Review and Measurements of Paradigm PW-Link Streamer/DAC

[Vasr]

Hello All,
Play-Fi Version 6.3 broke my Paradigm Link
Link via toslink to Bifrost2 to studio monitors.

Before the launch of the new rev, I was able to stream at 24/192 from Amazon HD and my hi-res content on my NAS and SSD via ethernet cable.

After the firmware upgrade, I can only max it out at 24/96 if I try full resolution the link lags and crashes.

The presets only work if you have location enabled and running this app in the background really drains the battery, I have a new iPhone and it's ridiculous that I'm out of juice after an 8hr shift that was the whole point of getting the link that I can control the volume from a distance.

I'm returning the link and staying with USB unison, Play-fi and BluOs are not ready for us demanding customers.

Play-Fi is one of the biggest abominations in the history of audio and software. Paradigm really did a bad decision hitching on to this platform to be so critical for using their devices.

Also the Paradigm PW Link is not the best choice as just a streamer. Its relevance is only becaus it is the cheapest 2-channel ARC processor you can buy (which is limited to 48khz anyway on this box).

 

[elliott]

Ok, sorry for the aside, but I've been following this thread as best I can.

I've got an airport express with optical out to minidsp 4x10 to @Buckeye Amps (awesome NC252MP based amp btw) to lxminis. I'm thinking of putting this between the airport express and the minidsp. Question is do we know if there is quality loss going from the optical in to optical out yet? Would I have better results using something like REW and I guess doing everything manually in the minidsp? And realistically how much work would it take to set everything up manually with something like REW and the minidsp?

 

[Vasr]

Ok, sorry for the aside, but I've been following this thread as best I can.

I've got an airport express with optical out to minidsp 4x10 to @Buckeye Amps (awesome NC252MP based amp btw) to lxminis. I'm thinking of putting this between the airport express and the minidsp. Question is do we know if there is quality loss going from the optical in to optical out yet? Would I have better results using something like REW and I guess doing everything manually in the minidsp? And realistically how much work would it take to set everything up manually with something like REW and the minidsp?

Optical to optical works fine and ARC really does a wonderful job without much tweaking necessary. Note that the PW-Link converts everything to 48khz sampling rate so higher sample rates in your content won't provide any benefits if it makes a difference to your listening.

With REW you can only asymptotically reach that level and only after a lot of experimentation. I do use REW based filters for multi-channel and ARC for stereo.

 

[PeteL]

Interesting that I never saw that before. Out of curiosity, Dac and streamer aside, that I may not use, are we looking at the cheapest room correction hardware solution on the market? How close are we to the results Dirac, or other solutions would do?

 

[fungd]

Ok, sorry for the aside, but I've been following this thread as best I can.

I've got an airport express with optical out to minidsp 4x10 to @Buckeye Amps (awesome NC252MP based amp btw) to lxminis. I'm thinking of putting this between the airport express and the minidsp. Question is do we know if there is quality loss going from the optical in to optical out yet? Would I have better results using something like REW and I guess doing everything manually in the minidsp? And realistically how much work would it take to set everything up manually with something like REW and the minidsp?

I use the PW Link in my LX521 system to tame room modes. My raspberry pi streamer goes digital out to the digital in of the Link which then goes digital out into the miniDSP 4x10. It works perfectly (no clicks and gapless playback with the RPi), and gives great results with ARC. I've done the REW route, but never found an easy way to equalize for more than just a single listening position, whereas the ARC algorithms (using 5+ measurement locations) quickly create adjustable equalizations that sounded really good.

So yes, the Link is the cheapest way to get quality room correction, as far as I know. BTW, Spotify Connect worked well with the Link, bypassing my RPi, allowing the direct use of all Spotify apps/interfaces. Sadly, Tidal Connect does not hook up directly.

Worth noting, if you buy the Martin Logan Unison ($199) over the Link, which is 95% identical, you can stream directly via AirPlay.

 

[Vasr]

The key with this unit when using the optical in is to have the upstream only send 48khz sampling rate to prevent artifacts between songs (like some bursts of sound or pops). Its "resting" default sampling seems to be 48khz, so if anything other than 48khz comes in after a pause in sound, it tries to sample it in 48khz immediately, "burps" without muting (that can sound like garbled music or just pops depending on the content), realizes its error and starts resampling.

Even though it can process and send out 44.1 out for 44.1 in, it creates problems even when only 44.1 content is played. Streaming through it does not seem to have this problem, only the optical input processing.

In the silence between songs, unit goes back to 48khz default and when the next song at 44.1 comes in, it needs to switch to 44.1 but does initial sampling in 48khz and "burps" that output. You can see all this happening if you connect its optical out to a fast detecting downstream device that can quickly display the sampling rate coming from it.

This problem can also be solved by using a downstream device that is rather slow in starting up after a break in content so it "eats" the "burp" while still muted. So, it looks like the PW-L works fine.

One would think a firmware update could have fixed this but I don't think this unit is being actively worked on.

 

[elliott]

Worth noting, if you buy the Martin Logan Unison ($199) over the Link, which is 95% identical, you can stream directly via AirPlay.

Wow, good to know. I always love one less box.

 

[PeteL]

The key with this unit when using the optical in is to have the upstream only send 48khz sampling rate to prevent artifacts between songs (like some bursts of sound or pops). Its "resting" default sampling seems to be 48khz, so if anything other than 48khz comes in after a pause in sound, it tries to sample it in 48khz immediately, "burps" without muting (that can sound like garbled music or just pops depending on the content), realizes its error and starts resampling.

Even though it can process and send out 44.1 out for 44.1 in, it creates problems even when only 44.1 content is played. Streaming through it does not seem to have this problem, only the optical input processing.

In the silence between songs, unit goes back to 48khz default and when the next song at 44.1 comes in, it needs to switch to 44.1 but does initial sampling in 48khz and "burps" that output. You can see all this happening if you connect its optical out to a fast detecting downstream device that can quickly display the sampling rate coming from it.

This problem can also be solved by using a downstream device that is rather slow in starting up after a break in content so it "eats" the "burp" while still muted. So, it looks like the PW-L works fine.

One would think a firmware update could have fixed this but I don't think this unit is being actively worked on.

Ouch. that scratches it out of the list for me. I was not hoping for better than 48k and was expecting it to resample and/or interpolate but this is a joke.

 

[fungd]

The key with this unit when using the optical in is to have the upstream only send 48khz sampling rate to prevent artifacts between songs (like some bursts of sound or pops). Its "resting" default sampling seems to be 48khz, so if anything other than 48khz comes in after a pause in sound, it tries to sample it in 48khz immediately, "burps" without muting (that can sound like garbled music or just pops depending on the content), realizes its error and starts resampling.

I don't see this issue with my setup (picoreplayer on RPi, no resampling settings), and can freely switch between tracks of various sample rates without hearing any issues. Perhaps the picoreplayer doesn't trigger this because it does not pause between tracks (I have gapless playback).

Possibly on a related note, the issue I find most annoying is when the processing of the PWLink stops and then kicks back in, resulting in the output being truncated until unmuting happens. This happens in the middle of certain test tracks and I am guessing that a long enough sequence of zeros in the digital stream makes the Link think that it should stop processing. Another thing they could fix in firmware but I'm not holding my breath.

Overall, a small annoyance considering the bang for buck I get out of it.

 

[Vasr]

I don't see this issue with my setup (picoreplayer on RPi, no resampling settings), and can freely switch between tracks of various sample rates without hearing any issues. Perhaps the picoreplayer doesn't trigger this because it does not pause between tracks (I have gapless playback).

Gapless playing fixes it, of course. In theory, this should also happen when the playing first starts with a sample rate other than 48khz but it doesn't seem to. So there is something that is triggered with the silence between tracks. Perhaps the difference between no audio (signal) vs a stream of silence. How much this becomes an issue also depends on the content. Tunes that start with a bang are much more likely to provoke a bigger " burp"/pop than songs that start with non-zero content at a very low level.

I think in all these devices there is a design struggle between amount of buffering, the speed of detection of sample rate and the length of muting to avoid pops. Different devices seem to make different compromises.

Overall, a small annoyance considering the bang for buck I get out of it.

That I totally agree with. A very good box for those that want to experiment with competent EQ as well. The supplied Mic is also good enough to be used with REW without calibration files.

 

[DonM]

Vasr said:
That I totally agree with. A very good box for those that want to experiment with competent EQ as well. The supplied Mic is also good enough to be used with REW without calibration files.[/QUOTE]

I just wanted to add: Based on my measurements with HolmImpulse, the ARC USB microphone was good between approximately 20 hz and 10K hz. I also found it is so much easier to use this versus my Behringer ECM8000 with the EMU-0404 pre-amp.

 

[elliott]

Ended up grabbing one of these on ebay for 100usd. There was no documentation for setup and the online manual is pretty sparse. So for anyone who lands on this thread, when you go into Wifi Setup mode or whatever it's called, it creates it's own wifi network (very similar to some other smart home devices), but then you need to find the IP address and navigate to that in a web browser and set your wifi network and password.

Maybe I just missed it, but that crucial setup was not obvious to me and maybe this will help others.

 

[DonM]

Ended up grabbing one of these on ebay for 100usd. There was no documentation for setup and the online manual is pretty sparse. So for anyone who lands on this thread, when you go into Wifi Setup mode or whatever it's called, it creates it's own wifi network (very similar to some other smart home devices), but then you need to find the IP address and navigate to that in a web browser and set your wifi network and password.

Maybe I just missed it, but that crucial setup was not obvious to me and maybe this will help others.

I have attached some printed instructions I received with a Martin Logan Unison. This should also apply to the PW Link. It was a challenge to compress the file size so it could be uploaded.

 

[DonM]

I had some problems using DTS Play-Fi and found that the Airport Express is not recommended as a wireless connection device. For more information you can refer to this FAQ:
https://play-fi.com/faq/entry/recommended-routers-and-network-specifications

The incompatible routers are listed here:
https://play-fi.com/faq/entry/incompatible-network-set-ups

 

[aerochrome2]

I use the PW Link in my LX521 system to tame room modes. My raspberry pi streamer goes digital out to the digital in of the Link which then goes digital out into the miniDSP 4x10. It works perfectly (no clicks and gapless playback with the RPi), and gives great results with ARC. I've done the REW route, but never found an easy way to equalize for more than just a single listening position, whereas the ARC algorithms (using 5+ measurement locations) quickly create adjustable equalizations that sounded really good.

So yes, the Link is the cheapest way to get quality room correction, as far as I know. BTW, Spotify Connect worked well with the Link, bypassing my RPi, allowing the direct use of all Spotify apps/interfaces. Sadly, Tidal Connect does not hook up directly.

Worth noting, if you buy the Martin Logan Unison ($199) over the Link, which is 95% identical, you can stream directly via AirPlay.

Given that the link and unison appear to be identical, I assume the Unison has the same down sampling issues as the link, but have not seen anywhere to confirm that. Does anyone know? It is the only reason I am holding off getting one or the other.

 

[Vasr]

Just to document that the PW Link does down-sample for optical in and out.

Foobar playing 96k file through optical to PW using WASAPI (direct mode)

DAC display while connected to the PW Optical out and playing the above. Downsampled to 48khz. Does not matter if ARC is enabled or not.

Attaching the same optical from PC directly to the DAC to ensure 96k coming through for the same source playing as above

 

[Vasr]

The problem situation is actually when playing 44.1k sources via the optical in/out.

PW Link sends the 44.1k as 44.1k out (does not upsample which is fine).

If there is gapless playing into it at 44.1khz, there is no problem.

But...
When there is a break in the song (am simulating it here with a pause and play), it sends something when that pause is encountered so the DAC switches momentarily to 48khz. The DAC will say No Audio if nothing is detected in the Optical, so the PW Link is sending something (silence) in this pause/break at 48khz.

And then when the play resumes (or the next song begins), the PW Link will play some small snippet/burst that the DAC is still apparently receiving in 48khz and then the input changes to 44.1khz again with a brief mute and song resumes. So depending on how the DAC itself handles the change in sampling rate, there could be muting in the DAC or if it is fast enough, it may catch any pops from the PW Link or at least that small burst before it resumes in 44.1k after a small muting.

I can't be absolutely sure from the above experiment that the DAC isn't the one creating the above problem in that transition but given the experiences others have related about the same small bursts or pops where the only thing common is presumably the PW Link, it is very likely that the problem is with the Link.

 

[aerochrome2]

The problem situation is actually when playing 44.1k sources via the optical in/out.

PW Link sends the 44.1k as 44.1k out (does not upsample which is fine).
View attachment 118122

If there is gapless playing into it at 44.1khz, there is no problem.

But...
When there is a break in the song (am simulating it here with a pause and play), it sends something when that pause is encountered so the DAC switches momentarily to 48khz. The DAC will say No Audio if nothing is detected in the Optical, so the PW Link is sending something (silence) in this pause/break at 48khz.

View attachment 118123

And then when the play resumes (or the next song begins), the PW Link will play some small snippet/burst that the DAC is still apparently receiving in 48khz and then the input changes to 44.1khz again with a brief mute and song resumes. So depending on how the DAC itself handles the change in sampling rate, there could be muting in the DAC or if it is fast enough, it may catch any pops from the PW Link or at least that small burst before it resumes in 44.1k after a small muting.

I can't be absolutely sure from the above experiment that the DAC isn't the one creating the above problem in that transition but given the experiences others have related about the same small bursts or pops where the only thing common is presumably the PW Link, it is very likely that the problem is with the Link.

Thanks. I have been going down the rabbit hole of this thread for about 45 minutes and still have a few pages to go.

That said, if the problem (clicks and pops) is mainly a result of down sampling from the optical in and is not an issue if streaming directly from playfi, I may want to give this a chance.

I.e., PW Link --> optical out to smsl m500 dac --> integrated amp.

Basically I would stop my old phone using usb into the dac over uapp (to stream tidal) and thus trade mqa and higher resolution audio for digital room correction.

 

[Vasr]

I haven't noticed any problems with using this as a streamer with PlayFi except having to deal with that terribly designed app. No issues with red book source content. Haven't tried with all sources that may have different gap behavior though. But this seems more like an Optical transceiver processing input issue.

 

[aerochrome2]

I haven't noticed any problems with using this as a streamer with PlayFi except having to deal with that terribly designed app. No issues with red book source content. Haven't tried with all sources that may have different gap behavior though. But this seems more like an Optical transceiver processing input issue.

Thanks. I would primarily use Tidal. It sounds like using DTS Play Fi would get rid of pops, but introduce 5 second gap. I don't feel like switching to spotify to solve for that. As tempted as I am, I may wait.