Why aren't we pushing for more 4-8 channel DACS for a quality Stereo setup

[jtatknox]

In a heartbeat. And my heart was a twitter when I saw the 2x8 Parasound descriptor--alas, not what I hand in mind, counting balanced and unbalanced outputs separately, ear screeching artefact, etc.

Still wish miniDSP would get their act together and outfit a 2x8 or a 4x10 with the better DAC's and SHARC's used in the SHD, bundled with Dirac to at least have the option--say for 1200. That would be close to perfect, esp with remote control and some PEQ's for crappy recordings.

It wasn't clear from the review but it really does have 8 digital channels in and 8 analog out (independent) and the artifact was only on the high pass filter not the full range output. It's truly 8x8 over 4 zones.

The miniDSP product you are pitching would be killer. The DDRC-88A with quality DAC and digital inputs. What I am doing now is building 4 Khadas Tone Boards into a 1U rack enclosure that I will pair with the DDRC-88D. Kind of hacky, but should be high end.

 

[JRS]

It wasn't clear from the review but it really does have 8 digital channels in and 8 analog out (independent) and the artifact was only on the high pass filter not the full range output. It's truly 8x8 over 4 zones.

The miniDSP product you are pitching would be killer. The DDRC-88A with quality DAC and digital inputs. What I am doing now is building 4 Khadas Tone Boards into a 1U rack enclosure that I will pair with the DDRC-88D. Kind of hacky, but should be high end.

Well thanks for that; curiously not only is it not mentioned as part of the current Parasound offerings, it's not even on the legacy product list. Wonder if they pulled it? But alas unobtanium it would appear, even if one didn't need the provided XO ability.

A for the miniDSP architecture, I just can't figure that out--a hybrid--dig in analog out and maybe a pass thru digital out. Likewise the DDRC-88D doesn't have analog out.

Both cases would seem to argue that we active/DSP 3 ways+ subs club are in a very shallow demand niche market for now.

 

[dualazmak]

Hello OP @B&WTube,

As far as judging from technical and engineering capabilities, the company SMSL would be another candidate for development and manufacturing of 8-CH and 16-CH multichannel DACs (XLR balanced out) using single or dual ES9038pro, as I just wrote here...

 

[somebodyelse]

Given the response to the SU-9/M-500 issue (who releases a bug fix firmware with the same version number as the buggy one?!) SMSL have a bit of work to do to regain my trust. This follows the distortion on the balanced output of the original SU-8 and confusion around its board revisions and possible component changes.

 

[B&WTube]

Hello OP @B&WTube,

As far as judging from technical and engineering capabilities, the company SMSL would be another candidate for development and manufacturing of 8-CH and 16-CH multichannel DACs (XLR balanced out) using single or dual ES9038pro, as I just wrote here...

Any ideas on how to contact someone with them?

 

[somebodyelse]

Any ideas on how to contact someone with them?

Tagging @SMSL-Mandy and @SMSL_Liu perhaps?

 

[Kal Rubinson]

Any ideas on how to contact someone with them?

Tagging @SMSL-Mandy and @SMSL_Liu perhaps?

I've tried before. Good luck.

 

[JRS]

Any ideas on how to contact someone with them?

What have you lost faith in the ASR homebrew project?

 

[Lambda]

I would like a company like Topping or SMSL to focus on making a good "modular" DAC. (mono or stereo)
Small cheap no features. just digital in (galvanicly isolated) analog out.
But of cause with clock input.
Maybe ADAT, or AES/EBU or plain I2S.

something like this but with XLR and in acually good

or like this:

And a extra DSP/ USB gateway box with the usual interface, display volume control.
If you need multi chennel just add more DACs.

 

[B&WTube]

What have you lost faith in the ASR homebrew project?

I don’t know enough about DAC design to homebrew it, and after listening to Rob Watts, of Chord, on design- I definitely don’t know how how to hold a SOTA multichannel DAC. I have always just wanted a good measuring and affordable company to make it.

 

[Kal Rubinson]

exaSound
Merging Technologies

 

[JRS]

I don’t know enough about DAC design to homebrew it, and after listening to Rob Watts, of Chord, on design- I definitely don’t know how how to hold a SOTA multichannel DAC. I have always just wanted a good measuring and affordable company to make it.

Me too. I love simple things like soldering a passive XO together--you know where these old eyes can see the target. I do have one project on hold--I bought 4 of those 200W ice amp modules from Parts Express and I have a very nice Marantz 5 ch amplifier that has a real 800 V-A supply and 5 sets of speaker terminals. Just need to gut the output stages--one by one they have gone poof and now left with two. Time for a refurb, and if all goes well a brand new 4x200W amp for 325.

What's the story about not holding it right--humor impaired at the moment?

 

[SMSL_Liu]

Any ideas on how to contact someone with them?

Hello, I want to know about the application scenarios of multi-channel DACs and are there any special requirements? I personally have a benchmark DAC2008, a very good old DAC (using TDA1547), it only has 4 AES inputs and 8 Analog outputs, no other functions, technically, we can indeed do 8-channel DAC, according to our current understanding of ES9038PRO, we can achieve 8ch, each channel can reach -123dB (@5Vrms)

 

[dualazmak]

Hello, I want to know about the application scenarios of multi-channel DACs and are there any special requirements? I personally have a benchmark DAC2008, a very good old DAC (using TDA1547), it only has 4 AES inputs and 8 Analog outputs, no other functions, technically, we can indeed do 8-channel DAC, according to our current understanding of ES9038PRO, we can achieve 8ch, each channel can reach -123dB (@5Vrms)

Hello SMSL_Liu,

Let me join our OP @B&WTube in greatly welcoming you on this thread!

I have OKTO DAC8PRO (one ES9028 for 8-Ch DAC processing) using in my multichannel multi-driver multi-way multi-amplifier "stereo" project consists of five SP drivers in L and R, i.e. sub-woofers (SWs), woofers (WOs), midrange Be-squakers (Be-SQs), Be-tweeters (Be-TWs) and metal horn super tweeters (STs). You can find my latest system configurations here (post #636 on that thread).

Although my system is actually 5-way 10-Ch stereo, OKTO DAC8PRO gives maximum of 8-Ch DAC processing so that I inevitably drive Be-TWs plus STs by the 7th(L) and 8th(R) channels of DAQC8PRO (and further splitting the signal in analog SP level into separate two amps for Be-TWs and STs). This means that, even at present, I would like to have HiFi 10-Ch USB-DAC to replace my OCTO DAC8PRO...

I am further planning to add a few SP drivers (and amps!) in this system which should be fully in sync with other SP drivers currently singing in full sync by DAC8PRO. (Very fortunately, the digital software XO/DSP/EQ "EKIO" I am using have no limitation in numbers of output channels.)

In my rather "extreme" multichannel system/project, therefore, I would like to have simple HiFi 16-Ch multichannel USB-DAC of similar performance and spec of DAC8PRO; I do not need any XO/DSP/EQ capabilities in such 16-Ch USB-DAC since I do XO/DSP/EQ in upstream digital domain within PC.

I do believe you at SMSL have enough knowledge and technology in developing such 16-Ch USB-DAC using two of ES9038PRO with common clock and XMOS firmware.

As I wrote in my above post #143 on this thread, Danville Signal has concrete plan for developing/manufacturing 2-In 16-Out USB-DAC+XO/DSP/EQ in one box using two of ES9038PRO (I believe so) in it. The coming Danville's dspNexus 2/16 will look like onebox alternative for the extraordinary expensive Trinnov Altitude 32; we (at least myself), however, do not need all of the XO/DSP/EQ functions, and we/I need only the fully sync 16-Out (XLR balanced) excellent HiFi multichannel USB-DAC unit.

For the possible SMLS's simple HiFi 16-Ch USB-DACs, of course we need reliable low-latency USB ASIO driver (in Windows PC, Linux, and MAC) which should recognize all of the 16 channels of the USB-DAC as output channels looking from digital software crossover XO/DSP/EQ software in PC through single USB 2.0 cable connection.

Thanks in advance for your kind attention and consideration.

Edit at 22:15 on October 27, 2021 Japan Time:
As @somebodyelse kindly pointed in his post below, I would be really happy if I can use two of your possible 8-Ch USB-DACs (XLR balanced out), Unit-1 and Unit-2, having clock sync mechanism between them, and if the OS and PC software would recognize (by your possible ASIO driver) all of the 16 channels independently as the output channels (hopefully by single USB 2.0 cable into the Unit-1).

 

[somebodyelse]

Hello, I want to know about the application scenarios of multi-channel DACs and are there any special requirements? I personally have a benchmark DAC2008, a very good old DAC (using TDA1547), it only has 4 AES inputs and 8 Analog outputs, no other functions, technically, we can indeed do 8-channel DAC, according to our current understanding of ES9038PRO, we can achieve 8ch, each channel can reach -123dB (@5Vrms)

Thanks for at least considering this. For the ASR Open Source Streamer Project the requirement is for a basic USB input, multi-channel output high quality DAC that will work with linux - essentially UAC2 without quirks like most of the stereo DACs, ideally including volume control over USB. For most the aim seems to be to use it as an active crossover, whether for multiway active speakers like the Linkwitz designs, or for mains and subs. I imagine there will be a subset of users wanting high channel counts so they can do active crossovers for surround systems, so clock sync between multiple devices would be good too. I'd argue for balanced outputs, though others would probably be happy with single ended.

Current options are limited - there's a big gap between the ESI Gigaport EX and the Okto. At the bottom end you can use a 5.1 or 7.1 device from traditional PC sound card manufacturers, but they often have significantly worse performance on the secondary channels. Higher up you can try to find a semi-pro audio interface that works with linux, but many have significant quirks and issues, and few if any are tested with linux by manufacturers. Notably at least one member here has said the MOTU Ultralite Mk5 works reliably, unlike their AVB series, but you still can't change most of its settings. That does give us an option between the ESI and the Okto.

Personally I'm probably out of this market for a bit as the 'spares or repair' DSP board I picked up seems functional after all.

 

[JRS]

Hello SMSL_Liu,

Let me join our OP @B&WTube in greatly welcoming you on this thread!

I have OKTO DAC8PRO (one ES9028 for 8-Ch DAC processing) using in my multichannel multi-driver multi-way multi-amplifier "stereo" project consists of five SP drivers in L and R, i.e. sub-woofers (SWs), woofers (WOs), midrange Be-squakers (Be-SQs), Be-tweeters (Be-TWs) and metal horn super tweeters (STs). You can find my latest system configurations here (post #636 on that thread).

Although my system is actually 5-way 10-Ch stereo, OKTO DAC8PRO gives maximum of 8-Ch DAC processing so that I inevitably drive Be-TWs plus STs by the 7th(L) and 8th(R) channels of DAQC8PRO (and further splitting the signal in analog SP level into separate two amps for Be-TWs and STs). This means that, even at present, I would like to have HiFi 10-Ch USB-DAC to replace my OCTO DAC8PRO...

I am further planning to add a few SP drivers (and amps!) in this system which should be fully in sync with other SP drivers currently singing in full sync by DAC8PRO. (Very fortunately, the digital software XO/DSP/EQ "EKIO" I am using have no limitation in numbers of output channels.)

As I wrote in my above post #143 on this thread, Danville Signal has concrete plan for developing/manufacturing 2-In 16-Out USB-DAC+XO/DSP/EQ in one box using two of ES9038PRO (I believe so) in it. The coming Danville's dspNexus 2/16 will look like onebox alternative for the extraordinary expensive Trinnov Altitude 32; we (at least myself), however, do not need all of the XO/DSP/EQ functions, and we/I need only the fully sync 16-Out (XLR balanced) excellent HiFi multichannel USB-DAC unit.
the output channels (hopefully by single USB 2.0 cable into the Unit-1).

I'm curious--I've been watching for the release of the dspNexus. (DEQX has an upcoming offering that will do 2/8 but likely be priced at >7500. --so as much as I like their products, that's a non-starter)., but one item I am ambivalent about with the Nexus is having to (?) use Audio Weaver, which seems more aligned with pro audio applications. I am a big believer in steep( >48dB/octave filters), and unless I misunderstood, are stuck cascading a bunch of 2'nd order filters after calculating the Biquads. Granted, one may only be rarely called to do so, but wit the DEQX at least, most of the behind the scenes stuff was automated. The user defines the window, the max cut/gain, the frequency limits and degree of smoothing and the software does the rest. Long story short, amy Audio Weaver users out there who might comment on the user-friendliness of it?

 

[dualazmak]

I'm curious--I've been watching for the release of the dspNexus. (DEQX has an upcoming offering that will do 2/8 but likely be priced at >7500. --so as much as I like their products, that's a non-starter)., but one item I am ambivalent about with the Nexus is having to (?) use Audio Weaver, which seems more aligned with pro audio applications. I am a big believer in steep( >48dB/octave filters), and unless I misunderstood, are stuck cascading a bunch of 2'nd order filters after calculating the Biquads. Granted, one may only be rarely called to do so, but wit the DEQX at least, most of the behind the scenes stuff was automated. The user defines the window, the max cut/gain, the frequency limits and degree of smoothing and the software does the rest. Long story short, amy Audio Weaver users out there who might comment on the user-friendliness of it?

Hello (again?) @JRS,

Since I am not an expert (you are the one, I believe) in mathematical and theoretical design of audio XO/EQ/DSP, the theoretical comparison between EKIO and other XO solutions would be far beyond my knowledge and capabilities. I am afraid of, therefore, that the following my points would be out of your discussion scope,, but...

As shared in my post here, Guillaume of LUPISOFT kindly responded to me informing;
"EKIO uses IIR filters. The processing is done using a cascade of second order transposed direct form II biquad sections. Every calculation is done using 64 bit floating point numbers."

I mainly use 2nd order -12 dB/Oct LR (Linkwiz-Riley) filters simulating Yamaha NS-1000's original passive LC XO network, and I am much satisfied/comfortable with EKIO in all aspects of the total sound quality.

@Lbstyling pointed in his post in my thread that IIR (in EKIO) may induce post ringing (less audible as the sound masks the ringing) "in theory". My rather primitive test/experiment showed, however, at least in my multichannel setup EKIO gives no audible post-ringing nor pre-ringing at all. I assume and believe that EKIO's internal IIR filter algorithm is well designed and carefully tuned/optimized to eliminate or minimize (to under audible level) any possible post-ringing (and pre-ringing).

Consequently, I love and stick to EKIO's very simple, stable, fast and flexible digital XO/EQ capabilities in "whole OS wide" application through ASIO4ALL; I mean EKIO can receive audio signal from any audio softwares including JRiver, Roon, web browsers, Adobe Audition, etc., and EKIO feeds all the XO-ed channels into DAC8PRO.

In any way, going back to the main theme of this thread, I would like to have reliable full sync 16-Ch USB-DAC (XLR balanced analog out) to which I can feed max. 16 channels from EKIO by single (or dual?) USB 2.0 cable by the possible dedicated ASIO driver.

 

[JRS]

Hello (again?) @JRS,

Since I am not an expert (you are the one, I believe) in mathematical and theoretical design of audio XO/EQ/DSP, the theoretical comparison between EKIO and other XO solutions would be far beyond my knowledge and capabilities. I am afraid of, therefore, that the following my points would be out of your discussion scope,, but...

In any way, going back to the main theme of this thread, I would like to have reliable full sync 16-Ch USB-DAC (XLR balanced analog out) to which I can feed max. 16 channels from EKIO by single (or dual?) USB 2.0 cable by the possible dedicated ASIO driver.

No expert here, I apologize if I gave anyone that impression. On the contrary, I wish to be coddled and have a smart and intuitive computer program do it for me. But having said that, it's good to know of EKIO. It seems that there are so many options, it might be helpful to have a sticky in the DIY forum with links and an overview. I greatly admire that you have been able to put together such a complex system using EKIO. It has been many decades since hearing those Yamaha monitors--I'm thinking late 1970's? I recall them as being neutral and able to play loud. But a speaker with great merit in it's time.

I do have a question for you--if I wished to have a 4'th order say Butterworth low pass filter, where do I get help? IIRC MiniDSP had a link for custom filter design--my concern with the Audio Weaver (and it appears EKIO) is that one could get in trouble with instability if they didn't have precise coefficients of filter elements in the cascade.

 

[dualazmak]

I hope I can share proper info on EKIO well responding to your inquiries.

EKIO is very simple and straightforward through its nice GUI;

Each of the output XO channels has Gain (dB), Delay (ms) and phase Invert controls. You can set multiple XO settings selectable from LOW-PASS, HIGH-PASS, BELL, LOW-SHELF, HIGH-SHELF. Filter type can be selected from BW, LR, Bessel. Slope can be selected from 12 dB/oct, 24 dB/oct, 32 dB/oct, 48 dB/oct.

Furthermore, each of the output channel panels has its group Delay control in ms. As I shared here, the group delay of EKIO is really accurate.

I would like to suggest you trying free version (support only two output channels) for flexible I/O and XO/EQ settings. The paid-up EKIO has no limitation of numbers of output channels. Even on my rather outdated silent Windows PCs, EKIO is very much stable and fast occupying less than 20% of the CPU power in full 10-channel XO/EQ operation.

 

[JRS]

I may just do that--currently w/o a stereo so switching between my IEM's and phones, this looks like a way to make a switch on the fly. Thx.