And there is a Crazy one who has 3 Totaldac reclockers chained to Totaldac 24.....
Taiko Audio SGM Extreme : the Crème de la Crème
- Thread starter CKKeung
- Start date
There is one thing I tested yesterday.
If the Ethernet copper cable introduces noise via its shield This might be a case in USB cables.
I have recommended by Emile Intona Ultimate . Excellent neutral cable.
This cable has a metal shield outside , cutting it could totally destroy the cable.
Shield is connected to server ground so it can transfer all the noise to USB reciever in the DAC.
What I did I simply used one of my 50 Audio Note ferrites .
Those were designed for getting niose out of interconnecting cables shields and speaker cables Shields.
Adding audio Note ferrite on the USB shield improved things Very significant.
Try it . It is very cheap and safe.
The other idea I Did not test is to power the USB card from DC4 to get a separate isolated ground . I am quite sure This could improve things very significant but I dont think Emile will recommend that , so I use ferrite.
Very glad I tested This ferrite on USB. It will stay there.
Actually I use 2 of them on both ends today.
More than 2 is not a good idea.
I agree the shield on USB cable introduces some niose .
Add ferrite or 2 of them ( Audio Note) and have fun !
You can try an unshielded USB cable like the Jena Labs:
"Why we do not shield the cable:
In the StreamDancer, the 2 data lines are a tightly twisted pair, as per the specification protocol of the USB standards. We have not found it necessary to shield them. Adding a shield will increase the parasitic capacitance to ground for each line in the pair, and reduce the bandwidth of the transmission line. You would hear that as a drop in transparency or detail. There may be a rare circumstance come up some day, where due to very high RF field in a given location, the trade-offs involved may well favor shielding the data lines...but we have yet to encounter that situation. If it is needed, we can do so with a grounded braided copper shield applied over the data pair, and the DC lines braided over the shielded data line. Yes, it is very possible to do so. but not needed in normal circumstance. And due to slowing of rise-time due to capacitance, not desirable unless absolutely needed to eliminate another problem that is greater in magnitude than the losses of the cure."
Matt
I don't recall ever seeing an Extreme manual? Is there one online that we can download?
Thank you.
This might be a better idea then a ferrite.
Ferrite might influence the USB data stream significant.
Will check that no shield USB cord solution.
I hope Emile who is known of his perfection to the detail will test some of the options to the USB shield issue as he did for the copper Ethernet cables.
Adding external power socket for the USB card might also be a good idea that will separate card from server ground. Simmilar solution was used by Marcin (Jcat) in his USB cards.
But for that to be incorporated into the Extreme we need Emile to make sure it is safe.
When we first rolled out the infamous "Roon fix" which included tweaks to a network adapter we applied that to the network connection in use with the remark to keep using that adapter and back then we labelled it "Tweaked Ethernet". Part of this decision was to avoid IP address changes and increase speed of deployment, we updated every Extreme manually, remote, in 1-2 weeks. On every Extreme shipped from then on we applied this on the network adapter labelled "LAN1".
In one of the next releases of TAS we will include an option to apply that tuning to the network adapter by your choice and/or apply a default configuration.
Yes, you can get it from Ben or download it directly from our website, it's listed at the bottom of the Extreme product page, here's a direct link:
Taiko Audio SGM Extreme manual
A ferrite cable clamp acts as a low pass filter by dissipating RF energy as heat or reflecting it back up the cable. In contrast the inductive low pass filter we use on the USB card operates by providing a high impedance to RF impeding the flow to start with. The addition of ferrites creates unpredictable results, to know exactly what happens you'd need exact specifications and simulate and/or measure.
Not using a USB cable shield will likely compromise data integrity, USB audio does not have extensive error correction like Ethernet does, and the radiation is undesirable as well, hence my earlier comment "try that with tube amps".
I posted this earlier in this thread but here's a display of Ethernet error correction:
This is a bit confusing. During that update I wasn't using either LAN connection, I was using the fiber connection (u didn't perform this update BTW, Christoph did it)
My "Tweaked Ethernet" is LAN 2. Should I be using it or LAN 1 ?
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Use the one labelled "Tweaked Ethernet" or feel free to send me teamviewer codes to modify.
Thank You Emile!
The LAN connection is sounding very good, especially with the UTP cable
The LAN connection is sounding very good, especially with the UTP cable
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I'm a little confused -- I know, I know, how is that any different from my normal state?
My Extreme pre-dates the "Roon Fix" and by the time Emile and company rolled out those new system settings I had been using fiber for some time. However, I'd like to revisit unshielded copper ethernet versus fiber again and hear if my preference has changed with all the improvements since the last time I tried copper ethernet. Which ethernet input should I be using on the Extreme for best effect?
Thanks,
Steve Z
Steve williams
Site Founder, Site Owner, Administrator
Oh, never mind. Now that I've had my first cup of coffee I realized I can go into my Extreme, check the Windows "Settings" and find out which ethernet connection is "Tweaked" (#2 in my case).
Steve Z
Steve Z
please report your observations as this sounds interesting
I assume you also considered building a ethernet card (since you think of everything!). Is that something that could happen at some point (instead of a switch)?
