Mi2016 said
. . . it becomes quite complicated to understand how software can sound different.
No question, but this is a separate from your assertion "when you properly isolate from the computer. . . . the software’s sound should be less of a factor." (emphasis in original).
It is this claim I question. Typically, if changes to a system remove noise it becomes easier to hear differences between sources; i.e., the sources do not become more similar in sound with a superior setup but even more different.
Elk said the sources do not become more similar in sound with a superior setup but even more different.
Right, we are in completely agreement there. We've found common ground (pun intended).
But once we properly isolate and we get into audio protocols, DLNA vs RAAT vs others, it all really quickly goes over my head and I fall-back to ears and I don’t hear differences today.
With Roon 18 months ago, possibly yes, but RAAT today is not the same sounding (to me) as 18 months ago.
Still, I keep an open mind and open ears and look forward to trying Audirvana for Windows later this year and then Octave next year.
Using pc USB you have ASIO and exclusive mode but using UltraR should be using DLNA/MPD bypassing all of those drivers. At least the DLNA part is how Audirvana is doing it.
Does Roon decompress before it goes out?
While we are comparing apples to monkeys:
I think your final question is the nub of the matter: people have claimed that the bridge sounds better with .wav compared to with .flac which seems plausible to me given that the decompression is running closer to the DAC proper (and probably closer to the rest of the audio system too.) Also the bridge processor is much less powerful than a typical PC/MAC/whatever these days.
Also it’s not obvious which is better: bypassing the audio stack of drivers or bypassing the network stack of drivers, …
Funny To have Ted mention wav v FLAC to the Bridge.
I try very hard to stay away from the dark side of the hobby and just enjoy the fruits of good stereo equipment. I’m not an endless tweaker (unless you count Bourbon); however, I did recently discover the difference between sending the Bridge a wav file vs FLAC by accident. I was experimenting with JRiver’s DSP and R128 volume leveling for a recent large party. The bottom line is I left JRiver set up to send FLAC to the Bridge. I couldn’t figure out why my stereo lost some life. I just figured I was in a bad listening mood. I then remembered what I had done and switched back to sending wav files from JRiver. My sound was back!
Now please don’t ask me about power cords (I do own some AC5s). Just don’t care to A-B them.
For the most part, all of the decoding work happens in the core.
For AirPlay ONLY, we (losslessly) convert to Apple Lossless format before shipping the data to the device. We do this because it is consistent with iTunes behavior, and because our AirPlay implementation would be less reliable than iTunes if we required the (often weak) WiFi chips on those devices to handle 80% more data.
For every other playback mechanism, we send PCM or DSD content directly, so there’s no decoding going on in the endpoint hardware.
yacheah said
My apologies - typo. I meant 9V iFi iPower. That is what I am using.
No problems. My old man (dad) has an iFi iPower in his system. I'll borrow it when I see him this weekend (as well as the ultraRendu I got him) and test it out later in my system.
Hehe no problem at all. A very quick Google of “Iso Regen 9V iPower” bought up those CA forum posts.
Great to hear. The DS does such an amazing job with jitter reduction that your findings don’t surprise me at all. On top of that, the iFi SPDIF iPurifier does a fantastic job of isolation and re-clocking (much like the Regen). I bought one to use with my Bluesound Node 2 before I bought the DS and I’ve since given the iPurifier to my old man to use with his Denon 4520 AVR and it makes a nice difference - gee he gets too much free stuff from me !
As per this thread, I’m finding small differences in the DS inputs and favouring some inputs over the others. If I were to make a list of ‘the best’ inputs and rank them I’m sure there will be at least 10 people that think I have my list completely backwards.
And they would be just as correct as I am - there’s no wrong answer. The differences I’m observing in this thread are much smaller than differences in our own personal tastes.
But I still like to share my own experiences and I love reading about others.
