[ZappaMan]

A blu2 I was watching on eBay just took a haircut - still can’t afford it tho!

 

[STR-1]

Rob, I’ve put my M scaler order in and am looking forward to its autumn release.

With the benefit that ferrites brought to my Blu 2, and believing on the strength of what some have said that ferrites can do no wrong on bnc cables, I am wondering what could be causing the M scaler to sound a little worse with ferrites attached to the bnc cables. Ferrites are a simple and cheap though sometimes clumsy way to try to improve cable performance and I will continue to experiment with the variety I have, but it seems things are not as straightforward as I first thought. Did the detrimental impact on the M scaler surprise you?

 

[rgs9200m]

Thanks for the HMS DX level control info Rob. (And thanks also for your all your breakthrough work.)

 

[Jawed]

I have also tried the Amphenol RF coax cables and agree that they do punch above their weight and are great value for money. I found them to be a bit more open and revealing than my Chord Signature, but after a while I reverted back to the Chord as they just sounded sweeter with a better bass definition.

Your preference, to me, is very much in accordance with the sound quality benefits of reduced RF. It's likely that the Chord cable will benefit from ferrites...

The HMS DX output volume would not affect a Dave, as it is not a DX receiver. You will use the DX volume for amp only DX amps, such as monoblocks. The first DX power amps will have their own volume control, or act as slaves from the DX data.

What is the purpose of turning off DX volume mode?

Rob, I’ve put my M scaler order in and am looking forward to its autumn release.

With the benefit that ferrites brought to my Blu 2, and believing on the strength of what some have said that ferrites can do no wrong on bnc cables [...]

Thanks in advance to the various people on this thread who own Blu 2 and will also own HMS: your reports of their relative quality and the effects of ferrites on HMS-bound cable will be very interesting...

Now playing: Andras Schiff - Robert Schumann - Noveletten, Piano Concerto 3, Nachtstücke

 

[Rob Watts]

Rob, I’ve put my M scaler order in and am looking forward to its autumn release.

With the benefit that ferrites brought to my Blu 2, and believing on the strength of what some have said that ferrites can do no wrong on bnc cables, I am wondering what could be causing the M scaler to sound a little worse with ferrites attached to the bnc cables. Ferrites are a simple and cheap though sometimes clumsy way to try to improve cable performance and I will continue to experiment with the variety I have, but it seems things are not as straightforward as I first thought. Did the detrimental impact on the M scaler surprise you?

Yes it did; as the change, although extremely small, was completely the opposite of what happens with ferrites - a brighter sound, indicating more noise floor modulation, and hence indicative of more RF noise. So it's very odd.

When I get back from my holiday I plan to re-do the listening tests, plus some other tests - things have been pretty crazy leading up to the launch and finishing the design ready for production.

Rob

 

[STR-1]

Yes it did; as the change, although extremely small, was completely the opposite of what happens with ferrites - a brighter sound, indicating more noise floor modulation, and hence indicative of more RF noise. So it's very odd.

When I get back from my holiday I plan to re-do the listening tests, plus some other tests - things have been pretty crazy leading up to the launch and finishing the design ready for production.

Rob

Thanks, Rob. Enjoy your holiday. You’ve earned it.

 

[jonstatt]

Yes it did; as the change, although extremely small, was completely the opposite of what happens with ferrites - a brighter sound, indicating more noise floor modulation, and hence indicative of more RF noise. So it's very odd.

When I get back from my holiday I plan to re-do the listening tests, plus some other tests - things have been pretty crazy leading up to the launch and finishing the design ready for production.

Rob

Could a non-optimally chosen ferrite (wrong target frequencies etc) act as a conduit for other RF frequencies instead?

 

[leatherneck]

Rob, I’ve put my M scaler order in and am looking forward to its autumn release.

With the benefit that ferrites brought to my Blu 2, and believing on the strength of what some have said that ferrites can do no wrong on bnc cables, I am wondering what could be causing the M scaler to sound a little worse with ferrites attached to the bnc cables. Ferrites are a simple and cheap though sometimes clumsy way to try to improve cable performance and I will continue to experiment with the variety I have, but it seems things are not as straightforward as I first thought. Did the detrimental impact on the M scaler surprise you?

I asked the makers of my BNC cables if the design of those cables would accomplish what ferrites accomplish and they said this...
In our DTC Cables we have some coil-based devices wrapped around the shell/ground of the cable. They work similar to ferrites, but at a steeper/higher frequency and with more resolve. They work by actively dealing with the steep slopes of noise. Quite confident that they’ll be more efficient in this respect than coils, as coils also has the side effect of rounding the corners of your digital pass signal.

 

[jonstatt]

I asked the makers of my BNC cables if the design of those cables would accomplish what ferrites accomplish and they said this...
In our DTC Cables we have some coil-based devices wrapped around the shell/ground of the cable. They work similar to ferrites, but at a steeper/higher frequency and with more resolve. They work by actively dealing with the steep slopes of noise. Quite confident that they’ll be more efficient in this respect than coils, as coils also has the side effect of rounding the corners of your digital pass signal.

True but rounding those corners would do two possible things that we know are not affecting Dave
1) Change the timing of the incoming signal, jitter. Not an issue as Dave re-clocks anyway
2) Round so severely such that a 1 is misread as a 0. CAn't be happening as this would be clearly audible as noise

 

[leatherneck]

True but rounding those corners would do two possible things that we know are not affecting Dave
1) Change the timing of the incoming signal, jitter. Not an issue as Dave re-clocks anyway
2) Round so severely such that a 1 is misread as a 0. CAn't be happening as this would be clearly audible as noise

It’s beyond my comprehension but I just wanted assurance that I needn’t have to deal with ferrites.

 

[watermad]

Ouch thats not good. As the Blu2 seems incapable of going into a true standby, remaining warm at all times, I was fearful of something like this. Although I would have expected this to be more likely with a room at 30c. rather than 25.

Ouch thats not good. As the Blu2 seems incapable of going into a true standby, remaining warm at all times, I was fearful of something like this. Although I would have expected this to be more likely with a room at 30c. rather than 25.

I got my Blu Mk2 back and some useful feeback from Chord, which points to my use of power conditioning causing a grounding issue which fried my SPDIF/IN as my Squeezebox Touch was not connected to the power conditioner the Chord Blu Mk2 was. I have since demoed and bought the Shunyata Research Denali 6000, I might be the first UK customer and with 6 inputs, there is no grounding issue and the increased musicality of my system is not subtle, on the scale of adding a Blu Mk2 to my Dave, low level resolution and dynamics, but musical.

 

[AndrewOld]

I asked the makers of my BNC cables if the design of those cables would accomplish what ferrites accomplish and they said this...
In our DTC Cables we have some coil-based devices wrapped around the shell/ground of the cable. They work similar to ferrites, but at a steeper/higher frequency and with more resolve. They work by actively dealing with the steep slopes of noise. Quite confident that they’ll be more efficient in this respect than coils, as coils also has the side effect of rounding the corners of your digital pass signal.

leatherneck, the ferrites that are proposed for the cable linking the Blu2 and DAVE are intended to fix a well-defined specific issue. They are designed to deal with noise at a particular, known frequency. If the makers of the DTC cables do not know what this frequency it is unlikely their cables can deal with it effectively. Indeed, as they say that their coil based devices work "at a higher frequency" than ferrites it is improbable that their cables fix the RF issue with the Blu2 (although since ferrites can work at all sorts of frequencies who knows what "a higher frequency" than ferrites means). So, to say again, for the cabling between the Blu2 and DAVE you need to know what frequency of RF it is beneficial to suppress, and use the correct ferrites to do that. Or of course you could hang on a bit and get an M Scaler where the issue has been designed out. And which seems to cost less than a mains cable from your cable guy!

 

[leatherneck]

leatherneck, the ferrites that are proposed for the cable linking the Blu2 and DAVE are intended to fix a well-defined specific issue. They are designed to deal with noise at a particular, known frequency. If the makers of the DTC cables do not know what this frequency it is unlikely their cables can deal with it effectively. Indeed, as they say that their coil based devices work "at a higher frequency" than ferrites it is improbable that their cables fix the RF issue with the Blu2 (although since ferrites can work at all sorts of frequencies who knows what "a higher frequency" than ferrites means). So, to say again, for the cabling between the Blu2 and DAVE you need to know what frequency of RF it is beneficial to suppress, and use the correct ferrites to do that. Or of course you could hang on a bit and get an M Scaler where the issue has been designed out. And which seems to cost less than a mains cable from your cable guy!

What frequency(s) are we concerned with?. It's academic anyway because I don't think I can use ferrite's on Ansuz DTC cables given their construction. So far, I'm really pleased with the Blu2/Dave combo using both CD's and music streamed from Tidal via an Aurender N10.

 

[marcmccalmont]

What frequency(s) are we concerned with?. It's academic anyway because I don't think I can use ferrite's on Ansuz DTC cables given their construction. So far, I'm really pleased with the Blu2/Dave combo using both CD's and music streamed from Tidal via an Aurender N10.

2 GHz
Now that you have your BLU2 let us know the difference in sound between powering your coax and unpowered

 

[leatherneck]

2 GHz
Now that you have your BLU2 let us know the difference in sound between powering your coax and unpowered

OK, but I want to listen to it for a while before I do that. Are you thinking I should hear the problems the ferrite's are supposed to take care of?