EverSolo Z8 DAC & Amp Review

[Brent71]

Are you sure about the frequency (1411200 Hz)??? That would be a DSD32 in my book...
Anyway, rest assured the Z8 CAN play DSD up to 512. Maybe Foobar2000 algorithm of upsampling DSD is buggy?
P.S.
There is no meaning in upsampling a DSD... find a file online - there are sites that offer test/demo files, I myself downloaded a couple of them to test my Z8.
I also tried a DSD1024, just to be sure it cannot reproduce it...

That was a direct copy/paste from the error window that popped up in Foobar2000. I did get the Z8 to do DSD512 for a while, but it had clicks and glitches at times. Not sure what's going on since the DAC is plugged directly into a USB 3.0 port on my X399 Taichi MB, not through a USB hub. Maybe it's the cable.

 

[Nutul]

That was a direct copy/paste from the error window that popped up in Foobar2000. I did get the Z8 to do DSD512 for a while, but it had clicks and glitches at times. Not sure what's going on since the DAC is plugged directly into a USB 3.0 port on my X399 Taichi MB, not through a USB hub. Maybe it's the cable.

Use a USB2 port, it's more than enough. The DAC requests data when it sees fit, so no struggling.
I have played DSD up to 512 (but just to test purposes, my entire library is FLAC at 16/44.1 with rare exceptions at higher sample-rates / bit-depths, and never experienced a glitch... are you playing local files or from the LAN? See if you are on the 2.4GHz (the 5GHz is less crowded), or, at least, try to use a different channel if cannot move to the 5GHz; say, 11, or 13 instead of the default 5 or 6 (cannot remember, but anyway, anything other than the defaults the router offers is a better choice)

 

[Brent71]

Use a USB2 port, it's more than enough. The DAC requests data when it sees fit, so no struggling.
I have played DSD up to 512 (but just to test purposes, my entire library is FLAC at 16/44.1 with rare exceptions at higher sample-rates / bit-depths, and never experienced a glitch... are you playing local files or from the LAN? See if you are on the 2.4GHz (the 5GHz is less crowded), or, at least, try to use a different channel if cannot move to the 5GHz; say, 11, or 13 instead of the default 5 or 6 (cannot remember, but anyway, anything other than the defaults the router offers is a better choice)

Files are on HDDs in my PC tower. No LAN or wireless involved.

 

[Nutul]

Files are on HDDs in my PC tower. No LAN or wireless involved.

On a Windows PC, I suspect, then...
If possible, try a USB2 port first. I use a Raspberry Pi 4 playing local files to my Z8, through one of its USB2 ports, and never had an issue.

 

[Brent71]

On a Windows PC, I suspect, then...
If possible, try a USB2 port first. I use a Raspberry Pi 4 playing local files to my Z8, through one of its USB2 ports, and never had an issue.

AMD 2950x Threadripper with 128 GB of RAM running Win10 Pro.

 

[Nutul]

AMD 2950x Threadripper with 128 GB of RAM running Win10 Pro.

The machine is wonderful (even more than needed to just play audio, TBH)
Anyway, I was thinking just a couple of minutes ago... an UPSAMPLED DSD is not a DSD... depending on the algorithm, there might be some artifatcts (a DSD is not supposed to be upsampled, nor is easy upsampled as, for instance, a PCM file)
Try an original, high rate DSD, then you can start looking elsewhere if the glitches are still there.

Just my 2c, HTH
Cheers, Al.

 

[Brent71]

The machine is wonderful (even more than needed to just play audio, TBH)
Anyway, I was thinking just a couple of minutes ago... an UPSAMPLED DSD is not a DSD... depending on the algorithm, there might be some artifatcts (a DSD is not supposed to be upsampled, nor is easy upsampled as, for instance, a PCM file)
Try an original, high rate DSD, then you can start looking elsewhere if the glitches are still there.

Just my 2c, HTH
Cheers, Al.

I built this about 7 years ago when I was doing a lot of editing with Lightroom with a triple monitor setup, so I made sure it had plenty of horsepower. I started off with a 1920 CPU and 64 GB of RAM and 3 or 4 years ago went to the 2950x and another 64 GB of RAM. I'm down to 2-27" monitors now and might go to 30" since old age (54) is a bitch and I need reading glasses half the time.

I'm not sure what's going on, but I was just messing around seeing how far I could go with sampling rates. It does fine with DSD 256 and 768/32 PCM files. Right now I have Foobar2000 set to upsample everything to DSD 256, which is overkill, but I do like the sound of PCM upsampled to DSD. I'm not sure what it is exactly I like, but I assume it's the better impulse response of DSD, especially since my Dunlavy SC-Vs excel at that.

 

[kieko]

Just got this out of curiosity following the reviews here and at Goldensound, wasn't impressed by the sound but these are my measurements with Arta using the RME Adi-2 Pro, couldn't get anything better than this in jitter tests, I'm using a pure 12khz sine at 48:

Clocked by RME spdiof or toslink looks like this with minor differences

I played with the buffers, going to 44.1 (which should use a different clock), different usb ports for the usb test, and with the intona galvanic isolator and I get variations in the patterns but nothing substantial or any reduction in the huge widening under -120db

This is obviously all with ASIO, it's definitely the device, here's the control with the same setup, loopback of the ADI2:

ps. I also tried the usb-c connection, no change