal. That video card is probably creating a huge EMF, they generate alot of noise, but unfortunately, nothing can be done about that. It may also benefit to get a clean Titanium power supply. They are made with much higher quality caps, low inrush current, low ripple, etc.

If your goal is to minimize noise injection into the audio stream, I'd recommend looking into these devices.

https://www.aliexpress.us/item/2255...00007625452668!sea&curPageLogUid=3VY7zwO0FeKs

I have the elfidelity pci card, fan filters and sata filters. I would have tried the usb card but I already have a JCAT card.

If you listen to music files, it would benefit alot if you got an SSD and isolate it as far away as possible from other components. The NVME drives are super fast but the motherboard is superspreader of noise and it will contaminate the NVME drive. Also you can use that sata filter.

Just some suggestions to make your PC a better audio source

 

[It Hz]

Nice. Post it here when it's done.

I've been toying with the idea too, but for a high reliability/low maintenance air cooling rig. But like...really massive air cooling (just not as massive as today's graphics cards) plus tunnel airflow.

9-slot XL ATX size chassis with regular slot config (in case I might use it normally later on) but it has to be very wide so I can use a "vertical" mount GPU converter pushed down towards the 9th slot and I'll mount a large CPU air cooler on the GPU; chassis will be vertically oriented with Fractal 180mm x 38mm fans blowing upward. PSU will be on the bottom compartment almost completely sealed off save for some cable routing at the front of the case, then have a 2in gap between that bottom chamber and the upper chamber with the computer. SSDs mounted just above teh intake fans getting the cool air first, then the CPU cooler and the CPU cooler on the GPU are oriented so all the air goes from the bottom intake straight up without the need to have any fan cranked to change the airflow direction or cram air below conventional GPU cooler intakes. There will effectively be two air tunnels so the CPU and GPU cores don't share hot air to the other. If the room exhaust intake was directly above it I'll build some sort of cabinet around it that's essentially a chimney going up to the exhaust so not only does it not recycle air, it also don't pump hot air into the room.

Then the Monsterlabo The Beast happened and I'm wondering if I should just go with that one but like, add fans.

Sounds like you have the right idea with your build. Some of the CPU and GPU air coolers are almost as effective as liquid cooling in some cases. They are also a lot more compact, don't cost as much and won't weigh as much as a refrigerator LOL There are good arguments taking this path. Maximize the convection cooling bringing the cool air on from the bottom and exhausting out the top. Since most of the cooling is done by the fans acting directly on the heatsink, after that all you need to do is scavenge the hot air out of the enclosure. With an air-cooled system, it also helps to have turbulent air blowing over the PCB to provide additional cooling over the entire surface area of the PCB which can act as its own heatsink. Turbulent air washing all around the components make a huge difference over linear airflow in a convection cooled system.

I watched a YouTube vid on the Monsterlabo Beast chassis I think if you're after a fanless system that may be a good choice but there are a number of compromises taking this route with regard to packaging, access to the boards and the limits of how much heat can be removed from the electronics. I think you will have better options sourcing a chassis and cooling components elsewhere. I would start with finding the right case first and work from there (the bigger the better if you have the space)

Yea know. I just could have bought an off-the-shelf case, stuck a motherboard, GPU and a PSU and end-up with pretty much what I have now

........but what is the fun in that? If not, I would probably be sitting in front of a TV watching some mindless program to entertain myself

For me nothing beats working on a project, doing your homework, selecting components, solving problems and building your own system rather than just buying an off-the-shelf computer and sticking the box under your desk. In the end you'll have something your very proud of and will enjoy it for years. And what you'll have is way better than what you can buy out of a box store. OEM's cut a lot of corners to reduce costs with lots of compromises made along the way.

What I like about liquid cooling is there is no better way to transfer heat out of the system, the fans can be throttled back making the system almost virtually silent and there is the "cool factor" but that's just me.

In my line of work convection cooling with no fans is the most desirable, followed by forced which is seen as a necessary evil due to the noise they produce if you have enough of them. A water-cooled system means you are "desperate" to shed heat and its almost "non-existent" to see a liquid cooled system in the commercial and defense industry due to cost, weigh, complication, reliability and hazards associated with the potential of dousing the enclose with water which will result in the total loss of the equipment. I have seen TEC's (Thermal Electric Coolers) used to accurately control the heat of a component. They are incredible devices and can super cool a device well below ambient but that will cause condensation issues leading to shorting out the electronics. Some guys install them between the heat sink and the CPU but I think that is very risky due to the condensation issue and if the TEC fails will fry the CPU in an instant! Not only that but the general rule with TEC's is they will consume as much power as they dissipate in heat energy, meaning to transfer 200 watts of heat energy will require another 200 watts effectively doubling the power consumption.

Love to hear more details what you're planning on doing

 

[It Hz]

Hey guys, just an update (sorry no computer chassis pics yet)

I just received the Kento speakers. These things are pretty nice .......... and heavy! I've been reading the comment sections in the reviews and it's pretty unanimous everyone including the reviewer thinks these are great speakers for the price. You have to take some of that with a grain of salt as you don't know what their level of experience is with regard to high fidelity audio, but you can see a trend when no one is saying anything bad. Kento has the YU2 which has a 3" driver and 3/4" dome tweeter and a YU6 that has a 5 1/4" driver with a 1" dome tweeter and a YU4 that's in between with a 4" driver and 1" tweeter. The thing is with those speakers is they have a built in DAC and all kinds of inputs none of which I need which adds all kind of unnecessary circuitry and cost.

The "YU"'s is the same as the YU4 but without all the "goggly gook" with everything I need to connect to the Burson Playmate 2 (2 RCA connectors) and a sub-out RCA.

Getting the Kento SUB8 paired with the speakers will just be icing on the cake. Initially I had doubts about the SUB8's. Some of the reviews were a bit lackluster, most of the complaints were due to the lack of really deep base and volume at the really low-end. The lowest frequency response is 35 Hz where some of the subs from other vendors can go below 20 with a lot more gain. I was wondering if I made the right choice. But then I started to think about it some more. These are sealed acoustic suspension subs and not ported or with a slave driver which can be a big "no no" due to the phase shift between both drivers. Going back to my home built sterio speaker days I recall that the slave driver was never used on high-end systems due to the phase shifting and sound cancellation. I recall going into stores that sold cheap speakers and pushing "in" one driver where the other pushed "out"

I see this set-up as more of a marketing gimmick getting people to think they are getting 2 woofers instead of 1.

I had back luck with my Klipsch ported computer sub blowing out on me which I suspect is from over exertion of the driver being a vented speaker due to the fact this thing can go pretty low or perhaps some signal clipping and distortion from the built-in amp which for a $150 system is probably not the highest quality. Perhaps I'll pry the grill off and I won't be surprised to see the outer suspension all blown-out which would cause the voice coil to lose alignment wiping out the speaker coil. Sealed subs tend to have better stability on the speaker cone due to the compressed air/vacuum behind it so they can be driven harder with higher accuracy bass, it just won't go as low or as loud as a vented speaker. Based on all this I think I made the right choice for a set of moderately priced computer speakers (I consider anything with a built-in speaker a "computer speaker" as an external amp is really the way to go for high fidelity).

The one thing about the reviews on the Kento's is, to my knowledge they were all driven of the built-in DAC off the MB. I will be driving it with a class A Burson DAC with Sparko SS2590 Pro Op Amps which I think will be light years ahead. I'm even considering the Berson Supercharger power supply from the reviews I've seen and read. I think I made the right choice for a $500 computer speaker system. The YU desktop speakers are fairly small and won't take-up much room on my desk. I also ordered Kento speaker stands which should provide better sound quality not sitting directly on the desk

These sit the speakers a little higher off the desk. They have another model that just angles them up a little There is a 1/4-20 threaded hole in the bottomof the speakers that can be used to secure them to the stands which is a nice touch. These speakers are made in Canada

One thing I was thinking about was the low frequency the desktop YU will have to be driving along with the sub. This is a complaint I heard from some of the reviewers and was not limited to the Kantos. The sub does have a built-in crossover knob that swings between 40 and 120 Hz but from what I can tell the YU main driver will have to deal with the same low-end signal the subs will be seeing. There are external crossovers that may address this where it can filter out the low bass frequency from the YU's but the one that I was looking at only filters the high-end from the sub which already has a crossover built in. I think that would be a good idea freeing the YU's from the low frequency allowing them to be driven harder. The YU go down to 60 Hz but it would be nice to filter their input at around 100 or so Hz

Can someone shed any light on this? Any recommendations?

I may give Kanto a call, they may have a this built into the YU's when the sub is connected but I kinda doubt it