[Porteroso]

 

 
My understanding is that the digital audio protocols (i.e. the protocols used between source components and DACs), including usb audio, do not do re-transmission.

No they do not. But USB protocol has re-transmission period.

USB will not correct any mistakes in an audio feed, which is the main point here. So yes, anything that causes an actual error in the transmission of 1s and 0s will result in an error being fed to the dac.
 
edit: Just to clarify, a thing that resulted in an error would almost never be a one time event. Things of that nature are present the entire time your equipment is setup the way it is. So the result would repeat itself, probably predictably. And if your dac is being fed predictable errors, it would manifest itself in a way that might certainly be audible.
 
Most of that would be the result of a terribly made USB cable, which there are many of. But USB implementations, especially in laptops, can have issues of their own.
 
Anyways, to make my point, I don't want to argue with you, but if most people run their fulla or whatever it is that you have on their desktops just fine, and it doesn't work in your 2 laptops... it might be your 2 laptops. And schiit cannot make products at their price level that do everything. They have made a fulla, which works well with anything feeding it a good signal. If your laptops are feeding it a bad usb signal, they have something for that too, to clean up whatever is happening.
 
My advice is, if you want to continue to schiit on schiit here, in one of their (many) little fanboy threads, buy a wyrd, and if it doesn't clean up your usb issues, continue to schiit on them. But if not, please, don't take a schiit on a product not related to this thread (the modi thread btw), that is designed not only on a performance basis, but also on a value basis.

 

[Jimster480]

  USB will not correct any mistakes in an audio feed, which is the main point here. So yes, anything that causes an actual error in the transmission of 1s and 0s will result in an error being fed to the dac.
 
edit: Just to clarify, a thing that resulted in an error would almost never be a one time event. Things of that nature are present the entire time your equipment is setup the way it is. So the result would repeat itself, probably predictably. And if your dac is being fed predictable errors, it would manifest itself in a way that might certainly be audible.
 
Most of that would be the result of a terribly made USB cable, which there are many of. But USB implementations, especially in laptops, can have issues of their own.
 
Anyways, to make my point, I don't want to argue with you, but if most people run their fulla or whatever it is that you have on their desktops just fine, and it doesn't work in your 2 laptops... it might be your 2 laptops. And schiit cannot make products at their price level that do everything. They have made a fulla, which works well with anything feeding it a good signal. If your laptops are feeding it a bad usb signal, they have something for that too, to clean up whatever is happening.
 
My advice is, if you want to continue to schiit on schiit here, in one of their (many) little fanboy threads, buy a wyrd, and if it doesn't clean up your usb issues, continue to schiit on them. But if not, please, don't take a schiit on a product not related to this thread (the modi thread btw), that is designed not only on a performance basis, but also on a value basis.

Unfortunately Modi uses the same USB implementation.
But now I have issues with both my Fulla 2 and my SMSL M8 on the desktop that used to be fine.
Either that or I hadn't listened enough to notice (but I doubt it).
 
I might try out a Wyrd even if its useless for my laptops but if I end up having issues on my desktops too as I'm seeing now then it could be worth it for the long run if it actually does something.
I tried the audioquest jitterbug and it did nothing at all.

 

[rydoggsc2]

My Modi Multibit is now on its way back to Schiit for warranty repair.  After being powered on for extended periods of time as a multibit DAC should be it would develop very audible distortion in one of the channels.  It happened multiple times on totally different setups.  It would go away after a reboot and then randomly reappear a week or so later.  It is a bummer and really disappointing that I am stuck paying for shipping across the US to send a month old defective unit back for repair.  Not impressed.

 

[alpovs]

My Modi Multibit is now on its way back to Schiit for warranty repair.  After being powered on for extended periods of time as a multibit DAC should be it would develop very audible distortion in one of the channels.  It happened multiple times on totally different setups.  It would go away after a reboot and then randomly reappear a week or so later.  It is a bummer and really a disappointing that I am stuck paying for shipping across the US to send a month old defective unit back for repair.  Not impressed.

Please keep us posted here. Mine may be from the same batch. Did it get very hot while playing?

 

[rydoggsc2]

It got warm but nothing too crazy.  I am also still in the winter months and keep my home very cool so that could be a factor.
 
I will keep you updated as I find out more. 

 

[cishida]

Here is a brief, fairly straightforward overview of usb audio, including how audio transfers differ from other usb data transfers: https://source.android.com/devices/audio/usb.html#isochronous 
 
From the section titled Isochronous transfer mode:
 
"USB includes many other device classes, some of which may be confused with the audio class. The mass storage class (MSC) is used for sector-oriented access to media, while Media Transfer Protocol (MTP) is for full file access to media. Both MSC and MTP may be used for transferring audio files, but only USB audio class is suitable for real-time streaming.
...
USB audio uses isochronous transfer mode for its real-time characteristics, at the expense of error recovery. In isochronous mode, bandwidth is guaranteed, and data transmission errors are detected using a cyclic redundancy check (CRC). But there is no packet acknowledgement or re-transmission in the event of error."

 

[Alchemist007]

  My Modi Multibit is now on its way back to Schiit for warranty repair.  After being powered on for extended periods of time as a multibit DAC should be it would develop very audible distortion in one of the channels.  It happened multiple times on totally different setups.  It would go away after a reboot and then randomly reappear a week or so later.  It is a bummer and really disappointing that I am stuck paying for shipping across the US to send a month old defective unit back for repair.  Not impressed.

Happened to me once so far, restarting it worked fine. I'm not entirely sure it's a defect but could just be a thing that happens when it's left on for weeks. Error's can pile up even on computer systems, a restart usually fixes that as well so I'm not surprised.

 

[rydoggsc2]

 
Happened to me once so far, restarting it worked fine. I'm not entirely sure it's a defect but could just be a thing that happens when it's left on for weeks. Error's can pile up even on computer systems, a restart usually fixes that as well so I'm not surprised.

According to Schiit it is not normal behavior and it requires service.  As far as comparing a DAC to a computer and operating system I think there is little in common there.

 

[Alchemist007]

  According to Schiit it is not normal behavior and it requires service.

Unfortunate, what was their exact wording?

 

[rydoggsc2]

  Unfortunate, what was their exact wording?

There was a back and forth of information about the problem that ended with them saying that they wanted to take a look at it and to start the RA process.

 

[Alchemist007]

Update whenever they get back to you on the issue, since I also experienced it (and probably others). If it ends up being some 'acceptable' side effect or some actual issue across units it would be good to know. Thanks.

 

[Jason Stoddard]

It may just be a glitch (Mike has written about this.) Any complex DSP-based product may have periodic glitches, especially when connected to noisy sources like computers. However, in an abundance of caution, I suspect we decided to take a look at this one.

 

[lentoviolento]

i can't find any audible difference between modi multibit and fulla 2... very expensive snake oil. i'm trying to downgrade to uber 2

 

[Clemmaster]

Lucky you.

 

[limelake]

  i can't find any audible difference between modi multibit and fulla 2... very expensive snake oil. i'm trying to downgrade to uber 2

Are you listening to MP3's or low bit rate music ?