Taiko Audio SGM Extreme : the Crème de la Crème

[MarkusBarkus]

The bridge (or bypassing Amanero) allows the qualities of the Extreme and the USB card to be more realistically expressed.

Thanks Roy. I can see where this is going: PFBuffalo Redux. OCXO replacement surgery! Sounds like fun. Thanks for the above updates.

 

[howiebrou]

Can I get some advice?

I have an Extreme on order, and I’m currently all digital. Mostly listen to rock, alternative, mixed in with some electronic and classical. No jazz.

I currently have zero albums, but I’m thinking of adding a turntable. Assume money isn’t an issue.

I’m not exactly asking whether a turntable sounds “better” … as I understand many audiophiles would prefer the sound of analog.

What I want to know is … for those with vinyl and an Extreme, how much listening is on each format?

About 50/50. In my opinion, there is still a large gap between digital and analog but it is shrinking.

 

[Rhapsody]

Installed a new Extreme (with new usb card)/TAS to an existing Pilium system this morning, WITH THE HELP OF ED doing the remote connection. Nice room! Thx Ed.

 

[romaz]

Installed a new Extreme (with new usb card)/TAS to an existing Pilium system this morning, WITH THE HELP OF ED doing the remote connection. Nice room! Thx Ed.

View attachment 77752View attachment 77753

Wow, Bob, the Pilium chassis are almost an exact match of the Extreme chassis. Even the black heat sinks on the sides look the same. They look great together!

 

[Taiko Audio]

Update of the DACs supported by our USB driver, new additions in bold text:



Currently supported:

-Analogue Domain DAC1

-APL DSD-MR

-Aries Cerat

-Aqua Formula xHD V2.0

-B&O Beolab 50

-Berkeley Alpha USB interface

-Bricasti MDxx

-Brinkmann Nyquist

-CH Precision

-DCS Vivaldi

-DCS Vivaldi Up-sampler

-DCS Vivaldi One

-Denafrips Terminator Plus

-EMM Labs DAC 2

-Esoteric Grandioso D1X

-Esoteric K-01X

-Esoteric K-03

-Gustard X26 Pro

-Holo Audio May

-Ideon Absolute

-Lampizator (with jlsounds interface)

-LH Davinci MKII

-MSB Pro USB

-MSB V / Quad

-Nagra HD-X

-Pilium Elektra

-Sennheiser HE-1

-T+A 3100 series

-Thrax Maximinus

-Totaldac

-Trinity 1st gen model

-Trinity Reference

-Vitus

-Weiss DAC-501

-Ypsilon 1000


Pending:

-Singxer SU-6


To have your DAC added contact us at contact@taikoaudio.com or run the Thesycon USB Descriptor Dumper utility downloadable here: https://thesycon.de/eng/usb_descriptordumper.shtml and e-mail us the output (use the save as file option).

 

[QSA-LANEDRI]

I would like to share, once more, how impressive is the Taiko support.
I had some issues on SQ and Emile did his magic and the SQ became more engaging than it was before but what makes this experience special is that I perceived Emile was feeling my pain out of loosing the engagement in my music sessions and that's top-notch service.

Thanks Taiko! Very much appreciated Emile.

 

[Rhapsody]

Wow, Bob, the Pilium chassis are almost an exact match of the Extreme chassis. Even the black heat sinks on the sides look the same. They look great together!

The owner and I were sitting looking at the system after the Extreme was installed. The custom color, Arctic White, on the Pilium gear and the "silver" finish on the Extreme look, as you say, almost identical. There is a Vivaldi sitting on the bottom left shelf, with the power off, that has a silver finish and it looks different than the Pilium gear and the Extreme. Interesting.

 

[onlychild]

Little late to the party here, but I wanted to mention it anyways. Ed/Taiko applied the TAS driver over the weekend and the level of improvement is significant!

Last bit of digititis is completely gone (though I think there is probably more that I won’t notice till its gone). More layers to the music. More high frequency noise is gone and the upper frequencies sound even more natural and refined. Bass has also become more defined. There’s a great flow and pace to the music now that wasn’t lacking before, but definitely was not at this level. Everything moved in a positive direction and nothing was sacrificed! Simply amazing.

I already have the USB card so maybe having this last piece of the puzzle put everything together/in-sync but the improvement is phenomenal just for a “driver update”.

I'm amazed how the Extreme can make a mediocre DAC like the ESS 9018 sound like a world beater!

 

[sbo6]

Might there be a plan to make the new USB card available to non - Extreme owners?

 

[cat6man]

Might there be a plan to make the new USB card available to non - Extreme owners?

previously answered no

 

[EuroDriver]

Audiowise SRC-DX USB to SPDIF over BNC cables for Chord Dave

I just installed the new CommTrue ASIO USB driver on a customer's Extreme.

I am happy to report that the ASIO data format requests between the XD Player and the CommTrue Driver appear to work solidly

Emile and I are excited to hear a SRC-DX ourselves in the coming weeks

 

[dmance]

Roy, and fellow BNC Bridge adopters: is the use and benefit of the bridge device also predicated on feeding the Dave upsampled source material, e.g. PGGB files to get to the desired 705/768 threshold? I didn't see that explicitly called-out in the various threads, but you guys may take that as a given. Thanks...

The intent of SRC-DX is to have the DAC turn off its USB receiver/chip & logic ...which also turns off the multiple clocks required. S/PDIF is a self-clocking protocol and inherently less noisy to decode than USB. So the entire process has a lower RF noise profile. You should hear benefit with lower bitrates but notably at the highest 705.6/768Khz rates.

 

[MarkusBarkus]

You should hear benefit with lower bitrates but notably at the highest 705.6/768Khz rates.

@dmance thanks x 10^23rd. I appreciate the specificity. I hope to get @EuroDriver to install the driver soon to test over the next few days.

The test challenge for me will be SRC-DX vs. MScaler vs. PGGB. Without MScaler or PGGB the file rates I have will max out at 192 from the Extreme. Will I notice a net-plus? Keen to see.

Thus far, I am odd-man out, as I do not prefer PGGB files vs. MScaler. Maybe even Dave-direct. I recently tested the Shunyata Omega USB and I would rate that quite highly and net-plus to SQ, with all above scenarios.

Emile sez getting around that Amanero chip is a very good thing, so: Amanaro negs vs. Bridge-box or Upscaled plus. One man's opinion/challenge.

And thanks to @oldmustang for the positive voice re: Omega. Do you want to participate in a casino heist for my funding plan? Thanks guys...

 

[QSA-LANEDRI]

The intent of SRC-DX is to have the DAC turn off its USB receiver/chip & logic ...which also turns off the multiple clocks required. S/PDIF is a self-clocking protocol and inherently less noisy to decode than USB. So the entire process has a lower RF noise profile. You should hear benefit with lower bitrates but notably at the highest 705.6/768Khz rates.

Does it mean that with the SRC.DX, the use of an external clocker from the Extreme to feed the SRC.DX will not have any SQ impact as the signal is converted to S/PDIF?

Also, will a high-end USB cable have the same SQ impact with the added SRC.DX in the chain?

 

[oldmustang]

And thanks to @oldmustang for the positive voice re: Omega. Do you want to participate in a casino heist for my funding plan? Thanks guys...

You're very welcome; I'm glad it is working out for you. Count me in on casino-heist -- I would dearly love to get more Shunyata Omegas in my system!

Steve Z

 

[QSA-LANEDRI]

Audiowise SRC-DX USB to SPDIF over BNC cables for Chord Dave

I just installed the new CommTrue ASIO USB driver on a customer's Extreme.

I am happy to report that the ASIO data format requests between the XD Player and the CommTrue Driver appear to work solidly

Emile and I are excited to hear a SRC-DX ourselves in the coming weeks

Excellent news

Looking forward to experimenting the SQ impact as I will have the SRC.DX delivered next Tuesday.

 

[dmance]

Does it mean that with the SRC.DX, the use of an external clocker from the Extreme to feed the SRC.DX will not have any SQ impact as the signal is converted to S/PDIF?

Also, will a high-end USB cable have the same SQ impact with the added SRC.DX in the chain?

I hope at this stage of the game, we all understand that the integrity of the bitstream remains intact regardless of upstream sources or re-clocking. Some DACs (notably PS Audio and MSB) provide bit-perfect source 'music' files to let users validate that their upstream processing chain does not touch the bits. So, if you have one of these DACs you download these test files (one for each sample rate) and when played from source to DAC their pseudo-random pattern gets matched by the DAC's FPGA (well past the input processing and just before the actual D/A workings). And you get a pass/fail indication to let you know that the data is intact and all is good. This lets you confirm that you don't have any resampling or volume adjustment settings happening ...that the bits from the original recording are making it inside the DAC.

You will get the same repeatable test results with any source component, to any DAC input, with USB reclocking or no, with ferrites or filters on cables or no. If your source chain is not touching the digital bits ..they always arrive perfectly - no matter how much (or how little) your spend on cables and such. This also means that all modern DACs are immune to jitter ...with regard that it has any impact on digital fidelity.

Yet ...our ear/brain indicates that each change sounds different. So the analog signal leaving the DAC is being perturbed sufficiently to be audible. And this must mean that something is being manifest at the DACs final d/a section - where the output clocked waveform is being created. Since the cause is not digital signal integrity, it must be due to the digital-generated electromagnetic (RF) noise riding the signal cable, radiated through the air to the DAC (and enters it through the chassis or other tethered components), or self-generated inside the DAC itself. Every little variation in RF emissions spectrum makes a difference, incredibly (impossibly) so.

So to maximize digital SQ, just pay attention to anything and everything in this regard. You can fight the battle on several fronts: use servers that are ultra-low-noise and low-power, apply filtering on cables and power, understand phase noise, understand the benefits of optical paths, use the lowest noise inputs, apply shielding, etc - basically using physics as your best friend.

-- To answer your question: a high end cable feeding into SRC-DX attenuates the RF noise on the USB cable ...which can only help.

 

[QuantumWave]

Firstly, delighted to jump onto this forum, long time reader but never posted! I have myself tried Dan' SRC-DX since January and can confirm that it was a great upgrade for Dave/DC4. It also seem to work with TAS+XD and sings beautifully, albeit seems to struggle on my extreme and after one song stops. No sound on the second item of the playlist (both low resolution and 705/768 PGGB).

Interestingly it works flawlessly with TAS+HQP, which I am using atm. I might add that Dan's optoUSB matches very well inbetween the extreme and the SRC-DX, for Chord users that might be something to consider. No affiliation with Dan obviously, just a happy camper!

For people who have been obsessing with TAS on iPhone/iPad, I discovered interestingly an TV OS app that sounds really good "SlimLibrary". The chain is: wifi bridge+aTV/SlimLibrary -> LAN -> double buffalo -> Finisar ->TK. The wifi-bridge is set on a guest network, so essentially you can isolate your chain from your home network easily (if you struggle like me with Netgear / VLAN) and control everything from the aTV.
Not as convenient as the Taiko app and a short-term solution, but fun to play with.

Last but not least, I can not recommend enough the double Buffalo 2016 stack from AfterDark, works wonder. Unfortunately I can confirm that even with a triple clocked MelcoPF/BuffaloPF, switching off the network provides a delta for Dave+TAS+TaikoUSB, not significant, but obvious.

I might have said too much and made my audio neurose/psychoneurosis far too evident, but I guess we are all in the same boat here .

 

[QSA-LANEDRI]

Firstly, delighted to jump onto this forum, long time reader but never posted! I have myself tried Dan' SRC-DX since January and can confirm that it was a great upgrade for Dave/DC4. It also seem to work with TAS+XD and sings beautifully, albeit seems to struggle on my extreme and after one song stops. No sound on the second item of the playlist (both low resolution and 705/768 PGGB).

Interestingly it works flawlessly with TAS+HQP, which I am using atm. I might add that Dan's optoUSB matches very well inbetween the extreme and the SRC-DX, for Chord users that might be something to consider. No affiliation with Dan obviously, just a happy camper!

For people who have been obsessing with TAS on iPhone/iPad, I discovered interestingly an TV OS app that sounds really good "SlimLibrary". The chain is: wifi bridge+aTV/SlimLibrary -> LAN -> double buffalo -> Finisar ->TK. The wifi-bridge is set on a guest network, so essentially you can isolate your chain from your home network easily (if you struggle like me with Netgear / VLAN) and control everything from the aTV.
Not as convenient as the Taiko app and a short-term solution, but fun to play with.

Last but not least, I can not recommend enough the double Buffalo 2016 stack from AfterDark, works wonder. Unfortunately I can confirm that even with a triple clocked MelcoPF/BuffaloPF, switching off the network provides a delta for Dave+TAS+TaikoUSB, not significant, but obvious.

I might have said too much and made my audio neurose/psychoneurosis far too evident, but I guess we are all in the same boat here .

Thanks for your sharing.

How do you describe the impact of the optoUSB?

 

[QuantumWave]

YMMV, and note that being in London I quickly realised that my mains are likely as bad as it gets. I observed the usual removal of noise, no in the sense of grain, but in the sense of better spatial cues, depth, and tonality. What really brought the whole thing together was moving to optical fiber as well, my rationale is that likely this would have isolated fully the TK from ground loops. I believe Romaz had early posted about this as well, just sitting on the shoulder of giants here. The difference between optoUSB and the slimrun is that you can power it at the receiver, without any copper inbetween. BTW Molex has also a very high quality optoUSB backward compatible with USB2, same as SlimRun with copper, but it was a good first step towards the Audiowise optoUSB.