Great link to the AOS forum Gary. I loved the interjection of Dr Boogie, or whatever he calls himself. It’s easier to see cable differences on a TV. I hope he doesn’t get into Hifi.
What have you settled on as:
a) best for picture quality
and
b) best for I2S
I have a DirectSteam Memory player running into DSD so suggestions for the I2S link are welcomed, particularly the lower cost ones. I’m looking for one which is less ‘bright’ (sound quality, not picture).
The gods of audio have awarded my good and just behavior: An updated Oppomod I2S card replacement, a 0.5m Apollo HDMI cable as recommended by @gazjam, and an HDMI adapter that blocks pin 18 (the 5v feed) from Jay’s Audio, all arrived at the same time and just before a three day weekend! Despite previous assurances from Jaehong that the DSD channel swap issue was fixed in firmware, this particular card (labeled Ver 1.1 Rev. C -2019-02-21) has a new DSD Swap jumper (SW4):
Just for fun and maybe to get some money back selling a Purist Audio HDMI cable, I purchased a $16 0.5m version of the Apollo AV Lightning v2 cable to run between my cable box and Oppo 203 (then onto a Lampi Atlantic TRP dac). What stood out immediately was a vibrant, almost silky upper half and virtually complete absence of a lower midrange down to bass, along with any sense of “body” that goes with it. About 100 hours in, that hasn’t changed, except when something has an emphasized bass, which still sounds weak. It would be most unusual if another 200-300 hours were to fundamentally change that.
I have just ripped all my SACDs via the iso2dsd software by Sonore. It is just like ripping CDs, except you get dsf 64 files. The bummer is it only works on Oppo 103 and 105 players. So now, I play back in Roon just like any other file.
I have ripped my SACDs in dsf to my computer using the iso2dsd program, for both Mac and PC. Since I use Roon, I can access them on all my devices, as Roon downsamples where needed. The downside is the iso2dsd programs only works with Oppo 103 and 105 units.
I am glad that someone has finally tried the I2S board and I2S module to finally get true L & R I2S output from a SONY (or Oppo ) player. It has been almost 2 yrs that I have been enjoying and playing SACD disc that way. I have discovered a few more tweaks that has increased the resolution of the playback system which will be posted in the not to distant future. It is a great feeling to just grab a SACD disc put it in a player and enjoy the music via the DSDSr while reading the information on the disc booklet.
nazo2771 thanks again for your post on this Forum last year. Swapping pin 3 and 5 on the little board was the key. How did you think to flip those two specifically for the L & R correction ?
The answer was on the big board when you flipped it over it was right there.
As a reminder the de-emphasis flag problem on this board when playing PCM is easily taken care of by using the tip of a very small precision screwdriver to gingerly scrape the R47 resistor off the board ( no need for a soldering iron)
It didn’t work so I put back the resistor back on. I have a Metcal fine tip soldering station so removal and replacement was easy.
I’m assuming that the Oppo does De-emphasis differently than Sony, Also I flipped pins 3 & 5 on the little blue I2S board and simply cut to size the ribbon cable, stripping the wires on the blue board end, and soldering.
