[Rockin_Zombie]

AFAIK R2R DACs can't do DSD. 

 

[x RELIC x]

No DSD with R-2R.

Delta-Sigma=DSD.

 

[Luckbad]

Does anyone have a full understanding or explanation from an informed source (like Kingwa) what the various DSP settings do?

http://www.audio-gd.com/Master/Master-11/M11EN_Use.htm

In particular, PLL, data dithering, and stopband attenuation.

 

[bimmer100]

  Has anyone figured what's the power usage of the Master 11 at idle ?

 
My Master 11 is plugged into my PSaudio PS300 and it indeed draws 45watts as advertised. 
 
I also have my NFB28 (2015 edition)35watts and gustard U12 (heavily modded, but not sure exact draw, approx 15watts) and everything pulls under about 95-100watts.

 

[bimmer100]

  Has anyone compared the sound from the Amanero and the old VIA yet?

 
Yes,
 
early in this thread I did a swap from the VIA to the Amanero. I was the second person to buy a Master11 from Audio-GD. and the thread starter was the first, who bought it directly from Audio-GD in China. Anyhow, our versions had the VIA installed as the amanero was NOT available at the time. I ordered upgrades for the M11 and my wife's NFB28 and installed each with some instructional photos and also illustrations from Kingwa. 
 
To the deets... The difference is not HUGE, it's an improvement though. I did notice sonic improvement but it would be subjective to some.  The one thing that I didn't like was that it has an intitial warm up time for the amanero when sending sound to the device for the first time (hardware synchronization)... Jriver has an option that adds 1sec delay. (*Play Silence at startup for hardware synchronization: 1 second)  This feature enabled will fix the issue. I do NOT know of a fix for foobar. It's a minor issue imho and do not happen on gapless playback or switching of albums etc. It seems it goes to sleep when the sound driver is not in use and can come back after a period of time. But I've never really experienced it again since switching the delay on in Jriver. Maybe new drivers for the amanero will fix this in the future.???
 
 
There are other higher end versions of the Amanero from AckoDac 
2CH USB-I2S/DSD Audio Module-AKU384
 

 
 
"High frequency Rogers board"
 
-HiRes, Bit-Perfect 32bits I2S - 44.1k, 48k, 88.2k, 96k, 176.4k, 192k, 352.8k and 384k
-DSD 64,128,256 and 512
-Based on Amanero and AKL-S03 Digital Isolator/Re-Clocker
-Dual Ultra-low Phase Noise Synchronous Audio Clocks
-Buffered Outputs on micro coax (u.fl) headers
-Direct connection to most DACs
-Drives ESS DACs in 'Turbo' Sync mode for the highest performance.
-All separate ultra-low noise (1uV rms) power supply and filters on board with very high PSSR
-Ultra pure 3.3V supply (<0.5uV rms noise) for Oscillator section. Options for external supply from batteries, etc
-I2C Port for reading sample rates directly from transport
-Led sample rate indicators on-board.
-Wide input supply 5-12V d.c. Regulated or unregulated
-Gold plated 2oz Rogers 4003 board 
-Selection of finest components
-Assembled and tested
 
- built-to-order only ~4wks lead time
 



Unit Price: USD 485 
 
 
is it worth it? I don't know, I don't have one.  I'm happy with my Gustard U12 which is modded to work with the Audio-GD HDMI i2s input. the wiring is different and a simple IC swap did the trick. Also the Crystals were swapped out and replaced with Crystek 957's and wish they made 575's with the 49.152/45.1584 options. My source is the USB3.0 card from Paul Pang (OCXO PPA3). Also everything is Linear Powered to further any potential improvements. The Amanero is very very good as is and really don't need to buy anything fancier imho. The improvement beyond the Audio-Gd implementation of the Combo384 is so minor it's likely not noticeable by most people. Basically i'm trying to say it's not dramatic and closer to subtle.  Hope this explanation helps a bit. Save your money? 
 
I spent a bit of money trying other options and comparing them all, and will be doing a more in depth test over the next few weeks with all the upgrades. including the Uptone Regen amber and the newest USB 3.0 IFI device ( http://ifi-audio.com/portfolio-view/micro-iusb3-0/ )  I've tried many others like the Wyrd, jitterbug etc. 

 

[bimmer100]

Anyone with experience with multiple Audio-gd products know anything about the remotes? I was wondering if a single Audio-gd remote would inadvertently send commands to two different amps if they were both powered on. Or does every Audio-gd product have unique remote codes/signals?

 
My Master 11 has the metal remote and my wife's NFB28(2015 edition) has a metal remote. They both are unique to the device. THANKFULLY since they sit next to each other  
 
 
I am NOT sure, but maybe the MCU unit inside each dac can be programmed to accept the same codes? maybe ask kingwa about this. It's very likely he can program two units to be the same, but i'm not sure about this.
 
Hope this helps.

 

[bimmer100]

  Does everyone here use WASAPI or ASIO.... anyone using just regular DirectSound/default Windows Mixer?
 
Whenever I use DS through the Windows Mixer I am getting the occasional pop or crackle during music playback which can get pretty annoying so I am forced to use ASIO which is fine but there are times I need to use DS.
 
Anyone using DS without any popping/crackling? My sample rate is set to the default 2 channel, 16-bit, 44100hz in the Windows sound settings. I know on some DAC's that I have used in the past where turning up this sample rate would result in obvious and constant crackling. But that is not the case with the M11, it is just an occasional pop that occurs but is enough to be annoying.

 
 
Personally I use kernel streaming mostly, and NEVER DS when listening to music. I prefer Jriver for all music playback and think it's worth the price. If using Amanero as the USB input than be sure to set the Hardware Synchronization delay to 1second to fix the initial glitch at startup of music streaming. This issue can occur when windows boots up and plays the silly startup too. It seems to be an issue with the hardware of the amanero. I usually default to a different input upon startup (my vanatoo T1's) and use my M11 for music/games/videos etc with exclusive Kernel Streaming  mostly for music. My audio settings (amanero) are the following:
Supported Formats:
 
uncheck DTS Audio, Dolby Digital and Microsoft WMA Pro Audio..
check all sample rates below, 44.1, 48.0, 88.2, 96, 176.4, 192.0
 
and under Advanced I have it set to 32bit 192000hz.  Oddly when the amanero is set to 384000hz it seems to not work for many applications. 
 
also check exclusive modes :
*Allow applications to take exclusive control of this device
*Give exclusive mode applications priority.
 
 
maybe this will help, maybe not. but trying to share my settings.  I'm using Windows 8.1 Pro 64bit.

 

[LancerFIN]

Now that my HE-6 are modified and most of the excess brightness is gone I'll have to change my opinion about the gain. If I want to really crank it I can hit the 90's with quiet recordings. I could max out but that's not comfortable. Headroom is quite small. With stock HE-6 headroom was plentiful. I am not planning on getting extra gain but if you order new M11 and plan on using HE-6 maybe it's worth getting.

 

[Ivan303]

   
Yes,
 
early in this thread I did a swap from the VIA to the Amanero. I was the second person to buy a Master11 from Audio-GD. and the thread starter was the first, who bought it directly from Audio-GD in China. Anyhow, our versions had the VIA installed as the amanero was NOT available at the time. I ordered upgrades for the M11 and my wife's NFB28 and installed each with some instructional photos and also illustrations from Kingwa. 
 
To the deets... The difference is not HUGE, it's an improvement though. I did notice sonic improvement but it would be subjective to some.  The one thing that I didn't like was that it has an intitial warm up time for the amanero when sending sound to the device for the first time (hardware synchronization)... Jriver has an option that adds 1sec delay. (*Play Silence at startup for hardware synchronization: 1 second)  This feature enabled will fix the issue. I do NOT know of a fix for foobar. It's a minor issue imho and do not happen on gapless playback or switching of albums etc. It seems it goes to sleep when the sound driver is not in use and can come back after a period of time. But I've never really experienced it again since switching the delay on in Jriver. Maybe new drivers for the amanero will fix this in the future.???
 
 
There are other higher end versions of the Amanero from AckoDac 
2CH USB-I2S/DSD Audio Module-AKU384
 

 
 
"High frequency Rogers board"
 
-HiRes, Bit-Perfect 32bits I2S - 44.1k, 48k, 88.2k, 96k, 176.4k, 192k, 352.8k and 384k
-DSD 64,128,256 and 512
-Based on Amanero and AKL-S03 Digital Isolator/Re-Clocker
-Dual Ultra-low Phase Noise Synchronous Audio Clocks
-Buffered Outputs on micro coax (u.fl) headers
-Direct connection to most DACs
-Drives ESS DACs in 'Turbo' Sync mode for the highest performance.
-All separate ultra-low noise (1uV rms) power supply and filters on board with very high PSSR
-Ultra pure 3.3V supply (<0.5uV rms noise) for Oscillator section. Options for external supply from batteries, etc
-I2C Port for reading sample rates directly from transport
-Led sample rate indicators on-board.
-Wide input supply 5-12V d.c. Regulated or unregulated
-Gold plated 2oz Rogers 4003 board 
-Selection of finest components
-Assembled and tested
 
- built-to-order only ~4wks lead time
 



Unit Price: USD 485 
 
 
is it worth it? I don't know, I don't have one.  I'm happy with my Gustard U12 which is modded to work with the Audio-GD HDMI i2s input. the wiring is different and a simple IC swap did the trick. Also the Crystals were swapped out and replaced with Crystek 957's and wish they made 575's with the 49.152/45.1584 options. My source is the USB3.0 card from Paul Pang (OCXO PPA3). Also everything is Linear Powered to further any potential improvements. The Amanero is very very good as is and really don't need to buy anything fancier imho. The improvement beyond the Audio-Gd implementation of the Combo384 is so minor it's likely not noticeable by most people. Basically i'm trying to say it's not dramatic and closer to subtle.  Hope this explanation helps a bit. Save your money? 
 
I spent a bit of money trying other options and comparing them all, and will be doing a more in depth test over the next few weeks with all the upgrades. including the Uptone Regen amber and the newest USB 3.0 IFI device ( http://ifi-audio.com/portfolio-view/micro-iusb3-0/ )  I've tried many others like the Wyrd, jitterbug etc. 

The pictures on the Audio-GD compared to the pictures on the AMANERO site would seem to indicated that the Audio-GD version is not stock.  Has any information as to what happens when one replaces the two 'clock' chips on the AMANERO board with Crystek 'femto' clock chips?  Seem to have read something about this topic but not in association with the Audio-gd products.

 

[johnzz4]

For Tidal which is 44.1/16, is it best to use 44.1/16 in the advanced settings of the Amanero driver to avoid windows oversampling?
 
When using Jriver, I've been sending everything to the M11 in its native sampling rate and bit depth via ASIO.
 
Does that sound optimal?

 

[munce31]

^^ That's why I like using Mac. Not that it is without it's own issues. It's just that things are a little easier (i.e. native support for USB 2.0 audio devices).

 

[Luckbad]

  For Tidal which is 44.1/16, is it best to use 44.1/16 in the advanced settings of the Amanero driver to avoid windows oversampling?
 
When using Jriver, I've been sending everything to the M11 in its native sampling rate and bit depth via ASIO.
 
Does that sound optimal?

 
You can just set it to 44.1/16 in Windows' Sound Control Panel. This is what almost everything is unless you're specifically rocking something in JRiver, foobar2000, etc. At that point, you should be using ASIO/Wasapi/KS that plays back in native format and ignores whatever you set in the control panel.
 

 

[johnzz4]

You can just set it to 44.1/16 in Windows' Sound Control Panel. This is what almost everything is unless you're specifically rocking something in JRiver, foobar2000, etc. At that point, you should be using ASIO/Wasapi/KS that plays back in native format and ignores whatever you set in the control panel.

Perfect, that's what I've been doing

 

[munce31]

Sadly my Master 11 has been held up in customs here in Melbourne..... Damn!

 

[pervysage]

Sadly my Master 11 has been held up in customs here in Melbourne..... Damn!

What shipping service is used there?