Damn my calves are aching. I installed Redcloud and the Bridge II update without a hitch yesterday. I spent about 4 hours listening yesterday and I am not used to tapping my toes for that long hence the sore calves this morning. I find it simply amazing the difference that software changes can make to the sound of the DSD dac. Everything sounds more accurate and the sound stage depth and width has been increased again.On numerous recordings I notice more echo almost like I am in the recording studio.
The Bridge II upgrade also fixed a problem I had. When I went into J River the Bridge II usually wasn’t recognized. I had to go into Roon which instantly recognized the Bridge II. I would then go back to J River with crossed fingers hoping that it would recognize the Bridge II. I would sometimes have to do this 3 to 4 times before I was able to play J River through the Bridge II. Now it appears each time I use J River.
Outstanding! To main change I’ve noticed is that a low level glare has been mitigated, revealing even more detail and ambiance.
As a bonus, a nasty “crack/thump” that would sporadically happen when I manually jumped between tracks on an album seems to be gone! (The small pop that occurred between tracks never really bothered me.) I’d though it was an idiosyncrasy of Audiophile Linux, but it appears to have been addressed with Redcloud. Yippee
I’m glad that the generic pop/tick suppression seems to be working on average. I could only reproduce a small set of ticks and pops, but the code I put in should never make things worse.
Ted, since loading up Redcloud the DS screen has to be prodded firmly and repeatedly few times to work ? I reloaded Huron plus a power-cycle and the DS screen worked perfectly as it did before with Huron but, after reloading Redcloud and power-cycling, the screen is once again far less sensitive to my touch ??
A live symphony orchestra at full bore can be very thrilling and often the power of a symphony climax can bring you literally to your feet. Impossible to duplicate that at home but yesterday, listening with Redcloud I got close. Osmo Vanska’s performance of Sibelius’ Symphony 5 with the Minnesota Orchestra (96k,24) is well recorded. So I played the final movement appropriately loud and the last few bars gave me absolute chills and goosebumps. That never happened before. I’ve no Idea how you did the magic Ted, but thank you and thanks to Paul and everyone at PS Audio who helped make this happen.
Ted, since loading up Redcloud the DS screen has to be prodded firmly and repeatedly few times to work ? I reloaded Huron plus a power-cycle and the DS screen worked perfectly as it did before with Huron but, after reloading Redcloud and power-cycling, the screen is once again far less sensitive to my touch ??
Bluenose, as you enjoy the Sibelius, I highly recommend Osmo Vänskä’s Grammy nominated recording of Mahler’s Fifth Symphony with the Minnesota Orchestra. It is spectacular in performance and sound. A vastly more sensitive and subtle reading of this high-strung, emotional music than one normally hears.
Let me say - Jazznut nailed my impressions. Dimension, mids have improved. A fullness and richness that I love. To Paul’s ‘horn blat’ comment in Mahler 3–yes! The horn tonality is magical with that…blat!!! Lol. I can’t describe it any other way. There is this ballsy character - I don’t know how else to put it.
I flipped back to Huron and things seemed tipped up just a little compared to Red Cloud.
To me - this seems through out the spectrum. Strings / horns/tympani/ voices all seem to have more body which I think as Jazznut said - might be coming somewhere from the improved lower mids.
If you have Tchaikovskys 6th - Gatti sacd - just do yourself a favor and put it on. There is a lifelike realism … Ok I cried. Lol. Leave me alone !!
There’s a screen recalibrate function: http://www.psaudio.com/ps_how/…..ch-screen/
Thanks Ted, I carried out the screen recalibration procedure but the screen just stayed the same, only displaying the calibration sequence - I heard a noise like a relay click but nothing changed re: screen ? I powered off at the rear switch and then rebooted the DS.. Nothing has changed, it still requires a few prods to activate the screen. 'Once again I reloaded Huron and the screen works faultlessly' ? I've tried another reload with Redcloud and two power-cycles then two more attempts at recalibrating the screen but sadly all to no avail ??
Is there an attenuation of higher frequencies, or filtering in this update? I’m hearing less tape hiss in analogue recordings and extension at matched levels to Huron.
Dirk said
I heard a noise like a relay click but nothing changed re: screen ? I powered off at the rear switch and then rebooted the DS.. Nothing has changed
You need to press very firmly in the recal to have it work, then things should be better.
Is there an attenuation of higher frequencies, or filtering in this update? I’m hearing less tape hiss in analogue recordings and extension at matched levels to Huron.
There’s never been any FR sculpting in the DS. But lowlevel THD and/or noise can cause all manner of perceived effects. Two things come to mind:
Perhaps some of the low level noise from previous releases was being perceived as tape hiss or extension, etc.
Perhaps you want to downgrade to Yale and then reupgrade to Redcloud. So far out of about 650 Redcloud DS updates we’ve had three reports of non-optimal behavior fixed by down grading and reupgrading.
Recognized a difference immediately and wow wow wow what an amazing update for our DAC Sr. / DSMP. Put on some Sheffield Labs disk and am absolutely stunned with the differences in the presentation and what wasn’t heard before that we are hearing now!
Great work Ted!
It’s just hard to imagine there was “that much more texture, spacial separation, soundstage depth and clarity” to be exposed in our system this morning. This is crazy good stuff. Very big “ear to ear” grin…
Rusty Jefferson said
Is there an attenuation of higher frequencies, or filtering in this update? I'm hearing less tape hiss in analogue recordings and extension at matched levels to Huron.
.......Perhaps you want to downgrade to Yale and then reupgrade to Redcloud. So far out of about 650 Redcloud DS updates we've had three reports of non-optimal behavior fixed by down grading and reupgrading.
Ted,
Okay, I won’t pretend to understand why, but this was apparently the issue. I reinstalled Yale, listened to a couple test tracks, then reinstalled Red Cloud, and the issue I heard with reduced/compressed high frequencies is gone. There is now less background noise and better dynamics.
I was perceiving a slightly reduced volume attenuation with the 1st install others mentioned that must be related. Those folks should probably try this “fix”.
I can’t add anything to what has already been posted, and can’t find an appropriate “gobsmacked” smiley either. Thanks to Ted, Paul and PSA for the early Christmas gift.
A live symphony orchestra at full bore can be very thrilling and often the power of a symphony climax can bring you literally to your feet. Impossible to duplicate that at home but yesterday, listening with Redcloud I got close. Osmo Vanska’s performance of Sibelius’ Symphony 5 with the Minnesota Orchestra (96k,24) is well recorded. So I played the final movement appropriately loud and the last few bars gave me absolute chills and goosebumps. That never happened before. I’ve no Idea how you did the magic Ted, but thank you and thanks to Paul and everyone at PS Audio who helped make this happen.
Unfortunately, no audio system can accurately reproduce even a single acoustic instrument, let alone an orchestra.
On the other hand, I always find fascinating when recording a live symphony concert the headphone feed always sounds “better” than live as one can hear more details and nuance. Microphones “hear” differently than we do and are placed in a better position that we can sit - often 15 feet above and just behind the conductor for the main stereo pair.