Taiko Audio SGM Extreme : the Crème de la Crème

[howiebrou]

https://www.facebook.com/345070582893669/posts/853036325430423

 

[matthias]

@howiebrou

Very nice looking systems particular this one:

ARTELUTHE STILETTO SPEAKERS

Mono & Stereo High-End Audio Magazine: Magico - Nagra - Tidal Audio - Wilson Audio - MSB - Totaldac - Living Voice - Taiko Audio - Aries Cerat -Thrax

www.monoandstereo.com

Matt

 

[Steve Williams]

can any of our advance scouting team (aka beta testers) give feedback on the sound quality of extremeDirect vs. gapless playback,
both for streaming media and onboard/local media?

I’ve had the beta version for about a week. The sound quality is superb using both players but TBH my ears hear no sonic difference between the two players Only difference is the shorter gap between files.

 

[EuroDriver]

Beta rollout road bumps

We expected there to be some road bumps in the Beta install process, so we decided to just start with a handful

sure enough there were some parts that need fixing, so we are taking it slowly until we have got the install package fully sorted

The Good news is that the SQ is there

 

[Steve Williams]

BTW one more plus for development of the platform as now there are lyrics, album info and author info. My understanding the use of metadata is being worked on and will be incorporated at some time as well.
I remain convinced that one of the most important factors in the uptick in SQ is due to the proprietary TAS driver. I went through the necessary change in the USB board in my Pacific from Amanero to JL Sounds which uses XMOS. You can’t use the TAS driver unless your USB board on your DAC is XMOS. I had only the new board for the first day and there was little sonic change that I heard. It wasn’t until the next day that Emile installed TAS driver. and then the change in SQ just expanded. The sound floor is so low that there is an immediate improvement in clarity, dynamics, 3D sound stage. I believe the TAS driver is essential to all if they are following the TAS path rather than Roon. All bets are off once you hear your system with the TAS driver, plus having the XMOS USB board allow full use of all the TAS buffers whereas Amanero didn't

 

[matthias]

@Taiko Audio

Hi Emile,

does it matter if the DAC USB interface is XMOS XU208 or XU216?
Thanks

Matt

 

[ack]

Yes, it’s not very practical btw, as if you want to avoid having to switch your DAC between single and dual AES to play low and respectively high sampling rates you’d have to upsample everything to the highest rate your DAC supports.

So I think I understand what you have done with the Extreme... A workstation-class ASUS motherboard, datacenter-class dual multi-core Xeons (i9's??), stripped down Windows 10 and enough threads for all remaining running tasks (hence the dual Xeons) so as to minimize any wait times, interrupts and kernel modes, plus custom USB, the Optane boot C: drive, an ASUS Hypercard M.2 for the storage drives, custom memory of some sort, plus all the silent cooling and well thought out power supply, and finally the careful shielding. Then remote-desktop for setup (firewall issues???). I am sure there is more. Impressive. Let me know what I missed.

 

[Kris]

Edward was so kind today on the weekend to spend some time installing the TAS Beta on my extreme. Thank you Edward and Wilson ! Thank you Emile !
I must say this is shocking good now.
In comparison to the Roon before there is simply no comparison In SQ.

Roon still works and is much better than before so you actually get 2 players much better
1. Roon - old install works few levels better in regards to SQ.
2. TAS as a new install.

I asked my wife to come and played her favourite songs.
She said its amazing and she loved It. She asked me how much I paid for that change ?
As you all know it is free of charge Taiko service.
I have to say she probably suspects I paid fortune for that......
The change is that big.

if anyone is still thinking about buying the Taiko Extreme . Stop thinking and get one !
I have mine 17 months already.

 

[Kris]

You're very welcomed.

---

It shouldn't be impossible, though we might have to ask @ray-dude to talk to Dan about the ASIO driver for his SRC•DX

https://audiowise-canada.myshopify....f/products/src-dx-usb-to-dual-spdif-interface

I extracted this driver linked below

https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/1552/8145/files/SRC-DX_ASIO_WHQL_20200106.exe?270

ctaud.inf

%CTUAC2.DeviceDesc%=CTUAC2,USB\VID_0EA0&PID_6002&MI_00
%CTUAC2.DeviceDesc%=CTUAC2,USB\VID_2FC6&PID_6013&MI_00
%CTUAC2.DeviceDesc%=CTUAC2,USB\VID_2FC6&PID_f018&MI_00

USB\VID_2FC6 meant that's coming from ComTrue Inc.

http://www.comtrue-inc.com/index.php/contact

CT7601 Audio USB Bridge

http://www.comtrue-inc.com/index.php/downloads2/category/4-ct7601
https://www.head-fi.org/threads/rev...phile-vortex-box.787020/page-79#post-14119139


And then there's also this alternative from China (approximately €76 plus shipping)

https://item.taobao.com/item.htm?id=611313177207

---

An affordable USB DDC that could handle 16fs when both coax ports are connected, some owners of Chord DAVE would be excited to replace the clock inside SRC•DX with an OCXO etc.

IIRC there's at least a handful of Extreme owners with Chord DAVE, most likely it's worth the effort to develop another ASIO driver for CT7601 IMHO.

What will be the best known in audio
USB to i2s /aes/spdif board ?
All opinions wellcome .
Few top exerts say its more softwere than hardwere depandend.

 

[RichardA]

Beta rollout road bumps

We expected there to be some road bumps in the Beta install process, so we decided to just start with a handful

sure enough there were some parts that need fixing, so we are taking it slowly until we have got the install package fully sorted

The Good news is that the SQ is there

Hi Edward,
Is that the reason why there was no email with appointment schedule and manual that you talked about in a previous post ?

 

[CDub]

Beta rollout road bumps

We expected there to be some road bumps in the Beta install process, so we decided to just start with a handful

sure enough there were some parts that need fixing, so we are taking it slowly until we have got the install package fully sorted

The Good news is that the SQ is there

Hi, I can't wait to get added to the beta but I have a question. I see a lot of discussion centered around the SQ with the USB DRIVERS. I do not use USB but I use a ethernet "Sablon" cable via the M12 Switch Gold. Can I expect similar improvements as those using thr USB cables with the new TAS? Thanks

 

[EuroDriver]

Hi Edward,
Is that the reason why there was no email with appointment schedule and manual that you talked about in a previous post ?

We are still sorting out the appointment booking calendars

 

[EuroDriver]

Hi, I can't wait to get added to the beta but I have a question. I see a lot of discussion centered around the SQ with the USB DRIVERS. I do not use USB but I use a ethernet "Sablon" cable via the M12 Switch Gold. Can I expect similar improvements as those using thr USB cables with the new TAS? Thanks

Which DAC are you using ?

 

[CDub]

Which DAC are you using ?

I'm using the MSB Reference DAC

 

[EuroDriver]

I'm using the MSB Reference DAC

According to our data points, we are confident you will getnoticeably better SQ having one of the USB interface options installed in the Reference DAC

 

[ray-dude]

An affordable USB DDC that could handle 16fs when both coax ports are connected, some owners of Chord DAVE would be excited to replace the clock inside SRC•DX with an OCXO etc.

I was thinking same. Once Emile and team finish finalizing USB details with the new Taiko USB card, I'd be quite keen to explore a USB to dual SPDIF converter. The USB chipset on DAVE is definitely one of the weakest points in the system

Chord's tendency to cheap out on critical things like power supply and USB chipset in a $10k+ flagship DAC is very disappointing. We can fix the power issue, but fixing USB is much harder. I'm keen to take a crack at it though

 

[CDub]

Which DAC are you using ?

I'm using the MSB Reference DAC wit

According to our data points, we are confident you will getnoticeably better SQ having one of the USB interface options installed in the Reference DAC

Thanks for the info. I currently just have the The MSB Network Renderer V2 but I will see if I can try out the MSB USB Inputs or the PROISL. Maybe pickup a USB from Mark while I'm at it or go Fiber... Thanks again.

 

[adyc]

I was thinking same. Once Emile and team finish finalizing USB details with the new Taiko USB card, I'd be quite keen to explore a USB to dual SPDIF converter. The USB chipset on DAVE is definitely one of the weakest points in the system

Chord's tendency to cheap out on critical things like power supply and USB chipset in a $10k+ flagship DAC is very disappointing. We can fix the power issue, but fixing USB is much harder. I'm keen to take a crack at it though

But isn’t coaxial is limited to 24 bit compared to USB 32bit?

 

[adyc]

The Chord Dave uses a proprietary Amanero based USB interface we cannot do much with (we did try). It simply performs best when being fed a 32 bit data stream. Which is why, afaik, all of our customers use it with HQPlayer and upsample to 32/768. When using TAS you would therefor select the HQPlayer output which bypasses all our bit-perfect player optimizations but the files do still go through our noise mitigation process.

Does your Extreme Player or Gapless Player require your USB driver? Can one use driver come from Chord with DAVE?

 

[EuroDriver]

Does your Extreme Player or Gapless Player require your USB driver? Can one use driver come from Chord with DAVE?

Extreme Serial and Batch will pass data to all ASIO compliant USB drivers