I cannot agree more. This is something that should defintiely be kept keep in mind while discussing this.
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Can you review a Synchro-Mesh S/PDIF re-clocker?
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I cannot agree more. This is something that should defintiely be kept keep in mind while discussing this.
digititus
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When people part with their hard earned cash for your product, they have already been convinced it will sound "good". They have no way of measuring your product and "trusting ones ears" is the fallacy the entire high end audio industry has been relying on for years to sell these products. You know this and have successfully made a business out of doing something you obviously enjoy. Congratulations.
ASR lets people understand whether or not a manufacturers claims for measured response correlate to what they receive in a final product. Whether or not they "like" your product has probably very little to do with how it sounds and more to do with how it looks and how they have understood it is perceived to perform.
In summary, I am curious as to how your products measure. The rest of the "hype" is just marketing noise.
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Can you share your current chain right now, if you don't mind. I'm curious.
You can easilly hear difference between FLAC and wav format of the same track (recording)?
I always thought that FLAC is losless when compared to wav so I would reallly like to see a video of the blind test proving that you can really hear the difference.
Veri
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Not just formats, lossless formats. Formats which do not have any LOSS in quality compared to the original, lossless. When unpacked back to the original WAVE they are all equally bitperfect. And he hears differences between them ????
Yes, ok. surely adds to one's credibility..... I mean, from the very definition of a lossless format: "can be transcoded to other lossless formats without any quality degradation."
I am trying very, very hard to honor Amir's request, but stuff like that does make it difficult.
solderdude
Grand Contributor
Maybe forget about the sonic claims.
What I understood from Steve's replies is that he is talking about the rise and fall times of the digital signal and the stability of it.
Bandwidth limiting is the root cause of jitter due to the way the SPDIF signal is made up.
A very fast transmitter, well made cable construction and impedance matching and a very fast receiver as well as stable clock signals will give a nicer looking and jitter-less reception.
I guess Steve just wants the digital signal measured (using the AP).
Doing this with a scope is not really possible as the trigger circuit alone has bigger timing problems than what Steve's product puts out.
I think a very expensive network analyzer would be more suited for the task but would like to see how this would affect products like the old modi for instance. See if that improves from a 'near perfect' (only my wife is perfect... so she claims
) input signal.
Me thinks the jitter of the DAC's that will be used for this comparison will have more jitter than Steve's product so it's a bit like driving in traffic with a supercar. It's superpowers will be limited by the cars in front of it and the traffic lights.
Let's see what it does first and then shoot at will... Steve can take some scepticism it seems.
The powersupply stability of digital chips has importance but you don't need superregs for this that regulate in the MHz. That would require many Amps of pulse power to keep cap voltages regulated and sense circuits near each chip that needs power. Pulses drawn by switching components in digital chips aren't handled by the regs at all. the PCB traces are way too long for this and have too much inductance. That's why there are decoupling caps as close as possible to its power pins. You can compound a few (say 10nF, 100nF and 1uF) if you want a wider range.
Steve knows this for sure but probably needs to write nonsense to keep his audience happy.
What I understood from Steve's replies is that he is talking about the rise and fall times of the digital signal and the stability of it.
Bandwidth limiting is the root cause of jitter due to the way the SPDIF signal is made up.
A very fast transmitter, well made cable construction and impedance matching and a very fast receiver as well as stable clock signals will give a nicer looking and jitter-less reception.
I guess Steve just wants the digital signal measured (using the AP).
Doing this with a scope is not really possible as the trigger circuit alone has bigger timing problems than what Steve's product puts out.
I think a very expensive network analyzer would be more suited for the task but would like to see how this would affect products like the old modi for instance. See if that improves from a 'near perfect' (only my wife is perfect... so she claims
) input signal.Me thinks the jitter of the DAC's that will be used for this comparison will have more jitter than Steve's product so it's a bit like driving in traffic with a supercar. It's superpowers will be limited by the cars in front of it and the traffic lights.
Let's see what it does first and then shoot at will... Steve can take some scepticism it seems.
The powersupply stability of digital chips has importance but you don't need superregs for this that regulate in the MHz. That would require many Amps of pulse power to keep cap voltages regulated and sense circuits near each chip that needs power. Pulses drawn by switching components in digital chips aren't handled by the regs at all. the PCB traces are way too long for this and have too much inductance. That's why there are decoupling caps as close as possible to its power pins. You can compound a few (say 10nF, 100nF and 1uF) if you want a wider range.
Steve knows this for sure but probably needs to write nonsense to keep his audience happy.
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You are many years behind the competition. People were claiming audible difference when listening to the same file in same format in defragged vs fragmented RAM disk.
Yes, it will give a nicer looking and jitter-less perception, but, as Amir pointed out, the question is how all that affects analog signal at the end of the DAC. So let's take some cheap but decently performing DAC like Topping D50 and see if this device can make D50 sound better or not.
digititus
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I have one of his products. There is no accusation, as that would imply something negative in my post. There is not.
solderdude
Grand Contributor
That's why I proposed the old Modi as that one has issues. The D50 probably has decent de-jitter circuitery.
The jitter in the DAC ultimately comes from the clock it runs on, the DAC chip itself and power supply issues for clock circuits and other chips.
Most likely that jitter is far worse than that of Steve's product. So in case of the D50 there will probably be no improvement.
I would not conclude that it did not improve things... it just did nothing for that DAC could be the only conclusion.
This doesn't mean the digital signal isn't say 10x 'nicer' and 'better' in quality as it is 'undone' in a DAC.
So that's why he wants it tested but not through a DAC.
Agreed that in the end it is the DAC output signal that should need to improve. Highly unlikely the D50 will benefit tough, if any DAC benefits at all.
Maybe some very old DACs without any jitter rejection that use incoming retreived clocks directly ?
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You are selling a "reclocker"
- that assumes there is something wrong with clocks, something that may have been true in the past but is not obvious today. Do you have evidence that there is a problem with the clocks of current well designed devices?
quote
"What you consider super-expensive and what I do may be worlds-apart I'm afraid. Most of my customers have systems starting at about $30KUSD. Most have speakers alone that cost that."
- that sounds a bit arrogant, I can assure you that some people who have $30K speakers and $50K systems can't hear differences between functional cables in a blind test. Anyway, that is "convenient escape door 1" for you. If the customer doesn't get the benefit of your device he has a poor system/poor ears/poor training.
And then this
"This proves that the molecular structure of the conductors is important, almost as important as the R, L and C."
That's an incorrect use of the term "molecular", metallic bonding would be more appropriate and is fundamentally different. It is always a bit amusing to hear designers talking about the molecular properties of their wires when they (alloys or else) are not molecular in nature... I mean, you could expect people making ground and sound breaking discoveries in cables, not to use vague, inaccurate terms.
To the questions
1. The measurements show no effect at all
2. Your device degrades the measurements.
3. Your device improves the measurements.
you have your escape door 2 - namely, measurements would be poorly done and escape door 3, measurements equipment would be inadequate. That's a bit easy, isn't it?
"I can easily hear the difference between ALAC, FLAC, .wav, AIFF and other formats playing the same track"
Here, you seem to claim to be able to easily hear differences between lossless formats. That's an amazing claim with profound implications in both information theory and physics. As such, it would have to be tested with a five-sigma level of confidence as opposed to the two-sigma level often used in social sciences. How has the test been conducted and at which level of confidence? Is the data public? Now, I understand that to reach that five-sigma level of confidence, you may have collected terabytes of data. How much storage do we need to send you so we can have a look at that data?
"Transient capability of the digital part of the DAC has nothing to do with this. The power delivery must support di/dt in the 1amp/usec range in order to not result in distortion in the analog output."
That statement seems to have been a bit hard to parse. Could you please clarify it? If what you are trying to say that a good amplification chain is required behind the DAC, no one will dispute that, just as no one will dispute that good speakers (whatever that is) are required after the analog amplification stage. But how is that relevant to a reclocker? Here, I can kind of guess what you are trying to say, but other members have asked specific clarifications and I haven't seen an answer.
Now, now let's go back to the basic claim that your reclocker improves something (still not quite clear in my mind) 10 or even 100 times... Even with the vagueness in the size of the improvement, that is a testable claim. Great.
Outcome A: Let's assume that you are a great designer, a bit like Rob Watts for example, and that a real improvement in measurements does indeed occur... The obvious question is then is it audible? For some reason, even though I own a couple of what you arbitrarily describe as high-end systems and speakers on the base of price, I have a very hard time noticing differences between fairly well behaved and similar devices that measured 95dB, 105dB and 110dB in some metric. I am sure I would not be able to notice anything if one arbitrary metric goes from 110dB to 120dB. And, if by some miracle I was, I would turn myself into the nearest research center to be studied. But yeah, in that outcome, you'd have deserved the right to call yourself a great designer, even if your goal is a bit pointless in practical terms.
Outcome B: no measurable gain or even a loss. In that case, just typical snake oil audio stuff. But no worries, you have escape doors 1/2/3
Sigh...
- that assumes there is something wrong with clocks, something that may have been true in the past but is not obvious today. Do you have evidence that there is a problem with the clocks of current well designed devices?
quote
"What you consider super-expensive and what I do may be worlds-apart I'm afraid. Most of my customers have systems starting at about $30KUSD. Most have speakers alone that cost that."
- that sounds a bit arrogant, I can assure you that some people who have $30K speakers and $50K systems can't hear differences between functional cables in a blind test. Anyway, that is "convenient escape door 1" for you. If the customer doesn't get the benefit of your device he has a poor system/poor ears/poor training.
And then this
"This proves that the molecular structure of the conductors is important, almost as important as the R, L and C."
That's an incorrect use of the term "molecular", metallic bonding would be more appropriate and is fundamentally different. It is always a bit amusing to hear designers talking about the molecular properties of their wires when they (alloys or else) are not molecular in nature... I mean, you could expect people making ground and sound breaking discoveries in cables, not to use vague, inaccurate terms.
To the questions
1. The measurements show no effect at all
2. Your device degrades the measurements.
3. Your device improves the measurements.
you have your escape door 2 - namely, measurements would be poorly done and escape door 3, measurements equipment would be inadequate. That's a bit easy, isn't it?
"I can easily hear the difference between ALAC, FLAC, .wav, AIFF and other formats playing the same track"
Here, you seem to claim to be able to easily hear differences between lossless formats. That's an amazing claim with profound implications in both information theory and physics. As such, it would have to be tested with a five-sigma level of confidence as opposed to the two-sigma level often used in social sciences. How has the test been conducted and at which level of confidence? Is the data public? Now, I understand that to reach that five-sigma level of confidence, you may have collected terabytes of data. How much storage do we need to send you so we can have a look at that data?
"Transient capability of the digital part of the DAC has nothing to do with this. The power delivery must support di/dt in the 1amp/usec range in order to not result in distortion in the analog output."
That statement seems to have been a bit hard to parse. Could you please clarify it? If what you are trying to say that a good amplification chain is required behind the DAC, no one will dispute that, just as no one will dispute that good speakers (whatever that is) are required after the analog amplification stage. But how is that relevant to a reclocker? Here, I can kind of guess what you are trying to say, but other members have asked specific clarifications and I haven't seen an answer.
Now, now let's go back to the basic claim that your reclocker improves something (still not quite clear in my mind) 10 or even 100 times... Even with the vagueness in the size of the improvement, that is a testable claim. Great.
Outcome A: Let's assume that you are a great designer, a bit like Rob Watts for example, and that a real improvement in measurements does indeed occur... The obvious question is then is it audible? For some reason, even though I own a couple of what you arbitrarily describe as high-end systems and speakers on the base of price, I have a very hard time noticing differences between fairly well behaved and similar devices that measured 95dB, 105dB and 110dB in some metric. I am sure I would not be able to notice anything if one arbitrary metric goes from 110dB to 120dB. And, if by some miracle I was, I would turn myself into the nearest research center to be studied. But yeah, in that outcome, you'd have deserved the right to call yourself a great designer, even if your goal is a bit pointless in practical terms.
Outcome B: no measurable gain or even a loss. In that case, just typical snake oil audio stuff. But no worries, you have escape doors 1/2/3
Sigh...
D
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Gents,
Steve Nugent has found himself in dust-ups regarding his views for many years. (That's why I mentioned this thread would quickly turn into a can-of-worms.)
Particularly entertaining was a letter-to-the-editor in AudioXpress about ten years ago outlining a Ferrari/Geo analogy. (You can Google if you like.)
It always boils down to the same thing. If you don't appreciate/experience the improvement his products offer, then your system is not in the 1% of systems resolving enough and/or you don't have the listening/hearing ability.
Regards an ASR evaluation: It doesn't matter what the outcome of device testing on the EA product(s) Amir puts his efforts toward, there will be suitable rationalizations ready to go immediately from Steve. Note that he's already laying the groundwork for those.
Dave.
Steve Nugent has found himself in dust-ups regarding his views for many years. (That's why I mentioned this thread would quickly turn into a can-of-worms.)
Particularly entertaining was a letter-to-the-editor in AudioXpress about ten years ago outlining a Ferrari/Geo analogy. (You can Google if you like.)
It always boils down to the same thing. If you don't appreciate/experience the improvement his products offer, then your system is not in the 1% of systems resolving enough and/or you don't have the listening/hearing ability.
Regards an ASR evaluation: It doesn't matter what the outcome of device testing on the EA product(s) Amir puts his efforts toward, there will be suitable rationalizations ready to go immediately from Steve. Note that he's already laying the groundwork for those.
Dave.
I apologize. I misunderstood and shall delete my comment.
I've also heard the solid state vs mechanical hard drive argument
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Me too. One is silent, the other makes a whirring sound.
solderdude
Grand Contributor
Lets not forget SandyK's claims.
Ah! The placebo effect is strong in you, unlucky fellow!
No wonder you have some unsubstantiable views.
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