[Kiont]

The Schiit website was quite critical of USB before they updated the USB board. They said it was like "telling a chef to make a great meal but he could only use McDonalds hamburgers" or something like that. All that talk has been removed, so they must think the new board is quite a step up over the old one.

If you have an optical or coax out on your source I would pass on the USB though.

I think this USB board should much better than the old one.
Jason mentioned on an email that optical is usually better than USB.

But that "better" is most likely barely noticeable.

 

[judmarc]

Quote:

Thanks Jud.  Have you tried the volume control in A+ with your Bifrost?  I believe that yours has the updated USB if I remember.
 
John

 
Nope, have a great preamp to do analog volume, so there's never been a reason to fiddle with digital volume control in A+.

 

[judmarc]

Quote:

I think this USB board should much better than the old one.
Jason mentioned on an email that optical is usually better than USB.

But that "better" is most likely barely noticeable.

 
In my particular setup, USB sounds better than optical.
 
This is very changeable system to system (how much jitter comes from your optical source and your coax? how much electrical noise through your coax and USB? does your software player provide oversampling, and how does it compare to the DAC chip's internal oversampling? do you want to play files that originate at or are oversampled to higher than 96kHz, and is your optical output hardware capable of this?), so blanket statements about most systems aren't IMO terribly helpful.

 

[Shimunogora]

I installed the USB Gen 2 card today.
 
Here's the album:
http://imgur.com/a/8JEGc

 

[paradoxper]

Perfect documentation. Glad all went well! Now impressions. 

 

[digitalzed]

Quote:

I installed the USB Gen 2 card today.
 
Here's the album:
http://imgur.com/a/8JEGc

Thanks for the photo's! The emory board (nail filer) is a great idea to help realign the LED's. My USB and Analog cards will arrive tomorrow so this is really timely for me. Thanks again for posting photos.

 

[elwappo99]

Quote:

I installed the USB Gen 2 card today.
 
Here's the album:
http://imgur.com/a/8JEGc

 
Great work! This looks a lot easier than I would have imagined! 
 
Quote:

Perfect documentation. Glad all went well! Now impressions. 

 
He just got it installed! We shouldn't be so demanding.
 
But really, we want impressions now

 

[flargosa]

to align the led lights, install the board to the outer shell first.  Then use fingers to push the led lights to its hole.  Then installed the rear board.  This is what I did to finally get the led lights to line up.  By the way Uber analog board has clearer sound and meatier bass.  

 

[Shimunogora]

Perfect documentation. Glad all went well! Now impressions. 

I don't exactly have trained ears, nor do I pay much attention to detail, but here are my (very uninformed and unanalytical) comments:

The sound quality is poor compared to the optical that I've been using for the past few months (Toslink out of a Xonar DG @ AHD-2000s). I can't exactly explain the quality difference (as I'm not good at pointing out specifics), but the sound is definitely less full. It is not something I would recommend adding unless you absolutely need it or it would be practical enough to use over optical/coax (though I think this is given). I didn't have the Gen 1, however, so I can't really comment on that. If you're hoping that it could replace SPDIF input then no, it's not quite there. My USB ports might just be cheap, though.

 

[internethandle]

Call me crazy but do Shimunogora's pictures show he already has the "Uber" board installed as well? Those two large caps, in particular, are definitely not on my stock non-Uber Bifrost's board, and the discrete output topology looks a lot more like Gungnir's. Maybe I missed where he said he had that already.

 

[HK_sends]

Quote:

I installed the USB Gen 2 card today.
 
Here's the album:
http://imgur.com/a/8JEGc

Thanks for the pictures!
 
Cheers!

-HK sends

 

[Shimunogora]

Call me crazy but do Shimunogora's pictures show he already has the "Uber" board installed as well? Those two large caps, in particular, are definitely not on my stock non-Uber Bifrost's board, and the discrete output topology looks a lot more like Gungnir's. Maybe I missed where he said he had that already.

As far as I am aware I do not have the Uber board. I got my Bifrost in late January (after about a one-month wait on backorders) and I haven't upgraded it since.

Edit: Bif4399ana V2.30 is what is printed on the board

 

[Sanlitun]

Quote:

Call me crazy but do Shimunogora's pictures show he already has the "Uber" board installed as well? Those two large caps, in particular, are definitely not on my stock non-Uber Bifrost's board, and the discrete output topology looks a lot more like Gungnir's. Maybe I missed where he said he had that already.

 
Interesting. It's different than the board pictures of the Bifrost on the Schiit website. 
 
Maybe a manufacturing revision? Or maybe he got an Uber somehow.

 

[EraserXIV]

His is clearly different than the picture provided of the stock analog stage of the Bifrost on the Schiit website. The topology does look much more similar to the analog stage of the Gungnir. You can see something at the top of the PCB that looks like "v2.3", can't make out the other words though. Also, if you look you can also see that it says "Thanks to Siegfried Erda and Loge" at the edge of the PCB, that line also shows up on the analog stages of the Gungnir on the Schiit website. Maybe there have been unannounced revisions to the Bifrost, or maybe he got lucky and got a free Uber board 

 

[Sanlitun]

I got my Bifrost in March. 
 
I guess I have to ponder if I already have an Uber. I suppose I will find out for certain when my board arrives.
 
If I look closely at Shimunagora's pics I can still see what I think are output caps tho. Can't really tell.
 
What we need is a pic of the Uber.