[musickid]

Is anyone using an imac usb straight into their mscaler? Im reshuffling "stuff" ahead of my new kef ls50 metas which i will power using mTT2. My current imac core might need to be switched to m1 macair laptop as core and then use the imac as roon endpoint into mscaler.

 

[Reactcore]

Is anyone using an imac usb straight into their mscaler? Im reshuffling "stuff" ahead of my new kef ls50 metas which i will power using mTT2. My current imac core might need to be switched to m1 macair laptop as core and then use the imac as roon endpoint into mscaler.

I have read positive results using a (now discontinued) Chromecast audio as Roon endpoint with optical into Mscaler.

They were $35 new.. now still on demand people ask double price 2nd hand

Im not a streaming guy btw.. playing only local files

 

[Triode User]

I have read positive results using a (now discontinued) Chromecast audio as Roon endpoint with optical into Mscaler.

They were $35 new.. now still on demand people ask double price 2nd hand

Im not a streaming guy btw.. playing only local files

I used a Chromecast with optical output for 10 minutes. Yes it worked in the sense that it produced music but for me it was not near enough to what I expected to keep using it. I didn’t realise it was an appreciating asset. I will look it out and keep it in a safe place!

 

[musickid]

I tried chromecast and the expected SQ just didn't happen for me. It sounded very dull and that was comparing to usb and optical straight out of an old imac i had.

 

[Reactcore]

I used a Chromecast with optical output for 10 minutes. Yes it worked in the sense that it produced music but for me it was not near enough to what I expected to keep using it. I didn’t realise it was an appreciating asset. I will look it out and keep it in a safe place!

I have read here a long review of @ray-dude where he experimented with different optimalisations and mentioned Chromecast:

https://www.head-fi.org/showcase/au...isolation-bridge-for-dual-spdif.23757/reviews

I quoted:
"How About A Purely Isolated End Point? (Network, Power, Optical)

I have (briefly) posted before about how impressed I am with the Chromecast Audio as a Roon end point (alas, it sucks serious backside as a Chromecast end point). It remains my go to recommendation for civilians looking to get to great sound quickly. For ~$40 used, you get a little puck of a device that connects to the network via WiFi (no crude coming down on ethernet lines), is externally powered so you can use clean power (clean power made a huge difference in my initial experiments several months ago), has TOSLINK audio out (up too 96/24 content with Roon with no downsampling), and Roon streams it bit perfect content and behaves impeccably with it. What’s not to like?"

 

[Progisus]

I used a Chromecast with optical output for 10 minutes. Yes it worked in the sense that it produced music but for me it was not near enough to what I expected to keep using it. I didn’t realise it was an appreciating asset. I will look it out and keep it in a safe place!

I guess bits aren’t bits. I think it needed an SJ power supply. . Fun aside, I found the same.

 

[Reactcore]

Go check my Choral mscaler thread.
Its assembled.

 

[ruthieandjohn]

Received my Mscaler about a month ago and hooked it to my Hugo TT2 to find negligible improvement if any. I found that left and right channel separation converged to the centerline - little stereo separation. Took Mscaler out of the system to find its presence greatly degraded sound quality as compared to the TT2 alone, due to this channel collapse. TT2 alone sounded great!

I wiggled the power plug into the Mscaler while fully inserted, and the lights flashed off, then back on if I wiggled a bit more. Wiggled the two BNC connectors to the TT2 to find signal went away and was replaced by loud continuous static with the music barely audible beneath. Wiggled the USB input to the Mscaler to find signal came and went.

I am using Roon into a QNAP 251+ NAS, connected via USB. Headphones from the TT2 are either the Focal Stellia or the Grado PS1000.

Anyone ever encountered anything like this? Any suggestions?

I have called the dealer, who is calling his supplier for next steps.

Thanks for any advice.

 

[Triode User]

Received my Mscaler about a month ago and hooked it to my Hugo TT2 to find negligible improvement if any. I found that left and right channel separation converged to the centerline - little stereo separation. Took Mscaler out of the system to find its presence greatly degraded sound quality as compared to the TT2 alone, due to this channel collapse. TT2 alone sounded great!

I wiggled the power plug into the Mscaler while fully inserted, and the lights flashed off, then back on if I wiggled a bit more. Wiggled the two BNC connectors to the TT2 to find signal went away and was replaced by loud continuous static with the music barely audible beneath. Wiggled the USB input to the Mscaler to find signal came and went.

I am using Roon into a QNAP 251+ NAS, connected via USB. Headphones from the TT2 are either the Focal Stellia or the Grado PS1000.

Anyone ever encountered anything like this? Any suggestions?

I have called the dealer, who is calling his supplier for next steps.

Thanks for any advice.

Something seems to be amiss. Perhaps with cables or sockets. You are doing the right thing by addressing this through your dealer. Unfortunately I doubt that anyone can diagnose this remotely.

 

[Meridian7]

I wiggled the power plug into the Mscaler while fully inserted, and the lights flashed off, then back on if I wiggled a bit more. Wiggled the two BNC connectors to the TT2 to find signal went away and was replaced by loud continuous static with the music barely audible beneath. Wiggled the USB input to the Mscaler to find signal came and went.

Hi, that are a lot of sus connections, power, bnc, usb.
Just to test and exclude the bnc's you could remove bnc's fully and use mscaler optical out into the TT2 optical input. Limitation of upscaling here of course, but just to check for bnc trouble, to see if the stereo is back.

 

[miketlse]

Received my Mscaler about a month ago and hooked it to my Hugo TT2 to find negligible improvement if any. I found that left and right channel separation converged to the centerline - little stereo separation. Took Mscaler out of the system to find its presence greatly degraded sound quality as compared to the TT2 alone, due to this channel collapse. TT2 alone sounded great!

I wiggled the power plug into the Mscaler while fully inserted, and the lights flashed off, then back on if I wiggled a bit more. Wiggled the two BNC connectors to the TT2 to find signal went away and was replaced by loud continuous static with the music barely audible beneath. Wiggled the USB input to the Mscaler to find signal came and went.

I am using Roon into a QNAP 251+ NAS, connected via USB. Headphones from the TT2 are either the Focal Stellia or the Grado PS1000.

Anyone ever encountered anything like this? Any suggestions?

I have called the dealer, who is calling his supplier for next steps.

Thanks for any advice.

Wiggling plugs until you cause short circuits does not fill me with great confidence.
I fear that your motherboard has passed into the realm where even your dealer/distributor cannot save it, and maybe an email to support@chordelectronics.co.uk may be the end solution.
Sorry if that offends, but I fear the worst.

 

[dac64]

... I found that left and right channel separation converged to the centerline - little stereo separation...

Regarding the above only, I once got the output BNCs wrong, check if output BNC 1 to input BNC 1, and output BNC 2 to input BNC 2, respectively.

And yes, keep the loop simple during troubleshooting, eg. Cd player->BNC/optical-> HMS directly.

 

[Karnicopia]

I would also suggest trying optical between the m scaler and the TT2 and (I run optical into the M scaler as well since I don't have a lot of high rez music anyway but I've heard the USB is isolated, I'd just prefer not to even have an electrical connection) then if you have a decent sized 12v battery I would try running the m scaler off of battery. Word of warning here you do not want a battery that outputs over 15v so I stay with 12v and chord says they will not honor warranty if you use external power supplies and I'm not sure if they consider battery as well but I never hear people have issues with batteries on here but just wanted to mention it in case you want to avoid this step. I had a used M scaler so I figured the warranty was gone anyway but I have had no issues.

I felt the same as you when I first connected the m scaler I preferred the sound of the TT2 by itself so I ran it off of battery and that helped but that didn't really solve the issue of noise going from the M scaler to the TT2 so when I did optical there it really helped and I preferred optical with lower upscaling to BNC with full upscaling. It may sound like a lot but optical cables and 12 v batteries are pretty cheap to test things out and I had a battery bank for my laptop that could do 12v so that was good to test and then when I found that it worked I picked up a nicer battery and Opto DX will give you the optical connection between the m scaler and TT2 and you can use full upscaling. Wave cables is another option as well between the two that I do not have much experience using but I went with the Opto DX route and was really happy with the results.

 

[AndrewOld]

I felt the same as you when I first connected the m scaler I preferred the sound of the TT2

Interesting. That’s another person who found an M Scaler as supplied was not an improvement over their DAC.

 

[AndrewOld]

Received my Mscaler about a month ago and hooked it to my Hugo TT2 to find negligible improvement if any. I found that left and right channel separation converged to the centerline - little stereo separation. Took Mscaler out of the system to find its presence greatly degraded sound quality as compared to the TT2 alone, due to this channel collapse. TT2 alone sounded great!

And another person who found the M Scaler as sold degraded the sound of their (Chord) DAC.