[nomad777]

Mscaler has an RFI problem? I don't know if perhaps the model this person has is faulty. I have owned both the Mscaler and MK blu2 and the Mscaler sounds better and I don't experience any RFI with the Mscaler at all and I am very sensitive to it if I hear it. However as I said before I have an elaborate system which includes a ps audio power generator combined with various pre filters and high end music players cables power cords you word clock usb filter etc.. you name it so I don't feel it at all.... someone said on here that the Msclare has a torrodial power supply in it... I'll have to investigate that and get back on this thread about that... I don't know if it does or has capacitors instead I'll research to see but it certainly doesn't way enough to have a torrodial transformer in it.. those are usually quite heavy even if they are small.....

 

[Progisus]

The circuit board. No toroids and not much else. The aluminum shield covering it is substantial.

 

[kennyb123]

Mscaler has an RFI problem? I don't know if perhaps the model this person has is faulty. I have owned both the Mscaler and MK blu2 and the Mscaler sounds better and I don't experience any RFI with the Mscaler at all and I am very sensitive to it if I hear it. However as I said before I have an elaborate system which includes a ps audio power generator combined with various pre filters and high end music players cables power cords you word clock usb filter etc.. .

I initially thought along the same lines. Then I spent about $20 on some ferrite clamps for my BNC cables and heard an improvement. It’s not that the RF in this case can be noticed. What it’s doing is actually is degrading the benefits you already hear from the M-Scaler. I had initially exaggerated a bit to friends that it seemed as if the OPTO DX delivered the kind of benefits we’d expect to hear from a future second generation M-Scaler. The M-Scaler that you already paid for has a ton of magic that’s still waiting to be unleashed.

And as far as power conditioning, I believe the issue here is the FPGA chip inside the M-Scaler. Rob has already said that this gives off so much RF that it wouldn’t be possible at this point to place this within the same chassis as the DAC with its analog circuits.

 

[onlychild]

I don’t think it’s correct to state that the Mscaler has an RFI problem, but rather all hifi equipment is effected by RFI/EMI to some degree.

The incredible thing with Chord DACs is that the noise floor is so low, that most likely everything else in your chain will have a higher noise floor so when you start to upgrade your equipment/cables, you end up dropping the noise floor thus enhancing the sound of the Chord products. I think this is what leads some to believe that it is an RFI issue with the chord Mscaler/Dac to begin with.

When you start upgrading cables, power, server, etc, you are essentially letting everything else catch up to the incredibly low noise floor of your Chord Equipment.

As someone who’s gone down the rabbit hole deeper than I would like to admit, I am thankful that each and every upgrade was easily heard due to the incredible transparency and low noise floor of the Dave/Mscaler combo.

If you don’t plan to go for the last 10%, you will still get sound better than pretty much any other Dac in this price range.

 

[kelly200269]

Mscaler has an RFI problem? I don't know if perhaps the model this person has is faulty. I have owned both the Mscaler and MK blu2 and the Mscaler sounds better and I don't experience any RFI with the Mscaler at all and I am very sensitive to it if I hear it. However as I said before I have an elaborate system which includes a ps audio power generator combined with various pre filters and high end music players cables power cords you word clock usb filter etc.. you name it so I don't feel it at all.... someone said on here that the Msclare has a torrodial power supply in it... I'll have to investigate that and get back on this thread about that... I don't know if it does or has capacitors instead I'll research to see but it certainly doesn't way enough to have a torrodial transformer in it.. those are usually quite heavy even if they are small.....

Yeah, you’re right.
The M Scaler doesn’t have an RFI problem at all.

 

[rkt31]

Try feeding m Scaler to other than chord dacs. It improves those dac too even with so called RFI problem. How come ? Each and every thing these days has RFI problem. even your streamer or mobile phone has much more RFI problem than HMS. Fact is that whatever improvement you get with these tweaks of rfi you would get with any other dac or audio equipments too. Here people are getting enthusiastic to improve the already highly transparent sound which other equipment owner won't .

 

[kennyb123]

Yeah, you’re right.
The M Scaler doesn’t have an RFI problem at all.

Proof that there are things that will limit a system’s potential far more than RF,

 

[drew911d]

Just a random note; the best enhancement I've made to my HMS/TT2 set up (aside from the Wave Stream cables) is ifi's AC purifier. I totally get that a lot of ifi's stuff is like witch craft voodoo, but the AC Purifier has really added a lot to my system. I bought one a couple weeks ago, and put it in front of my HMS plug on a Supra power strip. The change was immediately noticeable; primarily deeper bass and better dynamics. I got a second one yesterday and use it to separate the plugs of my HMS and TT2. The bass deepness and improved dynamics that appeared after the first one is still there, and now I'm getting a little more open sounding sound stage.

I don't necessarily recommend that anyone rush out and buy them, but for $100 each is a pretty inexpensive tweak that has benefited my system. I believe others have posted about the ifi AC Purifier recently in this thread which is what caused my purchase. Thanks to those that shared their experience, as I've had the same experience.

Interesting as I tried their DC iPurifier on my TT2 a few weeks ago. The change was most certainly immediately noticeable. I was surprised though by how much the sound improved when I removed it. I received the Pilot Pro2 battery in that same shipment. I ended up sending the DC iPurifier back to Amazon and then purchasing another PP2 for my HMS.

The DC iPurifier most noticeably shaved off some upper frequency energy. While that could lead one to think that it was just noise that had been stripped away, comparison to the battery supply indicated otherwise.

Very interesting to hear about the AC iPurifiers. I might try them. I wonder if it would be a decent match with the Furman PST-8D dual filtered power strip I use so far. Could be a nice compliment. Any thought would be appreciated.

@kennyb123 I'm surprised to hear you like the sound better without the DC iPurifier. I pulled it from my TT2 and it sounds more energetic, but less controlled without it. A harshness in the highs returned and less Bass control and dynamics. But, I still haven't done squat with the BNC interconnects. It may be from some reading here that if I do make a change there it could make other changes obsolete, or at least less effective. For now I consider the DC iPurifer at least to be relative to using a battery to identify weaknesses in power delivery. Maybe if I use an expensive lps in place I could find additional improvement. Time, and budget will tell. The ifi DC iPurifier uses Active Noise Cancelling technology to create an exact but opposite signal to cancel out noise. Same as ANC headphones to cancel out, say the noise of a jet engine for travellers. Even high end hearing protection for gun range users.

The HMS/Chord DAC has in and of itself such a low noise floor so many are not used to such a product. Here sound quality is revelatory. Stand alone it's top quality. But the product is actually better than initial impressions as it has an additional propensity to reach below usual accepted noise levels in this market. Making room for a new level of perfection. This is a paradigm shift in a sense. This percieved rfi susceptability is BS. You are looking at it from the wrong perspective. We now have a product that can be better than the air around us, meaning the transmissions of energy can now be shown to affect each other. Other DAC's aren't able to get so detailed to make the difference audible. We can now hear that better standards are achievable with further experimentation. Instead of demanding the DAC reach a new level of noise suppression, we now have a DAC that we can strive to reach it's capability of low noise level. The DAC is beyond our noise environment for the first time.

The tiniest of energy waveforms, even those generated by the HMS FPGA (current technology inherent weakness) itself can be like butter on toast, causing a viel to take away from the best optimal sound signal. Chord does a remarkable job getting this noise to be nearly ineffectual. Show me a perfect sine wave if you can. It's only theory in real life, there are so many imperfections it's amazing electronic products work at all..

It's a new level of purity that we are finding possible especially thanks to the intrinsic super low noise level of Chord. We're just now finding ways to make this super low noise environment possible and discernable in practical use. This is what we are as a community working toward. Whatever it takes to remove the byproduct of our many pieces of electrical signal processing to make our daily lives easier from our hightened sense of auditory perception (that means you, audiophile) that could not be achievable if a product didn't exist to allow such perfection to be achievable. Don't blame the gear that can demonstrate that perfect sine wave, blame the waves in the air, or any other transmission media that corrupt the signal on the path to output. Then get rid of that shiat.

 

[N Quarter]

Woah, maybe the best enviroment would be in the middle of the desert with a bunch of batteries to power everything.Ultimate low noise floor, might be a little hot though.

 

[muski]

Motherless Brooklyn (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)

https://open.qobuz.com/album/yhdwrrg8dyo4b



hoping its good, rainy jazz

Wow, great recommendation. First track is absolutely pouring soaking wet.

 

[nomad777]

Here is what I found:

You may view the internal plate via the porthole looking glass which protects the sensitive internal circuitry from radio frequency (RF) interference

With a thick, solid aluminium chassis, the Hugo M Scaler’s casework largely protects the sensitive internal circuitry from radio frequency interference. However, for optimal performance, it is recommended that the following points are observed:

1. Consider placing the Hugo M Scaler away from wireless routers. 2. Separate the Hugo M Scaler from amplifiers using toroidal transformers. 3. Operate mobile phones at a distance to avoid interference.

2. Separate the Hugo M Scaler from amplifiers using toroidal transformers.

3. Operate mobile phones at a distance to avoid interference.

Although the Hugo M Scaler is largely shielded, it can generate radio frequency interference that may have an effect on radio and television reception. If this occurs, please reconsider your placement.

I have yet to see it affect anything that I have near it... I do have it beside the woo wa33 headphone amp maybe about 12 inches away .. so we will see


So we are clear the mscaler (does not have a torrodial transformer in it) it can produce RFI I will have a conversation with Rob Watts to see how far away it should be from a torrodial transformer

Ironically it can't be that bad if in many placements its stacked with the TT2

 

[nomad777]

I just ordered my Mscaler 2 days ago, and I appreciate all the posts about improving the sound of the stock Mscaler with stock cables. I plan to get an Opto DX and maybe wave cables eventually, but want to try it stock at first, so I can see/hear what each item adds. I notice a lot of posters here are using USB, even on the Opto Dx website, his little diagram shows USB as the source. I use BNC from my NDS as my source, will all these “upgrades” be necessary still for me?

the stock cables are crap....

 

[N Quarter]

the stock cables are crap....

Even loaded with ferrites? I will probably seek out something a little better then, to get me started.

 

[nomad777]

Even loaded with ferrites? I will probably seek out something a little better then, to get me started.

yes crap even with 100 ferrites

 

[Crgreen]

I have to agree with this. The M-Scaler, absolutely unequivocally has an RFI problem. This problem is orders of magnitudes lower if you use a Chord DAC alone. The degree to which it affects you depends on the resolution and tonal balance of your existing system, and your sensitivity to it.

If it doesn't bother you or you don't notice anything wrong, great! You've saved yourself a bunch of money and annoyance. But I don't need to hear from you about how it's not a problem because IT IS - just not for you. So talk about something else.

@kelly200269 - C'mon - your quote is ridiculous. You wouldn't have spent thousands of dollars on a DAC and an upscaler if you didn't appreciate good sound. You bought an M Scaler a week ago and enjoy it. Great. I'm happy for you. But don't come in here and talk to everyone like they are crazy. It's incredibly condescending - and frankly - I can't imagine you've listened to any of the solutions that are offered - so have any first hand experience on the difference they make.

The vast majority of this thread (and the Blu thread) is about RFI. This is not the case for threads on other digital equipment. There are commercial ferrite-laden cables and optical solutions to address this issue. Do you think it's possible that some people are having a problem?

I love my Dave and I think the M-Scaler does amazing things. That said IT IS UNLISTENABLE TO THE POINT OF PAIN with me without some RFI reduction. I do not have this issue with Dave alone, in the same system.

TLDR: @kelly200269 SHUT UP

I absolutely agree.The chip itself produces the offending RFI. For some people that’s not a problem, but for others it is. I wish I was one of those for whom it wasn’t an issue.