Life after Yggdrasil: Watering the Ash

Thx for the welcome Bengo,

The thing i find with digital audio is the EVERYTHING matters, it is a complete pain. I have been following a number of threads, across a number of fora, by a number of people, and especially a chap named Bob; He has done a lot of heuristics w.r.t. AOIP & USB chains and I have found his advice especially to work for me.

I really enjoyed the Yggdrasil. The thing which would stop me just buying the Lampi is the clarity of the Yggdrasil, and the lithe nature of the bass. For instance, one of my favourite singles has always been, 'Son of a Preacher Man'. I had NEVER realised how batshit crazy the bass player goes, stupendous. That is absent with the Bel Canto, even though it goes deeper, and you have to listen for it with the Lampi. Having said that the Lampi seems to capture the sheer exuberance of music in my system.

My hope is that the Border Patrol will give me the highlights of BOTH these DACs - perhaps a triumph of hope over experience.

Cheers,

M

 

Hi Torq,

Thx for asking. I am buying a BP DAC on approval. I'll post my findings - excuse me if I don't post it BACK to the States from the UK; especially of I like it, I'll be too busy listening to it!

M

 

Bob's nervosa is considered more than just a little over the top here. Hell, my nervosa in trying the new UpTone Audio ISO Regen is probably considered a little over the top considering I should be investing that money in an AOIP solution. That is my plan but the AOIP product I want isn't out yet so I am still playing with USB.

I agree with the folks here. The goal should be to get away from USB completely. Bob seems to think USB is required and that you need those Ethernet-based USB extenders to get the best sound. You have to wonder when every little thing he does improves the sound quality some amount. His chains are crazy and he goes way overboard on the LPS side of things.

I almost fell into Bob's trap but I got lucky and found this place. They set me straight and I am very thankful for it!

 

This is something that's always amusing to me (not just with him or his chain) ... these types always seem to get a positive difference the more convoluted and fiddly (and expensive) that their configurations become. And then the tendency to describe probably-inaudible differences as "huge", "massive", "dramatic" or "night and day" on top of it makes it seems like a bit of a farce.

I've seen (and heard) setups that have multiple Mutec MC3+ units in series (or other types of filters, reclockers, etc.), with the claim being that each one added made a "significant improvement". If it does, a) I couldn't hear it (I'm well aware that there are definitely people out there that can hear changes that I can't) and b) the supposed mechanism by which this improvement came about doesn't make any sense (which isn't to say there can't be an improvement ... just that it can't be for the reasons being suggested).

You don't, for example, get progressively better clock performance by chaining re-clockers. Such devices generally don't work on the "improves the clock by 10%" principle. Instead, if they get a lock on the input signal, then the quality of the output is pretty much fixed. That final clock will have a specific level of phase-noise/beat-error/drift, that'll be within some tolerance range (so some "identical" units will, invariably, perform slightly better or worse than others), and that's what the DAC will see. Clocks further up the chain will have no effect on that final clock's performance with these typical lock->buffer->re-clock-from-buffer designs.

A much more likely situation is that there will be variation of performance, due to normal differences in tolerances, that means that there will be a "best" performing unit in such a chain, and a "worset" performing one. Those differences may be sufficient to be audible (and they're probably measurable), but the likelihood is that adding additional units to the chain and actually getting an improvement is simply down to the best-performing re-clocker being the FINAL unit in said chain (either by luck, or by experimentation). And then swapping the order of them around could easily make things worse. Once you've identified the "best" performing unit, I'd be very surprised if just using that, on it's own, didn't yield indistinguishable results from the multi-unit chain (depending, of course, on exactly what devices we're talking about).

In a much simpler example, adding a Mutec MC3+ to the output of a RedNet 3 improved the sound into a DAC that didn't have a solid re-clocking scheme. Adding the SAME Mutec MC3+ to the output of one of my Aries units, feeding the same DAC, resulted in poorer reproduction. A different copy of the Mutec MC3+ might have had different results.

 

Well, I certainly didn't mean to push the thread off on a tangent, so I will refrain from replying to the USB chain comments.

The BP DAC will be being despatched shortly ....hope it is all it is reported to be. In the meanwhile back to the Lampizator and some great music.

M

 

Not a big deal; with long-running threads like this there's always going to be some of that sort of thing. However, If it's the sort of thing you're interested in there's a specific thread for USB chain/improvement/nervosa discussions that you might not have seen. Lots of good info in there.

 

My life is still in the well before Yggdrasil stage. My chain consists of a Note 3 > micro iDSD (silver). Considering the Modi Multibit in the near future. The Breeze/Ali site says "Windows/Mac". Does anyone know if it'll support USB out from an Android device?

 

http://schiit.com/guides/getting-connected

"You can connect our DACs to many Android devices using a USB On The Go cable. Devices that shipped with Android M or N stock probably won't need additional player software, but earlier devices may need USB Audio Player Pro to play music. Some Android devices will need to be connected through a USB powered hub, since they cannot supply enough power to run the DAC."

As far as the Modi Multibit goes, just buy one already It's a fantastic DAC at any price.

 

I'm not asking about the Modi Multibit.

[And sorry to drag this thread further off topic.]

 

The Breeze requires XMOS device drivers, it doesn't work with the common class compliant USB 2 audio drivers native to most OS. I stand corrected. The DU-U8 apparently works with everything that exhibits class compliant USB 1 or 2 except mine, which isn't surprising given the specialized nature of said equipment in lab.

 

Nope. The XMOS drivers only exist because of the lack of proper UAC2 drivers in Windows. The Breeze U8 uses the XMOS drivers in Windows*, but will generally work with things that have their own UAC2 support- without additional drivers. This situation only exists because Windows lags behind in USB Audio Class driver support- pretty much any other useful OS will work just fine.

The XMOS stuff will generally work with Android quite happily- within the usual Android constraints of platform fragmentation and dodging unsolicited sample rate conversion.

From the XMOS drivers page:

To answer your question more specifically, @gixxerwimp - I just double checked for you. I hooked my old Nexus 6 (Android 7) up to a Breeze U8 via an OTG adaptor, then plugged that into my Gungnir Multibit via coax. Works fine, hasn't missed a beat. If you're doing this sort of thing, use UAPP as a player to bypass Android's "audioflinger" sound libraries that do sample rate conversion, so that you get bitperfect output.


Now that is a threadjack. Sorry, @Torq - though I suspect you're used to it by now.


* Windows 10 "creator's update" allegedly has its own baked-in UAC2 playback drivers, but I've not tried them yet. I'm using the newest XMOS 64 bit signed drivers that I could find, when I need to use the U8 from Windows.

 

I have just replaced my Yggdrasil with a Metrum Pavane (level 1). Only 4 hours in, but already the Pavane is impressive. It seems to combine the great technical abilities of the Yggdrasil with a more musical and warm presentation. I found the Yggdrasil brilliant in many ways, but it was more to the clinical / neutral side than I would like. I was expecting a warmer and more musical presentation from the Pavane, and early impressions seem to support that. Will know more in a few weeks.

To get around the clinical presentation of the Yggdrasil I was using a Freya pre between the Yggdrasil and M9 amp, fitted with some very sweet tubes (1945 NOS NU 6C8Gs). After only 4 hours on the Pavane I have been able to take the Freya out of the chain and am happy with the resulting sound.

Before anyone gets the torches and pitchforks out, I am not saying that the Pavane is a better DAC - just different. A presentation that is more musical and warm - and that is what I was looking for. Best I can tell, the technicalities are quite similar between the two DACs. The sonic flavour is different. The Pavane has more of what I like than the Yggdrasil. YMMV.

For anyone looking for a Yggdrasil level of technical performance, with a presentation more on the warm/musical side, I recommend giving the Pavane an audition.

 

I'm pretty sure that no-one wants to burn you at the stake for enjoying the sound of a reputable NOS DAC. It's very much a matter of taste. It's great that you're enjoying the sound, though!

 

A friend has a Pavane and I think it sounds pretty good too. I don't think it is any better than the Yggdrasil he had before but it is somewhat warmer which he likes. It's not the bargain Yggdrasil is but it is a fine DAC!

 

TonyNewman:

I have just replaced my Yggdrasil with a Metrum Pavane (level 1). Only 4 hours in, but already the Pavane is impressive. It seems to combine the great technical abilities of the Yggdrasil with a more musical and warm presentation.

Hi Tony,

This is what I preferred with the Lampizator L4 over the Yggdrasil, however, in my case the quality of the Schiit bass on pop & rock was a definite notch up in terms of clarity.

 

At some point I'd like to do another session with the Pavane, both back-to-back with Yggdrasil (which I've done before) but also to have it alongside the Spring DAC for a direct comparison there. However, when I do this it's likely to be with the whatever the highest-spec Pavane modules are at the time rather than the original ones.

 

I did look at the level 2 Pavane, and might have gone for it but I listen to 16/44 recordings almost exclusively. I just don't need the hirez support that the next level of Pavane offers, and the base model was in stock (a rare thing in my part of the world).

 

I did get the level 2 pricing from the local dealer - about another 2K (in my money) and a special order from Europe (multiple week lead time). Level 1 was in stock locally (in black) and a very good price. Ordered on Tuesday afternoon and had it in my hands on Thursday morning. Had to stop my dollar spillage somewhere - level 2 was a DAC too far for me. No doubt the level 2 offers some improvement beyond the capability to handle higher res, but I couldn't do it. Not that I didn't want to, of course.

 

It's been a week with Yggdrasil.

Keep in mind I've been of the mindset invest first in speakers/headphones, then the pre-amp/amp, DAC last. I wasted money on CD players that all ended up sounding so similar, I had resigned myself to 'so this is digital'. It's convenient, but I guess it's always going to have digital glare, sheen and fuzz.

Solid state -> Lyr 2 was a nice upgrade. The tubes brought back some of that analog I remembered.
The Bifrost Uber -> Multibit, a nice upgrade, but still a minor one. Smoother, more analog like, very pleasant, but still not it.
Lyr 2 -> MJ2 (same tubes), more energetic, quieter background, better separation. Nice.

All nice, but Yggdrasil... seriously holy cr*p.

Bells finally have that sweet metallic ring. Still a touch of fuzz, but finally, it sounds like a bell.
Cymbals have that metallic ring, as they should.
Violins, finally the sweet richness, layers of subtle detail that doesn't just sound like a one-note buzz saw.
I could go on and on about instruments finally sounding much more like the actual instrument and a lot less like a digital window.

And bass... deep, subterranean, those low frequencies aren't just blurring out the mids/highs. I hear things in the background I vaguely knew were there but lost in fuzz and muck. Rock and Pop songs are aggressive as they should be.

And live music? I put on Joe Satriani - Always with Me (Live), and for the first time, it was like I had stepped into the venue, versus it sounding like I was listening standing just outside the door to the the upper balcony. I was there in the upper balcony. Energetic, lively, the echos placed correctly and coherent.

Yggdrasil has completely changed my mind about what a DAC can do.