[MKHunt]

I, too, am very interested in this solution. Please, can someone confirm (even posting some pictures)?

Thanks in advance!

Ah, sort of like this?


Quick question for @Quadman : What method did you use to remove the coax tower? I'm thinking heat gun but if there is a better desoldering method I am all ears. Since getting the Singxer I just threw the DIYinHK board away. That thing was terribly unstable.

The singxer has its quirks too. Just for reference I have the gustard connected by a Monoprice sleeved 18awg 1 foot length HDMI cable. It is insanely stiff and I had to form it before connecting the Singxer and Gustard.

Basic method is this:

-Install SIngxer drivers
-Use SIngxer XMOS dfupdate to update firmware to v 2.22
-Uninstall Singxer drivers (limited to DSD256 via DoP)
-Install HoloAudio signed XMOS drivers for kitsune Spring DAC with SU-1 connected
-Make sure your SU-1 is NOT plugged into a USB 3.0 SS port (took a while for me to realize this goof)
-Enjoy

I still have to unplug and replug the Singxer USB occasionally or else the left channel is pure static in DSD mode on a rare occasion. Not sure if that is just my setup though.

 

[rafabro]

What method did you use to remove the coax tower? I'm thinking heat gun but if there is a better desoldering method I am all ears.

I can answer your question. Heat gun yes, but only if you have proper nozzle.
The tool you looking for is hot air soldering station like this.

 

[Excellence 5]

@MKHunt, thanks for posting that nice picture! Is your DSD512 native or via DoP? And how about the sound quality?

However, your trouble on left channel is strange.

 

[Quadman]

What method did you use to remove the coax tower?

I used a old really big soldering iron (for stained glass) and flux, that allowed me to heat 3 legs of the tower at the same time, I also used another soldering iron on the 4th leg. My wife had to hold the second iron while I gently pulled on the tower with the original coax cable attached and hold the thick iron on the 3 legs. Tricky but doable. Iron was something like this. https://www.amazon.com/Weller-SPG80...&sr=1-3&keywords=stained+glass+soldering+iron. Again I was not notified of a mention in a post, my apologies.

 

[DrTone]

@MKHunt, thanks for posting that nice picture! Is your DSD512 native or via DoP? And how about the sound quality?

However, your trouble on left channel is strange.

There is no DSD512 via DOP. It would require at least 1411.2 kHZ PCM speeds.

 

[HeadFierUsername2022]

Hello,


Could you compare it to Violectric v800?
Is it better bang for the buck?


Thanks!

 

[Quadman]

I just posted my buddies Gustard X20U with Level 1 mod in the for sale section. This is the dac I wrote about on this forum April/May of last year. At the time it was full level 1 as the clock mod had not yet been verified. Instead of a clock near the dac chips this has a very high quality pure silver coax cable replacing the stock cable. All other level 1 mods have been done including the WA Quantum chips and new damping that Ric discovered to improve the sound and I was able to verify. If one wanted the clock mod I can do that and would only charge parts cost for it. A level 1 modded X20u will sound better than a stock X20pro.

Check out the ad or PM me for more information.

 

[Quadman]

Has anyone played back .wav files thru the gustard X20? I don't have any .wav files so I never tried. I assume it would but has anyone actually played them back and up sampled them?

 

[DrTone]

Has anyone played back .wav files thru the gustard X20? I don't have any .wav files so I never tried. I assume it would but has anyone actually played them back and up sampled them?

Everyone has unless they do DSD only. WAV is a uncompress PCM container. The software player would have to convert to PCM or DSD before sending it to the DAC.

 

[Quadman]

Everyone has unless they do DSD only. WAV is a uncompress PCM container. The software player would have to convert to PCM or DSD before sending it to the DAC.

Thanks, I was pretty confident it would as long as the software player can support it.

 

[Excellence 5]

Please, help: I’m receiving the Singxer SU-1 soon the incoming week…

...
-Install SIngxer drivers
-Use SIngxer XMOS dfupdate to update firmware to v 2.22
-Uninstall Singxer drivers (limited to DSD256 via DoP)
-Install HoloAudio signed XMOS drivers for kitsune Spring DAC with SU-1 connected
-Make sure your SU-1 is NOT plugged into a USB 3.0 SS port (took a while for me to realize this goof)
-Enjoy
...

Thanks a lot for the guide.

Are the mentioned Holo Audio drivers for Windows 7/8 or 10 (v3.40.0) the ones available here: https://kitsunehifi.com/product/springdacgreen/ ?

And where do I find the firmware v2.22 for the Singxer SU-1? Can it be the one at the following link: https://download.shenzhenaudio.com/Singxer/SU-1-Firmware-2017.rar ?

Thanks in advance to everyone for helping me.

 

[MKHunt]

Well my noise issue persists. Maybe one of the experts or those understanding better can help. When I first play a DSD file after having listened to PCM both speakers play the music softly but there is a loud static-y hiss with a high frequency sine wave in the background. If I continue playing the stream the static and sine noise slowly decrease over about 12-20 seconds and the music gets to full volume. After this, DSD files play without noise on track changes unless I go back to PCM or stop playing audio for a few minutes.

The pattern of the decreasing noise strongly reminds me of an incandescent lightbulb in series with a battery and capacitor. The bulb is bright initially then fades as the capacitor charges; eventually going out. Any thoughts? I have not experienced this behavior with DSD until I got the singxer. Once the noise has faded, everything plays and works fine.

Also, when an audio stream begins with PCM, I can hear a faint pop through my audio system. I hear the same faint pop when the audio stream ends. I'm putting the coax cable delete on hold until I get this figured out.

 

[Excellence 5]

Hello to everybody.

I finally received the Singxer SU-1 interface and then I connected it to the Gustard DAC X20U.

Thanks to MKHunt’s help I updated and installed all the requested softwares, and now I can display the beloved DSD 512. Yes, I can do that, but I’m really disappointed at the moment:

- If I play DSD 256 everything goes well, but I think I would not notice any difference if the SU-1 would be kiked out from the chain. Really. That’s why I suspect I spent exactly 287, 90 euro just for nothing. But maybe not, we’ll see later (maybe).

- If I try playing DSD 512 then the disaster starts: when I first press the play button on Jriver 22 I hear an horrible hiss that, luckily, ceases in a few seconds; then the thing goes on with an intermittent sound that is really horrible to hear. Ouch! It would seem a buffer problem, but I don’t think it is so. I tried to adjust settings into Jriver and into Holo Audio control panel, but I couldn’t fix the issue. I'm on Windows 10.

Any suggestion, please?

Thanks

PS
Oh, I also tried adjusting some setting on the Gustard machine, but nothig.


UPDATE
Now I think it’s a buffer problem: the sample rate on ASIO buffer size, on HoloAudio control panel menù, is limited to 32768 at most; if I go down to 16384 or less the sound becomes intermittent at DSD 256 as well.

Does anyone have the same issue?

 

[Excellence 5]

I made some more test using HQPlayer (instead of Jriver) on another PC under Windows 8.1: in this case the bad situation worsens in the sense that both DSD 256 & 512 play with intermittent sound.

So what’s wrong?

Here all the available sample rates on HoloAudio control panel:

- 64
- 128
- 256
- 512
- 1024
- 2048
- 4096
- 8192
- 16384
- 32768

And here the warning message just like the one I saw on my system:

When attempting to play DSD 512 the above warning message disappears once selected 16384. It means that 16384 should be enought for DSD 512, am I wrong? So is or isn’t it a buffer size problem?

I’m very confused...

 

[wwmhf]

To me, how it sounds is more important than those numbers in the software. Those numbers means nothing without a good calibration.

Does your X20 sound good with HWPlayer in DSD256 or DSD512?

I made some more test using HQPlayer (instead of Jriver) on another PC under Windows 8.1: in this case the bad situation worsens in the sense that both DSD 256 & 512 play with intermittent sound.

So what’s wrong?

Here all the available sample rates on HoloAudio control panel:

- 64
- 128
- 256
- 512
- 1024
- 2048
- 4096
- 8192
- 16384
- 32768

And here the warning message just like the one I saw on my system:

When attempting to play DSD 512 the above warning message disappears once selected 16384. It means that 16384 should be enought for DSD 512, am I wrong? So is or isn’t it a buffer size problem?

I’m very confused...