[amirm]

Thanks! I checked yesterday, and with insurance it should be about $70 or so with FedEx (looks like UPS Ground insurance stops at $1000, so that's not an option for me). Does that work for you, too?
Then I saw that you may have a much better arrangement with Jude, so let's see how that pans out first.

Jude has gone silent on me so I don't expect anything to come out of that.

And yes, I am OK with picking up the return expense, whatever it may be. I use the post office these days as they have the cheapest rates.

 

[the finisher]

Well , here's another nice mess we've gotten you into.

Not thinking it was your fault... maybe mine LOL

 

[Xcalibur255]

What???
/snipped for length/

Fair enough. Your previous comments gave me the impression I referred to previously, but I'm happy to take your reply at face value and hold my peace.

 

[Xcalibur255]

I have a legitimate on-topic question for Yggrasil owners who have had the Gen 5 USB upgrade done. When you got the unit back did you find you had to update/re-install the USB driver (assuming you are using Windows that is), or did that not change and the unit worked just as it had before the upgrade without touching anything PC-side?

 

[adamaley]

I didn't have to install any drivers (I did the install at home myself). Note that I use a Microrendu so my DAC is not connected directly to a computer. A direct USB connection to a computer may require driver upgrades.

 

[jude]

Jude has gone silent on me so I don't expect anything to come out of that...

I've had graduation parties and a surprise birthday party that have kept me busy through most of the day and evening.

The other night I asked you simply for your specific settings for testing loopback linearity:

Hi amirm, someone sent me to the post on your forum where you discuss loopback on the APx555:

I'll run the loopback test, but I want to make sure I run it exactly as you did.

Can you tell me your exact settings for the linearity loopback test with which you got the result in your post?

Connector:
Sample Rate:
Etc.

Are you choosing one of the digital outputs under "Output Configuration" and then checking the "Loopback" box under "Input Configuration"?

Sorry to ask such simple questions, but I want to try running it exactly as you did.

Thanks in advance, amirm.

Best Regards,
Jude

(That was before I noticed your X-axis was dBV.)

And you respond with:

Let's do the reverse (I am not yet ready to share mine as I am still optimizing it to match the AP2522). Please send me the project the file that you used for linearity measurements. My email address is (I redacted amirm's email address for this post).

Your answer didn't surprise me one bit.

Start with the default new APx project file, set APx to output digital through its balanced digital output --> Yggdrasil 2's balanced digital input. HPSA checked. High-pass AC (<10 Hz). Low-pass ADC passband. Weighting none. EQ none. Yggdrasil 2 to the AP's balanced analog inputs. Sequence mode, stepped level sweep, linearity. Waveform sine. Start level -140 dBFS. Stop level 0 dBFS. Sweep linear. Points 281 (for a step size of 0.500 dBFS). Frequency 1 kHz.

Once you get an Yggdrasil 2 back in your hands, you can run it yourself.

amirm, at this point, I'm strongly inclined to agree with Currawong -- I feel very confident that I'm once again dealing with nwavguy. Welcome...back?

Until now, I have never publicly specifically explained why nwavguy was banned, because we do not typically discuss a member banning except with the member being banned. I had received several hostile messages from nwavguy that began when I asked him to stop constantly linking to his blog -- they weren't pleasant message exchanges, but these had nothing to do with his ban. What finally got nwavguy banned wasn't any post he made, but a message he sent to one of our moderators. He sent the following message -- unsolicited -- to our moderator kwkarth:

Just so you know, I have multiple screen captures of the entire Schiit thread. Head-fi, in the past, has deleted many of my posts so please understand I take additional precautions after learning Jude's methods.

I've talked with my attorney and I'm fully prepared to post the real truth on my blog, and elsewhere, regarding censorship and bias at Head-Fi if I'm censored again. Jude has been entirely unreasonable in the past and I won't put up with more of the same. I'm in a better position than ever to let the truth be known with over 100,000 unique visitors to my blog. I'm 100% serious about exposing any company, Schiit Audio included, that mis-represents their products. In the end, the truth will always prevail. I will make SURE it does.

This is a message I have shared over the years with only a handful of people outside of our moderating team, including a couple of industry members, and a couple of community members.

As any longtime moderator here will tell you, one of our internal policies is that when someone contacts us with a hostile or threatening tone, and particularly with any mention of attorneys or lawsuits, we take it very seriously. Attorney fees (billed at hundreds of dollars per hour) add up every time we have to call them to discuss any issues that we feel should be brought to their attention. As such, anyone taking such a posture or tone with us won't be posting here anymore.

By the way, if anyone searches our forums for nwavguy's posts criticizing any company (Schiit included), they're still here. What we deleted (to his great consternation) was his constant linking to his blog, which we'd asked him to curb. We told him he could post his data and findings here instead of constantly linking out -- he continued with his constant linking-out anyway. All of his graphs were very clearly watermarked with his blog's URL, so it's not like anyone wouldn't know where they came from. Again, his findings, opinions, and measurements remained. The assertion that we deleted his posts about those companies and their products was a misconception that nwavguy pushed, but that was inaccurate, and he knew that -- but it made for a good story on his blog.

So many clues lead me to strongly believe I know who I'm dealing with. Again.

And the last two lines of that old PM from nwavguy... Perhaps he wasn't biased or without an agenda either.

 

[Ableza]

I think Jude is correct. What other purpose does this person have other than to drive traffic to his site? I say ban the troll.

 

[gdhal]

I find it interesting how/why so many owners dismiss measurements that are negative/bad, but would happily embrace them if they were positive/good.

Remember how great everyone felt/believed the A1 sounds? Then, Schiit must have realized something - presumably measurable - introduced a fix and here we are today with an A2 that sounds better.

 

[MWSVette]

I think Jude is correct. What other purpose does this person have other than to drive traffic to his site? I say ban the troll.

Agreed...

 

[Ripper2860]

presumably measurable - introduced a fix and here we are today with an A2 that sounds better.

But according to Amir's findings, the A2 measures worse.

 

[Ableza]

Remember how great everyone felt/believed the A1 sounds? Then, Schiit must have realized something - presumably measurable - introduced a fix and here we are today with an A2 that sounds better.

​

The A1 did sound great. world-class in my opinion. The A2 has a lower noise floor and perhaps a different impedance signal path leading to higher output level in certain frequency bands. It is also world class.

The point about measurements, and I say this as an experienced design engineer who back in the 70's and 80's worked for a few well-known audio companies and who made my living for a while doing nothing but certifying commercial gear in a lab, measurements tell you a couple of things. They can tell you if the gear performs to design or to a set of specifications, and they can tell you if there are emergent behaviors or problems from the design, component selection or manufacturing process. In order to do that the test conditions and testing equipment must conform to certain criteria and the results must be interpreted correctly. And I can also tell you that some engineers I have worked with at these same well-known companies do not know how to properly analyze their results no matter how thorough is their data set.

But the one thing measurements cannot tell you is how a piece of gear sounds nor if users will like it. Analyzing a signal path is only generally related to analyzing the resultant acoustics and auditory perception. This is the fatal flaw most hard-core objective measurement types make. They know enough to be dangerous: they only understand part of the process of audio reproduction, and they often leave out the most critical part: human perception.

-edit to add: I refer you to one of my former employers, Sony, whose audio gear performed exceptionally well on the 'scope and who was an industry leader in the 1980's. Sony gear was routinely described by critics and users as cold, lifeless, clinical, analytical, and dull. But the performance to measurements was great, perfect in fact, so how can this be? It was because none of the main designers in Japan had a clue about designing for use. They were tweakers and electronics purists and their designs led to a saying we had: "Friends don't let friends buy Sony audio."

 

[hornytoad]

I find it interesting how/why so many owners dismiss measurements that are negative/bad, but would happily embrace them if they were positive/good.

Remember how great everyone felt/believed the A1 sounds? Then, Schiit must have realized something - presumably measurable - introduced a fix and here we are today with an A2 that sounds better.

I would happily embrace the measurements if I could hear it .

 

[BagelJoe]

I go out of the country for a week and what happened? Schiit happened I guess. Been buying equipment of one type or another since 1968. I’ve owned a Harmon Kardon amp/pre-amp with Dual turntable(got me thru college and beyond). Crown amp and pre-amp, Dahlquist DQ-10’s, Bryston amps, Krell amps, Audio Research pre-amps, Aerial 10-T’s and Velodyne subs and even a Sansui tuner from 1976-still in my system just in case I need am/fm. Never once was I sold by measurements tho I’m sure in some contexts they were mentioned. I purchased all I’ve owned through listening-synergy is a great term for what I was looking for. The sum was better than it’s parts.

I’m sure that measurements have their place, it’s just not how I shop in the first place. Got to Schiit thru the forums. Bought my Yggdrasil and my Ragnarok after reading comments. Kept them because I loved the sound, not how they measured because those would mean little to nothing to me. I don’t begrudge those who love the numbers and graphs etc. Just leave our Schiit alone. We like what we hear here.

My 2 cents

 

[gdhal]

But according to Amir's findings, the A2 measures worse.

But according to Schiit, it measures better.

I would happily embrace the measurements if I could hear it .

Given that the Yggrdasil is a modular, upgradeable design, what do you propose Schiit should embrace when/if they offer another upgrade? I would think, and hope, although I could be wrong, they (Schiit) examine the measurements in some way shape or form. This is of course in addition to listening. Presumably they (Schiit) are not offering upgrades solely on the basis of subjective listening, but somewhere along the line include objective measurements.

 

[MWSVette]

I go out of the country for a week and what happened? Schiit happened I guess. Been buying equipment of one type or another since 1968. I’ve owned a Harmon Kardon amp/pre-amp with Dual turntable(got me thru college and beyond). Crown amp and pre-amp, Dahlquist DQ-10’s, Bryston amps, Krell amps, Audio Research pre-amps, Aerial 10-T’s and Velodyne subs and even a Sansui tuner from 1976-still in my system just in case I need am/fm. Never once was I sold by measurements tho I’m sure in some contexts they were mentioned. I purchased all I’ve owned through listening-synergy is a great term for what I was looking for. The sum was better than it’s parts.

I’m sure that measurements have their place, it’s just not how I shop in the first place. Got to Schiit thru the forums. Bought my Yggdrasil and my Ragnarok after reading comments. Kept them because I loved the sound, not how they measured because those would mean little to nothing to me. I don’t begrudge those who love the numbers and graphs etc. Just leave our Schiit alone. We like what we hear here.

My 2 cents

@BagelJoe, very well stated and I agree whole heartedly....