Radsone EarStudio ES100
Aug 14, 2018 at 5:47 PM Post #2,116 of 6,673
Just signed up for Tidal 30 days trail... And boy did the sound quality take me to another level with LDAC+ES100... I highly recomend switching from Spotify to Tidal if you want even better SQ! Even tho I lost around 20/500 songs because Tidal's got bit lower song quantity in their library.
I heard a minimal difference in quality with Tidal, a bit more dynamics & resolution. In the end though, discovery of new music is better with Spotify not to mention the UI is a lot better than Tidal, Tidal reminds me of Amazon Music app lol.
 
Aug 14, 2018 at 6:07 PM Post #2,117 of 6,673
Am I deaf? I’m using es100 in usb-mode hooked up to my iphone. HP is HD660S. There is not a big difference between this little fella and the mojo. The mojo maybe a little clearer, mor detailed and more natural but I really need to sit down and listen to spot and big differences. They are more similar than different, but the price is much higher for the mojo..

Need to do a bit more listening. Will be buying balances cable for hd660s soon, I wonder if it will sound better.

I don’t know if I’m impressed with es100 or disappointed with the mojo. Anybody else in a similar position?
From a too brief listen last year it seems to me the Chord Mojo is overdue for a price cut. What does it do better than the now cheaper RHA L1, or the Pro-ject Pre Box S2? Chord themselves didn’t seem to have a lot riding on the Mojo anymore at the show where I heard it: they’d paired it with a mediocre, discontinued model from Focal. That’s also why I was so underwhelmed, I know it can do better!

The Earstudio takes us all the way to the Land of Diminishing Returns, where Substantial Improvements are paid for with sweat and tears (or lots of cash).
 
Aug 14, 2018 at 7:58 PM Post #2,118 of 6,673
Then wait till qobuz is starting worldwide.
I use a sublime+ subscription with up to 24/192 streaming (most is in 88.2 or 96).

(Yes i know, 24 Bit and high sample rates is only for guys with golden ears and differences to 16/44.1 are more imagination than reality. - But: the mastering delivered by the studios for stuff available in 24 bit is very often much better. - And the better mastering makes the main difference.)
All mastering is done in 24/32 bit (often float nowadays). 16bit downsamlling is done with additional dithering which goes beyond anyones ears resolution. If anyone does remastering - they release it in 16 bit almost always. Because this is where it pays off. Very few things remastered for 24bit release only and somehow prohibited from 16 bit distribution.
 
Aug 14, 2018 at 8:44 PM Post #2,119 of 6,673
All mastering is done in 24/32 bit (often float nowadays). 16bit downsamlling is done with additional dithering which goes beyond anyones ears resolution. If anyone does remastering - they release it in 16 bit almost always. Because this is where it pays off. Very few things remastered for 24bit release only and somehow prohibited from 16 bit distribution.

Yes and no.
Though more and more Studios/Distributors are using the original Studio master for all their distribution channels, it's still usual for most of them that this original studio master is getting re-edited before it's getting to be released to these channels.(sometimes even a totally different person is doing those reedits - maybe even for every channel an extra person.)

(and this has nothing to do with a re-release of a album as remastered Version or something like this. - cause for this a new Studio master gets created)

Radio often gets more brick-walled as it has to be loud to be noticed
the master for the Premaster (often a DDP Fileset - needed for creating the physical Glasmaster) for CD is often the same as radio.
Normal Streaming like Spotify sometimes get it's own mastering (surprisingly less brick-walled than CD) but often CD master is used.
Due technical reasons a Vinyl release gets its own master. (if a vinyl is pressed :wink: - sometimes the master is the same as for SACD and so on)
If the Mastered for iTunes badge is wanted (which includes extra promo on iTunes for free or at least discounted) the master for apple need to be inside special limits. So they get a own master (or the same as next one)
And SACD/DVD-Audio or other highres stuff like hdtracks and qobuz -- //edit: and also Tidal Masters (MQA)


Normally at least least one 16-bit (CD and digital distribution) and one 24-bit Master which have different normalizer/limiter settings (resulting in different dynamic) are produced and distributed.
(all the talk is more or less independent from bitdepth and samplerate adjustments)


//edit: as example take a look at one of the first search results i found on this topic:
https://www.justmastering.com/rates.php
Even the standard Service includes:
"16-bit (CD and digital distribution), 24-bit (Mastered for iTunes) plus standard 128kbps and high quality 320kbps Mp3 master formats provided"

//another edit: i often notice at qobuz that the provide at least 2 different masters for the same release.
If i set the Player to Highres i get a different master which has more dynamic range than when i set quality to CD.
(I have confirmed it for myself and a friend by using a tool which can directly download the flac from their servers and used TT DR Offline Meter on these files - and there was depending on the album a huge difference between them)
 
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Aug 14, 2018 at 9:18 PM Post #2,121 of 6,673
Has anyone used this clip while being active, e.g., at the gym? I read one review in particular on Amazon in which the reviewer praised everything else about this (including the sound) but groused about the "garbage" clip which according to the reviewer doesn't grip very well and is thus "useless." I'm hoping that reviewer is wrong.
 
Aug 14, 2018 at 10:04 PM Post #2,122 of 6,673
Has anyone used this clip while being active, e.g., at the gym? I read one review in particular on Amazon in which the reviewer praised everything else about this (including the sound) but groused about the "garbage" clip which according to the reviewer doesn't grip very well and is thus "useless." I'm hoping that reviewer is wrong.

The clip is lightweight and not particularly "grippy" and I normally put the ES100 in a pocket (shirt/ shorts etc.).Today I was carrying it clipped to a golf type shirt around the neck and I had to make a dash to cross a road before the lights changed. The ES100 flew off when I accelerated into a fairly gentle jog. The good news was, it was so light that it neither disconnected from the cable nor pulled my earphones out. It was a bit disconcerting though swinging around at the end of the cable until I got to the other side of the road.
 
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Aug 14, 2018 at 10:23 PM Post #2,123 of 6,673
Has anyone used this clip while being active, e.g., at the gym? I read one review in particular on Amazon in which the reviewer praised everything else about this (including the sound) but groused about the "garbage" clip which according to the reviewer doesn't grip very well and is thus "useless." I'm hoping that reviewer is wrong.
1) the device is so tiny, I rarely use the clip. Those shorts’ pockets made to hold a locker key? Forget about stuffing your phone in there; but they accomodate the ES100 easy.

2) the clip grips fine. It doesn’t have huge clamping force, but I’m a personal trainer, train 2 to 3 hours a day which often involve upside-down sessions, dynamic inversions, hand balancing or bar work at weird angles and spots of running and treadmill climbing, and I don’t fear losing the ES100.
 
Aug 14, 2018 at 11:10 PM Post #2,124 of 6,673
The following post can be found on p.29 of the thread for the Ifi xDSD. It both proves me right and proves me wrong on the matter of codec support.

Radsone’s claim on the Earstudio’s website of a “proprietary audio processing algorithm optimized for Bluetooth streaming” makes me think they have done their homework on BT jitter elimination in a similar way to Ifi’s. Higher-than-aptX support does indeed sound like it’s much less important than properly clocking the BT signal and feeding it to a capable conversion and amp section.

At the same time Ifi regret not being able to support higher-end codecs this time around, LDAC in particular, not so much for the 24-bit depth but rather for the upgrade to a 96kHz sample rate. They don’t comment on the extent of the improvement that would achieve, they just write it “would make sense.”
Let's talk Bluetooth!

Some comments on X-Series Bluetooth. First, Bluetooth implementations vary widely. Just looking at BT revision level or codec support is not useful to understand sound quality potential of a given Bluetooth device.

Yes, Sub Band Codec (SBC) is seriously hobbled and should not be used for music. A very extensive comparison of Bluetooth codecs (sadly excluding AAC) is found here:
With aptX/aptX HD and AAC, optional codecs are available that perform better than SBC, however codec support is a fairly small issue.

By default, most certified Bluetooth modules only offer analogue outputs, directly from the System On a Chip aka. SOC (CSR/Qualcomm in the upper end devices, others in the rest). To get a digital output for SOCs with that option available, a firmware needs to be changed (which is not trivial) and - because is changed in the process - any agency certification needs to be applied yet again, which costs a nice stack of cash.

So most Bluetooth products rely on a DAC in a chip, to:
  • save money for an extra DAC
  • save money for firmware changes
  • save money for recertification process
The problem is that a DAC/headphone amplifier inside Bluetooth chipsets is usually worse than DAC/headphone amps used in most headphones. For example, let's compare top rated CSR chipset's specs to audio test results of last iPhone with a headphone jack or Apple's lightning to 3.5mm adapter.

With only 96dB dynamic range, aptX HD is wasted in such devices as these only support 16 bit audio on a DAC level and both objective and subjective audio performance from the SOC DAC/headphone amplifier is poor.



To move on, in order to have higher quality Bluetooth audio, we need to bite the bullet and pay developers to enable digital outputs and THEN pay for the recertification of the module according to CE/EMC (European Union) FCC (USA), Giteki (JP) and KCC (Korea) etc. Now we can add an external DAC chip of higher grade.

But hold it, we have another problem. Clocks. The typical Bluetooth SOC chip creates all clocks (those for audio as well) from a single 26MHz crystal via multiple PLLs of 'adequate' quality. The datasheet for the current 'Top of the Line' CSR chip (the only one that supports aptX HD) lists audio clock jitter as a maximum of 21,000pS in 'high quality' mode (more in power saving)!

In order to deliver 16 bit audio without degradation, jitter must be below 243pS!

So the jitter in the audio clocks actually precludes even 16 bit performance by being almost 100 times as large as the 16 bit limit as long as an external DAC (not the one in a Bluetooth chipset) includes means to clean up this jitter. The real performance will be degraded to only around 10 bit worth of actual audio performance.

If a 'high end' version of a given system produces 100x the jitter permissible for 16 bit audio, effectively limits audio to 10 bit and barely manages 16 bit equivalent SNR with volume control maxed out (even where external higher grade DAC's are used, then Bluetooth associated with poor audio quality is a reputation well deserved.

Noise and jitter levels in standard Bluetooth SOCs are comparable to the worst and darkest day of early digital audio, time when the understanding of what caused 'digital/artificial sound' was poor. The best external DAC will not solve this without extra effort spent on clocks.

Let's get real now: the extra bits from aptX HD over aptX are not going help here, even aptX and AAC are probably mostly a wasted effort.

In the xDSD we have the ultimate jitter fighting weapon on-board, in addition to our high quality DAC and a headphone amp, a super precise clock and memory buffer already applied to wired connections.



All in all, squeezing the last drop of quality out of Bluetooth is not hard. After dealing with the wireless side, we simply take digital data from a system associated with it in the same way we treat USB and S/PDIF. And finally we get to a point where we can tell the different codecs apart (and aptX wins).



In the xCAN it was more challenging to get a subsystem to get excellent sound from Bluetooth. We naturally can't fit a full xDSD level circuitry and that's why we cherry-picked ESS Sabre instead of Burr-Brown.

We feel that using the ESS Time Domain Jitter Eliminator to kill the jitter from the Bluetooth SOC is decisive in getting excellent sound quality. The reference clock for the ESS DAC is produced from a discrete oscillator with its own low noise power regulator.



Swap in Burr-Brown (as excellent as it is in our xDSD), run it on Bluetooth clocks and the sound quality suffers severely.

The result of these efforts is a level of sound quality from Bluetooth for both xDSD and xCAN that is not comparable to the majority of Bluetooth products.

And yes, adding aptX HD and even LDAC more than aptX HD (as the extra bits of aptX HD are not very useful whereas the 96kHz maximum supported sample rate of LDAC is) would make sense for xDSD and xCAN. However, it requires a substantial R&D time and was not possible for this year's release cycle.

And lastly, slides used in this post were extracted from the Tokyo Headphone Festival presentation by iFi audio, already published by headpie.net at:

 
Aug 15, 2018 at 12:10 AM Post #2,125 of 6,673
1) the device is so tiny, I rarely use the clip. Those shorts’ pockets made to hold a locker key? Forget about stuffing your phone in there; but they accomodate the ES100 easy.

2) the clip grips fine. It doesn’t have huge clamping force, but I’m a personal trainer, train 2 to 3 hours a day which often involve upside-down sessions, dynamic inversions, hand balancing or bar work at weird angles and spots of running and treadmill climbing, and I don’t fear losing the ES100.

Unfortunately, all but two of the shorts I use at the gym, lack pockets -- so the existing, so I clip my existing el cheapo Bluetooth receiver (a Trond) to the bottom of my shirt. I'm still probably going to get the Radsone in any case and just try it for myself to see if it works for that scenario -- if not, I'll use it for other scenarios.
 
Aug 15, 2018 at 12:26 AM Post #2,126 of 6,673
Unfortunately, all but two of the shorts I use at the gym, lack pockets -- so the existing, so I clip my existing el cheapo Bluetooth receiver (a Trond) to the bottom of my shirt. I'm still probably going to get the Radsone in any case and just try it for myself to see if it works for that scenario -- if not, I'll use it for other scenarios.
Clipping to the bottom of your shirt definitely won't work. Top of shirt? Yes. Personally I'd just get an arm band or sweat band and clip to that and tie up any cable slack
 
Aug 15, 2018 at 12:36 AM Post #2,127 of 6,673
The following post can be found on p.29 of the thread for the Ifi xDSD. It both proves me right and proves me wrong on the matter of codec support.

Radsone’s claim on the Earstudio’s website of a “proprietary audio processing algorithm optimized for Bluetooth streaming” makes me think they have done their homework on BT jitter elimination in a similar way to Ifi’s. Higher-than-aptX support does indeed sound like it’s much less important than properly clocking the BT signal and feeding it to a capable conversion and amp section.

At the same time Ifi regret not being able to support higher-end codecs this time around, LDAC in particular, not so much for the 24-bit depth but rather for the upgrade to a 96kHz sample rate. They don’t comment on the extent of the improvement that would achieve, they just write it “would make sense.”

To a large degree, the fact that the range is 24-bit in AptX HD does compensate for not going higher than 48KHz, especially when considering the jitter (time domain imprecision) is large with the Bluetooth chain as this article points out.

My understanding is that the ESS SoC the 9218, like it's DAC only cousins (9018, 9023, 9028 and 9038) has an excellent jitter elimination process, that helps isolate the incoming jitter through some kind of async internal clock feedback system (don't quote me on that - that's just my best interpretation) providing a robustness that is similar, but more flexible than reclocking alone - with more parallel units of this async time domain recovery aggregating a more smooth clock like a kind of tiny analog buffer - hence the Quad DAC term, it's just a way of providing protection from external components increasing the jitter, the 9018 has 8 parallel units averaging out together to make a much smoother clock.

I think the AK 4375a has some jitter elimination, but the ESS chips I believe are the best at this.

I don't know how this relates to Bluetooth jitter - with USB, clocking comes either as isosynchronous, asynchronous or adaptive.

Isosynchronous uses the source clock for the DAC - not the best since the timing is determined by the USB data stream clock which is not designed for audio precision.
Asynchronous uses another clock at the sink and forces the data stream to buffer, with the source being a slave to filling it as soon as the sink is ready for more data - this is the best for USB audio, allowing any type of DAC clock to force the data stream to follow it.
The last mode, adaptive, doesn't reclock like asynchronous, but tries to compensate frames - the ESS chipset is good enough to compensate even further and allow for close to asynchronous like clocking smoothness.

Now the ES100 uses a kind of isosynchronous mode for Bluetooth timing - @wslee mentioned earlier in this thread, but I think the data is possibly reshaped to more closely resemble the original intended clock like an adaptive mode would or something to that effect, which may well be the best method if you can't simply improve the timing of the original data.

Please @wslee, if it's not too proprietary, enlighten us further.
 
Aug 15, 2018 at 1:34 AM Post #2,128 of 6,673
Unfortunately, all but two of the shorts I use at the gym, lack pockets -- so the existing, so I clip my existing el cheapo Bluetooth receiver (a Trond) to the bottom of my shirt. I'm still probably going to get the Radsone in any case and just try it for myself to see if it works for that scenario -- if not, I'll use it for other scenarios.

For all those questioning the clip, it was found a great and easy solution was attaching a small amount off Velcro / hook loop (only 1 side) to the inside worked wonders to increase friction and fix all concerns!
 
Aug 15, 2018 at 3:43 AM Post #2,129 of 6,673
earstudio_symphonio.jpg
Now, my other headphones either sound better wired (Focal Elear balanced 80 Ohm) or about the same (MSR7 unbalanced 35 Ohm) as through the Earstudio but these new earsbuds, the Symphonio Dragon 2+ (32Ohm balanced) sound a little better....

The functionality is superb now, really easy to handle portable sound, earbuds straight in, clip it on and switch it on.:dt880smile:
 
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Aug 15, 2018 at 5:30 AM Post #2,130 of 6,673
@wslee

Feature request time:

The ability to “lock” the maximum analogue volume of the device?

Bonus: a small tone or beep when that maximum limit is reached.

I.e. I really don’t want to go above -25.0 dB, even though I know it can, I am worried about damaging my ears and my IEM.

If I set this I know I can just push the volume up buttok the device without having to check if I’ve gone over on my phone!

Thanks again for an amazing device, I love it and use it everyday!
 

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