Taiko Audio SGM Extreme : the Crème de la Crème
- Thread starter CKKeung
- Start date
Release information posted here:
https://www.whatsbestforum.com/thre...w-perspective-on-modern-music-playback.37939/
https://www.whatsbestforum.com/thre...w-perspective-on-modern-music-playback.37939/
I never had a doubt, Emile.I’m up
We have a saying, "No rest for the wicked." You must have been very, very wicked.
In a good way, of course!
Steve Z
A Day in Oldenzaal
This past Wednesday I spent the day talking to each Taiko Team member. There is this air and mood of confidence, engagement and joy in their activities, a team firing on all cylinders. Taiko has come a long way since the kitchen table in July 2015.
The Olympus chassis was a foam model my last visit, now its a fully machined two piece aluminium alloy case and looking beautiful
The biggest news is the further leap in the musical beauty of the Olympus IO. I asked Emile "what did you change in the last couple of weeks" ?
The reply was, " oh about 50 things "
This past Wednesday I spent the day talking to each Taiko Team member. There is this air and mood of confidence, engagement and joy in their activities, a team firing on all cylinders. Taiko has come a long way since the kitchen table in July 2015.
The Olympus chassis was a foam model my last visit, now its a fully machined two piece aluminium alloy case and looking beautiful
The biggest news is the further leap in the musical beauty of the Olympus IO. I asked Emile "what did you change in the last couple of weeks" ?
The reply was, " oh about 50 things "
I've had the router and DCD running for about a week now with the switch and Extreme. It took around five minutes to get the router up and running with my system. Just used the recommended hookup and power cycling, set my i-pad controller to TAIKO WI-FI and Roon showed up as usual.
Not a single wi-fi drop out or hiccup. Just pure music.
The sound has taken on a solidness that was not there before adding the router/DCD. The imaging is ultra stable now. Best I've heard yet.
GO TAIKO!!!
Not a single wi-fi drop out or hiccup. Just pure music.
The sound has taken on a solidness that was not there before adding the router/DCD. The imaging is ultra stable now. Best I've heard yet.
GO TAIKO!!!
The future is here, indeed.
A few patches of NSM had been implemented previously in XDMS before, allowing things I had not thought possible with Digital at all:
Subtle dynamic gradations, nuance in the voice of a singer, all those things which separates a soso musical performance from a great one. The things which make you get lost in music, which mean the expression, which are the meaning of a musical interpretation.
The transportation of emotion, which for me is most important quality of true high end.
Similar to this an enhanced tonal expression, finer gradations, simply more and more different colours.
The lack of both had always made Digital a boredom for me.
NSM
has added even more nuances, more of what fascinates me with music.
With NSM a few more thing have arrived:
An enhanced sense of space, of spatial clues of the recording venue.
Localisation of performers is now much more evident, no doubts, they are simply here, quite nice and pretty impressive.
For me the „why“ of perforers is more important than the „where“ of them, a pretty nice added sonic quality, nevertheless
Bass! Much more nuance here, too. Much more differentiation of bass notes, of their depth, their character.
Simply more relevant information here, too.
Very nice as well!
Criticism?
Umm, no.
When following Emiles advice & taking out the (pretty good) Ediscreation extreme switch between internet box and Taiko switch and putting it parallel to Taiko switch, NSM improved in many ways, but I think I lost some vigour, some attack, some excitement, when music asked for it.
Maybe ASIO format, adaptive change, as mentioned elsewhere, might help.
Maybe this minor problem is in my personal setup.
28. of December is the estimated time of arrival of Taiko router and switch. This will undoubtedly elevate things even more and maybe change again some of the odd interactions of my setup with rest of internet in my home.
Many thanks again to all of Team Taiko for your products and most of all, an absolutely incomparable after sales service!
(do you feed Ed some abominable drugs so that he doesn’t ever sleep?)
Cheers from Engadin
A few patches of NSM had been implemented previously in XDMS before, allowing things I had not thought possible with Digital at all:
Subtle dynamic gradations, nuance in the voice of a singer, all those things which separates a soso musical performance from a great one. The things which make you get lost in music, which mean the expression, which are the meaning of a musical interpretation.
The transportation of emotion, which for me is most important quality of true high end.
Similar to this an enhanced tonal expression, finer gradations, simply more and more different colours.
The lack of both had always made Digital a boredom for me.
NSM
has added even more nuances, more of what fascinates me with music.
With NSM a few more thing have arrived:
An enhanced sense of space, of spatial clues of the recording venue.
Localisation of performers is now much more evident, no doubts, they are simply here, quite nice and pretty impressive.
For me the „why“ of perforers is more important than the „where“ of them, a pretty nice added sonic quality, nevertheless
Bass! Much more nuance here, too. Much more differentiation of bass notes, of their depth, their character.
Simply more relevant information here, too.
Very nice as well!
Criticism?
Umm, no.
When following Emiles advice & taking out the (pretty good) Ediscreation extreme switch between internet box and Taiko switch and putting it parallel to Taiko switch, NSM improved in many ways, but I think I lost some vigour, some attack, some excitement, when music asked for it.
Maybe ASIO format, adaptive change, as mentioned elsewhere, might help.
Maybe this minor problem is in my personal setup.
28. of December is the estimated time of arrival of Taiko router and switch. This will undoubtedly elevate things even more and maybe change again some of the odd interactions of my setup with rest of internet in my home.
Many thanks again to all of Team Taiko for your products and most of all, an absolutely incomparable after sales service!
(do you feed Ed some abominable drugs so that he doesn’t ever sleep?)
Cheers from Engadin
Attachments
-
IMG_7209.jpeg
Last edited:
Thanks for your review of NSM. I believe you described what we are all looking for more of from digital.
Posts like that make me really look forward to using NSM.
Happy to be on the Taiko train!
Posts like that make me really look forward to using NSM.
Happy to be on the Taiko train!
After spending all day today playing with NSM I began to explore many of the buttons that I had set before NSM. One in particular I found very interesting and that was the "sound profile" button with default vs Alternative. I remember months ago there were posts about this button and I recall that Emile preferred Alternative whereas I think the only ones who preferred default was myself and 2nd liner (Michael). Well today was a completely different story with NSM as it was simply no contest. It wasn't even close as Alternative with NSM to my ears sounds so much better. I have no idea whether this is a filter or something else but today was so much better that I am now keeping that button on Alternative
Anyone else with similar findings or is this just one of those buttons that we use for preference
Anyone else with similar findings or is this just one of those buttons that we use for preference
There is no such thing as a "USB-spec compliant printer cable." All USB cables are either USB compliant or not, a printer is a device that, if implementing USB for I/O and / or power needs to adhere to USB specs like any other USB - capable device.
I had forgotten all about that toggle setting, Steve. Thanks for the reminder! I'll have to give it some use and comparisons after our guests vacate my audio room in a week.
I forgot about this, Steve, thanks for the reminder! Field report forthcoming…
Surely you can get them into a hotel a bit sooner to free up your audio room Jay!
I was always preferring Alternative , also with Roon It works excellent but „only for some time„
as Emile suggested. It works permanent with XDMS , NSM .
this botton works for months now.
I think Emile mentioned once the difference between standard and alternative is in the way memory
is cleaned.
Happy holidays to all on this epic thread! Even though I have never met anyone here in person, it has been an amazing place to share, cheer, console and learn in this hobby we are fortunate to have and occasionally a window into people’s lives.
Hope Team Taiko gets some seriously overdue rest in the coming days. 2024 sure looks to be shaping up to be the most exciting and audibly best yet thanks to their passion and innovation.
Hope Team Taiko gets some seriously overdue rest in the coming days. 2024 sure looks to be shaping up to be the most exciting and audibly best yet thanks to their passion and innovation.
Last edited:
Right now the toggle in the app isn’t functional but Ed thinks he found the issue.
the button always worked Kris. My comment was that I had it on default while using XDMS and IIRC myself and 2nd Liner preferred default. Yesterday I decided to listen to "alternative " with XDMS and I was shocked at how much better it now sounded
 | Steve Williams Site Founder | Site Owner | Administrator |  | Ron Resnick Site Co-Owner | Administrator |  | Julian (The Fixer) Website Build | Marketing Managersing |