[rb2013]

In the ICRON model numbers - it a little clearer as they have 'LAN' in the model number
 
This is what you want:

The USB 2.0 Ranger 2304-LAN​

http://www.icron.com/products/icron-brand/usb-extenders/lan/usb-2-0-ranger-2304-lan/

 
 
NOT this!

The USB 2.0 Ranger​

®​

2304​

http://www.icron.com/products/icron-brand/usb-extenders/cat5/usb-2-0-ranger-2304/

 

[panhead]

  Well the issue with the Maggies - they have to be placed in the right sized and shaped room.  Then extreme care must be used in placement - I found for my room (ideal size for the 1.6qr) 3ft from back wall, 3ft from side wall.
 
The cables are critical!  I went through 7 different ones - including Nordost Valhalla, Synergistic Apex Tesla Active - these Tellurium Q Ultra Blacks were heads above.  The amp is another amazing audio find:   The Bada SE 3.3 - heavily modded with Mundorf Supreme Silver/Gold/Oil Caps (these alone were close to $1000), ELNA Similic II 'lyctics, etc.  The amp is a Class A hybrid design - runs Class A for the first 30Watts then biases over to A/B to 160W.  Uses two massive toroidal transformers for the Toshisba outputs - one for each channel - then a separate R-core for the 6922 tube pre-section (this amp is a beast to lift!).  Another big improvement -my 'Holy Grail' very rare 1975 Reflektor Single Wire Getter Post Silver Shield 6N23P - the finest audio tube I have ever owned!.

 
 
I have two of these amps - one in my office one in my main room.  They are the most extraordinary amps I have ever heard.  I went through a SS phase owning a half dozen of the best Krell, PASS, Mark Levinison, etc...  That didn't cut it for me, then went all tube - including a few 300B and about a dozen KT-88 and 6550 based.  After an amazing write up by Harry Pearson in Absolute Sound - bought the 200W a channel 8 tubes ASL Hurricane Mono Blocks.  I had three version of this amp - the last being a heavily modded (By Response Audio) with all V-CAP Teflon caps (The mods cost $10,000 - back then a V-CAP was $300 each).  I rolled through $5000 in tubes and settled for GEC KT-88s and Tungsol Round plate VT231's. This fed a $30,000 pair of Talon Firebird Diamonds.  Pre-amp the $16,000 Conrad Johnson ACT2.  I used two Velodyne DD-12's for subs - that's another $6000.  Feeding this was the APL NWOjr DAC and a $30K analog rig.  Wiring was all Nordost Valhalla then SR Apex Tesla (another $12,000).


 
 

 
Let me say this $1000 Bada - before the Mundorf recapping equaled the V-CAP Hurricanes and CJ ACT2!  So I bought two.  They don't make this version anymore - just a 4 12au7 one.

 
 
The sound then could lift the roof - the Vel's alone had 3,000 Watts combined power.  The Firebirds 11in Focal Woofers in 300lb 6in thick laminate cabinets.  The Aluminum spikes on the bottom along weighted 10lbs each.
 
But I have to say the life like and life sized imaging and as I described total immersion presentation today beats that $100,000 system!  For a tiny fraction of the price!  Just the cost of the Dynavector (and I had a Benz Ebony LP cart as well) - I could buy my whole system now.  To my ears the guitars are the absolute perfect size and height and tone - I know as I'm a guitar player.
 
I post this just so folks know my reference point - I have been going at this audio thing with gusto for 25yrs.  I have over 200 transactions on audiogon alone (rb99).
So I think I have a pretty good handle on what great audio should sound like.  Right now - it's the best I ever had!  Seriously - this little F-1 - is just plain magic.   I no longer judge audio equipment by the sticker price - but by their sonic abilities.
 
We live in extraordinary audio times!
Cheers

 

Awesome looking amps!   You are a lot more dedicated than I am.   I purchased the Classe Cam 200s based on a review to power the Maggie 3.5r and have not experimented in that area except pcs and vibration control. 

 

[rb2013]

  If you scroll down the page its 480mb.     Curious if the 1GB version sounds that much different.

Oh yes!  Completely different - I bet if you took the cover off a whole different board.

To be 1GB LAN compatible must use USB to TCP/IP conversion.

The non-LAN does not.
 
I tried this one and it said 480mb and sounded like crap:
http://www.amazon.com/StarTech-com-2-0-Over-Cat5-Extender-Extension-USB2004EXTV/dp/B00T9RTT2U?ie=UTF8&psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o07_s00

 

[rb2013]

  Awesome looking amps!   You are a lot more dedicated than I am.   I purchased the Classe Cam 200s based on a review to power the Maggie 3.5r and have not experimented in that area except pcs and vibration control. 

In my office I use these beauties with a modded BADA 3.3SE:
 
http://www.reference3a.com/dulcet.html
 

 
PS You must have a ballroom for a listening room.  Those big maggies need a lot of space to breathe.
 
I laugh when I see people hate Maggies and have them next to the rear wall on the side of their flat screens.

 

[onlythat]

"Oh yes!  Completely different - I bet if you took the cover off a whole different board.

To be 1GB LAN compatible must use USB to TCP/IP conversion."

yah- when I saw the 480mbps I thought at first cool and 330.00. Then I thought 'too good to be true' and it was

To console myself, I just bought a Wyred 4 Sound Revovery, iPurifier 2 and the official Rb approved Pro 4x4 power filter to try with both the PUC and F-1. Will use my Teradak into the Recovery to try it.

I was about to pull trigger on Startech also- but 1000 bucks all at one time seemed daunting even for my level of tweaks-matter-greatly audiophiliosis.

I'll play with the USB toys a little while first. Should be interesting...

[apologies- screwed up and put my comment in the quote]

 

[rb2013]

 

"Oh yes!  Completely different - I bet if you took the cover off a whole different board.

To be 1GB LAN compatible must use USB to TCP/IP conversion."

yah- when I saw the 480mbps I thought at first cool and 330.00. Then I thought 'too good to be true' and it was

To console myself, I just bought a Wyred 4 Sound Revovery, iPurifier 2 and the official Rb approved Pro 4x4 power filter to try with both the PUC and F-1. Will use my Teradak into the Recovery to try it.

I was about to pull trigger on Startech also- but 1000 bucks all at one time seemed daunting even for my level of tweaks-matter-greatly audiophiliosis.

I'll play with the USB toys a little while first. Should be interesting...

[apologies- screwed up and put my comment in the quote]

The Art Audio PB4X4 Pro - must have 'Pro' in the latter half of the description.  Some of these con artists on Ebay use Art Audio Pro PB4X4 as the description - that is a different animal - is does not have the AC line filtering and isolation.  The PB4X4 is $49 and the PB4X4 Pro is $85
 
NOT this: ART Pro Audio PB 4x4 Rackmount 8 Outlet Power Conditioner & Surge Protector
http://www.ebay.com/itm/ART-Pro-Audio-PB-4x4-Rackmount-8-Outlet-Power-Conditioner-Surge-Protector-/272232033314?hash=item3f624b2c22:g:tX4AAOSw2GlXKPgc
 
But this: ART Audio PB4x4 PRO - Power Distribution System
http://www.proaudiosolutions.com/ART-Audio-PB4x4-PRO-Power-Distribution-System-p/pb4x4pro.htm?gclid=CjwKEAjwjca5BRCAyaPGi6_h8m8SJADryPLh6dQccdMDIanBEOanIII3yNMLr90ishBSKqrVJx26tBoCANzw_wcB&Click=26201&utm_source=GoogleShopping&utm_medium=shoppingengine
 
You can tell the correct one has the word PRO in white on the front, has one front outlet, and is marked APF on the front to the side and comes with a flexible light stalk:


NOT THIS:

I bought two of the wrong ones by accident - so don't make my mistake:
http://artproaudio.com/power_solutions/product/pb4x4_pro/
 

Presenting the 4x4 PRO SERIES Power Distribution Systems from ART. Built on the foundation of the popular 4x4s, the PRO SERIES are durably constructed, reliable power conditioners for use in many applications. Wherever power management system is required, the 4x4 PRO SERIES provide the surge protection you need to keep your rack safe from unwanted disruption.
All PRO SERIES models have an additional internal discrete module called APF™ (Advanced Power Filtering) which filters out digital and dimmer hash as well as any high frequency noise that is above the audio range. Some off-the-shelf add-on modules saturate and lose their filtering effectiveness as the load increases, but by using a high power discrete design we were able to create a filter that stays effective over the full operating range.
By using both Common Mode and Differential Mode topologies in series for the filter design we are able to block virtually all of the unwanted noise that is between the AC line and ground, and also the two sides of the AC line. This has the additional benefit of reducing ground loop problems in your system. High frequency noise currents in particular are highly attenuated in both directions so that any line noise that could be generated by one of your components is not allowed to get back into your main A.C. wiring so if you use a number of PRO SERIES Power Conditioners in your setup, you can distribute and isolate the noisy components from the sensitive components in your system. Additionally, any signals above 10kHz are filtered from the line with over 40dB of attenuation above 100kHz and beyond.
Every PRO SERIES power conditioner is designed with a power capacity of 1800 Watts, surge/spike protection, APF with EMI & RFI filtering, front-mounted unswitched power outlet and an adjustable rear-mounted gooseneck light source for bright illumination behind the rack. The spacing and alignment of the rear outlets to accommodate various size power plugs and AC adapters.
 

 

[rw35]

Interesting post rb.
 
I use the Furman DMC Pro in my studio : http://www.furmansound.com/product.php?div=01&id=PL-PRODMC
 
It hadn't occurred to me that I could put some of the remaining dirty SMPS's in the lounge on one of those or similar.
 
My policy is to put EMI chokes on everything around the house except the analogue parts of my system (they can be detrimental on those) - and have a dedicated distribution board/supply for the system.
 
Got me thinking about that now.

 

[abartels]

  Hi, which cables did you think were Oyaide's?
 
The mains cables are DIY off of eBay, which are about to be replaced with 'Mark Grant DSP 2.5 Black'... the signal cables are DIY silver balanced made. The only non DIY branded cable I have is the short Curious USB.
 

 
I ment the powercord connectors,,,,, those are Chinese make Oyaide copies,,, had them too, not bad at all but finally bought Taiwanese iEGO solid silver ones (IEC320 inlet and connector).
Years ago I planned to distribute those connectors for Europe, exclusively, but finally missed the boat because a German company got the exclusive rights for Europe.....
Had ordered some samples, cost me a lot of money back then, and finally used them for my own powercords. I bought several versions, pure silver, pure red copper, pure red copper silvered,
pure red copper guilded, the pure silver versions sounded best, but they are expensive..... IEC 320 inlet pure silver about $90 and the pure silver plug about $100 Copper and gold versions about $50
There even are pre-production models, without labels, and a pre-production Schuko.
 
Left from that project:
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 
Those good old times.......

 

[Albrecht]

What was that AirTight in your pic?
 
Man, - I've always wanted to hear Airtight Amps cause of their rep, and also their incredible beauty.
 
The only time i got to hear one was with those people from GTT audio dist, who insisted of only having vinyl, only playing the blues, and only matching them with QUAD speakers.....
 
Sorry to be so opinionated, but I DESPISE the blues, and Quad speakers. Never heard either sound good, and the former makes me run from any room screaming.
 
Your Bada amps sound like they would be amazing and I would love to hear them......

 

[rw35]

@abartels
 
Ahh.. cool, makes sense now.
 

 

[rb2013]

  Interesting post rb.
 
I use the Furman DMC Pro in my studio : http://www.furmansound.com/product.php?div=01&id=PL-PRODMC
 
It hadn't occurred to me that I could put some of the remaining dirty SMPS's in the lounge on one of those or similar.
 
My policy is to put EMI chokes on everything around the house except the analogue parts of my system (they can be detrimental on those) - and have a dedicated distribution board/supply for the system.
 
Got me thinking about that now.

Yes I use two now - one for the DDC chain and the other for the DAC.  They are useful.  I then have a separate one for the PC.  So everything is isolated.
 
The reason to keep the DAC and DDC separate is the issues John Swenson mentions about PHY AGC created 'Packet Noise' to to varying SI.  This can feed back through the AC power supply and cause noise issues with the DAC's femto clocks.  This may be why having the USB processing out of the DAC is best, keeping the DDC as a separate device on a separate power chain.
 
http://www.audiostream.com/content/qa-john-swenson-part-1-what-digital#5wBf3Vkfpl9AG0LC.97
http://www.audiostream.com/content/qa-john-swenson-part-2-are-bits-just-bits#LQX6egzmLMjobH0J.97
http://www.audiostream.com/content/qa-john-swenson-part-3-how-bit-perfect-software-can-affect-sound#PVibmULpc6cdEqqx.97
 
I added the bolding:

So now the crux of the matter, how can what goes into the USB receiver affect any of this?  In several ways: packet jitter, edge jitter, PLLs. I’ll go over each of these.​

Packet jitter is the difference in the arrival time of packets to the receiver chip. USB packets are transmitted over the bus at either 1000 per second (full speed mode) or 8000 per second (high speed mode). Every time one of those packets hits the receiver a lot of activity happens inside the receiver chip. This creates lots of noise inside the chip and on the ground plane. This causes a lot of jitter on the outputs from the chip. The spectrum of this noise and jitter has a VERY strong component at either 1KHz or 8KHz, both of which are directly in the audio range. Any changes in the arrival time of the packets will change the spectrum of this packet noise. In the next installment I’ll cover what causes this packet jitter.​

Next is PLLs. Every USB receiver chip has at least one if not more PLLs. These PLLs are affected by both the previous types of jitter and since almost all the circuitry inside the chip is clocked by these PLLs, the jitter on output signals and ground plane noise is going to be significantly affected by the noise spectrum coming out of the PLLs. This is filtered by the PLL loop filter, but there are still major components related to the input jitter.​

So how do we keep all this noise from the USB receiver from getting to our sensitive DAC circuits? It’s called ground plane isolation. You have separate ground planes for the USB receiver and the rest of the DAC circuitry. This DOES prevent ground plane noise from crossing over. BUT if you cut the ground plane there is no way for the return current from the signals crossing the boundary (the I2S signals and clock etc) to get between the “ground domains”. The solution is digital isolators. There are many different technologies to choose from, one most people are familiar with is opto-couplers. Some of these actually add huge amounts of jitter to the signals going through them so are bad choices for our purposes.​

A signal from the receiver now has a return current coming from the isolator so it’s happy. On the other side of the boundary there is a return current to the DAC circuitry so it is happy. BUT any jitter on the signal coming out of the isolator is STILL creating ground plane noise with a spectrum related to the jitter it had on the other side of the isolator. In addition it is containing jitter related to the isolation scheme as well, and some of THAT jitter is ALSO related to noise on the ground plane on the receiver side.​

So again the ground plane isolation and signal isolators can decrease the jitter and noise going from the USB receiver to the DAC circuits, BUT they cannot eliminate it. Some always gets through.​

So again the ground plane isolation and signal isolators can decrease the jitter and noise going from the USB receiver to the DAC circuits, BUT they cannot eliminate it. Some always gets through.​

 

First I am going to cover differences transmitted through USB packet timing. Remember from article two that the arrival of each USB packet in the receiver generates a burst of noise on the power traces and ground plane. Variations in the timing of these packets will significantly change the spectrum of the noise. Note: the bits still make it across correctly and the AVERAGE data rate stays the same. I’m going to call this “packet jitter”.​

 
Then from the Uptone website:
http://uptoneaudio.com/pages/j-swenson-tech-corner
 
Quote:

For example when talking about connections say downstream port of the REGEN is connected to the DAC. But when talking about signal integrity (SI) it is appropriate to talk about the receiver in the DAC PHY, since that is the part that is susceptible to SI. The transmitter in the DAC PHY is not active very much and has little impact on noise in the DAC. OTOH the transmitter in the REGEN's downstream PHY IS important to the SI received by the DAC PHY. 

Since the receiver in the REGEN's upstream PHY is susceptible to SI just like every other USB PHY in existence the quality of the signal it receives is still important. So using a good cable and good host PHY are still important. Whether a PPA USB board in the computer feeding a good cable without a REGEN is going to be as good as a regular USB port and good cable and REGEN at DAC, who knows, there are so many variables it's impossible to make a general statement on that. BUT there is a good probability that the PPA AND the REGEN will sound better than either. 

So if you already have a specialty USB card (Paul Pang, SOtM, JCAT, etc.) in your computer, don't throw it away when you get a REGEN, the combo is most likely going to sound significantly better. You may find that just using the REGEN without the upgraded SBB host card is not much worse than both, in which case you might find it a good idea to use the card on another computer that has been begging for an upgrade. 

Remember that SI consists of rise/fall time, noise, and jitter. The jitter in the SIGNAL is determined by the transmitter PHY, which can be significantly influenced by the clock IT gets and the noise on its PG planes. USUALLY noise is low on the signal as it exits the PHY. The cable (and connectors) cause an increase in raise/fall times, added noise (EMI and crosstalk from power and ground wires) and decreased amplitude of the signal. Any decent receiver will have an automatic gain control (AGC) which compensates for this effect, but that raises the noise on the signal, so I'm lumping the amplitude decrease into noise. The cable by itself rarely adds jitter to the signal, BUT the increased rise/fall times and extra noise cause the received data to have increased jitter in the PHY. This is one of the big issues that all that extra processing is designed to deal with.

When that XMOS chip is dealing with data from the host it is generating its own noise on the PG planes, part of the noise will be from the PHY and part from the MAC. The PHY part can change due to SI of the USB signal, the rest cannot, it stays the same. If separate ground planes and separate power supplies are not used, that noise can directly affect the DAC chip(s) and the master clock oscillator. As was posted from a previous post of mine, even if separate supplies and planes are used with isolation between them, the effects of this noise still winds up at the DAC chip and clock.

The part of this noise not from the PHY is always there, it doesn't matter what your cable is, what USB card you have, whether you have a REGEN etc, it's still there. All that stuff is keeping the PHY part from ADDING extra noise that makes things worse. 

The technically correct solution is to figure out how to prevent this noise from crossing the barrier and getting into the DAC chip and clock, unfortunately this is really tough and nobody has yet to completely figured out how to do this. Thus every DAC ever built will have some level of susceptibility to external influences, some more some less. 

By the way, just because a DAC is not very sensitive to external influences does not mean it sounds really good, there are lots of ways to decrease the sensitivity that muck up the sound. The trick is decrease the sensitivity AND do it in such a way that doesn't decrease SQ. 

So everybody that is tweaking their computers, using different cables, a REGEN etc are all still hearing the effects of the non-PHY noise. If we can figure out how to get rid of THAT, WOW, you won't know what hit you. 

John S.

 
I guess the bottomline is keep the USB processing board OUT of the DAC - and on a separate AC line with at least with some decent common mode and differential mode isolation and filtering.

 

[rb2013]

  What was that AirTight in your pic?
 
Man, - I've always wanted to hear Airtight Amps cause of their rep, and also their incredible beauty.
 
The only time i got to hear one was with those people from GTT audio dist, who insisted of only having vinyl, only playing the blues, and only matching them with QUAD speakers.....
 
Sorry to be so opinionated, but I DESPISE the blues, and Quad speakers. Never heard either sound good, and the former makes me run from any room screaming.
 
Your Bada amps sound like they would be amazing and I would love to hear them......

Yes had an Airtight 300B with NOS Western Electric 300's .  The tubes alone today go for $2000.
 
They are truly pieces of masterful audio design.  The Tamura transformers are very special.
 
If I ever started an audio company I would copy them but use Mundorf Supreme Silver Gold Oil caps, what a difference those made! - these were the stock ones:

 
 
The modded BADA - wired with Mundorf solid silver/teflon wiring:

I eventually replaced the MKP on the bottom - mounted to the underside:

 
BTW those Mundorf Supreme S/G/O did wonders in my R2R PCM1704UK DAC60 mod project:

 
I see many $10K+ amps and DACs that use $10 caps - you can really move the needle on lessor gear with totl caps - especailly for coupling

 

[Albrecht]

Man,
 
Awesome....
 
I would LOVE to hear your system, - so kick-ass!!!

 

[FredA]

  How could we know if there even is NO info available right now? If they have some sort of connection scheme to share with us,
yes, then we could tell you if it's compatible with M7.
 
Maybe you could opt asking Kingwa to contact Singxer and confirm it is compatible.
 
广州声仕电子有限公司
·地址：广州市番禺区新造镇北约村新北工业园F区
·电话：156-2212-8276
·联系人：陈先生
·邮箱：leter@singxer.com

I believe the pinout is configurable to some extent, with dip switches. I am tempted by it as well.
 
There you go:
 
http://img.alicdn.com/bao/uploaded/i4/156213177/TB2MzJ6mFXXXXagXpXXXXXXXXXX_!!156213177.jpg
 
Comes from this taobao agent page:
 
http://www.buytome.com/fr/goods/item/detail/id/528898172401
 
Just have to compare to audio-gd's. Looks the same.

 

[hugoboss]

@rb2013 how many days already that silver gold oil mundorf caps in your amp?
 
one thing keep me stay away from mundorf silver gold in oil cap is some people said the oil will leak in hot environment like inside tube amp, then the caps died in very short life.
i even email mundorf in germany. they reply just the same " don't use silver gold oil or silver in oil caps in tube amp"
so i just planning to replace or the cap in my cayin tube amp with mundorf supreme caps (non oil)