[tigon_ridge]

Quote:

Mind you the software USB driver for the USB 2.0 hardware is still the version 1.  Hardware USB 2.0 high speed is capable to handle 480Mbps which is 60MBps.  This bandwidth is shared among the USB devices attached to your computer but it is pretty safe to assume that a 6MBps rate can be sustained without difficulties in usual circumstance for a PC dedicated to play the music.
 
A 16/44 wave file requires about 10MB per minute.  Even a 24/192 wave file requires only 65MB per minute, which translates to about 1.1MBps.  You may be surprised that this speed requirement is actually less than the USB 1.1 hardward standard full speed standard which is 1.5MBps (or 12Mbps technically).
 
Hence don't worry about USB 2.0 or USB 3.0.  The usual 24/96 limitation is because of the USB chips or the software driver used.  M2Tech HiFace uses USB and can deliver 24/192 without much difficulties from a netbook using 1.67GHz atom processor and many head-fiers are already enjoying it.
 

Bolded: Yes, I've read that somewhere before but have forgotten it. Thanks for the reminder. So then, that solves that... for those mobile audiophiles, you only need a converter... The excuse of "It's just gonna be an extra clunking piece of hardware to carry around" won't make sense, because the biggest clunking component, by far, is the laptop itself. Making high-res usb input as an expensive additional feature is definitely uncalled for in this case. Not gonna wait 6 months longer, only to shell out an extra $200-300 for such a feature that I know I will probably never use, as I don't travel much.
 

 

[DTSyX]

Quote:

I don't get it... what is all this talk about the need to have hi-res usb input (very difficult and expensive) or optical input? Just get a new sound card that has 24-bit-192 kHz-capable coax output; they're not expensive. And, please, don't give me any of that nonsense about how coax is inferior to optical. Also, if you're going for portability, just kiss hi-res input goodbye, because the chances of any portable device feeding a 192kHz or even 92kHz is nil. USB 3.0 still is designed with jitter deliberately implemented, which makes it still unfeasible for the ideal setup.

Well. We're talking really portable. Not notebook, not netbooks. But portable music players. Like the H1x0. They have optical S/PDIF in and out. So why and where to put in a sound card in such devices? Why walking around with an additional optical to coaxial converter if the simplest solution would be just to add an optical input to the JH-3A? And talking about new soundcards for a notebook or netbook. Are there many notebooks and netbooks where you can just put in another soundcard?  And as I understand there are many Apple users here, I don't think Apple will ever let you decide what soundcard you want. External soundcards? Well, you still have to connect them to your device. Via which connector? Hmmm, USB? And is it still portable then? Well, in the end you could also go with a full size solution as you wouldn't be able to walk around with all that conversion and/or additional gear anyway.
 
Btw, yes, I'm yearning for an optical input for the JH-3A, but not because I think coax is inferior quality wise to optical (the specs say it's the other way around), but I think there are many devices out there that have optical output but no coaxial. So, I rather have an inferior digital way than having to go the analog one... And it would be just an additional option, not one OR the other.
 
Btw2: My notebook also has optical S/PDIF output. I think it's not unusual for other notebooks either...

 

[cooperpwc]

DTSyX, I heart you on the joys of the H1x - I owned the H40 - but they have been out of production for years. I have looked at the Sony and Korg recorders that currently offer optical out and there is nothing too attractive there for music playback. So this is hardly the basis for Jerry to  choose input options.
 
USB is the most desired input in his target market. Coaxial allows for 24 bit input. That is a pretty good combination.

 

[artears]

I loved JH3A when I listened to them with the JH16s and I think that combo was the hit of the meet.  This is why I was reading the thread to see what others think about it. However, I fail to understand why some members here try to defend the lack of optical input. There are some downsides with the concept, one being that the iem and JH-3A cannot be used separately and the other being the lack of optical input. I don't mind the former, but the latter is important IMHO. Although iriver ihp1x0s are out of production, a lot of members here still own them. There are also portable cd-players and notebooks with optical out. So, an optical input will surely be an important feature to have. Only coax won't make the system that portable considering the need for another device to bypass ADC in the device. If JH3A comes to the market without an optical input, I don't think I will invest in another product just to have coax, I will only use it with analog input and rely on ADC chip inside. The demo unit already sounded great with ipad's analog output.
 
Having said that, I will order it in some near future, that's for sure, but I still think optical input would be a wise option to have...

 

[tigon_ridge]

 
Quote:

Well. We're talking really portable. Not notebook, not netbooks. But portable music players. Like the H1x0. They have optical S/PDIF in and out. So why and where to put in a sound card in such devices? Why walking around with an additional optical to coaxial converter if the simplest solution would be just to add an optical input to the JH-3A? And talking about new soundcards for a notebook or netbook. Are there many notebooks and netbooks where you can just put in another soundcard?  And as I understand there are many Apple users here, I don't think Apple will ever let you decide what soundcard you want. External soundcards? Well, you still have to connect them to your device. Via which connector? Hmmm, USB? And is it still portable then? Well, in the end you could also go with a full size solution as you wouldn't be able to walk around with all that conversion and/or additional gear anyway.
 
Btw, yes, I'm yearning for an optical input for the JH-3A, but not because I think coax is inferior quality wise to optical (the specs say it's the other way around), but I think there are many devices out there that have optical output but no coaxial. So, I rather have an inferior digital way than having to go the analog one... And it would be just an additional option, not one OR the other.
 
Btw2: My notebook also has optical S/PDIF output. I think it's not unusual for other notebooks either...

Let's hope Jerry will develop a future "JH-4A PortaPro" that has the additional function of being a 24bit/192kHz-capable player! Talk about the ultimate portable audio system...

 

[tigon_ridge]

Quote:

I loved JH3A when I listened to them with the JH16s and I think that combo was the hit of the meet.  This is why I was reading the thread to see what others think about it. However, I fail to understand why some members here try to defend the lack of optical input. There are some downsides with the concept, one being that the iem and JH-3A cannot be used separately and the other being the lack of optical input. I don't mind the former, but the latter is important IMHO. Although iriver ihp1x0s are out of production, a lot of members here still own them. There are also portable cd-players and notebooks with optical out. So, an optical input will surely be an important feature to have. Only coax won't make the system that portable considering the need for another device to bypass ADC in the device. If JH3A comes to the market without an optical input, I don't think I will invest in another product just to have coax, I will only use it with analog input and rely on ADC chip inside. The demo unit already sounded great with ipad's analog output.
 
Having said that, I will order it in some near future, that's for sure, but I still think optical input would be a wise option to have...

I'm at the point where I'm not too concerned about the optical or coaxial input option subject. I'm still not very convince that "high-res" will make that big a difference. I do think, however, that going from from analog to digital, to analog again would be a mistake. Why would you go through an extra step of conversion, even if you have the highest-end DAC in the world? I'm speculating that that would yield worse sound than going from 16bit/44kHz straight to the mini-usb in. Remember that DACs generally also add a bit of coloring to the original signal (for better or worse).

 

[DTSyX]

Quote:

Let's hope Jerry will develop a future "JH-4A PortaPro" that has the additional function of being a 24bit/192kHz-capable player! Talk about the ultimate portable audio system...

Yeah, that'd be really cool!
 
I guess I'd buy that one...

 

[artears]

Quote:

I'm at the point where I'm not too concerned about the optical or coaxial input option subject. I'm still not very convince that "high-res" will make that big a difference. I do think, however, that going from from analog to digital, to analog again would be a mistake. Why would you go through an extra step of conversion, even if you have the highest-end DAC in the world? I'm speculating that that would yield worse sound than going from 16bit/44kHz straight to the mini-usb in. Remember that DACs generally also add a bit of coloring to the original signal (for better or worse).

 
I agree in what you are saying about going through another conversion giving worse sound quality compared to staying all digital until the amp section, or better said, the quality will be very much related to ADC section in the device and probably not on par with all digital. However, I guess you missed my point or maybe I was not very clear. Because of the very same reason of bypassing ADC in JH3A, I would love to see an optical input in the device, since an optical input will only increase the possibilities for compatibility with various devices. Only coax will make things bulkier due to having the need for another device to stay digital at all times. I only want to have JH3A and a second device storing my music archive, which will be my iriver ihp-140 in that case. I don't understand the reasoning behind members defending the lack of the optical input in JH3A.
 
BTW, even with the analog input from ipad, the sound quality was better than a lot of setups I had chance listening to. At the end, I would prefer having all digital, but if there is no optical input, I would not hesitate using analog just to avoid the extra bulkiness that an additional device for coax conversion can bring to the table...
 
IMHO, the only important downside of the system would be the lack of optical input, if the design stays the same as the prototype. But, I also think that this should be mentioned as a negative point too. There is no need to find excuses to justify the lack of it.
 
I am trying to be as objective as possible here, I still think that this product was the most impressive one in the meet and easily bested a lot of setups. I know that I will order it also, but although it is a very big step towards the perfect iem setup, the lack of optical does not make it perfect IMHO.

 

[khaos974]

It is strange that even fed from the analog out of an ipad, it would still sound so good (as is better than good source + good amp + good headphones for those for whom the JH combo was the best of canjam).
It either means:
 

1. the "garbage is, garbage out" truism is untrue and that improvement in any link of the chain will improve SQ ie. no bottleneck factor and "garbage in, diamonds out" can happen.
2. that the ipad analog out is actually really good.
3. that most dacs are good enough so satisfy any audiophile and the ipad's dac is no exception to this rule.
4. JH pulled out a rabbit out of its magic hat, the sound is improved somehow, the mystery remains.

 
Well I could have forgotten an hypothesis, but my point still stands.

 

[cooperpwc]

Quote:

 

It is strange that even fed from the analog out of an ipad, it would still sound so good (as is better than good source + good amp + good headphones for those for whom the JH combo was the best of canjam).
 ....that the ipad analog out is actually really good.
 

FTW I am guessing. iPhone 3GS line out is certainly excellent.

 

[tigon_ridge]

Quote:

It is strange that even fed from the analog out of an ipad, it would still sound so good (as is better than good source + good amp + good headphones for those for whom the JH combo was the best of canjam).
It either means:
 

1. the "garbage is, garbage out" truism is untrue and that improvement in any link of the chain will improve SQ ie. no bottleneck factor and "garbage in, diamonds out" can happen.
2. that the ipad analog out is actually really good.
3. that most dacs are good enough so satisfy any audiophile and the ipad's dac is no exception to this rule.
4. JH pulled out a rabbit out of its magic hat, the sound is improved somehow, the mystery remains.

 
Well I could have forgotten an hypothesis, but my point still stands.

I somehow think the perfect phase alignment and timing, and the 3-way amping may have made up for the slight loss in audio quality from the AD-to-DA process. Which means that if the prototype + universal JH16 were that good at the meet, we can only imagine how much better the final product using digital input + custom JH1x could be...

 

[artears]

Well, since I did not say it was the best of everything and only said better than most, I think you did not address your post to me, however I also want to say some things after seeing your list of hypothesis:
 
I believe transducers will make the most significant change in the chain, then comes the source and the amp as the last one. JH-16s seem to be very much comparable to the best headphones on the market. Believe me, I was really skeptical about this. This is why I had my custom IEMs with me. I compared them to the universal JH-13s and 16s. I was expecting to hear a worse or similar sound to my customs simply because of the better fitting. But the universal JH iems were better than my customs. I was really surprised. I love my home setup and I will continue using it, even if I get this JH combo, but this combo seems to be the best in the portable world and was in fact better than most desktop setups. The IEMs are a big part of this equation. Considering that they removed the weakest link in the IEMs and replaced it with something much better, we can say overall quality of the IEMs are increased as well. This is not considering the DAC and the amp...
 
I also believe in the synergy of components, so this JH combo has the highest synergy possible in that kind of setup.
 
I am not a fan of ipod, in fact, ipods do not satisfy me in terms of sq. I have no basis of comparison of ipad to other ipods or to my mp3 players, because I simply did not have them with me. I don't know if ipad's line out is really good, but I very much liked ipad line out -> jh3a -> universal jh16s I liked this combo a lot and it was better than most setups, that's a fact for me. I had a hypothesis of iems not sounding as good as a nice setup, but testing the hypothesis proved me otherwise.
 
Skepticism is good and I can easily relate since the comments here about a product can make you believe that it is the next best thing to sliced bread, however being sarcastic about something you did not audition is also not a reasonable thing to do...
 
I will not make any further comments on this. I just wanted to share my opinion...

 

[qusp]

wow lots of stuff to answer here, sorry for the long post, but seems there is some confusion in the ranks
 
Quote:

It really isn't about ruggedness ... they are paired, and essentially useless without one another so unpairing them seems like a rare event anyways. its about data transmission and cleanliness. it looks like a clusterf*, when while your deprecating the old connection essentially due to the pairing, you're free to move forward in design and tech for connecting the IEM. the old design would seem like the new bottleneck. i just think its forcing the old pin arrangement in the new reference which clearly has higher demands as far as channel separation from the adaptation of the old 2 pin to the new 2x2pin *(which is garish), square peg/round hold. i would go for a single ended high bit rate (hbr) multichannel (up to 4 triad pair channels in some cases; 4x(3 pins; 2 channels - 1 ground)) connector that is small enough for the IEMs ... just my observation, if i could ask jerry i would: pm his email if you guys have it.
 

 

I think you have missed the vital DAC with digital XO stage, before you start trying to tell them what to do, maybe read up a bit, because I really dont think you understand the concepts at play here. I agree there could be a better connector, but bitrate waah?? the wires used already will take any 'bitrate' you throw at them. adding more wires will not make any difference at all and optical is plain weird I dont know what you mean. the dac is in the dac/amp, not in the IEM, the crossover is digital too, thats the whole point of this was to take it OUT of the IEM to somewhere that could do the required processing and have enough room and power to do so in a sophisticated way; that requires a combination of hardware AND software. 
 
besides, optical cables would be microphonic as hell
 
Quote:

 
I talked to Matt while evaluating the Solo prototype.  He decided by the Woolfson DAC because it is more advanced than the version installed in the iMods, yet the power requirements are still within the limits of the 5V USB-out of the iDevices.  This revelation had dawned on me after a totally separate 1-on-1 I had with Fang about his HFM-801 design decisions.  Fang very patiently and clearly explained that high-end DAC chipsets (no doubt DSPs as well) have much higher power requirements than low- or mid-grade 16/44 implementations.  Now there are still differences even with those, because a quality 16/44 chipset with an accurate clock and low jitter parameters will sound noticeably better than without.  Bottom line is that the Solo is using the best DAC chipset available today that can be powered from an iDevice dock on-the-go.
 

well actually the sabre is 3v3 volts, but around 200-250ma which could be a problem. I mentioned the wolfston, because its a dac that is not being used in the way we would connect it here. does the solo really take its power from the idevice/usb host?? wow that would chew battery
 
Quote:

Jerry just let me know that the final build WILL ACCEPT 16/44 audio from the mini USB.
 
I'm not certain what his actual intentions are in this regard, but he also said that taking 24/192 from the USB input would add $250-300 to the cost of the device and take about 6 months to become available.

well there are some new native usb 2.0 audio chips that will do it that are available now at digikey, but yeah development would take a little while, the PCM270X reciever he is probably using is OK, but jitter can be a  bit of an issue. I wonder if they could do any ASRC to upsample/resample it. I agree though that going hirez usb would take time and money to develope and would also add a higher power overhead; which is most likely already stressed with a multichannel dac/amp in a portable
 
Quote:

... whats the rush? fix the output connector to something optical, ive checked out some AOC cables and they are small enough to keep the signal digital all the way through to the BA's with clear channel separation on a SINGLE ended termination point on the IEMs themselves. why skimp on the connector. it doesnt need to be standard, just available. it already costs $1750 ... whats an extra $250 and superior SQ through a usb port?
 
@thread can you please PM Jerry's email information (thanks) i would like to email him about the engineering aspects of this amp. they said they were open to see what people were looking for. i would like to see what he thinks.
 
thanks

 
USELESS INFO BELOW:
something that has _NOTHING_ to do with ANYTHING on this site: i was just finished with this post and looked over at the juice bottle on my desk its Simply Limeade which is produced in Apopka Florida ... LOL.

 
I would think before doing that, send him emails with this jibberish and he wont know what to say

Quote:

So if I understand it right, the [size=medium][size=medium][size=medium]AlgoRhythm Solo extracts digital audio from an iPod and also has a dac on board, next to a digal output for the JH-3a.[/size][/size][/size]
Does it extract high-res also, and if so how does one get high-res audio into an iPod?

none of the old range of ipods support hirez files, the codec they use downsamples to 16/44 even when you can actually play them (hirez flac with rockbox) the iphone G4 apparently supports WAV, ALAX and AIFF, I suppose there is a possibility it will do hidef, it has hidef digi camera, and I would bet the processor used will support hires audio, maybe even multichannel....
 

that sucks
 
so its about the cable makers, not eliminating one of the last minute bottlenecks? what happens when they design a custom connector and R&D is finished ... JH-6A? if hes trying to innovate, then put it out there, so far out that other companies cant adapt fast enough, to keep up with the 6-8-12 month cycle JHA has been churning. id go optical with an hbr AOC chip in the the connector.wire and that chip will convert the optical electrical signal into an electrical signal for the BAs in the IEM ... but thats just me. why leave it for the next amp, design it right the first time. squeeze it out! it simplifies the connection to the IEM that way you can clean up that 2x2 structure that they are using now.

huh the cable makers haha not me
Quote:

it isnt more conversions, no need to convert the signal to analog from the amp itself to the cable to begin with. the signal conversion (optical electrical to electrical) is taken care of in the connector (a special AOC chip is necessary, which is similar in size to an XLR connector) which is powered by the amp. no need for a chip in the earpiece (which is what precipitated the new amp in the first place). also the connector wouldnt take up more space than the 2x2 they have in place. your also not limited to 4 channels with one ground per ear ... you could have also send the signal balanced to each driver if you wanted with a high enough bandwidth. i would surmise that a digital file at 24/192 would benefit from that.
 

ps: can the iphone4 play back 24.192 aac, flac, or alac (if apple even sells music with such a BR)?

I say go out there and make it yourself man; you go boy!! some could say the same about me I guess, but I wouldnt even pretend to have the knowledge and knowhow to do what matt has done here, even if I feel there were a few things that could have been done differently, I still think this thing is way cool as is.
Quote:

Current laptops don't support 3.0, except for the new ones. 2.0 definitely can't support the massive bit rate of HD music files. Anyone thinking of going out to buy a brand new laptop just to listen to their audiophile setup in HD? Yes, I know some of you have plenty of extra cash lying around, but I'm speaking to the majority. Is there a real purpose to a usb>spdif converter other than to eliminate jitter (I'm assuming that's one of its functions) and expanding compatibility with a spdif-only DAC? Converting usb 2.0 to spdif doesn't change the fact that the usb 2.0 circuitry on the motherboard can't handle the high bit rate (EDIT: on second thought, maybe it can).
 
(2nd EDIT: Okay, it definitely can. I just found products that can convert to spdif up to 24bit/92kHz. One thing I'm curious of is does the computer still automatically bypasses the onboard sound circuitry to the external DAC if there's a usb/spdif converter + spdif cable in between? I'm guessing not, because such spdif-input-only DACs don't have the firmware for usb plug-and-play. In which case, how would you configure the operating system to bypass the onboard sound and send signals to the usb port?)

hehehe USB2 handles 400mbit; hidef audio wouldnt even take up 2% of the bandwidth and there is already a native, driverless hidef USB 2.0 audio codec running on mac, though not PC yet. The only hidef USB on PC is proprietary like the hiface which needs a driver, which wont be supported on ipad, but i'm hoping they port the USB audio codec over to ipad/iphone 4.
 
yes it does bypass the audio hardware, its only sending data, which is buffered and then converted, then reclocked in some cases.
 
sorry I dont know what you are on about in the last bit, dacs do indeed often have what is called a USB receiver, which does a similar job to the convertors you found, but internally in the dac and the conversion is most often to i2s rather than spdif; so the audio is just sent as data, which is buffered in the reciever, then with good devices the clock component is thrown away and a new low jitter clock generated and passed on along with the music data to the DAC. in the case of the convertor you mention, the dac just needs to accept spdif or AES, be it optical, coax (RCA or BNC generally, but like this and some laptops a 2 terminal mini can be used)
 
to sum it up, the bandwidth with usb was never the problem, USB 1 has enough bandwidth, the problem has been a lack of software and USB receivers that could decode the audio data in hidef. hasnt been really implemented until fairly recently, but there has been a spate of new devices come to market in the last 6 months and more even recently like the native driverless USB 2.0 audio codec

 

[GreenLeo]

I would like the JH3A that can handle SDXC cards rather than any digital inputs.  Then this would be a super HiFiman801.  Don't get me wrong: I'm not a fanboy of 801 or any gears but good music.  The only thing that I didn't like of the 801 is its amp because the SQ of the lineout to an external amp could better.  I know that I may be flamed here but this has been my long term opinion.  But the effective unlimited storage of the 801 is definitely a merit.  The amp synergy is another nasty thing and now the JH3A has taken care of.
 
I don't like the i-device to the JH3A idea at the moment because the i-device cannot play hires files.  I don't care if it really matters (personally I believe it does matter SQ wise) but the thought that my system JH3A cannot be optimized in this aspect is a dealbreaker to me.

 

[qusp]

any impressions on how natural the JH3a sounds? with all this trickery it would be easy for it to sound mindblowing and detailed, but fatiguing, I suppose nobody has ;listened to it long enough to answer this yet.
from
 what I gather this doesnt sound to be the case, but keen to hear some more in depth reviews after people have lived with it for a while. 
plus
 there is nothing stopping other companies for developing a driver unit of their own for this, definitely a tall order without being jerry/matt but doable