[littlej0e]

I have a hard time understanding what "electrically contaminated" means when speaking of digital data. Are you saying electricity is commonly flipping bits in your RAM at random? Because you'd have more problems than audio quality if that were the case.

Don't want to speak for him, but I believe the answer you are looking for is: buffering can inadvertently expose data to secondary sources of electricity, magnetic fields, etc., also known as "noise, interference and/or data corruption." This can potentially to do all sorts of nasty things to electrical signals that use carefully constructed wave forms to transmit binary data in an error free state (i.e. buffering 1 and 0s, which are normally transmitted as square waves, could be inadvertently affected by secondary electrical inputs that cause errors requiring reformation and retransmission of the square wave/binary message). Normally, this isn't a problem as there are many error correction features built in to account for this. But for some reason, as it relates to digital audio, our human brains seems to be highly susceptible to large amounts of errors. Digital signal timing also seems to play a major role in how our brains process and interpret sound. It is extremely fascinating when you really dig into it.

Anyway, to ditch all the nerd speak...think of it like cars on a highway. If there are no other cars on the road, there is much less chance of an accident, and therefore a much higher probability the car will arrive at it's destination without incident. In the case of optical/spdif, he's basically saying that using these type of connections are akin to building a custom lane on a highway that no other cars can use in the first place.

Make sense?

 

[Somatic]

WE300B are a very nice reference point, thanks! Just to clarify, I'm guessing that you've auditioned WE300B from the current production?

Yes, current production. I need to let them burn in but planning to get the Elrog MO instead.

 

[Somatic]

Thanks for your reply. The reason I asked, I haven’t been impressed with Susvara so far, I tried Enleum, Ferrum, AHB2 and I find Sol P way better. In comparison Susvara is lightweight and more analytical. I guess I have to try the Envy with Susvara to see how that goes. I have Dave + M Scaler as a source.

I see. I used to own the SolP as well. I liked them a lot. More authoritative bass, grand soundstage. Very detailed but I found they lacked a bit of soul. I felt the mids were more recessed on the SolP than Susvara.

Well Envy + upgraded tubes, it adds a lot more body to Susvara. It gets so bassy with certain genres that I can't imagibne the drivers producing more bass. On the cusp of being too much actually.

So I am really curious how the SOLP would be with Envy. I can't imagine. So that's a headphone I'm thinking of repurchasing.

 

[homeros8000]

I see. I used to own the SolP as well. I liked them a lot. More authoritative bass, grand soundstage. Very detailed but I found they lacked a bit of soul. I felt the mids were more recessed on the SolP than Susvara.

Well Envy + upgraded tubes, it adds a lot more body to Susvara. It gets so bassy with certain genres that I can't imagibne the drivers producing more bass. On the cusp of being too much actually.

So I am really curious how the SOLP would be with Envy. I can't imagine. So that's a headphone I'm thinking of repurchasing.

Have you tried the Sol P with the AHB2? This combo creates the biggest soundstage I’ve ever had. The instruments are literally out of my head and for the first time I‘m listening to orchestral pieces comfortably.

 

[Spawn300Z]

Thanks for your reply. The reason I asked, I haven’t been impressed with Susvara so far, I tried Enleum, Ferrum, AHB2 and I find Sol P way better. In comparison Susvara is lightweight and more analytical. I guess I have to try the Envy with Susvara to see how that goes. I have Dave + M Scaler as a source.

I love the riviera AIC-10 with the Susvara. But if I was going to get another tube I would go with the Woo Audio WA23.

 

[orrman]

Thanks for your reply. The reason I asked, I haven’t been impressed with Susvara so far, I tried Enleum, Ferrum, AHB2 and I find Sol P way better. In comparison Susvara is lightweight and more analytical. I guess I have to try the Envy with Susvara to see how that goes. I have Dave + M Scaler as a source.

There are some people who just don't really like the Susvara. Considering what you've heard them with, I won't be surprised if that's the case for you.

 

[Somatic]

Have you tried the Sol P with the AHB2? This combo creates the biggest soundstage I’ve ever had. The instruments are literally out of my head and for the first time I‘m listening to orchestral pieces comfortably.

No I haven't. But this makes me want the SOLP in my grasps again haha

 

[jlbrach]

the susvara has an ethereal laid back presentation whereas some do not like,some want "slam" which I never quite understood but hey tons of choices out there

There are some people who just don't really like the Susvara. Considering what you've heard then with, I won't be surprised if that's the case for you.

 

[littlej0e]

Generally, no. I do have an amp with analog EQ, and I occasionally use it sparingly if I must. I used to work as a mix engineer and I found that the best EQ was no EQ. Even very transparent ones in digital or analog realms do spoil the sound a little bit and often add some fatigue (especially with boosts). And you are adding another stage of processing, which inherently colors the sound a little bit.

But it exists for a reason, and sometimes is necessary.

This is both what I assumed and what I was afraid of. Sounds like it just isn't worth it for a tiny bass boost and some additional flexibility lol! Oh well, back to the drawing board!

Oh geeze, it took a lot. I use an optical I2S connection between my streamer and DAC, and actually store my files on a SSD directly attached to my Emm Labs NS1 streamer. I found this sounded the same as storing them over network on an Innous server. However, I also found that fancy USB cables and an iGalvanic on that USB bus helped further. Then lots of fancy power cables and audiophile fuses helped filter out noise from the power system.

This is quite interesting... So using the NS1 as the front end is all it took in either direct-attached or network stored scenarios. You just switched on a massive lightbulb.

My current setup is in my signature, and it is admittedly over the top, but the best solution i was able to come up with to fix things I was hearing and didn't like. I'm surely someone could accomplish all this more cheaply.

The biggest things were getting away from USB and ethernet as direct connections to a DAC, and getting away from FLAC. I had a big lightbulb when I heard a toslink (which is also flawed but super low noise) from source to DAC, and found that AES, and esp I2S over HDMI were also pretty good. I'd say attending to power cables and conditioning also helped.

This makes total sense. Almost every audio vendor I've worked/spoken with tends to put them in the following order: I2S > AES > TOS > USB (the exception being Taiko Audio as they developed some sort of super, mega, alpha nerd USB solution and no longer recommend using anything else).

The next phase for me is focusing on chasis grounds to get the ground plane noise and loops out. I probably would never have felt the necessity with disc playback.

This is quite revealing and I get it. At this point, your in too deep and I don't blame you. It's a real shame though. I never would have guessed audio quality would actually take a significant step(s) back for the purposes of convenience. I stupidly assumed digital files were superior. Shows what I know...

I've seen a ton of grounding solutions, but all of them were a total PITA. I also looked into a whole home/grounding at the box systems, but none seemed to be any good. Most folks seem to agree grounding at the rack/chassis level is the only proper way to do it.

In any case, I sure do appreciate you sharing your knowledge. These tips will almost certainly save me boatloads of time, effort, and money. For this, I can't thank you enough.

 

[BassicScience]

Can we please take discussion of non-Susvara topics (grounding, CDs vs. streaming, etc.) somewhere else at this point?

 

[littlej0e]

Thanks for your reply. The reason I asked, I haven’t been impressed with Susvara so far, I tried Enleum, Ferrum, AHB2 and I find Sol P way better. In comparison Susvara is lightweight and more analytical. I guess I have to try the Envy with Susvara to see how that goes. I have Dave + M Scaler as a source.

If you don't like the Susvaras because they are too light and analytical to your ear, I would recommend trying the Focal Utopia 2022 (a.k.a. "nutopia"). Much more "slam" than the Susvaras at a close'ish level of performance. They aren't quite as detailed, fast, or accurate and also have a smaller stage. Mostly neutral tuning as well.

 

[newtseverywhere]

Don't want to speak for him, but I believe the answer you are looking for is: buffering can inadvertently expose data to secondary sources of electricity, magnetic fields, etc., also known as "noise, interference and/or data corruption." This can potentially to do all sorts of nasty things to electrical signals that use carefully constructed wave forms to transmit binary data in an error free state (i.e. buffering 1 and 0s, which are normally transmitted as square waves, could be inadvertently affected by secondary electrical inputs that cause errors requiring reformation and retransmission of the square wave/binary message). Normally, this isn't a problem as there are many error correction features built in to account for this. But for some reason, as it relates to digital audio, our human brains seems to be highly susceptible to large amounts of errors. Digital signal timing also seems to play a major role in how our brains process and interpret sound. It is extremely fascinating when you really dig into it.

Anyway, to ditch all the nerd speak...think of it like cars on a highway. If there are no other cars on the road, there is much less chance of an accident, and therefore a much higher probability the car will arrive at it's destination without incident. In the case of optical/spdif, he's basically saying that using these type of connections are akin to building a custom lane on a highway that no other cars can use in the first place.

Make sense?

Buffering means the data is in a buffer, in RAM. Besides faulty RAM, rowhammer attacks or cosmic events, I don't see how it would make digital bits flip and thus result in incorrect data when played back.
Transmission itself over a wire (vs. optical cable) can be susceptible to noise, but buffering? I really don't see how. It's like the local FLAC vs streaming FLAC discussion: the very same bits end up in RAM before being played, how could they sound different?

 

[George Hincapie]

Don't want to speak for him, but I believe the answer you are looking for is: buffering can inadvertently expose data to secondary sources of electricity, magnetic fields, etc., also known as "noise, interference and/or data corruption." This can potentially to do all sorts of nasty things to electrical signals that use carefully constructed wave forms to transmit binary data in an error free state (i.e. buffering 1 and 0s, which are normally transmitted as square waves, could be inadvertently affected by secondary electrical inputs that cause errors requiring reformation and retransmission of the square wave/binary message). Normally, this isn't a problem as there are many error correction features built in to account for this. But for some reason, as it relates to digital audio, our human brains seems to be highly susceptible to large amounts of errors. Digital signal timing also seems to play a major role in how our brains process and interpret sound. It is extremely fascinating when you really dig into it.

Anyway, to ditch all the nerd speak...think of it like cars on a highway. If there are no other cars on the road, there is much less chance of an accident, and therefore a much higher probability the car will arrive at it's destination without incident. In the case of optical/spdif, he's basically saying that using these type of connections are akin to building a custom lane on a highway that no other cars can use in the first place.

Make sense?

No. It's nonsense.

 

[orrman]

If you don't like the Susvaras because they are too light and analytical to your ear, I would recommend trying the Focal Utopia 2022 (a.k.a. "nutopia"). Much more "slam" than the Susvaras at a close'ish level of performance. They aren't quite as detailed, fast, or accurate and also have a smaller stage. Mostly neutral tuning as well.

The Utopia 2022 are great, would add to that list the Final Audio D8000 Pro (I own the Limited Edition that might or might not be different than the regular, unclear yet). I find it better than the Utopia to my tastes at least and a somewhat more engaging Susvara experience.

 

[littlej0e]

Buffering means the data is in a buffer, in RAM.

Not necessarily, but I get your point. Some buffering systems use an NVME, SSD, HDD or RAM as a buffer/caching system for a myriad of reasons. It all depends on the implementation and use case. That's the nerdy pedantic answer, but you see where I'm going.

Besides faulty RAM, rowhammer attacks or cosmic events, I don't see how it would make digital bits flip and thus result in incorrect data when played back.

You don't need to flip a bit to create an error or cause a retransmission. All you need to do is alter a square wave to the point where the receiving end can't decipher the bit and therefore reports an error. Flipping bits actually tends to be quite rare (in my experience anyway). We're talking about more subtle things that can affect the electricity itself.

Transmission itself over a wire (vs. optical cable) can be susceptible to noise, but buffering?

Technically, both can be true - it depends on the gear and architecture involved (for the record, optical signals are also susceptible to noise, but usually a different kind and/or in a different way) For example, most enterprise-level network routers and switches tend to use packet buffer processing systems. But receiving and buffering incoming data and transmitting it are two very different processes. The key point here is the translation of electricity to light. That's normally what an optical output/re-transmission system does. So as it relates to audio, you have electrical separation at the point of signal translation where it converts from electricity to light, which therefore creates electrical isolation between components, making it extremely difficult to transmit whatever electrical noise exists (beyond the interpreted square wave) over the optical link.

I really don't see how. It's like the local FLAC vs streaming FLAC discussion: the very same bits end up in RAM before being played, how could they sound different?

Don't think of it as bits sounding different. Think of it in terms of unintended electrical noise adversely affecting the ability of transmitting and receiving devices to process those bits (i.e. causing errors, micro delays, jitter, timing issues/re-clocks, etc.). Make sense?