[Stellabagpuss]

Well TBH, l have only painted where the PSU used to be, apart from that, l made a sheild and painted it with Rustins G Sheild, it basically Sheilds the front displays from the other components.
l have thought about making a cardboard Sheild and doing the same, and covering. One for the future
What audible difference have you heard covering this section?

 

[rodthebod]

Right, as close as possible + short hi-quality cable.

This shows the 10Mhz clock inside the DAC using an external LPS (Allo Shanti) with a motherboard to clock cable of around 80mm in length (RG-405 works best), it makes a positive difference. I have plans to place a direct PCB connector onto the underside of the Leo Bodnar PCB with a 40mm long RG-405 lead doing away with the clunky BNC connectors. The board would still be fully shielded with the aluminium foil shroud, as the supplied aluminium extrusion of the LB will not fit. Look at my previous posts for more detail.

 

[Jake2]

Well TBH, l have only painted where the PSU used to be, apart from that, l made a sheild and painted it with Rustins G Sheild, it basically Sheilds the front displays from the other components.
l have thought about making a cardboard Sheild and doing the same, and covering. One for the future
What audible difference have you heard covering this section?

If the question is for me, the honest answer is I'm not sure what difference adding the additional shielding between the LPS section and the digital mid section made as I did it while my main system was disassembled for a month. Two many variables in its reassembly. And also tbh I've yet to AB the other copper inserts in shot (and graphite) beside the R2R and DAC sections, that shot was a mock-up whilst system was disassembled a week ago. I've been waiting for a clear day/night not after being out on the turps with Christmas festivities (tonight is out also). My recollection of the test using foil and cardboard I did ages ago was it calmed the sound and made the timbre richer.

I like your idea of painting cardboard with your paint, I might do the same. Can I suggest painting some cardboard then folding it tightly in a concertina style like a hepa filter... Will maximise bounces to and from the graphite and RFI absorption opportunities.

 

[Buckminster]

Happy Holidays to all. First time poster here; I appreciate the depth of knowledge on this forum generally, thread specifically, and thank all the contributors. You’ve helped transform me into a recovering DAC skeptic and proud R26 owner over the last few months.

I have two tidbits that may be of interest to current and prospective Gustard owners, plus a question that I’m struggling to find an answer to.

First, I asked Gustard directly about the 1v43 upgrade and they linked to the same Mediafire URL that is on Page 1, so according to service@gustard.com, this link is kosher and approved by Gustard if anyone was on the fence for this reason.

Second, I decided to see what all this clock business is about and ordered a C18 clock and C2 cable from Shenzhen Audio. There was a delay of a few weeks, but it eventually shipped and I received it last week. Nowhere is it mentioned anywhere on the internet that I can see, not on Gustard’s site nor anywhere else, but Gustard has quietly updated this unit. Rather than two pairs of outputs, one Sine, one Square, both of which are 50 ohms impedance, the new C18 is ONLY Square for both pairs, but with one toggle switch per pair that allows you to change the impedance to 50 or 75 ohms to better match up with various cables and components. Since consensus seems to favor Square anyway, this seems like an upgrade, but could be an unpleasant surprise for some. If you’d like to see the pdf manual for full details, also seemingly unavailable on the web, Shenzhen has this and should be able to send this to you if you ask them.

My question involves external clocking with the R26 and sample rates. With 44.1khz and its multiples, the effect of the external clock when switching it on and off in the R26 menu, despite the click and delay, is instantly obvious. So much so that I would consider the clock’s influence to provide a night/day change, rare at this level of diminishing returns, and to my ears a categorical improvement, transforming my system from sounding just very good, to immersive and impressive. If the R26 on its own is a tasty cheeseburger, the clock adds a second patty and fried egg on top.

I do not have this same experience with 48khz material and its multiples, however. With a 48khz song playing (Tidal MQA or FLAC via mconnect on iOS) there is no click nor delay when switching the external clock on and off and I’m not able to detect any change when doing so. When doing informal blind testing with 44.1 stuff, I’m able to identify the external clock 100% of the time, but no better than a coin flip with 48, which makes me wonder if it’s doing anything at all. If it is, it’s extremely subtle.

Does anyone have a similar experience with the C18 or other clocks and the R26? Do external clocks benefit 44.1 material more and does this sound normal?

I dug for an answer to no avail and am having some language barrier issues communicating with Gustard. I’m a clock n00b so please go easy on me; I appreciate any help and insight.

 

[Jake2]

Happy Holidays to all. First time poster here; I appreciate the depth of knowledge on this forum generally, thread specifically, and thank all the contributors. You’ve helped transform me into a recovering DAC skeptic and proud R26 owner over the last few months.

I have two tidbits that may be of interest to current and prospective Gustard owners, plus a question that I’m struggling to find an answer to.

First, I asked Gustard directly about the 1v43 upgrade and they linked to the same Mediafire URL that is on Page 1, so according to service@gustard.com, this link is kosher and approved by Gustard if anyone was on the fence for this reason.

Second, I decided to see what all this clock business is about and ordered a C18 clock and C2 cable from Shenzhen Audio. There was a delay of a few weeks, but it eventually shipped and I received it last week. Nowhere is it mentioned anywhere on the internet that I can see, not on Gustard’s site nor anywhere else, but Gustard has quietly updated this unit. Rather than two pairs of outputs, one Sine, one Square, both of which are 50 ohms impedance, the new C18 is ONLY Square for both pairs, but with one toggle switch per pair that allows you to change the impedance to 50 or 75 ohms to better match up with various cables and components. Since consensus seems to favor Square anyway, this seems like an upgrade, but could be an unpleasant surprise for some. If you’d like to see the pdf manual for full details, also seemingly unavailable on the web, Shenzhen has this and should be able to send this to you if you ask them.

My question involves external clocking with the R26 and sample rates. With 44.1khz and its multiples, the effect of the external clock when switching it on and off in the R26 menu, despite the click and delay, is instantly obvious. So much so that I would consider the clock’s influence to provide a night/day change, rare at this level of diminishing returns, and to my ears a categorical improvement, transforming my system from sounding just very good, to immersive and impressive. If the R26 on its own is a tasty cheeseburger, the clock adds a second patty and fried egg on top.

I do not have this same experience with 48khz material and its multiples, however. With a 48khz song playing (Tidal MQA or FLAC via mconnect on iOS) there is no click nor delay when switching the external clock on and off and I’m not able to detect any change when doing so. When doing informal blind testing with 44.1 stuff, I’m able to identify the external clock 100% of the time, but no better than a coin flip with 48, which makes me wonder if it’s doing anything at all. If it is, it’s extremely subtle.

Does anyone have a similar experience with the C18 or other clocks and the R26? Do external clocks benefit 44.1 material more and does this sound normal?

I dug for an answer to no avail and am having some language barrier issues communicating with Gustard. I’m a clock n00b so please go easy on me; I appreciate any help and insight.

Interesting observations and not something I have observed but almost all of my content is 44.1khz so when I was AB'ing internal vs external clock etc it, would have been pure luck if I'd used some 48khz content

What I did notice when comparing HQPlayer PCM>DSD upsampling settings over six months ago was that the R26 behaves differently with 44.1khz vs 48hz multiples, regardless of the original music source sample rate. From memory with DSD a low background hiss that was there with 44.1khz rate family was gone with 48khz rate family. This was with DSD direct.

It may be that was a quirk of the 1 bit DSD chip but I suspect it is a quirk of the K2 clock synthesiser that takes the reference rate from the local oscillator or the external clock (10mhz) and synthesises it into the required rate for the DAC for the music input signal sample rate.

Suggest you try with PCM NOS and/or DSD Direct on/off if you have not already to see if this has an impact

 

[Jake2]

PS - @Buckminster Welcome to the thread/forum and seasons greetings!

 

[dacwizard]

Happy Holidays to all. First time poster here; I appreciate the depth of knowledge on this forum generally, thread specifically, and thank all the contributors. You’ve helped transform me into a recovering DAC skeptic and proud R26 owner over the last few months.

I have two tidbits that may be of interest to current and prospective Gustard owners, plus a question that I’m struggling to find an answer to.

First, I asked Gustard directly about the 1v43 upgrade and they linked to the same Mediafire URL that is on Page 1, so according to service@gustard.com, this link is kosher and approved by Gustard if anyone was on the fence for this reason.

Second, I decided to see what all this clock business is about and ordered a C18 clock and C2 cable from Shenzhen Audio. There was a delay of a few weeks, but it eventually shipped and I received it last week. Nowhere is it mentioned anywhere on the internet that I can see, not on Gustard’s site nor anywhere else, but Gustard has quietly updated this unit. Rather than two pairs of outputs, one Sine, one Square, both of which are 50 ohms impedance, the new C18 is ONLY Square for both pairs, but with one toggle switch per pair that allows you to change the impedance to 50 or 75 ohms to better match up with various cables and components. Since consensus seems to favor Square anyway, this seems like an upgrade, but could be an unpleasant surprise for some. If you’d like to see the pdf manual for full details, also seemingly unavailable on the web, Shenzhen has this and should be able to send this to you if you ask them.

My question involves external clocking with the R26 and sample rates. With 44.1khz and its multiples, the effect of the external clock when switching it on and off in the R26 menu, despite the click and delay, is instantly obvious. So much so that I would consider the clock’s influence to provide a night/day change, rare at this level of diminishing returns, and to my ears a categorical improvement, transforming my system from sounding just very good, to immersive and impressive. If the R26 on its own is a tasty cheeseburger, the clock adds a second patty and fried egg on top.

I do not have this same experience with 48khz material and its multiples, however. With a 48khz song playing (Tidal MQA or FLAC via mconnect on iOS) there is no click nor delay when switching the external clock on and off and I’m not able to detect any change when doing so. When doing informal blind testing with 44.1 stuff, I’m able to identify the external clock 100% of the time, but no better than a coin flip with 48, which makes me wonder if it’s doing anything at all. If it is, it’s extremely subtle.

Does anyone have a similar experience with the C18 or other clocks and the R26? Do external clocks benefit 44.1 material more and does this sound normal?

I dug for an answer to no avail and am having some language barrier issues communicating with Gustard. I’m a clock n00b so please go easy on me; I appreciate any help and insight.

I don’t subscribe to the idea of external clocks improving performance, but by the by the impact should be similar on both as far as my understanding goes. As far as I can tell the K2 clock synthesiser is used in both types of clock bases. I don’t know if the on board crystal clocks at the same rate as that that an external clock provides or not would seem sensible of you are going to provide and external clock option, if that’s the case both clock rates should be equally affected.

 

[Buckminster]

Thanks for the warm welcome, @Jake2 , and thanks also for your insights. I absolutely read that post of yours from six months ago or so and thought to myself that that could be a clue to what I'm seeing. DSD or NOS settings make no difference to this phenomenon. And as you say luckily 48khz stuff is much less common vs 44.1, but I notice it's overrepresented on some labels, ECM coming to mind, for one.

Yes, @dacwizard , logic tells me this should affect both sample rates and that something is fishy here. It's frustrating I can't directly A/B this, but I'm trying to establish a contrast between what I'm hearing with a 48khz sample, and that same track as a 44.1 version when I downgrade the Tidal tier in the settings. Honestly, my gut is saying that the 48 version with ext clock on or off more resembles the 44.1 version with the clock off, but I'm going to keep testing.

If someone out there has an ext clock and would like to test this out, I'd love to hear your experience if you're hearing a click when engaging the clock with a 48khz track or not, and if you're hearing a difference in the music and presentation.

 

[Jake2]

If someone out there has an ext clock and would like to test this out, I'd love to hear your experience if you're hearing a click when engaging the clock with a 48khz track or not, and if you're hearing a difference in the music and presentation.

I tried this last night with PCM NOS ON and 48khz music via spdif. No click but the usual audible difference was apparent (soundstage focus and depth the most prominent).

 

[Buckminster]

I appreciate you taking the time to check, @Jake2 .

Back on post #1698 of this thread from over a year ago, you had mentioned testing whether or not NOS mode via spdif made a difference with an external clock given that Gustard had told another member that the external clock is not used with coax or optical when NOS is engaged. Did Gustard make any updates since then that changed this fact, or have you simply observed that the ext clock does indeed make a difference regardless of the NOS setting and input?

I just plugged in a Sonos streamer via coax and opt to test this out, and I'm not hearing a click or much of a difference even on 16/44.1 material with NOS engaged. If I switch back to NOS:Off, PCM:Fast, there is a click and the same dramatic difference I've been experiencing.

With that same 16/44.1 song played via LAN and NOS:On, there is a click and a difference, albeit a smaller one. With that song as 24/48 MQA and NOS: On, there is no click and no obvious difference, just as if NOS were off.

 

[Jake2]

I appreciate you taking the time to check, @Jake2 .

Back on post #1698 of this thread from over a year ago, you had mentioned testing whether or not NOS mode via spdif made a difference with an external clock given that Gustard had told another member that the external clock is not used with coax or optical when NOS is engaged. Did Gustard make any updates since then that changed this fact, or have you simply observed that the ext clock does indeed make a difference regardless of the NOS setting and input?

I just plugged in a Sonos streamer via coax and opt to test this out, and I'm not hearing a click or much of a difference even on 16/44.1 material with NOS engaged. If I switch back to NOS:Off, PCM:Fast, there is a click and the same dramatic difference I've been experiencing.

With that same 16/44.1 song played via LAN and NOS:On, there is a click and a difference, albeit a smaller one. With that song as 24/48 MQA and NOS: On, there is no click and no obvious difference, just as if NOS were off.

Hi, goodness has it been a year already... time flies, and here I am still posting now and then about this great DAC.

I realised as I was posting it would've been simpler if I'd used the LAN input, but my server was/is still disassembled so the only active input was spdif. So a bit of a niche use case, but my experience, then and now, is that despite Gustard saying over email back then the benefit of an external clock didn't apply to synchronous inputs (incl SPDIF) + NOS on, there is a positive difference, subtle (less pronounced than I recalled with LAN or SPDIF + NOS OFF), but there. In the past I've speculated this might have been because the R26/K2 still used the external timing source for some of its functions, if not the primary timing stream which is taken 'unchanged' from the synchronous SPDIF data. @sajunky commented on why this might be a few months back IIRC.

So not sure if this helps with your scenario & question.. but maybe just serves to illustrate the number of variables in play here.

I'm now out of town for sometime so can't assist with any further testing for the time being sorry.

 

[ohcrapgorillas]

Does anyone have a Schiit Mjolnir 3 that can tell me if this is a good pairing? Using ZMF Atticus and modded HD800.

EDIT: I'm going to find out sooner than later.

 

[Nuge]

Are there any streamers around the 400-800 dollar range that beat the Gustard's for sound quality?

 

[molca]

Is it possible to modify the u-boot settings of the SOC (SigmaStar's SSD202D) built into the R26?
I want to boot a custom-built Linux kernel.

 

[Fluty]

Are there any streamers around the 400-800 dollar range that beat the Gustard's for sound quality?

I'm using an iFi Zen Stream which is far better than the R26 streamer, also it works flawlessly and is inexpensive.