rb2013
Author of The 6922 Tube Review
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- Apr 12, 2013
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I've been following this discussion for a while and it's been very interesting...If I may take a step back for a moment and look at the wider picture though. I'm just an amateur without the expertise or access to hardware that some of you have. It seems to me there's a few trends in audiophile computer audio recently, with people claiming benefits but going in different directions, but not so easy to incorporate them all....
1. Isolation/Reclocking of USB transmission - isolating the noise from the source/player hardware up to the DAC.
- On direct USB, such as Uptone Regen, Intona, etc
- Via USB Interfaces such as Gustard, Singxer F1/SU1, Mutec MC3+USB etc
2. Moving from USB to network/IP transmission:
- Via the network using player-specific protocols like HQPlayer NAA, Roon RAAT etc into small Linux boxes such as uRendu, SonicOrbiter, RoonReady devices.
- Via the network using OS-wide virtual soundcards such as in the Dante system and Focusrite Rednet, Ravenna, AVB, AES67.
3. Upsampling material to high DSD data rates
- HQPlayer, Audirvana, etc fed to DSD capable DACS at high rates like DSD256/512.
4. As a Mac user, many of these high-rate DSD DACs aren't accessible at those rates because of the need for DoP.
5. DSP/Room correction can bring significant benefits, but combining it as software with some of the above methods can bring a bunch of compatibility issues, and the available hardware such as MiniDSP restricts data rates, as well as difficulties combining with DSD.
So there's a lot of interesting methods being used, but it strikes me as difficult to combine them and some of them are incompatible with each other...
A. "Professional" DAC equipment seems to shy away from anything higher than 192khz, in many cases 96khz, and doesn't seem concerned much by DSD compatibility or high DSD rates
B. "Professional" network protocols such as Dante/Rednet of which there's been some very strong positive comments recently also limit the rates.
C. Methods that do allow high-rate upsampling and network transmission such as HQPlayer NAA require you to be locked into that particular player (or via Roon), and the endpoints such as those NAA-compatible like the uRendu bring you back to a USB connection to the DAC.
D. Connection methods that don't use USB such as AES, Toslink, SPDIF, with the exception of i2s that is still fairly rare externally, always seem to restrict the data rate.
Given the bandwidth of Gigabit ethernet, it would seem it is easily capable of higher rates than 24bit/192khz. These Dante devices can do dozens of channels simultaneously, but restrict a single channel's rate. In an ideal world we'd have some type of network endpoint that could receive very high rate PCM and DSD material across a LAN via ethernet, outputting to i2s then to DAC, I guess also with USB, AES, SPDIF options for compatibility, but that wasn't locked to a specific player such as HQPlayer and was system-wide.
Or that was built-in to the DAC so that the path from the network input to the DAC chip didn't involve an intermediate interface such as USB. Something like the Burl B2 Bomber DAC probably seems closest in the sense that you have a systemwide virtual Dante soundcard, going over the network to a network input inside a DAC. But it's limited to 192khz. Or the uRendu that allows high data rate over the network but then connects to the DAC via USB. It seems you can't have everything.... yet.
Like I say, I'm just an amateur with an interest in all this, and I have none of this hardware to use or try personally, and have limited budget. I just wonder what people's thoughts are on how best to try and combine some of these methods, or if that isn't possible then which to prioritise over others and which gives the most benefits.
Good points - actually the NADAC is the closest to your quest - for ethernet only ultra high resolution and DSD support - and a direct feed straight to the DAC. It uses AES67 Ravenna (please read the beginning of this thread).
But remember 99.9% of music is only available on Redbook. Unless you off the beaten trail stuff - anything mainstrean - even jazz is very hard to find in native DSD.
Now since Redbook WAV files are 16 bit/44k - upsampling to 24 bit 192k is quite a step up. But it's not just sample rates that make for good SQ. If so this little DAC I own would be killer. And it's not: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Musiland-Monitor-03-US-Dragon-32Bit-384KHz-ASIO-USB3-0-Sound-card-DAC-PCM1798-/151608262311?hash=item234c8e7ea7:g:xf8AAOSwBahU9hUR
In fact many say one of the very best DAC's for SQ ever made was the 16/44k only Zanden 5000 DAC. So it comes down to design - yes the NADAC does 384k and DSD254 natively but does the rest of it's design hold water? It should for $10k
What the REDNET 3 and 16d allow with DANTE is getting USB out of the picture completely - this is apparently extremely important for a whole host of reasons - that all this USB isolation schemes and other gizmos like reclokers try to fix. It's not a hopeless cause - but reallya Rube Goldbrick way for going about things. Use a inherently flawed system not designed for this purpose - then go crazy try to fix it.
Why should Focusrite Audinate try for higher rates? For what purpose? They output to SPDIF or AES - both limited to 192k input for most DACs. The RD3 can handle 32 bit so that limit is quite high. And my tubed DAC can as well. I have many archived LPs at that rate that play fine.
So here we are combing a few of these trends in one system - Redbook upsampled to 192k through the REDNET 3 into a tube DAC using SPDIF - and the results are outstanding. I do not want to be tied down or captured to any one player - that should be open and left to the user.
That HQPlayer chooses to make their player prop to their NAA is not my problem