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".

 

File transfer from local drives is inferior to TCP/IP transfer on the Olympus when combined with the router.

This is due to a protocol limitation—we cannot modify the local drive protocol to a sufficient degree. However, we can manipulate the TCP/IP data stream to a more meaningful extent.

A NAS acts like a local storage to tcp/ip transfer converter.

The DCD is mentioned because it appears to be a critical component for achieving audiophile-level sound quality with the vast majority of “audiophile” power supplies on the market. If your power supply is of high enough quality, the DCD may not offer an upgrade and can be omitted. That said, I have yet to encounter one that meets that threshold. I would have expected several companies to have incorporated this technology into their designs by now. It seems we are among the most copied companies in the space—but oddly, not in this particular area, despite the fact that it’s not rocket science. Clean power is however more or less a requirement with SFP copper DAC (Direct-Attach) links, which is why we keep mentioning it.

The switch is not mentioned, as it’s not a critical component in achieving this goal—it has no intelligence that affects the data stream.

By the way, this mechanism is why XDMS performs worse than Roon on the Olympus + Router/DCD setup. Bypassing this mechanism would require a significant rewrite of one of XDMS’s core systems. As an alternative, we’ll be offering UPnP support soon. It’s actually ready, but we’re holding off on release to create some breathing room in our current workload, which continues to shift. At the moment, I’m spending most of my time sourcing critical components that went out of stock in many regions after the tariffs were announced.

 

@Taiko Audio Can you make the Router (and the Switch) internal in I/O to be powered by I/O's battery? If so, how soon can you do so? I'd be eager for that new Router version. I would think it would be a very significant improvement to SQ over the current Router's. Otherwise, I would have a DIY guy make me a dual-unit battery power (carbon) to power the Router and the Switch separately (rather than using DCD). He knows how to implement properly (he modded my DVD transports with proprietary i2s (4 separate signals) resulting in outstanding SQ when connected with the DAC's similarly equipped i2s inputs).

 

As an alternative, we’ll be offering UPnP support soon.

Hi Emile,
please, can you comment on the SQ vs Roon
Thank you

 

Hi Emile,
please, can you comment on the SQ vs Roon
Thank you

I’ll leave that to “the troops”.

 

@Taiko Audio Can you make the Router (and the Switch) internal in I/O to be powered by I/O's battery? If so, how soon can you do so? I'd be eager for that new Router version. I would think it would be a very significant improvement to SQ over the current Router's. Otherwise, I would have a DIY guy make me a dual-unit battery power (carbon) to power the Router and the Switch separately (rather than using DCD). He knows how to implement properly (he modded my DVD transports with proprietary i2s (4 separate signals) resulting in outstanding SQ when connected with the DAC's similarly equipped i2s inputs).

Yes but not soon.

 

What is the next step up from superlative? My experience (with others) has been that local WAV playback is *much* better than cloud streaming (which of course is flac based). We need another descriptor.

Yeah, I also worried about that in advance;-). But I preferred using words rather than percentages. In the end, all the chart intends to indicate are the relative differences.

 

Also, from a tech layperson's perspective, I would guess that NAS going through some cable connection or the innards of a router is not a 100% transparent passage and such extra connection or passage would introduce some jitters itself. The only way is to rely on one's own ears (and I may run tests later). My own experience is that WAV sounds noticeably better than FLAC, PCM noticeably better than DSD (a bit dull and bottom heavy), and hi-res files in excess of 24/96 are invariably worse than 24/96 or 24/48 (I listen to lots of large-scale complex orchestral and choral music; 24/192 is never good for me). If a hi-res album which is re-mastered (many classic classical recordings were made in the heydays of late 1950s to 1970s) sounds much better in a recent reissue than the first CD remastering (in the early 1980s) it is, I guess, because of the more careful remastering (via original tapes), not because of hi-res format (which is hyped for marketing reasons).

Hi @Moladiego , regardless of why WAV sounds different with your Olympus — and better to your ears, of course — I completely get that. But whether it’s WAV or FLAC from a local drive, can you confirm that both sound better with the Taiko Router attached?
Also, unless I missed it (the thread is getting pretty long), I don’t think you’ve shared your experience with streaming — from a cloud service or through a NAS. If you haven’t explored those yet, that would be a really fair comparison?

One more thought — some noticed that Olympus can actually sound better when the local drive is removed altogether. Have you tried that? You can add an USB drive to the Taiko Router to try (someone please correct me if that is not optimal). Just wondering, because whether it’s FLAC or WAV, both should theoretically benefit from the same uplift. Maybe there are still some Olympus secrets left to discover...

 

Hi, regardless of why WAV sounds different — and better to your ears, of course — I completely get that. But whether it’s WAV or FLAC from a local drive, can you confirm that both sound better with the Taiko Router attached?
Also, unless I missed it (the thread is getting pretty long), I don’t think you’ve shared your experience with streaming — from a cloud service or through a NAS. If you haven’t explored those yet, that would be a really fair comparison?

One more thought — some noticed that Olympus can actually sound better when the local drive is removed altogether. Have you tried that? You can add an USB drive to the Taiko Router to try (someone please correct me if that is not optimal). Just wondering, because whether it’s FLAC or WAV, both should theoretically benefit from the same uplift. Maybe there are still some Olympus secrets left to discover...

Just to confirm, the Extreme Router has a significant impact on the server's SQ, whether playing WAV or FLAC. Whether playing locally, from NAS, or streaming from a cloud service, there is always an impact. The diagram shared a few posts back aims to indicate the offsets between these variables.

 

What is not clear to me (Emile or Christiaan) is whether the Taiko Switch in Olympus continues to improve the sound compared to eliminating it and keeping only Router and DCD

 

Just to confirm, the Extreme Router has a significant impact on the server's SQ, whether playing WAV or FLAC. Whether playing locally, from NAS, or streaming from a cloud service, there is always an impact. The diagram shared a few posts back aims to indicate the offsets between these variables.

I'm referring specifically to the users Olympus system here ( I corrected my message). Are you also referring to Olympus in the diagram above, or are you discussing a different setup?

 

@Di-fi , yes the thread is long and it’s near impossible to separate comments/experiences from people who don’t have an Olympus(yet), like @Moladiego you ate quoting, and others who’ve been posting here, with those who do.

@Christiaan Punter is maintaining “summary documents” you can download from our website in the downloads section. Those do contain most of the relevant information and I would recommend reading those first.

A second option is to use the search function and search this thread for posts posted by either “Taiko Audio”, “Christiaan Punter” or “nenon”.

A third option we’re contemplating on is starting a new thread with a focus on providing correct information, we would need to moderate this new thread though to avoid it from turning into the same “chaos” as this one. This may be an impopulair direction to take as we would probably end up either editing, deleting or moving 75% of the posts made there.

OTH it may turn into a valuable resource for information, and save us a lot of time as yes, all these questions have been asked and answered before, multiple times, but are very hard to find again, even for myself.

 

What is not clear to me (Emile or Christiaan) is whether the Taiko Switch in Olympus continues to improve the sound compared to eliminating it and keeping only Router and DCD

It does, and several have commented on finding the switch to continue being a worthwhile tool.

 

I'm referring specifically to the users Olympus system here ( I corrected my message). Are you also referring to Olympus in the diagram above, or are you discussing a different setup?

This is the Olympus thread, all comments made by Taiko staff members in this thread apply to the Olympus, unless it’s specifically stated to apply to a different product.

 

Yeah, I also worried about that in advance;-). But I preferred using words rather than percentages. In the end, all the chart intends to indicate are the relative differences.

Taiko is an technical/engineering company not a novel based entity. Keep it that way please. IMO percentages preferred....

 

Can't see how NAS storage is better than internal storage..IMO I trust a single internal ssd drive vs 4 16Tb drives constantly spinning in my NAS. Now internal "very slightly" isn't as good. There has to be more to it....

Thank u for the detailed explanation Emile
Yes I lost fact that decisions are made ultimately on sonics....

 

Taiko is an technical/engineering company not a novel based entity. Keep it that way please. IMO percentages preferred....

Percentages are open to interpretation and have the disadvantage of having a maximum of 100, and I do not want to resort to using values such as 110%, 150%... The chosen words were intended as an indication of an increasing scale. In any case, I have now modified the diagram to contain no words or percentages.

 

@Di-fi , yes the thread is long and it’s near impossible to separate comments/experiences from people who don’t have an Olympus(yet), like @Moladiego you ate quoting, and others who’ve been posting here, with those who do.

Hi Emile, thanks for clarifying that @Moladiego is using the Extreme server — I had been under the impression it was an Olympus. And Olympus, really, to me at least, is all about FLAC files from the cloud and NAS instead of WAV files from a local drive. So in that context, focusing on local WAV playback feels a bit out of place.

That said, since he is highlighting WAV as sounding best to him on a Extreme, a few questions still seem relevant to be discussed... in the Extreme thread of course :

1. Whether it's WAV or FLAC from a local drive, do both improve when the Taiko Router is in the chain?
2. Have you tried or shared any impressions of streaming — from a cloud service or via NAS? (Again, I might have missed it; the thread’s gotten quite long.)

And just one look at the Olympus Performance Diagram V2 — “no words or percentages” confirms again: while the system performs excellently across the board, the top tier is clearly with DCD + Router, whether via Local NAS streaming or Cloud service streaming.

 

A third option we’re contemplating on is starting a new thread with a focus on providing correct information, we would need to moderate this new thread though to avoid it from turning into the same “chaos” as this one. This may be an impopulair direction to take as we would probably end up either editing, deleting or moving 75% of the posts made there.

Starting a new thread with a bunch of pinned posts which represent Taiko Audio’s current thinking on a slew of topics would be great. It would provide a fresh start, so to speak, now that the Olympus has been out in the wild for 9 months and your team has had an opportunity to further understand its performance. Granted, it will take some work to “keep it clean”. Maybe this thread continues on as a sandbox of comments for users while the new thread serves more as an “official word” and informational purpose.

 

“summary documents” you can download from our website in the downloads section. Those do contain most of the relevant information and I would recommend reading those first.

I really appreciate the huge amount of information Taiko has shared on WBF and in the various PDFs — it's a massive effort, and I do recognize the value in it. That said, the lack of structure and chronology makes it difficult for users to keep track of key developments or find specific details.

Information is scattered across Taiko’s PDFs and long-form discussions here on WBF. For example, I was recently looking for Christiaan’s recent post #5,635, where he mentioned, "This has been added to the FAQ document," in reference to Router performance. It turned out to be in the Olympus PDF?, not the Router PDF — still haven’t located it, to be honest.

What’s really needed is something dynamic: a system that organizes content both chronologically and by subject or device — Extreme, Olympus, Router, DCD, etc. Right now, it's too easy to lose context. For example, the thread subject disappears as soon as you scroll down the page. This makes it hard to even know where you're posting — no kidding. We need thread identifiers that stay visible, auto-scrolling headers, or some kind of persistent navigation element so users can stay oriented while reading or replying.

I get why a dedicated Taiko forum isn’t in the cards (so I won’t go there ). But if the goal is to keep discussions on WBF, perhaps @WBF Team could consider implementing better-integrated subforums or navigation layers — with powerful search tools and category filtering — so users can access and correlate technical content more effectively.

If this sounds like a step in the right direction, feel free to give it a vote @WBF Team — maybe we can help make it happen.

 

I really appreciate the huge amount of information Taiko has shared on WBF and in the various PDFs — it's a massive effort, and I do recognize the value in it. That said, the lack of structure and chronology makes it difficult for users to keep track of key developments or find specific details.

Information is scattered across Taiko’s PDFs and long-form discussions here on WBF. For example, I was recently looking for Christiaan’s recent post #5,635, where he mentioned, "This has been added to the FAQ document," in reference to Router performance. It turned out to be in the Olympus PDF?, not the Router PDF — still haven’t located it, to be honest.

What’s really needed is something dynamic: a system that organizes content both chronologically and by subject or device — Extreme, Olympus, Router, DCD, etc. I get why a dedicated Taiko forum isn’t in the cards (so I won’t go there ). But if the goal is to keep discussions on WBF, perhaps WBF could consider implementing better-integrated subforums or navigation layers — with powerful search tools and category filtering — so users can access and correlate technical content more effectively.

Please note that Taiko Audio product information should generally be looked up in the manuals and guides in the Downloads section of our website. These documents present all the official information. Where applicable, newly supplied information is used to update these manuals and guides, so they always remain current.

The abundance of additional information discussed on this forum is often preliminary and fresh from Emile's mind, or very case-specific and frequently unsuitable for a manual. Nevertheless, to make this valuable information more easily accessible, it is gathered in the Summary / Introduction / FAQ documents, which are continually maintained locally. However, uploading these documents to the Taiko website occurs at longer intervals—sometimes days, sometimes weeks.

While they contain interesting deep-dive information, the Summary documents should not be regarded as representing a final state of affairs, as they frequently contain early information regarding ongoing developments and are, in essence, always a work in progress.

With all that said, we strive to make information as easily accessible as possible, and we are always open to improvement where possible. For now, we do not have the time to make structural changes, but all the input and helpful suggestions are always appreciated.

I will also add the aforementioned diagram to the Router FAQ document, referencing the more extended information in the Olympus and Olympus IO Introduction & FAQ document.

BTW, I mentioned the following:
"This has been added to the FAQ document, which I will upload to the site after making a few other additions."
The document was uploaded earlier today. ;-)