[Parafeed]

Quote:

I may need to get a pulse transformer if I go the cheap route.

 
Whilst I'm a big fan of the Audionote toroidal digital transformers, I wouldn't get that hung up on this. Fine, the Touch doesn't have a transformer on the dig out, but most equipment that you plug it into will have one on the input. Personally I wouldn't worry about it if I knew that the DAC had one on the input. But then I've removed the input transformers from several DAC's and used a Touch to drive them. Galvanic isolation...... Pah, SQ first! You'd probably be surprised at the difference in SQ without the transformers!

 

[Dynobot]

Anyone using coax/bnc with their Ref 7???
 
If so which cable brand and length do you prefer and which cable brands have you tried?
 
I have the Oyaide, Stereovox, AGD bnc cable, a Valab silver cable, and a Mogami 75ohm cable.  I read somewhere a long time ago that you want to go at least 1.5 meter with coax in order to avoid cable reflections.  Technically this may be true but I don't know how this pans out audibly....esp over the characteristics of the cable themselves.
 
At any rate I like the Stereovox the best followed by the Oyaide, the Mogam is last.  I'm sure this is all system [synergy] dependent.  Anyone with a BlackCat cable?  I was wondering if it is similar to the Stereovox.

 

[Dynobot]

Interesting find concerning XLR vs. BNC jitter
 
Per Audio-GD with regards to the CD7 BNC digital outputs.
 
BNC has the least JITTER, 10 times or even lesser than balanced digital output.
 
http://www.audio-gd.com/Pro/dac/CD7FV/CD7SEFVEN.htm
Line item number 6
 
Unlike other "respected" members of this forum, I do not rely on character assassinations, name calling, and childish antics to prove a point.  I use real sources of data from reputable 3rd parties.  For example the links I provided that compared Stereophiles jitter specs of the Transport using only a 1K test pattern vs another that used full spectrum test patterns.  My claims stand in fact and real tests not by shameless torrents of flaming.  However this exchange over the past few days has served to bring to light the true character of some posters here, as I have tried to meet harsh criticisms with humor instead of disrespect and name calling.

 

[realmassy]

Quote:

With regard to buffering. In my own Linux set up I use a more powerful but low watt processor which is dual core.  I route all audio processing to a single core which only handles audio. This means I am able to reduce buffering down to extremely low levels without hiccups.  Reducing buffering means reducing latency which in turn reduces jitter.  With a little due diligence you can verify this by searching for IMB's operating system jitter specifications and measurements for the Linux operating system.  In my case I have installed the Linux real-time kernel and am now routing all audio data in real-time with no buffering, setting aside 2 cores to work only for audio.  One core is for the audio program while the other is only for alsa.
 

Interesting...you mean you set the audio_buffer_size value to a lower value than the default one? Which value, if I may ask you?
I'm using a larger buffer, 8192 kb, to my ears it sounds better... but I never tried small buffer.

 

[Dynobot]

Quote:

Interesting...you mean you set the audio_buffer_size value to a lower value than the default one? Which value, if I may ask you?
I'm using a larger buffer, 8192 kb, to my ears it sounds better... but I never tried small buffer.

Through much experimentation I settled on 256 period size and 1024 buffer size.  I found that larger buffers resulted in smoother, mellower sound...I reduced the buffer until I achieved the sound that I liked.  Since I use the Real-Time Kernel and a very stripped down version of Linux with even more processes stopped -and- affinity set for the CPU to handle only audio on specific core's I do not get any hiccups.  My CPU load never goes above 3%.  I have used period sizes down to 2 and buffer at 8 but the sound seemed slightly too lean and clean.
 
More on ALSA buffer etc.
 
http://www.alsa-project.org/main/index.php/FramesPeriods

 

[haloxt]

Quote:

Interesting find concerning XLR vs. BNC jitter
 
Per Audio-GD with regards to the CD7 BNC digital outputs.
 
BNC has the least JITTER, 10 times or even lesser than balanced digital output.
 
http://www.audio-gd.com/Pro/dac/CD7FV/CD7SEFVEN.htm
Line item number 6
 
Unlike other "respected" members of this forum, I do not rely on character assassinations, name calling, and childish antics to prove a point.  I use real sources of data from reputable 3rd parties.  For example the links I provided that compared Stereophiles jitter specs of the Transport using only a 1K test pattern vs another that used full spectrum test patterns.  My claims stand in fact and real tests not by shameless torrents of flaming.  However this exchange over the past few days has served to bring to light the true character of some posters here, as I have tried to meet harsh criticisms with humor instead of disrespect and name calling.

 
Nobody here is saying that balanced has less jitter than bnc. Ipodpj personally likes aes/ebu, but that doesn't mean he is trying to contradict Kingwa's jitter measurement. And from what I read, even a full spectrum jitter test cannot say with certainty how much AUDIBLE jitter is there. There's different kinds of jitter, some supposedly worse than others. And if you can provide, I would like to see jitter measurements by the same person who did the full spectrum test on other spdif outputs, using the same equipment. I'd like to see this because many people believe psu is important in reducing jitter, or in other words, less electrical pollution. For all we know the person doing the test plugged the transporter in the kitchen with a bunch of appliances injecting noise into the transporter.

 

[Dynobot]

What can cause more jitter....[anything and everything]
 
Even the time of day, tool used to measure and material being played.
 
I have talked to people with measuring tools used to measure jitter and even they have confirmed jitter is a hard thing to nail down...and in fact 99% of the talk from Audiophiles means nothing in terms of sound quality.
 
No new News here.....but good sticking up for your buddy, I'm sure he will appreciate that...
 

 

[haloxt]

If you know jitter is not static, why do you keep bringing up that transporter measurement? What point are you trying to make?

 

[Currawong]

Dan Lavry made some significant posts about jitter on Head-Fi. I strongly recommend searching for them.  It's not really a topic that can be discussed easily.  Unfortunately I've only ever seen a single post, ever, anywhere where someone showed the distortions in a digital square wave from cable reflections caused by a non-75 Ohm plug, for example.

 

[sayh]

 
Quote:

Anyone with a BlackCat cable?  I was wondering if it is similar to the Stereovox.

 
Blackcat cables are techically stripped down of the older stereovox i believed. Give it some play time and it has replaced the few budget digital coax i had e.g. BJC, AGD, oyaide.
Veloce is detailed, naturally forward and value for money i say. 

 

[The Monkey]

This thread reads like a single member with multiple user IDs arguing with him/herself.

 

[Pricklely Peete]

After 3 cups of dark roast I have more jitter on my output than the CD7....
 
Here is a link to a page that goes into great detail about transports and the methods/issues sending digital streams to DACs....it reinforces what I said earlier about 110 ohm AES vs BNC....I2S is the way to go while BNC is the next best thing (not much of a surprise there). http://www.lampizator.eu/lampizator/TRANSPORT/CD_transport_DIY.html
 
Peete.

 

[ccschua]

In the next few day, I will be comparing Blackcat with Grover BNC cable.
 

 

[computerparts]

nevermind

 

[sokolov91]

Quote:

After 3 cups of dark roast I have more jitter on my output than the CD7....
 
Here is a link to a page that goes into great detail about transports and the methods/issues sending digital streams to DACs....it reinforces what I said earlier about 110 ohm AES vs BNC....I2S is the way to go while BNC is the next best thing (not much of a surprise there). http://www.lampizator.eu/lampizator/TRANSPORT/CD_transport_DIY.html
 
Peete.

Kinda neat but is there any info (instead of assertions) available about the audibility of the things discussed in his article?
 
I wonder what it really means too with chips doing jitter reduction and all that jazz nowadays like with the Ref - 7.   :/
 
Can't sat I wouldn't want one of those C.E.C transports had I the cash lol.