CHORD ELECTRONICS DAVE

[stemiki]

As promised, here are the links of the electronic devices used with the battery.

This is the charger: https://www.ebay.it/itm/183741165673?hash=item2ac7d3b069:g:WWQAAOSw2s1UrrWE

It is a power supply with adjustable tension that must be about 163.8 Volts.

If you want to recharge independently, without having to connect/disconnect the charger every day, you need two timers:

This is a common timer with weekly adjustment. You can find it on Amazon or eBay.

The charging time is very short, it only takes a few hours a day. I leave it charging from 23.00 to 6.00 in the morning.


This is instead a double relay timer to disconnect the two recharging wires from the battery during use: mod. FRM02 for sale on Aliexpress.

This is because otherwise the interference of the power line would still enter the Dave.

Now the most important thing, the battery.

You have to find a highly specialized company that can make one. Must have an operating voltage of 160 Volt max. and 120 Volt. min.

If you do not find anyone who can help you, you can try to contact the company that produced mine: https: //specialith.com/

At the end of the work, you can also make you create an aluminum case to insert everything inside and create a real hi end construction!


Good luck!

 

[ZappaMan]

As promised, here are the links of the electronic devices used with the battery.

This is the charger: https://www.ebay.it/itm/183741165673?hash=item2ac7d3b069:g:WWQAAOSw2s1UrrWE

It is a power supply with adjustable tension that must be about 163.8 Volts.

If you want to recharge independently, without having to connect/disconnect the charger every day, you need two timers:



This is a common timer with weekly adjustment. You can find it on Amazon or eBay.

The charging time is very short, it only takes a few hours a day. I leave it charging from 23.00 to 6.00 in the morning.


This is instead a double relay timer to disconnect the two recharging wires from the battery during use: mod. FRM02 for sale on Aliexpress.



This is because otherwise the interference of the power line would still enter the Dave.

Now the most important thing, the battery.

You have to find a highly specialized company that can make one. Must have an operating voltage of 160 Volt max. and 120 Volt. min.

If you do not find anyone who can help you, you can try to contact the company that produced mine: https: //specialith.com/

At the end of the work, you can also make you create an aluminum case to insert everything inside and create a real hi end construction!


Good luck!

Thank you kindly, would it be possible to give an approximate cost for a battery like this?

 

[stemiki]

Thank you kindly, would it be possible to give an approximate cost for a battery like this?

Yes, certainly. I paid €650.00 for the battery. Hand delivery.. Consider the whole project costing slightly less than 1k.. And you're set..

 

[Kentajalli]

The idea that there are sides that must be chosen is honestly the biggest problem in audio right now.

The entire reason I started my channel and site in the first place is cause I was frustrated at the lack of middle ground content and discussion.
Tbh the main reason i spend more time in my patron telegram group than anywhere else isn't cause its 'my group' but its cause its genuinely one of the few places where a hundred people with different gear, ideas and preferences can actually have a discussion and/or debate about it and everything stays friendly and constructive.

Most other places it's hard to have a discussion without people from one 'side' getting upset you said something that slightly supports the other 'side' or that you're not on their side enough

Let's be frank!
We are talking john-doe ASR member vs john-doe Headfi member.
Before I get shouted at, hear me out! BTW, I am a member of both sites and enjoy both.
A typical john-doe at headfi may believe:
- that what he hears is the ultimate test.
- there are attributes to sound that science can not measure or quantify.
A typical john-doe at ASR may believe:
- everything your ears can hear, can be measured. Hell, things you can not hear are also measurable.
- if a device measures perfectly, it WILL sound perfectly. No need for auditioning!
Personally, I have beef with both, and I agree with both!
I don't believe measurements tell all, measurements tell if there is something is broken, but the reverse does not automatically follow. i.e. if I can not find something wrong in my lab, therefore nothing is broken.
Equally, going by the ear alone is very short-sighted.
Surely, things that are not immediately obvious by listening, can be measured. Also, things that may be audible easily now and today, may not be audible or accurate tomorrow. Ears can be fooled, add one dB of treble boost, and at first you might hear "better resolution and airiness", but soon you realize, it is just a little bright!
So @Golden Ears is right to say, there must be a middle ground. I personally wouldn't give 10 seconds of my time to a device that has been shown as "broken" by lab test results, such as the ones on ASR or Goldenears. Indeed, the positive objective tests are a necessary first step, before I audition a device to see if all that engineering is bearing fruit.
By auditioning, AFTER lab testing, you get to know if you missed something at the lab!
Neither alone is sufficient.

 

[GoldenSound]

Let's be frank!
We are talking john-doe ASR member vs john-doe Headfi member.
Before I get shouted at, hear me out! BTW, I am a member of both sites and enjoy both.
A typical john-doe at headfi may believe:
- that what he hears is the ultimate test.
- there are attributes to sound that science can not measure or quantify.
A typical john-doe at ASR may believe:
- everything your ears can hear, can be measured. Hell, things you can not hear are also measurable.
- if a device measures perfectly, it WILL sound perfectly. No need for auditioning!
Personally, I have beef with both, and I agree with both!
I don't believe measurements tell all, measurements tell if there is something is broken, but the reverse does not automatically follow. i.e. if I can not find something wrong in my lab, therefore nothing is broken.
Equally, going by the ear alone is very short-sighted.
Surely, things that are not immediately obvious by listening, can be measured. Also, things that may be audible easily now and today, may not be audible or accurate tomorrow. Ears can be fooled, add one dB of treble boost, and at first you might hear "better resolution and airiness", but soon you realize, it is just a little bright!
So @Golden Ears is right to say, there must be a middle ground. I personally wouldn't give 10 seconds of my time to a device that has been shown as "broken" by lab test results, such as the ones on ASR or Goldenears. Indeed, the positive objective tests are a necessary first step, before I audition a device to see if all that engineering is bearing fruit.
By auditioning, AFTER lab testing, you get to know if you missed something at the lab!
Neither alone is sufficient.

My general issue with a lot of the discussion on ASR is that whilst the core of it is objective information, there's a huge amount of subjective influence that gets mixed in and which you're seemingly not allowed to debate.
Things such as testing methodology having issues and never being addressed, usually with the person who points it out just being banned or ganged up on until they leave, or a hyper-focus on very specific measurements with little to no consideration of others or even the factors that make up figures like SINAD itself. Even leading to many measurements either being disregarded completely regardless of study/evidence around their audible influence, and conversely in other cases claims about audibility or particular measurements are made where existing evidence is either non-existent or has various flaws/limitations that can and SHOULD be discussed if you want to be 'objective' and fair.
But again, you can't discuss it. If you could have a constructive debate it'd be fine, that's how science and understanding progresses, but on ASR once something is deemed 'truth' by a couple specific people, then regardless of any other evidence, literature, experimentation or anything, you cannot discuss/debate it further else you'll either get banned or harassed by people defending specific points even if they themselves don't understand them.
It's an 'objective' forum only in the sense that it's centred around measurements. Personally I don't consider the overall approach to be particularly objective and instead it's subjectively structured to provide an extremely SEO and purchase justification friendly ladder and reinforcement.

My general issue with a lot of the discussion on head-fi is that people take an almost polar opposite approach. With a huge number of people scoffing at the mere mention of any sort of measurement or test, and a huge number of people seemingly completely unwilling to accept that our hearing is fallible and no one is immune to factors like expectation bias and placebo.
The phrase 'just use your ears' is not a good method unless you're going to follow it up with proper controls. Sighted listening tests are NOT reliable and whilst there are many situations where it's impossible or just very inconvenient to conduct a properly controlled test, it doesn't mean that people should have the mindset of 'well I hear something and the measurements don't show it so the measurements must be useless'. The more likely answers are either that the measurements ARE showing something but it's just not plainly obvious, or that actually you aren't hearing a difference but you can't know for sure unless you conduct a proper test.
Additionally, there's just a bit of logic that should be applied to stuff. Things like DACs, amps etc show clear measurable differences and so whilst there's an argument to whether or not or to what degree they sound different, there are plenty of reasons why they'd behave different and endless measurements showing they ARE different to some degree.
Other things like audiophile fuses, ethernet cables and quantum stickers though which not only have never been able to show any difference whatsoever let alone any improvement, but also quite simply go against the fundamental way in which these things work, I cannot really understand.

Both are presenting what is actually to a large extent subjective opinion as absolute fact, just in different ways, and the combination of the two seems to be leading towards an increasing polarisation in the community and an ever-increasing unwillingness to find middleground.
Mention a topic like jitter for example and on one hand you'll have half the community saying 'well this study from 1998 showed that listeners could only hear jitter to levels that basically all devices beat, so jitter is inaudible and all DDCs/clocks etc are snake oil'.
On the other hand you'll have half the community saying 'well I hear a difference with my DDC so your measurements are wrong/useless'.
Meanwhile there's no one in the middle saying 'ok well....we can show differences in jitter from these devices, and that study only used 8 listeners (whom no info was given about iirc), and there's been massive advances in DAC/ADC tech in the last 25 years including in time domain affecting areas like noise shapers, so maybe a test with 8 listeners from 25 years ago might need to be redone with more modern hardware and a larger selection of listeners before we decide that this is a '100% conclusively solved issue'?

(Also, GoldenEars is a different user, My username is GoldenSound/GoldenOne)

 

[chesebert]

My general issue with a lot of the discussion on ASR is that whilst the core of it is objective information, there's a huge amount of subjective influence that gets mixed in and which you're seemingly not allowed to debate.
Things such as testing methodology having issues and never being addressed, usually with the person who points it out just being banned or ganged up on until they leave, or a hyper-focus on very specific measurements with little to no consideration of others or even the factors that make up figures like SINAD itself. Even leading to many measurements either being disregarded completely regardless of study/evidence around their audible influence, and conversely in other cases claims about audibility or particular measurements are made where existing evidence is either non-existent or has various flaws/limitations that can and SHOULD be discussed if you want to be 'objective' and fair.
But again, you can't discuss it. If you could have a constructive debate it'd be fine, that's how science and understanding progresses, but on ASR once something is deemed 'truth' by a couple specific people, then regardless of any other evidence, literature, experimentation or anything, you cannot discuss/debate it further else you'll either get banned or harassed by people defending specific points even if they themselves don't understand them.
It's an 'objective' forum only in the sense that it's centred around measurements. Personally I don't consider the overall approach to be particularly objective and instead it's subjectively structured to provide an extremely SEO and purchase justification friendly ladder and reinforcement.

My general issue with a lot of the discussion on head-fi is that people take an almost polar opposite approach. With a huge number of people scoffing at the mere mention of any sort of measurement or test, and a huge number of people seemingly completely unwilling to accept that our hearing is fallible and no one is immune to factors like expectation bias and placebo.
The phrase 'just use your ears' is not a good method unless you're going to follow it up with proper controls. Sighted listening tests are NOT reliable and whilst there are many situations where it's impossible or just very inconvenient to conduct a properly controlled test, it doesn't mean that people should have the mindset of 'well I hear something and the measurements don't show it so the measurements must be useless'. The more likely answers are either that the measurements ARE showing something but it's just not plainly obvious, or that actually you aren't hearing a difference but you can't know for sure unless you conduct a proper test.
Additionally, there's just a bit of logic that should be applied to stuff. Things like DACs, amps etc show clear measurable differences and so whilst there's an argument to whether or not or to what degree they sound different, there are plenty of reasons why they'd behave different and endless measurements showing they ARE different to some degree.
Other things like audiophile fuses, ethernet cables and quantum stickers though which not only have never been able to show any difference whatsoever let alone any improvement, but also quite simply go against the fundamental way in which these things work, I cannot really understand.

And the combination of the two seems to be leading towards an increasing polarisation in the community and an ever-increasing unwillingness to find middleground.
Mention a topic like jitter for example and on one hand you'll have half the community saying 'well this study from 1998 showed that listeners could only hear jitter to levels that basically all devices beat, so jitter is inaudible and all DDCs/clocks etc are snake oil'.
On the other hand you'll have half the community saying 'well I hear a difference with my DDC so your measurements are wrong/useless'.
Meanwhile there's no one in the middle saying 'ok well....we can show differences in jitter from these devices, and that study only used 8 listeners (whom no info was given about iirc), and there's been massive advances in DAC/ADC tech in the last 25 years including in time domain affecting areas like noise shapers, so maybe a test with 8 listeners from 25 years ago might need to be redone with more modern hardware and a larger selection of listeners before we decide that this is a '100% conclusively solved issue'?

(Also, GoldenEars is a different user, My username is GoldenSound/GoldenOne)

Even though we don't agree on everything, I have always appreciated your work and said here and elsewhere that you do valuable work for this hobby.

 

[ObjectiveSubjectivist]

The phrase 'just use your ears' is not a good method unless you're going to follow it up with proper controls.

Exactly that.
Our ears (actually brain) are not a perfect tool.
Proper controlled listening tests - that's the key. Unfortunately not many people are willing to do so.

 

[TheR0v3r]

It’s been fantastic to follow this thread over the years enjoy and always thrilling when @Rob Watts engages in the conversion. It’s been an absolute pleasure learning about his work and POV on digital-to analog techniques - very generously contributing to the community.

If one should criticize Chord dacs (I’ve owned several) it’s more about not giving Rob Watts the hardware plattform his code deserves. It’s the same thing everytime: noise, power supply and/or analog conversion issues.

IMHO.

 

[GuiltyRocker]

It's been such a pleasure that I may go into DAC design myself, Rob Watts has inspired me. At the end of the day all that really matters is what you enjoy, if you have equipment that stands the test of time and you constantly enjoy, doesn't cause you ear fatigue and the need to turn it off, you have struck gold. For me it is the combination of Rob Watts designed digital equipment, Parasound JC analog equipment designed by John Curl and Persona speakers. I can listen for a whole day and have zero ear fatigue and get very emotional about the music...end of story.

 

[griff500]

Exactly that.
Our ears (actually brain) are not a perfect tool.
Proper controlled listening tests - that's the key. Unfortunately not many people are willing to do so.

Most people are content with their phone and Beats.

 

[TheR0v3r]

It's been such a pleasure that I may go into DAC design myself, Rob Watts has inspired me. At the end of the day all that really matters is what you enjoy, if you have equipment that stands the test of time and you constantly enjoy, doesn't cause you ear fatigue and the need to turn it off, you have struck gold. For me it is the combination of Rob Watts designed digital equipment, Parasound JC analog equipment designed by John Curl and Persona speakers. I can listen for a whole day and have zero ear fatigue and get very emotional about the music...end of story.

How about starting with hardware design and then licensing your design to Chord?

P.S. Only half joking…

 

[GuiltyRocker]

How about starting with hardware design and then licensing your design to Chord?

P.S. Only half joking…

Hahahahahahaha

 

[pichler]

But please GuiltyRocker, screen must be OLED

 

[GuiltyRocker]

But please GuiltyRocker, screen must be OLED

You got it.

 

[FunkyBassMan]

If you're on the designing/production end, measurements are vital.

But from the audiophile consumer side, while both measurement and listening 'matter' in a technical sense, the importance ratio is probably at most 10%/90%.

This is evidenced by the fact that probably 95%+ of satisfied audio equipment buyers have never measured a single thing or even looked at measurements and are perfectly happy. And even if they did measure things, if their ears preferred something that "measured worse", they would still go with it.

Because the point of owning audio gear is not to the own gear that measures best, it's to enjoy what you hear. And we all are perfectly capable of knowing whether we do or don't. I never did a double blind anything on M-Dave, nor laid a tester across its terminals because I love every minute of it and could care less if something else measures better. And I suspect if you tell anyone who loves the sound of their equipment that the whatever doesn't measure as well as the whatever, they'd just say "get a life".