This is my first post here. I just got my DS yesterday. I ended up not doing any work and listening for hours and I anticipate much of the same the rest of the week. What an amazing DAC. Hats off to the team at PS Audio, this is life changing for me – I’ve never owned a source this good before and am thrilled. I tend to keep my equipment for a long time ( I’m still running speakers I purchased in 1998 ). I’m running it via ROON over ethernet into the bridge II from a Mac. It works amazingly well.
However, I noticed a few things that I thought I should mention, and apologies if there is already a solution for this or mentioned elsewhere before ( I’m still learning the interface ):
DS Seems to work with ROON as a RAAT ready device for the most part. However, the forward/back buttons behave strangely. The forward button at least a few times went to the beginning of the queue and other times to the previous track. The back button moved forward. I'm guessing they are just reversed and I noticed an anomaly but it would be good to fix the reversal since it's clunky.
It's great seeing album art. But at a distance all the other stuff is unreadable glare and one can barely see the album, it's so tiny. Also it's very inelegant to have all that text when it is only meaningful up close. Just as an example, it would be nice to have 3 modes in the display:
The one you have currently
A screen with just the Album filling half of the screen ( instead of a fourth ) and names without track position or bitrate etc
A screen with only the album filling the screen at the largest square ( and maybe track info underneath ).
Blacking on the background when the album only is shown
Dimming has only one step to turn off and is extremely bright when on. It would be good to cycle through multiple levels of brightness when pressing the dim button.
The bridge ii doesn't show any firmware info it's at 0.0
A question on burn in, the word on the street is that it takes 500 hours. I noticed a slight improvement at the end of my listening yesterday. Is a normal progression to notice a gradual improvement all the way?
Anyways, my thanks again for making such a great product that is bound to provide many hours of future enjoyment.
I can’t help with DirectStream details as I currently have a PerfectWave DAC with Bridge II.
You keep stuff forever?? I have (and use) two sets of speakers that I bought in the '80s.
I like your comments on the screen, the text and album art are too small to be of value more than a few feet away. My solution is to look at those on the tablet that I use for controlling the system. If you are using a computer in the music room then it’s display could do duty for this info.
Screen brightness can be adjusted, but only using the touchscreen and during initialization. If you tap the screen during initialization you should get a menu for several functions and brightness is one of these. I have not read the DirectStream manual, but this information should be in there somewhere.
As for burn in: The PS Audio DACs do take a long time to settle out, my PWD took something like 800~1000 hours when I upgraded it to Mk.II. Some people have noticed some periods of degradation in the process, but this almost always happens very early on. My favorite burn-in practice is to run seashore / ocean wave environment tracks constantly in the background whenever I am not listening to music. At 168 hours a week, you can get most of the burn in done in a few weeks.
Again, welcome to the forum and we look forward to hearing more of your system and experience.
Break-in: J.P. Is correct in his comments on break-in and many others I’m sure would concur.
Screen brightness: In the main screen you will see a small gear symbol in the upper left side of the screen. Tap it and in the next screen there should be a “Dimmer” setting. Tap the symbol to the right and it should toggle between high, medium and low.
Bridge firmware: If I recall correctly, the latest Bridge firmware that permits use of Roon is displaying 0.00. PS Audio is aware of this, and will fix in the next firmware upgrade.
Screen size: Yes many of us would like a larger screen, but we’re stuck with what we got. If you use the Bridge you can get the same or similar information on your control point, e.g. an iPad.
Roon: Sorry I’m not using Roon yet, but I’m sure someone out there can help you.
wingsounds13 said
First off... Welcome to the forum.
I can’t help with DirectStream details as I currently have a PerfectWave DAC with Bridge II.
You keep stuff forever?? I have (and use) two sets of speakers that I bought in the '80s.
I like your comments on the screen, the text and album art are too small to be of value more than a few feet away. My solution is to look at those on the tablet that I use for controlling the system. If you are using a computer in the music room then it’s display could do duty for this info.
Screen brightness can be adjusted, but only using the touchscreen and during initialization. If you tap the screen during initialization you should get a menu for several functions and brightness is one of these. I have not read the DirectStream manual, but this information should be in there somewhere.
As for burn in: The PS Audio DACs do take a long time to settle out, my PWD took something like 800~1000 hours when I upgraded it to Mk.II. Some people have noticed some periods of degradation in the process, but this almost always happens very early on. My favorite burn-in practice is to run seashore / ocean wave environment tracks constantly in the background whenever I am not listening to music. At 168 hours a week, you can get most of the burn in done in a few weeks.
Again, welcome to the forum and we look forward to hearing more of your system and experience.
J.P.
Thanks! Yes you have me beat with long term purchases
I do use the tablet. Roon has a fantastic iPad app, so my comment isn’t on what I’m not able to do, but that I find the DS playback screen to have a lot of room for improvement since it is basically of no use when sitting at a normal distance and listening to music.
I’ll take a look at the deeper setting, but it would be nice to adjust the brightness from the remote since there is already a button that basically turns off and on, and it would be nice to have it be a dimmer.
Thanks for the info, look forward to sharing my experiences moving forward!
audiovkk said
. . . this is life changing for me -- I've never owned a source this good before and am thrilled.
It is great fun, isn’t it?
Welcome!
pmotz said
I'll add my 2 cents ...
Break-in: J.P. Is correct in his comments on break-in and many others I’m sure would concur.
Screen brightness: In the main screen you will see a small gear symbol in the upper left side of the screen. Tap it and in the next screen there should be a “Dimmer” setting. Tap the symbol to the right and it should toggle between high, medium and low.
Bridge firmware: If I recall correctly, the latest Bridge firmware that permits use of Roon is displaying 0.00. PS Audio is aware of this, and will fix in the next firmware upgrade.
Screen size: Yes many of us would like a larger screen, but we’re stuck with what we got. If you use the Bridge you can get the same or similar information on your control point, e.g. an iPad.
Roon: Sorry I’m not using Roon yet, but I’m sure someone out there can help you.
Thanks, yes I’ll look at that ( and missed that setting ), but as mentioned above, it would still be nice to have that functionality in the remote where a button is already allocated for dimming.
I wasn’t saying we should have a larger screen size. I’m saying that it would be good to take up more of the display with the album art and actually have a toggle that goes through multiple sizes of album art. I’m an engineer and so understand that the display can’t be changed. I think having album art more visible would enhance the appeal of the product.
I understand Roon pretty well, I think. It has a protocol that allows Dacs to interface with the player and so the ps audio remote actually controls the player and vice versa. Most of the functions work, but the forward back are reversed.
audiovkk said
. . . this is life changing for me -- I've never owned a source this good before and am thrilled.
It is great fun, isn’t it?
Welcome!
pmotz said
I'll add my 2 cents ...
Break-in: J.P. Is correct in his comments on break-in and many others I’m sure would concur.
Screen brightness: In the main screen you will see a small gear symbol in the upper left side of the screen. Tap it and in the next screen there should be a “Dimmer” setting. Tap the symbol to the right and it should toggle between high, medium and low.
Bridge firmware: If I recall correctly, the latest Bridge firmware that permits use of Roon is displaying 0.00. PS Audio is aware of this, and will fix in the next firmware upgrade.
Screen size: Yes many of us would like a larger screen, but we’re stuck with what we got. If you use the Bridge you can get the same or similar information on your control point, e.g. an iPad.
Roon: Sorry I’m not using Roon yet, but I’m sure someone out there can help you.
Thanks, yes I’ll look at that ( and missed that setting ), but as mentioned above, it would still be nice to have that functionality in the remote where a button is already allocated for dimming.
I wasn’t saying we should have a larger screen size. I’m saying that it would be good to take up more of the display with the album art and actually have a toggle that goes through multiple sizes of album art. I’m an engineer and so understand that the display can’t be changed. I think having album art more visible would enhance the appeal of the product.
I understand Roon pretty well, I think. It has a protocol that allows Dacs to interface with the player and so the ps audio remote actually controls the player and vice versa. Most of the functions work, but the forward back are reversed.
Thanks for the feedback!
audiovkk said
Elk said
audiovkk said
. . . this is life changing for me -- I've never owned a source this good before and am thrilled.
It is great fun, isn’t it?
Welcome!
pmotz said
I'll add my 2 cents ...
Break-in: J.P. Is correct in his comments on break-in and many others I’m sure would concur.
Screen brightness: In the main screen you will see a small gear symbol in the upper left side of the screen. Tap it and in the next screen there should be a “Dimmer” setting. Tap the symbol to the right and it should toggle between high, medium and low.
Bridge firmware: If I recall correctly, the latest Bridge firmware that permits use of Roon is displaying 0.00. PS Audio is aware of this, and will fix in the next firmware upgrade.
Screen size: Yes many of us would like a larger screen, but we’re stuck with what we got. If you use the Bridge you can get the same or similar information on your control point, e.g. an iPad.
Roon: Sorry I’m not using Roon yet, but I’m sure someone out there can help you.
Thanks, yes I’ll look at that ( and missed that setting ), but as mentioned above, it would still be nice to have that functionality in the remote where a button is already allocated for dimming.
I wasn’t saying we should have a larger screen size. I’m saying that it would be good to take up more of the display with the album art and actually have a toggle that goes through multiple sizes of album art. I’m an engineer and so understand that the display can’t be changed. I think having album art more visible would enhance the appeal of the product.
I understand Roon pretty well, I think. It has a protocol that allows Dacs to interface with the player and so the ps audio remote actually controls the player and vice versa. Most of the functions work, but the forward back are reversed.
I have the brightness set to medium and normally leave the screen black. Thus when it does light up, it is not in torch mode as it comes from the factory. The remote selects between the two.
I agree however, being able to set the brightness from the remote would be nice.
Elk said
I have the brightness set to medium and normally leave the screen black. Thus when it does light up, it is not in torch mode as it comes from the factory. The remote selects between the two.
I agree however, being able to set the brightness from the remote would be nice.
