GUSTARD DAC-R26 Balanced Decoder R2R+1Bit Dual Native Decoding Music Bridge

[Dandoudou]

Ok, really in another condition, but, with a lot of another devices to reach this. In my case, day after day the R26 surprises in a very positive way. I was waiting a great DAC and it was showed easily but the streamer has become a very important item too to improve my SQ and make the things more clean.Wifi and FMC's was another very effective improvement - thanks guys!

When I received the DAC, I was also surprised how good is the streamer of the R26.
Its SQ was quite close at that time to the GentooPlayer/Diretta streaming setup that I was using. So, it motivated me to upgrade it further.

 

[Sound Eq]

TBH i dont know which stock firmware i have now running on R26 because i am far from home. Could be 1.30 or 1.32.
either way, it is weird that you can not run Roon.

Select LAN Mode in R26, then in the Roon remote app go to settings, go to Audio, you should see "Gustarender" as an audio device.

Your streamer and R26 should be connected both to a router or ethernet switch.

If you are using a direct LAN connection from your PC to R26 then you need a crosslinked LAN cable. A normal LAN cable does not work in that case.

what i meant if install version 1.3 can i still use r26 as endpoint in roon like i do with v1,4

and is the sq between v1.3 and 1,42 that big of a difference

 

[mgsu]

what i meant if install version 1.3 can i still use r26 as endpoint in roon like i do with v1,4

and is the sq between v1.3 and 1,42 that big of a difference

I tried only the modified firmware 1.42 Roon + Tidal Connect so far. Differences where huge, like 30% worse than stock firmware.

I can not speak for the modified firmware 1.42 with Tidal Connect only.

i assume that every unaltered stock firmware is just fine if you want to play it safe.

 

[Deleeh]

Hello,

I have read the threath a bit more as a silent reader.

On the subject of opening the housing because of the screws.
Well I had to smile a bit when I read it.
I know there is a guy on youtube who says the same thing about the Denafrips Ares.

I opened my unit today just for the head.
And checked it out.
I'll be honest, my unit has been sitting untouched in the same place for 6 months.
When I opened it today and checked it, I have to say that nothing was too tight on mine.
On the contrary, it had been tight and loose enough.
I didn't need vel force to loosen the screws.
However, I loosened everything again, tightened it and turned it out a quarter of a turn so that the board would still be tight.

And when I plugged it back in, I didn't hear any difference.
Sorry if I'm smiling a bit and seeing it more on the voodoo side of this story.
In my opinion, Gustard did everything right in the manufacturing process and used the hardware that was still current last year.
One can actually spare oneself this fiddling around.


On the subject of Bluethooth, I have also tested this with 2 Daps that I received for testing, and it is great when the Dap acts as a streamer and transmits via Bluethooth to the R26.
There is no reason to neuter it if you want to use it.
Bluethooth is only active when you switch to it, otherwise it is switched off, so no need to worry about interference.

Don't take offence if I say leave the church in the village.
Just enjoy the good stuff with a clean power supply, cables and fuse.
Anything else is just too much of a good thing.

Cheers

 

[mgsu]

Hello,

I have read the threath a bit more as a silent reader.

On the subject of opening the housing because of the screws.
Well I had to smile a bit when I read it.
I know there is a guy on youtube who says the same thing about the Denafrips Ares.

I opened my unit today just for the head.
And checked it out.
I'll be honest, my unit has been sitting untouched in the same place for 6 months.
When I opened it today and checked it, I have to say that nothing was too tight on mine.
On the contrary, it had been tight and loose enough.
I didn't need vel force to loosen the screws.
However, I loosened everything again, tightened it and turned it out a quarter of a turn so that the board would still be tight.

And when I plugged it back in, I didn't hear any difference.
Sorry if I'm smiling a bit and seeing it more on the voodoo side of this story.
In my opinion, Gustard did everything right in the manufacturing process and used the hardware that was still current last year.
One can actually spare oneself this fiddling around.


On the subject of Bluethooth, I have also tested this with 2 Daps that I received for testing, and it is great when the Dap acts as a streamer and transmits via Bluethooth to the R26.
There is no reason to neuter it if you want to use it.
Bluethooth is only active when you switch to it, otherwise it is switched off, so no need to worry about interference.

Don't take offence if I say leave the church in the village.
Just enjoy the good stuff with a clean power supply, cables and fuse.
Anything else is just too much of a good thing.

Cheers

Funny that you mention this YT guy with the Denafrips. It was the same guy that i had in mind when i discovered the hex screws tweak and posted about.
I put his suggestions back then in the esoteric drawer till i had to swap SD cards for a firmware upgrade.

Doing the SD card swap, i realized that the hex screws on my R26 chassis where so tight that i struggled opening up the chassis.

After the SD swap, i tightened the screws back, but only faintly and realized a huge bump in SQ after.

The bump in SQ was not from the FW upgrade because i did not like the modified FW and went back to stock FW.

Then i realized that the bump in SQ must come from the loosened chassis. Then i laughed loud inside my esoteric drawer.

If your chassis screws are not that tight fastened as you described, then you are good. There is no need to tinker around.

But i would courage everyone to check on they'r devices and unfasten a bit the screws if they are to tight. It improved in my case the SQ on the cheap.

Edit: on the bluetooth antenna topic. Since i dont use bluetooth i disconnected and isolated the antenna to play it safe.

Even if bluetooth is not activated, the antenna induces RF into the DAC because it is an antenna and this is what an antenna does.

Edit 2: Sorry if you got offended. I was suggesting a cheap tweak that i didn't believed a couple of weeks ago. Me dont like voodoo either. If you go 2 pages back, there is one guy @Gary M that had also to tight screws and done the tweak with great results.

 

[Dandoudou]

I opened my unit today just for the head.

Since, you opened the R26, you should have taken the occasion to fo.Q the components.

 

[camrector]

what i meant if install version 1.3 can i still use r26 as endpoint in roon like i do with v1,4

and is the sq between v1.3 and 1,42 that big of a difference

Been using Roon since day 1 firmware.
There hasn’t been any SQ changes between firmware changes.

 

[camrector]

Since, you opened the R26, you should have taken the occasion to fo.Q the components.

To which, and with what do you recommend?

 

[Deleeh]

@Dandoudou
Which components?
What I saw was everything that could be seen in the pictures.
Or do you mean something else?

I don't deny that it can happen that the circuit board is overtightened, which can happen more often than you think, not just with Gustard alone.
But so far everything has always been OK, even in other devices that I opened out of curiosity.
And I have never experienced afterwards that it has affected the Sq.

There may have been other reasons why you experienced such an increase.
It is possible that the firmware had an error in decoding between the ones and zeros.

Admittedly, the guy from headqarter Audio is very crazy about such things.
Have you seen his house wiring? It is extremely crazy when it comes to esotericism and such things.

By the way, if you open it up and the connections are facing the front, the R2R circuit board is at the bottom right.
Loosen the four screws and carefully remove the circuit board.
Carefully because it is clipped in (press upwards in the middle, not on the sides).
There are 2 more screws under the board that need to be loosened if you are already doing it.
My tip here is as follows:
When you have removed the board of the R2R conductor, loosen the rest and tighten everything equally.
When the screw becomes tighter, turn it back 1/8-1/4 of a turn.
For the R2R conductor board, also tighten it crosswise.

 

[Dandoudou]

To which, and with what do you recommend?

Which components?

I don't know exactly, but @Jake2 and @cdacosta can tell us.
I've been busy with other projects, so I did not open the R26 yet.
I'm keeping my fo.Q for that.

 

[Deleeh]

I am now curious to know what it is.

 

[Jake2]

Yes, I agree, let me clarify:
Would it also work like a reclocker for USB, so USB in to USB out?

Matt

I don’t think it outputs USB when USB input (I.e. DDC function) is selected. I read this several times on Red thread.

 

[mgsu]

@Dandoudou
Which components?
What I saw was everything that could be seen in the pictures.
Or do you mean something else?

I don't deny that it can happen that the circuit board is overtightened, which can happen more often than you think, not just with Gustard alone.
But so far everything has always been OK, even in other devices that I opened out of curiosity.
And I have never experienced afterwards that it has affected the Sq.

There may have been other reasons why you experienced such an increase.
It is possible that the firmware had an error in decoding between the ones and zeros.

Admittedly, the guy from headqarter Audio is very crazy about such things.
Have you seen his house wiring? It is extremely crazy when it comes to esotericism and such things.

By the way, if you open it up and the connections are facing the front, the R2R circuit board is at the bottom right.
Loosen the four screws and carefully remove the circuit board.
Carefully because it is clipped in (press upwards in the middle, not on the sides).
There are 2 more screws under the board that need to be loosened if you are already doing it.
My tip here is as follows:
When you have removed the board of the R2R conductor, loosen the rest and tighten everything equally.
When the screw becomes tighter, turn it back 1/8-1/4 of a turn.
For the R2R conductor board, also tighten it crosswise.

Agree with you on the YT guy. He is the epitome of esoteric. Thats why we call him "YT guy" because we dont want that someone here discovers his channel and fall into the rabbit hole

But on the loose chassis tweak he is right. Mine was ridiculous tight, i had to put a towel around the screwdriver to get more grip to be able to loosen the screws.

FW was not compromised:
I had the original SD card with stock FW that came from Gustard put aside, so i can swap it back, which i did.

After the hex tweak, i am runing the same SD card with the same FW as before.
So bad FW is out of discussion.

 

[Ray79]

Did not tried the FW without Roon you refer to so i can not speak for this firmware, but I like to give my two cents about the altered firmware 1.42 + Roon+Tidal Connect

I respect the efforts of Wikaudio for putting Tidal Connect into the Gustard firmware but i experienced a worsened SQ with the LAN streamer of R26. Tidal Connect sounded awful in my listening test. Roon was little bit better, but not on par with stock firmware. So i downgraded back to stock firmware 1.30

I was using 1.42 + Tidal Connect + Roon. Maybe it is to much overload for R26 limited RAM to handle this various streaming protocols because i had experienced not only deteriorating SQ but also dropouts.

This firmware with Tidal Connect and without Roon sounds similar to the original 1.42... verry good.

 

[mgsu]

This firmware with Tidal Connect and without Roon sounds similar to the original 1.42... verry good.

Glad to hear that!
Didn't tried this one yet because it does not have Roon. Maybe Roon+Tidal Connect is to much for R26 to handle.