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last week I had an interesting session at a friends home listening to the differences between power supplies on his streamer and network switch. It was easy to spot the differences between th einternal SMPS, a Farad 3 (supercap based PSU) and an unregulated LPSU based off of the Taiko ATX module.

Sure the files and bytes are likely not different, the difference in how those are presented to the ear and brain is vastly different...
 
x100 on how the brain perceives.

Would be interested to see you record FR at listening position for the different versions. None should affect sound pressure level since it's all the digital steam, so should be pretty simple to do?
 
I don't, since frequency responses tell little to nothing other than that they serve as objectivator for our assumptions making us think a frequency is very low when in reality it's f.e. around 120Hz and the same applies to high frequencies...HIFI IMO was yet another marketing gimmick, like stereo was.
Sit in a music hall and close your eyes, try locate the individual instrumenst of the players of a quartet...near impossible.
the cahllenge is that there are no good measurements (yet) allowing us to quantify what is a good system.

The differences lie in the details of sound reproduction, think f.e. how the leading edge of a violin is reproduced or the whole bandwidth of a voice. The sound of a violin string(s) can be smeared and the edge is not distiguishable from the rest of the sound (the resiny stringy part), when it actually is differentiated by the source the instruments sounds so much more real.

There is some explanation on the Taiko website, exactly explaining how digital is MUCH more than zeros and ones..f.e. latency in a computer system is pretty much as important as the noise floor is, as is speed of the PSU etc
 
eh, 'smeared' would show up in frequency response, as it would mean part of a note was appearing/ present when is should not be.

Yesterday I brought home some new speakers, to replace the ones I've used for 26 years. Got a little bit of setup to work through over the next couple of weekends (no DIY content other than I may make some new speaker cables)
 
setting up speakers for best results can be quite involved, placement from walls, toe in, spikes/cones/pods....happy tinkering!
 
Agreed. The new ones have much deeper bass, so the distance from the wall needs to be adjusted if the bass controls on the speaker do not tame it well enough.
 
Nice to discover this thread.

I finally solved a frustrating episode yesterday; one of my systems had a dead channel, and I'd previously played around with it to figure out where the problem lay, and couldn't. So I had some spare time, and went through every link in the chain: computer -> network -> Raspberry Pi [all set up in the most overly elaborate way possible] -> DAC -> preamp -> power amp -> speakers. It turned out to be one of the last things I expected: the preamp-to-power amp interconnect. Oh well, at least it was an easy fix.

I've actually been thinking a bit lately about audio stuff in relation to knives. At the end of the day I just want to hear good music, not spend my whole life ****ing with audio gear; similarly, I want to make dinner, not study metallurgy. But good audio sounds better, and good knives cut better, so here we are <shrug>.
 
I hear you. I had been thinking of going with active speakers and streaming Tidal to them directly, possibly with a way of keeping TT and FM tuner accessible as well. Picking up new passive speakers set that back a ways.

But I may do a work-around, since my amp has RCA and balanced inputs, and can switch between them. I may run the Oppo directly into the amp with the balanced connection, with a Wiim used to stream Tidal to the Oppo's DAC section. Then I can keep the tuner and TT connected to the hybrid preamp, so I can switch over tot hat when needed.
 
if you can, not sure if it's available, try Quobuz for sound..I know they also stream 0's and 1's yet they sound better IMO (and in the opinion of many other audiophiles)
 
meanwhile I have finally started the tech drawing of the final stereo Trionor build...finally...I cannot wait to hear what 3 Tesla ARO 835's per channel do :)
 
MarcelNL said:
if you can, not sure if it's available, try Quobuz for sound..I know they also stream 0's and 1's yet they sound better IMO (and in the opinion of many other audiophiles)
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We had Tidal due to the music selection (more rock, and more of some international that my wife likes). Now that MQA is going away there soon should be no difference from the other services that stream lossless. MQA was a solution is search of a problem. Or more realistically an extortion scheme.
 
While I haven’t been able to here any differences between local digital sources running into my dac I have definitely heard differences between different streaming music companies. To me that makes sense. There’s a lot more going on by the time the signal gets to your dac.

I have also heard the differences between class A amplifiers compared to class D amplifiers. I’ve owned a few of each and have heard several others in my audio room and it’s clear to me that class D has an edge to it that makes long term listening much less enjoyable.
 
Class AB is nice. Not as good as class A, but then I don't have to run a heater every time I listen to music…
 
Michi said:
Class AB is nice. Not as good as class A, but then I don't have to run a heater every time I listen to music…
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My music server is acting as a heater already, so will the class A tube amps and their heaters. The amp is designed around a lots of iron and the least nr of active stages and I only need a couple of watts at 105-107 dB/W/m efficiency.
The Geothermal well in our new house thanks me for it ;)
 
Meanwhile my speaker setup is my headphones laying on my desk because my amp died. :( Not exactly headphones weather...
 
Jovidah said:
Meanwhile my speaker setup is my headphones laying on my desk because my amp died. :( Not exactly headphones weather...
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bummer....indeed headphone weather it's not...did both channels die on your amp? that would point at a problem early on in the circuit, fuses tend to fade away slowly, they creep up on you and hit you with dead silence for no good reason sometimes.
 
Michi said:
Class AB is nice. Not as good as class A, but then I don't have to run a heater every time I listen to music…
Click to expand...
AB amplifiers can be great. My class A amp gets fairly warm to the touch but not too hot 🥵. Plus, I live in Seattle so it’s only hot for 2 or 3 months a year.
 
20230709_171909.jpg
 
Since you are a little slow, I will leave a hint! It's an amplifier...
 
You guys are the worst quiz audience. I even had a follow up question ready..
 
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