[438555]

Just out of curiosity, I tried using three DACs simultaneously.
PC > USB > nano iDSD > Coax out > RCA Splitter > (micro iDSD + Yggy)
And it worked, even at 24/192

I did a similar thing with the modi2uber and mimby, feeding them with a split output from eitr. Works great, and to me, doesn't sound any different than running separately. Also, I just used pyst cables rather than 75 Ohm rated spdif coaxial cables and haven't noticed any difference there either. Can anyone comment on when you'd worry about using a regular RCA cable for digital instead of one specifically rated for it?

 

[bosiemoncrieff]

Seeing my last ballet of the season on Saturday. I’m very excited.

 

[KoshNaranek]

Seeing my last ballet of the season on Saturday. I’m very excited.

If I was seeing my last ballet, I would be excited too.

 

[bosiemoncrieff]

I saw Unbound A, and it was amazing (though the first act meh), Unbound B, which was also very good, Unbound D, which had two decent acts and a mediocre third act set to Bjork. (I remarked, leaving the theatre, "stale before the curtain fell.") Saturday is Unbound C. Also seeing the Brahms Violin Concerto.

 

[gldgate]

Received my Yggy upgrade (Analog 2 + USB Gen 5) a few days ago. While it certainly took a while (I ordered as soon as it became available) I am happy with the results. While I do not have an original Yggy to do a pure A/B comparison, my subjective opinion is that the Yggy sounds a bit smoother and a tad bit warmer/sweeter in the midrange without sacrificing any of its trademark detail. Well worth it. Congrats Schiit. Eagerly looking forward to the gadget....

 

[bosiemoncrieff]

Yggy has been pushed well into next year...iMac must take precedence. But I am looking forward to it. The added analog outs will finally simplify the rat's nest of splitters I'm dealing with. And let me run MJ2 fully balanced.



Seeing this tonight. Can't wait.

 

[433521]

Two b stock mjolnir 1's on the schiit page for $300.

I don't have those kind of headphones so it's ain't for me, sadly. Sounds like a good deal.

gone.

lots of good stuff left. Ragnarok for $400 off.

 

[bosiemoncrieff]

Ray Chen was glorious in the Brahms violin concerto. He did a fantastic Paganini caprice as the first encore, and when he came on for his next ovation, I shouted from the side terrace, "Bach partita!"

I got my Bach partita.

Would using different lengths of cable for two different speakers located different distances from the amplifier cause any problems with the sound? I can't imagine there is a meaningful delay between 6' and 25' XLR cables.

Just made a new friend at the SF Opera in charge of school programs. In addition to the tickets I have for the first cycle, I'm now seeing the final dress from the grand tier. That's thirty hours of Wagner in eleven days.

 

[FLTWS]

@bosiemoncrieff

As I understand it, every piece of wire has 3 measurable electrical characteristics; resistance, capacitance, and impedance the total amount of each will vary based on the length. To the extent that these characteristics vary in two identical pieces of wire that are of significantly different lengths there "might" be a difference in the frequency response of the two devises connected at the other end. A few inches shouldn't matter but 6' vs. 25', I suspect there could be a significant difference.

I'll leave it to an EE to explain it better, LOL!

 

[Ableza]

Would using different lengths of cable for two different speakers located different distances from the amplifier cause any problems with the sound? I can't imagine there is a meaningful delay between 6' and 25' XLR cables.

Is there a timing difference? A theoretical one that could be calculated, yes. Is it a practical difference? No, not at all. Electricity travels through wire at approx. 285 million meters per second, so unless the difference is miles, it is not detectable by humans.

 

[Ableza]

@bosiemoncrieff

As I understand it, every piece of wire has 3 measurable electrical characteristics; resistance, capacitance, and impedance the total amount of each will vary based on the length. To the extent that these characteristics vary in two identical pieces of wire that are of significantly different lengths there "might" be a difference in the frequency response of the two devises connected at the other end. A few inches shouldn't matter but 6' vs. 25', I suspect there could be a significant difference.

I'll leave it to an EE to explain it better, LOL!

Resistance, capacitance and inductance. Impedance is a sum of these when the signal is an alternating current, and varies due to frequency.

 

[Baldr]

So it has been a bit of time since I have posted as I have been very distracted with the Sol, which now seems to be finally ready to order parts for production. Jason and I keep slowing each other down out of an abundance of caution with this, our first mechanical product. Done with that, at least the Engineering.

Next I will tease (Myself as well as the reader) with a variety of possible products that I am currently trying out. So for the moment allow me to emulate Jason in the sense that the following are products that are either ideas, built as prototypes, either plywood (alpha) or in chassis (beta). All of the caveats apply, which specifically are: They could never happen. They may happen in a very combined or modified form, or they may even be built as they are.

Product candidate number 1 is a CD transport. It has been built as an alpha. It works and sounds fine - I feel content with respect to its performance. It should be a $300 to $500 product. The dependencies of a workable production product are our ability to source a transport assembly in the thousands of units, and our ability to design packing and ship production quantities of fragile items, which we have not yet done. I am convinced that CDs (many/most of which can yet be easily found at a dollar and under) will become popular and enjoy a resurgence of popularity once most realize that streaming is seldom, if ever, the best possible digital source. The original Solti Ring cycle on CD (not the remaster) is by far and away the best sounding. (I know, Bosie, you hate the Solti Ring – the fact remains that is a sonic miracle and one of the two or three best recordings of the last century.) I maintain now is the time to acquire CDs before they suffer the price inflation of California coastal real estate or vinyl records.

The next candidate is a Floorsweep product which is partially built of recycled parts (think, for example, the recycled parts from old Yggy analog board). Now this would not be a current or old Yggy or Gungnir killer at all, but a scaled down product that would punch way above its price point. Much physically smaller, shorter warranty, ugly in a quaint sense. Jason suggested a hammertone finish, which I love. Gibson in the pre-WW2 days made Floorsweep banjos and mandolins, which are hugely expensive collector’s items today. One has been built, but may be integrated further before production. Or not, or may not be built at all – just a notion of how to utilize old parts that we hate to throw away.

Oh yeah, the Gadget. Already built as a digital beta product, in fact a production ready coax to coax product. The problem is how do we interface it? What inputs? USB? Coax? AES? TOS? What outputs? If we put something in production do people really want another box in the chain? Really? Probably won’t be built for that reason. Leads to the next contemplated product.

So my next wet dream is (how do you describe it??) a digital preamp or a “Swiss Army Knife”. This would have every common socket at the input, such as USB, coax, etc. Maybe BitWordData (BWD) to hook up with a transport. It would have at least coax and maybe BWD out as well. It would be mandatory that we have De-Jitter/re-clocking as well. It could also have slots for an optional Gadget and maybe for my other idea music processor as well. More on that in a future post. We already have such a device with a reduced feature set on the market, Eitr. Think of it as an expanded, upgradable Eitr.

Then we have the new USB board, which we would roll our own implementation into a generic Microchip Pic Part. Up to now, the best choices are XMOS or C-Media (which we now use). The reason we want our own USB2 algorithm living in a microprocessor is that it greatly increases our options for instrumentation DAC selections, many of which require configuration to set them up as straight audio DACs. This gives rise to opportunities for even lower priced Multibit DACs. Also helpful as many “audio” multibit DACs have bend over and spread ‘em pricing. This is in process, but very buggy and needs a lot of work, again if we implement it at all. Call it pre-alpha.

The above is a description of much of the work here at Chateau Moffat that lies somewhere between mental masturbation and could be production. I could well have forgotten something. Feedback is encouraged. Thanks for all of your support!

 

[garbulky]

I appreciate the info! What is a floorsweep product and what is bitworddata ? CD transports, well I think their time is gone personally. At least for the headphone market demographic. Maybe I'm wrong.

For me, I have one thing that I've been interested in. And it seems very niche right now and probably beyond the scope of Schiit. But I figure I'd mention it in hope.

I would love a dedicated 2 channel digital PC source card that makes use of those fancy inputs like AES, BNC, I2s. And by that I mean NON-USB sources (think PCI slots).
Optional: spice it up with say the ability to connect to a separate power supply and fancy clocks.

Seriously, I don't see anything out there. There's a billion PCI soundcards but nodigital transports. The one that I own right now is a discontinued Musiland Digital Times and I am looking for something just a bit more high end.

 

[NoahFence]

@Baldr, two responses
1) I hope the tgransport will play DVDs as I like to WATCH opera as well as listen to it.
2) The usb idea is exciting to me.
Keep up the good work. We don't want you designing deep fryers.

NF

 

[Alcophone]

So my next wet dream is (how do you describe it??) a digital preamp or a “Swiss Army Knife”. This would have every common socket at the input, such as USB, coax, etc. Maybe BitWordData (BWD) to hook up with a transport. It would have at least coax and maybe BWD out as well. It would be mandatory that we have De-Jitter/re-clocking as well. It could also have slots for an optional Gadget and maybe for my other idea music processor as well. More on that in a future post. We already have such a device with a reduced feature set on the market, Eitr. Think of it as an expanded, upgradable Eitr.

Love it. Especially if it has as an output whatever you deem best for Yggy (AES?) and a remote, to turn Yggy into more of a two channel product.
Maybe you offer various input modules and the thing just has uniformly sized slots for them, so customers can pick whatever combination of inputs they want (3x Coax, 2x USB + TOSlink, whatever - though USB modules would probably be bigger than S/PDIF modules.) Publish the standards so third parties can make an HDMI input module with Dolby Digital / DTS support.
If not flexible modules, having more than one input of the same type might be nice (2x coax, for instance).
Bonus points if there's a way to get bit perfect audio back into a computer via USB (the same USB port used for input would do) from whatever digital input is selected. Extra bonus points if all digital inputs are available as separate USB recording devices.
If it has multiple outputs, would they all be active at the same time? That would be sweet.
Slots for an optional gadget... yes, makes sense. But an option for digital modifiers, chain-linked via S/PDIF might be nice, too. I.e. Coax loop out > Gadget > other idea music processor > miniDSP nanoDigi* > Coax loop in > AES > Yggy

You say digital preamp, would it have a volume control? I wouldn't need it.

* Preferably a hypothetical nanoDigi HD operating at up to 192 kHz internally, rather than 96 kHz.