Sold my Schiit, need something new

[jackenhack]

itll be good for me to have the balanced, because ill be able to hook up my speakers and i plan on getting the thx 789 eventually as my solid state amp.

If you are planning for a THX 789, I would spring for the SU-8, otherwise, the D50 is very good. I have them both.

 

[mtf612]

Also curious. Currently using a Magni 2u and Modi 2u. Just replaced my Sennheiser 650 with Audeze LCD-3, so looking to upgrade DAC/AMP too. Was thinking maybe THX 789, but I was thinking about maybe going full balanced? I'm not sure what my next step is.

 

[amirm]

Also curious. Currently using a Magni 2u and Modi 2u. Just replaced my Sennheiser 650 with Audeze LCD-3, so looking to upgrade DAC/AMP too. Was thinking maybe THX 789, but I was thinking about maybe going full balanced? I'm not sure what my next step is.

The answer is right above. Get the SMSL SU-8. It has balanced output so you will be good to go.

 

[mtf612]

Get the SMSL SU-8. It has balanced output so you will be good to go.

Thank you! So it would be a full balanced set up assuming I picked the SU-8, THX 789 (whenever that drop happens), and a balanced cable for the LCD-3?

 

[amirm]

Thank you! So it would be a full balanced set up assuming I picked the SU-8, THX 789 (whenever that drop happens), and a balanced cable for the LCD-3?

Sure. The balanced interconnects between SU-8 and THX will give you ground loop resilience and the balanced cable for LCD-3 will give you more power.

 

[jbar2797]

Bought the SU-8, she will be here tomorrow. Thank you one day Amazon shipping!

 

[Vincent Kars]

How does HQPlayers filters neglect the filters built into the internals of the DAC?

The answer is simple, no external media player has control over anything happening inside the DAC.
The claim of HQPlayer is that if you have an upsampling DAC, you can defeat this upsampling if you feed audio at exactly the same rate as this DAC is using internally.
E.g. upsample a 16/44 external to 24/192 and feed it into a 24/192 DAC.
Its second claim is that the upsampling used by HQ is superior to the one as implemented in the firmware of the DAC

The question of course is what the internal sample rate of a DAC is.
My Benchmark runs internally at 120 and of course no way to feed it this sample rate as no receiver will accept this and probably no media player will support this rate either.

If the DAC runs at a high internal sample rate you can try all kind of filters using external upsampling.
Archimago has more: http://archimago.blogspot.com/2017/12/howto-musings-playing-with-digital_23.html

 

[jbar2797]

The answer is simple, no external media player has control over anything happening inside the DAC.
The claim of HQPlayer is that if you have an upsampling DAC, you can defeat this upsampling if you feed audio at exactly the same rate as this DAC is using internally.
E.g. upsample a 16/44 external to 24/192 and feed it into a 24/192 DAC.
Its second claim is that the upsampling used by HQ is superior to the one as implemented in the firmware of the DAC

The question of course is what the internal sample rate of a DAC is.
My Benchmark runs internally at 120 and of course no way to feed it this sample rate as no receiver will accept this and probably no media player will support this rate either.

If the DAC runs at a high internal sample rate you can try all kind of filters using external upsampling.
Archimago has more: http://archimago.blogspot.com/2017/12/howto-musings-playing-with-digital_23.html

Thank you for the reply. So how about the internal filter of the DAC? Is that bypassed too? What is the relationship of the up-sampling and filter in a DAC?

 

[headwhacker]

THX789/SU-8 unbeatable combo. Dont think you can go any better.

 

[vitalii427]

THX789/SU-8 unbeatable combo. Dont think you can go any better.

Maybe DAC3/HPA4 ))

 

[richpjr]

THX789/SU-8 unbeatable combo. Dont think you can go any better.

Agree that it is a great combo, but the problem is who knows when, if ever, that the THX 789 will be available on a drop again. I'm interested in what balanced alternatives to it are that aren't at the whim of a drop.

 

[jbar2797]

SMSL SU-8 come in this afternoon. It sounds awesome. Running it with Roon and HQPlayer at 384khz. Im messing around with filters. Really liking the closed form and minringFIR filters with my setup.

 

[Vincent Kars]

What is the relationship of the up-sampling and filter in a DAC?

An artifact of the DA conversion are the aliases.
They start at the half of the sample rate.
You don’t want to have them in the output hence there is a filter.
If the DAC is running at 44, you need a very steep filter (brickwall) as you want to preserve the audible range (up to 21 kHz) and has to clear out before half Fs begins (22 kHz).

As it is digital, everything remains the same.
Upsample to e.g. 176.
Of course there will be an alias starting at 88.
Of course we must filter but this time half Fs is far away from the upper threshold of out hearing.
No need to brickwall, a smoother one will do the job as well.

Bit more detail: http://www.thewelltemperedcomputer.com/KB/Sampling.htm

 

[jbar2797]

An artifact of the DA conversion are the aliases.
They start at the half of the sample rate.
You don’t want to have them in the output hence there is a filter.
If the DAC is running at 44, you need a very steep filter (brickwall) as you want to preserve the audible range (up to 21 kHz) and has to clear out before half Fs begins (22 kHz).

As it is digital, everything remains the same.
Upsample to e.g. 176.
Of course there will be an alias starting at 88.
Of course we must filter but this time half Fs is far away from the upper threshold of out hearing.
No need to brickwall, a smoother one will do the job as well.

Bit more detail: http://www.thewelltemperedcomputer.com/KB/Sampling.htm

So theoretically no filter is needed if umpsampled to anything past 96?

 

[Veri]

So theoretically no filter is needed if umpsampled to anything past 96?

Some DACs perform at their optimal at a certain rate. Whether the performance benefit is audible is another matter though.. but I believe both benchmark and crane song upsample to 211Khz

On computeraudiophile DSD256 upsampling seems to get the best THD measures but this is, imo, simply measurebating/pointless.

 

[MusicNBeer]

So theoretically no filter is needed if umpsampled to anything past 96?

No, it always needs a filter to remove the images of the original sampling rate. The upsampled stream is actually created with this filter. With no filter, you'd get a second copy of your music spectrum centered at 44.1KHz (input sampling rate). Really bad!

 

[Veri]

Really bad!

From 96Khz and definitely 192Khz it is pretty much entirely inaudible right?

 

[MusicNBeer]

From 96Khz and definitely 192Khz it is pretty much entirely inaudible right?

Ideally yes. It may drive dogs nuts. All the really high frequncy energy may cause all kinds of issues with tweeters and amplifiers. There's no reason to not filter other than audiophool selling point possibly.

 

[Veri]

Ideally yes. It may drive dogs nuts. All the really high frequncy energy may cause all kinds of issues with tweeters and amplifiers. There's no reason to not filter other than audiophool selling point possibly.

Lol ok thanks for clarifying.

 

[bennetng]

Actually cats are better, but maybe they cheated in listening tests.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hearing_range#In_animals