Introducing Olympus & Olympus I/O - A new perspective on modern music playback

For those who just started reading up on Olympus, Olympus I/O, and XDMI, please note that all information in this thread has been summarized in a single PDF document that can be downloaded from the Taiko Website.

https://taikoaudio.com/taiko-2020/taiko-audio-downloads

The document is frequently updated.

Scroll down to the 'XDMI, Olympus Music Server, Olympus I/O' section and click 'XDMI, Olympus, Olympus I/O Product Introduction & FAQ' to download the latest version.

Good morning WBF!​

We are introducing the culmination of close to 4 years of research and development. As a bona fide IT/tech nerd with a passion for music, I have always been intrigued by the potential of leveraging the most modern of technologies in order to create a better music playback experience. This, amongst others, led to the creation of our popular, perhaps even revolutionary, Extreme music server 5 years ago, which we have been steadily improving and updating with new technologies throughout its life cycle. Today I feel we can safely claim it's holding its ground against the onslaught of new server releases from other companies, and we are committed to keep improving it for years to come.

We are introducing a new server model called the Olympus. Hierarchically, it positions itself above the Extreme. It does provide quite a different music experience than the Extreme, or any other server I've heard, for that matter. Conventional audiophile descriptions such as sound staging, dynamics, color palette, etc, fall short to describe this difference. It does not sound digital or analog, I would be inclined to describe it as coming closer to the intended (or unintended) performance of the recording engineer.

Committed to keeping the Extreme as current as possible, we are introducing a second product called the Olympus I/O. This is an external upgrade to the Extreme containing a significant part of the Olympus technology, allowing it to come near, though not entirely at, Olympus performance levels. The Olympus I/O can even be added to the Olympus itself to elevate its performance even further, though not as dramatic an uplift as adding it to the Extreme. Consider it the proverbial "cherry on top".

 

Can only imagine how exciting for Emile/Taiko to be reading the initial feedback here and how long the anticipation has been. And how satisfying it must feel to let the Olympus do the talking and to hear the descriptors (e.g. like a puff of weed ). Sounds like a whole new paradigm. On the margins, will be curious to hear whether folks hear any difference between a stock power cord vs a hi end power cord on the Olympus. I recall Emile saying it could have an effect but not as great as on the Extreme etc.

For some reason the power cord still matters with the Olympus. So don't sell your good power cord just because the Olympus is running on batteries. It's actually quite interesting - the Olympus seems to be pretty immune to bad AC power, but a good power cord is still an improvement.

 

For some reason the power cord still matters with the Olympus. So don't sell your good power cord just because the Olympus is running on batteries. It's actually quite interesting - the Olympus seems to be pretty immune to bad AC power, but a good power cord is still an improvement.

Emile also relayed this strange behavior, hard to wrap your brain around why it would have any influence...EDIT: Some kind of grounding reaction? Emile also reported additional grounding had a negative effect. Perhaps some kind of correlation there?

 

it is STRICTLY FORBIDDEN to ship any charged batteries. So it comes EMPTY

There goes my chance to A/B between Dutch electrons and American electrons....

 

The best advice I can give is to just RTFM

Hi Emile,

This expression reminds me of the days when I contributed VERY modestly to the OpenBSD project.

The safest OS back then, and even now I suppose.

OpenBSD

the main OpenBSD page

www.openbsd.org

Back then, web forums didn't exist.

We use to communicate on private IRCs.

Participation was by invitation only. And it was kind of a privilege to be invited.

When someone asked a question whose answer could have been found in the documentation, even if it had implications, on compiling details or so, the only answer was often an RTFM.

And when the question was frankly stupid (meaning irrelevant) the answer often ended with a /dev/null

This was the days... more then 20 years ago!

It was fun!

Cheers,

Thomas

 

Hi Emile,

This expression reminds me of the days when I contributed VERY modestly to the OpenBSD project.

The safest OS back then, and even now I suppose.

OpenBSD

the main OpenBSD page

www.openbsd.org

Back then, web forums didn't exist.

We use to communicate on private IRCs.

Participation was by invitation only. And it was kind of a privilege to be invited.

When anyone asked a question, even if it had implications, about compiling details or so, often the only answer was a RTFM.

And when the question was frankly stupid (meaning irrelevant) the answer often ended with a /dev/null

This was the days... more then 20 years ago!

It was fun!

Cheers,

Thomas

AFK

 

OpenBSD: security via obscurity
Thank you THEO

 

Is it possible to get the Olympus with a dedicated USB card fitted ? (like the Extreme)

 

It's been a week since I got my Olympus and in the meantime I had to fight the weather anomalies, trees falling, electricity blacking out etc. Anyway, after a week I feel like I am getting a hint of what is happening with the Olympus.
Just to remind you - what I have is XDMI link to Lampizator DAC and USB ports which are - according to Emile - non audiophile, just for technical reasons like inserting HDD or pendrive. Anyway - this USB plays music as well.
My worst problem was that I could not understand why on some occasions I was in a. state of bliss on other occasions - I was just okay. It seems like the sound quality very strongly depends on the battery system voltage which in turn depends on level of charge . The higher charge the better sound. My first two days I was using the Olympus at below 5% charge because from cold start - it is how high it will go in one hour . If you charge without listening - it goes up faster. So as soon as the Olympus would show up in Roon - I would IMPATIENTLY listen. That was a wrong approach. Next level of quality is when the Olympus gets charged to 80% or so - things get really interesting. But eventually the Olympus will charge enough and disengage the charger and glide without engines - on battery power alone. THATS the real McCoy. My problem is that I don't know when these things happen because there is no display. I had to learn to use their app which monitors batteries, chargers, currents, voltages etc. The app is free (the only free thing with Taiko ;-) and easy to use.
Another thing I did not have is an Extreme server for reference so I was using Lampizator Gulfstream which I know very well.
Back to the "hated" USB port- say what you want or sue me but it sounds fantastic. It does something that my Gulfstream could only dream - the bass and space is so awesome, and the presentation is so not-digital that I really love it. As a lover of USB I can only dream that Taiko would provide the "audiophile approved" usb card in addition to these USB motherboard ports.
Now switching to XDMI with the (Taikoized) Horizon DAC. We enter different realm. I can only compare it to enhancing the listening session with a small puff of weed. Things become so whooooaaa spooky. To fully appreciate it's sound I suggest a completely dark room and relaxed state of mind. We change the so called "they are here" experience with "you are there" and it is for me the goal of being in this hobby. (the hobby is listening to music because my business is managing the factory). The ideas of having Jimi Hendrix in my room is interesting, but the goal is to travel in time and space and to be in Woodstock in person.
I honestly honestly don't know if bass is deeper, if frequency response is wider, if signal to noise is better, if THD is better, if jitter is lower, if dynamic range is improved - I swim in music and don't have a care in this world.
I can imagine it may not be for everyone, like close encounters with musicians in your room would not be welcome by introverts and sociopaths. For ME and I speak only for myself - this is the ultimate fun machine. We will NEVER agree unanimously - like with my other hobby sailing - some people like sailboats, other prefer motorboats, other love catamarans, or god forbid windsurfing. Similarly with audio - the endless quarrels between SS versus tube people, horns vs planars, headphones versus speakers, silver cables versus copper, opamped DACs versus no-feedback - there is never any consensus. I predict that equal 1/3rd of people will love Taiko analog out, 1/3rd will like XDMI to tubed DAC and 1/3 will like USB to SS DAC or something like that. If you are a person who "normally agrees with Lukasz Fikus' idea of sound - you will probably love the Lampizator+Olympus path. I heard before the Taiko analog output and it was super exciting but I prefer Horizon. Emile uses also Horizon in his system. If this is telling you something. And I will be fine if many people will disagree with me because I can not produce tens of horizons per month anyway. My take away advice for the Horizon users: let the Olympus charge and stabilise for MINIMUM 24 hrs from unpacking. Get the best XDMI cable you can - these are really important. Don't expect miracles because miracles don't happen. Do expect that you will never go back. Tell your family they won't see you any time soon. Stash food supplies and water.

"The ideas of having Jimi Hendrix in my room is interesting, but the goal is to travel in time and space and to be in Woodstock in person. I honestly honestly don't know if bass is deeper, if frequency response is wider, if signal to noise is better, if THD is better, if jitter is lower, if dynamic range is improved - I swim in music and don't have a care in this world."

There's nothing left to be said!

 

Is it possible to get the Olympus with a dedicated USB card fitted ? (like the Extreme)

I think you'll find some answers here :

https://www.whatsbestforum.com/threads/introducing-olympus-olympus-i-o-a-new-perspective-on-modern-music-playback.37939/post-984930

Hope it helps,

Cheers,

Thomas

 

A little more on the "System" battery charging. After discharging the battery to nearly 50%, with the Olympus turned off, it took about 2 hours to charge to full 100%.

( this test was done with Chicago-based electrons, @keithc )

 

Is it possible to get the Olympus with a dedicated USB card fitted ? (like the Extreme)

This will not be an improvement, but a degradation to the current implementation. We have tried that (and much, much more that we cannot share here). Well implemented battery power changes the landscape.

 

I had battery powered SSD on my server for 10 years or so ... so I'm a beliver.

I'm not sure it is a good idea to have motheboard / SSDs with such a huge current draw powered from batteries ... but that is a question for another time.

Question for those lucky few that had first hand experience with Olympus: how long are the batteries supposed to last when fully charged?

- for the XDMI card
- for the MoBo

Is it normal for the batteries to drain overnight to basicly zero?

 

I had battery powered SSD on my server for 10 years or so ... so I'm a beliver.

I'm not sure it is a good idea to have motheboard / SSDs with such a huge current draw powered from batteries ... but that is a question for another time.

Question for those lucky few that had first hand experience with Olympus: how long are the batteries supposed to last when fully charged?

- for the XDMI card
- for the MoBo

Is it normal for the batteries to drain overnight to basicly zero?

The Olympus has an unusual configuration - the MoBo battery is "always charging", meaning it acts as a buffer. Because the (linear) charger power supply is active while playing, the power cord still matters (although less than with regular linear powered gear). The old audiophile rule still applies - everything connected to your system makes a difference.
The XDMI card is battery powered in a classical fashion and can play for many hours, as the current draw is not very large. You can configure the charging cycle through the app, typically you'd set this for night- or working hours.

 

On the battery again: The transportation rules vary between regions - Asia - EU, USA and the other. Also it is different when commercial passenger planes are used or specialized cargo planes, and different for road transportation. So there is no definitive answer. In many cases a hybrid scheme is used - with mixed means of transport. The strictest rule applies then as the common denominator.

 

For some reason the power cord still matters with the Olympus. So don't sell your good power cord just because the Olympus is running on batteries. It's actually quite interesting - the Olympus seems to be pretty immune to bad AC power, but a good power cord is still an improvement.

I would add to Vassil’s observation that the fuse will matter in a similar fashion. For those of you with expensive fuses in your Extremes (QSA Silver in my case), don’t forget to remove them before you return your trade-in Extreme back to Taiko!

 

For some reason the power cord still matters with the Olympus. So don't sell your good power cord just because the Olympus is running on batteries. It's actually quite interesting - the Olympus seems to be pretty immune to bad AC power, but a good power cord is still an improvement.

I guess the follow up question will be, to what extent is an excellent power cord also recommended for the IO

 

The Olympus has an unusual configuration - the MoBo battery is "always charging", meaning it acts as a buffer.

If that is the case, then the MoBo is not really battery powered.

It would be interested to learn why they have chosen betteries instead of ultra capacitors, which charge faster and can discharge much greater amounts of energy in a very short period of time (their output impedance is much lower; high output impedance is an Achille's heel of every battery) which suits MotherBoard requirements really well.

Ultra Capacitors have been recently introduced in the latest Aurender models and PinkFaun Ultra server (although in the later case, only on the USB card).

 

If that is the case, then the MoBo is not really battery powered.

It would be interested to learn why they have chosen betteries instead of ultra capacitors, which charge faster and can discharge much greater amounts of energy in a very short period of time (their output impedance is much lower; high output impedance is an Achille's heel of every battery) which suits MotherBoard requirements really well.

Ultra Capacitors have been recently introduced in the latest Aurender models and PinkFaun Ultra server (although in the later case, only on the USB card).

Thank God they did not. I would have never ordered an Olympus, nor become a Taiko dealer, or recommend the Taiko Olympus so passionately if they chose ultra capacitors instead of batteries. That would have been an excellent reason for me to go back to building DIY servers and DACs instead.

I just don't think ultra capacitors belong inside a high end server or inside the power supply in a DAC. They have a sound signature that I really dislike. And I've tried many different ones... and many products using them.

 

Thank God they did not. I would have never ordered an Olympus, nor become a Taiko dealer, or recommend the Taiko Olympus so passionately if they chose ultra capacitors instead of batteries. That would have been an excellent reason for me to go back to building DIY servers and DACs instead.

I just don't think ultra capacitors belong inside a high end server or inside the power supply in a DAC. They have a sound signature that I really dislike. And I've tried many different ones... and many products using them.

You'd extend that blanket dislike to linear power supplies? I use a Farad LPS utilising super capacitors on my TT motor controller.

 

You'd extend that blanket dislike to linear power supplies? I use a Farad LPS utilising super capacitors on my TT motor controller.

I don’t think that would be that same since it isn’t in the audio signal path.