[Mr Rick]

Tonight's Syn-full song recommendation:

Suicide Blonde.........INXS

 

[Randolf711]

most-recent Urd internals pic (with revised connection of AC mains hot and neutral lines) does not show any obvious (e.g. coupling transformers as used USB interface for bifrost/gungnir/yggy/BF2) galvanic isolation components for the USB inputs and outputs.

Adding the Urd into the all-USB signal path might add an additional connection from USB cable ground to AC mains ground, however.

@Randolf711 Was the Mac a laptop (and running off internal power with no other AC-line powered peripherals connected) or a desktop / tower unit using AC power?
happy belated birthday to you!,
glad Fedex didn't destroy your Urd

Thank you for the birthday wishes! I ran a laptop without power connected.

 

[theeclone]

Why do you claim that it's all about timing issues? You could have for example a ground loop that does not mess with the DAC clocks but affects the analog output. Or high frequency switching noise that is aliased by DAC nonlinearities (a DAC is electrically nonlinear, right?) into the audible range. While the clocks go merrily on. Archimago, who is no wooly subjectivist, showed with measurements when USB isolators can be helpful. TL; DR "it's these single-ended devices that are much more prone to ground loops and other noise." Not jitter.

I see you updated with a link. I'm not convinced that one graph showing no significant sidebands on a plot when testing one particular set of Topping gear really supports the claims being made about jitter (though I can think of another forum that might be very receptive to this position). He's basically saying the isolator ultimately improves signal to noise in this case, which we're now supposed to believe is the only thing they're good for? Let's just say I know from experience that signal to noise is not my top concern.

Plus he kind of lost me here:

"Apologies to those looking for a subjective 'How does it sounds?' section to this review. There's simply no need to write paragraphs describing whether sound stage expanded, transients changed, bass got deeper or treble extended beyond the frequency range audible to dogs. When a system is well isolated and you're using a DAC with excellent temporal performance (ie. low jitter), it just sounds like 'Bits are Bits'"

Finally you've admitted that noise can make its way into the analog section. Well, depending on the design of the DAC, and what level of abstraction we're talking about, there's very likely a clock there, if not very nearby. Many DAC designs put the clock right next to the chip, which is then connected to the analog output stage. I don't understand the claims being made here that buffering and USB implementations can magically eliminate any effects of noise on this clock, which comes after the USB. Also, I could be wrong, but from what I understand galvanic isolation isn't a failsafe in this regard either.

 

[matthia]

IMO it improves the sound considerably. It noticeably lowers the sound floor and the quality of the sound got a huge boost. I am using Apple Music lossless. Urd is made for someone like myself who prefers CD and supplements that with streaming. I used to own a roon nucleus and streaming through the Urd sounds much, much better than when I streamed through a computer or the Roon Nucleus.

Thanks, that is really great!
Maybe @Jason Stoddard cares to share some details how the USB signal is improved in the Urd?

Matt

 

[US Blues]

...Of the protos I'm working on, we have one new-ish thing in 3 variants--and that is getting to near completion, and you'll see something from that soon, because shockingly it was simpler than I expected--and one completely new thing, which we'll see how it goes. That one won't be measured in how much I get done on them at the end of every day.

Haven't you told us in the past that when things seem simple is when the problems arise?

j/k- Glad to hear that new toys will be bankrupting available to us soon!

 

[US Blues]

It sounds fantastic! I’m comparing unison out vs AES and leaning towards AES so far but the differences are small.

 

[matthia]

In regards to the usb out or AES out, I was comparing CD sound quality and not streaming at that point- sorry for the confusion. I have used the Mac straight to the Yggy and so far the Urd does seem to improve the quality of the sound. But please don’t take it as fact- I’m not running comparisons. I typically don’t really like the sound of streaming and have found that Urd is doing something that improves it.

You could do us a favor and compare streaming via
Macbook > Urd > AES out
vs
Macbook > Urd > USB out
Thank you

Matt

 

[matthia]

@Jason Stoddard
How is the grounding in Urd and Yggdrasil arranged?
Is the signal ground floating relative to chassis ground or are both connected?
This is a really important question for me!
Thank you

Matt

 

[adias]

@Jason Stoddard
How is the grounding in Urd and Yggdrasil arranged?
Is the signal ground floating relative to chassis ground or are both connected?
This is a really important question for me!
Thank you

Matt

Take a look at the green wire on the URD photo with the top off.

 

[matthia]

Take a look at the green wire on the URD photo with the top off.

According to this photo I would say both are connected? Correct?
Do you have any info about Yggdrasil?
Thx

Matt

 

[Melineous]

One of my personal favorites was a company I once contracted with that rated the quality* of the work their internal and external programmers did by the number of lines of code they committed to a project by the end of each day. You can probably imagine what kind of behavior this fostered and the quality of the product they eventually ended up with.
You can't make this crap up…

* yes, quality, not quantity. Not a typo.

I work for the largest medical device manufacturer in their field. At my job I make the final call on what goes into a patients body and what doesn't, and (in case MDSAP is listening) let's just say I found this comment a little "too funny."

 

[JamminVMI]

Almost as bad as being an IT consultant. In a former life, I was and got dinged by being too efficient. Solving problems quickly doesn't increase billable time. Was glad to leave that career, and join as small, entrepreneurial firm --- where leadership sketched out what we needed, and gave us the resources and freedom to do it. 20+ years later, our IT is really small, efficient (anecdotally), and delivers amazing technology. It's also fun. No metrics.

lol, me 2. But as as the old adage goes: “There’s a lot of money to be made prolonging the problem!” Cannot abide that, but it’s all around…

 

[Light - Man]

OMG, the Schiit Urd with a silent T............................. the Schiit *urd.

What were they thinking!

 

[Randolf711]

You could do us a favor and compare streaming via
Macbook > Urd > AES out
vs
Macbook > Urd > USB out
Thank you

Matt

Will play with it some more today and let you know!

 

[strider1007]

OMG, the Schiit Urd with a silent T............................. the Schiit *urd.

What were they thinking!

My guess is that's exactly what they were thinking..