[Paul Staples]

I would have thought the clock that governs the audio output (i.e. Pink Faun i2s bridge) is what matters.

thank you! ...please present your evidence that supports this claim, i.e. your factualised evidence that makes you state such a claim in the first instance, to convince me beyond all doubt that this is indeed the case. Cheers!

...(bearing in mind that a chain is only as strong as its weakest link)

 

[Paul Staples]

I do think the 100Mhz clock inside the lks004 is the element that limit the lks004 performances. What is possible upgrade here ? Pulsar ? I saw someone was about to perform the mod, but he doesn’t post anymore. The board seems to be ready for a Dip-socket type, which make Pulsar mod a huge possibility.

Also wonder if replacing Nichicon fine gold into Audio grade Nichicon capacitors, it may improve the performances too 47mF

I am still doubtful all this: "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis" ...can make to the purity of the audio sound/music? I have recently looked at websites selling PRO AUDIO recording equipment e.g. http://www.inta-audio.com/pc-builder/select_base#selected_unit_6 ...and non of them say anything about "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis", despite advertising very expensive microphone and electric instrumentation interfaces like "focusrite" and PRO vocal microphones! Surely if these PC's are for recording professionals they do not consider that "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis" are all that important to the quality of a professional recording? If they did think that "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis" was critically important to the recording process - THEY WOULD USE THEM! ...but it appears - they DON'T!

 

[xiamen]

I am still doubtful all this: "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis" ...can make to the purity of the audio sound/music? I have recently looked at websites selling PRO AUDIO recording equipment e.g. http://www.inta-audio.com/pc-builder/select_base#selected_unit_6 ...and non of them say anything about "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis", despite advertising very expensive microphone and electric instrumentation interfaces like "focusrite" and PRO vocal microphones! Surely if these PC's are for recording professionals they do not consider that "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis" are all that important to the quality of a professional recording? If they did think that "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis" was critically important to the recording process - THEY WOULD USE THEM! ...but it appears - they DON'T!

Unfortunately, you would never know if something is worth it until you listen to it yourself. May be there are showrooms near you where you can listen for free and make your own judgement. The link you referred to may be a shop with great microphones, but the spec of their "music pc" are pretty ordinary in my book. While would you need Thunderbolt 3 or 64 GB of memory for a music server http://www.inta-audio.com/pc-builder/select_base#selected_unit_6 ? Anyway, it appears you are a Pink Faun fan. So here is a real music server in my book https://www.pinkfaun.com/index.php/products/streaming-audio/pink-faun-streamer-2-16.html. But then their price is many times more.

 

[Paul Staples]

Unfortunately, you would never know if something is worth it until you listen to it yourself. May be there are showrooms near you where you can listen for free and make your own judgement. The link you referred to may be a shop with great microphones, but the spec of their "music pc" are pretty ordinary in my book. While would you need Thunderbolt 3 or 64 GB of memory for a music server http://www.inta-audio.com/pc-builder/select_base#selected_unit_6 ? Anyway, it appears you are a Pink Faun fan. So here is a real music server in my book https://www.pinkfaun.com/index.php/products/streaming-audio/pink-faun-streamer-2-16.html. But then their price is many times more.

there are several other places selling "pro audio" PC's similar to INTA that don't say anything about "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis" but like you say they are usually cheaper than things like pink faun etc. There may be showrooms near me that have things with "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis" etc. I'll look in to it.

 

[xiamen]

there are several other places selling "pro audio" PC's similar to INTA that don't say anything about "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis" but like you say they are usually cheaper than things like pink faun etc. There may be showrooms near me that have things with "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis" etc. I'll look in to it.

Holland is not that far away from you

there are several other places selling "pro audio" PC's similar to INTA that don't say anything about "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis" but like you say they are usually cheaper than things like pink faun etc. There may be showrooms near me that have things with "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis" etc. I'll look in to it.

May be you can go to Pink Faun showroom. Holland is not that far from you right . I have to say I'm skeptical whether you need OCXO clock on everything. I did ask Pink Faun re upgrading motherboard clock. The answer was:

"Thanks for mailing, replacing the motherboards clock is a huge upgrade but is a very delicate job to do. Without any experience it’s a risk to do it yourself. You can send me the board so I can replace the clock, I charge an extra fee of €100 per clock. I can also test the motherboard before shipping it back.
The Z370 board also has a separate clock for the processor, this one is also very important. In our own streamer 2.16 X I replace this clock also.

Best regards / Met vriendelijke groet

Jord Groen, Triple M audio shop"

 

[Paul Staples]

how to build ultimate PC audiophile streamer:

...no mention of: "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis"! ...On the contrary, it actually extols the virtues of using fans!!

http://www.modelpromo.nl/Audio Dandy Streamer Part 2.htm

"Even passively cooled hardware needs a little airflow to work perfectly.
That means that we recommend at least two special 120mm chassis fan's to
generate a little airflow through the chassis.

These chassis fan's are not required for normal working operation but they will
greatly improve the lifespan of your expensive hardware equipment."

 

[Paul Staples]

Holland is not that far away from you

May be you can go to Pink Faun showroom. Holland is not that far from you right . I have to say I'm skeptical whether you need OCXO clock on everything. I did ask Pink Faun re upgrading motherboard clock. The answer was:

"Thanks for mailing, replacing the motherboards clock is a huge upgrade but is a very delicate job to do. Without any experience it’s a risk to do it yourself. You can send me the board so I can replace the clock, I charge an extra fee of €100 per clock. I can also test the motherboard before shipping it back.
The Z370 board also has a separate clock for the processor, this one is also very important. In our own streamer 2.16 X I replace this clock also.

Best regards / Met vriendelijke groet

Jord Groen, Triple M audio shop"

thank you!

 

[Paul Staples]

http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/digi...phase-noise-jitter-crystal-oscillator-93.html

QUOTE:

"24 MHz Crystal
Before you get too far please be sure of what you hope to accomplish upgrading crystals on motherboards and USB interfaces. In both cases jitter or phase noise is not a big issue. Absolute frequency accuracy is not really important either, the tolerances are broad enough that inexpensive crystals work fine. Some applications will use a packaged oscillator, others will use a crystal tied to a gate oscillator. In the latter case swapping a crystal without making the necessary circuit adjustments will certainly not work.

Don't expect either to have any sonic benefit, or any significant or detectable impact on performance. All the clocks connected to them will be completely asynchronous to any audio clock. The one case where there was an issue I encountered was a Via single board computer. However the audio clock/sample rate was 3% low so they could derive it from an internal clock. It did not help anything and no dac I had could lock to it.

Also for both this and for any audio application using a high speed driver (74AC or potato) you can get lower phase noise at the expense of turning your project into a powerful transmitter with a clean reference (NIST already does that with the WWV transmitters), not what you want in the presence of sensitive analog circuits. The cleanest clock drive is a clipped sine wave but that's not exactly want the CMOS circuit want to see.

This stuff is never easy.

There are so many questions to be resolved before any thought of the clock jitter being an aspect.
1) the mobo has a clock modulator to get through FCC testing. It doesn't actually reduce the RFI just spreads it out so the receiver doesn't see it as much. Essentially a jitter modulator/creator. Its everything you don't want for audio.
2) increased EMI from faster edges is often responsible for a "more incisive high end" which is really an artifact.

If you start with a Soekris or Alix board and follow the efforts to make it a low jitter NTP clock source https://www.febo.com/pages/soekris/ you may get positive results. i don't think a conventional motherboard would ever get there. And this would not be a quick project. I do have a couple of the Soekris net4501's i have retired. However for audio its not so simple.

A properly controlled experiment would be really difficult. I think Peter's last remark in the thread mirrors my feelings, neutral but skeptical.

Personally I suggest what I did in the Auraliti L1000- make the whole player in an EMI tight enclosure with the various subsystems well isolated from each other and the EMI well contained so it won't get out.
__________________
Demian Martin
Product Design Services"

 

[xiamen]

how to build ultimate PC audiophile streamer:

...no mention of: "ocxo clock, LPSU, fanless case/chassis"! ...On the contrary, it actually extols the virtues of using fans!!
Streamer Part 2.htm

"Even passively cooled hardware needs a little airflow to work perfectly.
That means that we recommend at least two special 120mm chassis fan's to
generate a little airflow through the chassis.

These chassis fan's are not required for normal working operation but they will
greatly improve the lifespan of your expensive hardware equipment."

Well, the article talks about building an av streamer not an audiophile streamer. Playing blue-ray videos? Anyway, that's not the point. The point is he has a no fan copper cooler on its own. I suppose this will be spouting hot air into the case. Thats where the fans come in I think to remove the hot air. The fanless case like hd-plex or streacom has heat pipes that takes the heat out to the aluminium case. That's while no fans at all. Works well for me.

 

[Paul Staples]

The point is he has a no fan copper cooler on its own, I suppose this will be spouting hot air into the case. That's where the fans come in I think to remove the hot air.

Good point!!

The fanless case like hd-plex or streacom has heat pipes that takes the heat out to the aluminium case.

Yes, I know. I presume there is no significant heat left trapped inside these fanless cases?

 

[Paul Staples]

...at the risk of peer derision, I think this thread has transmuted from the LKS 004 to one concerning media transport solutions; e.g. transport fanless cases, transport/i2s ocxo clocks, transport LPSU, transport mainboard ocxo clock, transport CPU/memory/SSD/HDD requirement, etc. Anyone agree? So, I am going to start a new thread regarding PC transport and I hope you will all join me there soon? B.T.W. please keep posting here regarding the LKS 004 and it's future development. Thanks to everyone so far for their personal opinions, thoughts and advice! Long may it continue 'here' for the LKS 004 (chord dave 'beater') ...China can produce top quality goods at a superior price point compared to Europe & the USA!

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/the-big-big-pc-transport-thread.883782/

 

[Topnikko]

Is anyone here familiar with the NAD M51? I've been living with this DAC for many years now but have the upgrade fever. Would the LKS 004 be a decent upgrade over the M51? Does the LKS 004 decode MQA?

 

[natemact]

In the time it took you to write that you could've found out your MQA question

Honestly, Why do SO MANY refuse to open up another tab on the exact same internet that brought them to HF and find out their typically easy to find answers instantly on their own?? I just smh and then have no choice but to write something like this. I realize you need to learn the ropes around here so think of this more like preventative maintenance. Just please don't rely on the community to be your Google once you get acquainted around here.

I've only spent time with the M51 so can't give you an A/B comparison but from listening to M51 and reading about 004 I can confidently say the 004 has it beat. Why can I say this? Because the M51 is long in the tooth now and there is a long list of dacs I'd take over it currently. If you want to stick with Chi-Fi you can spend around $1K and better the M51 now. Audio-gd D-77 is one of the best examples of $1K if D/S chip based a must...............but I have a sneaking suspicion that neither of these dacs will be on your short list because you want MQA You can find a list of MQA partners at http://www.mqa.co.uk/

Enjoy your time here. Contrary to your first response received, we're actually very nice

 

[Topnikko]

I appreciate the response. I don't need to stick with Chi-Fi...I'm open to any DAC that will give me the most bang for the buck! If you're so inclined please feel free to throw out some other options. FYI, the DAC upgrade was precipitated by an upgrade to my amplification. I'm moving up from the Plinius SA-103 to the new Plinius RA-300.

 

[natemact]

I appreciate the response. I don't need to stick with Chi-Fi...I'm open to any DAC that will give me the most bang for the buck! If you're so inclined please feel free to throw out some other options. FYI, the DAC upgrade was precipitated by an upgrade to my amplification. I'm moving up from the Plinius SA-103 to the new Plinius RA-300.

We used to be a Plinius dealer. I always loved the SA-103. The RA-300 must be quite special! My advice is to start a new thread. Outline your musical preferences, preferred sound signature, ancillary gear and what you want to achieve with the upgrade. Make sure to include what matters most to you as in MQA or not, DSD, D/S, FPGA or R2R, XLR or RCA, try to think of everything so folks don't have to go back and forth with you. Like choosing any component it really comes down process of elimination as there's just too many choices today. So whittle the list down and then try to audition.