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Post by MartinT on Mar 3, 2019 16:40:46 GMT
Meanwhile, listening today and it's sounding all-round good. I tried something recommended in the Head-Fi forum: turning off the volume bypass and just leaving it set to 0dB. It should sound the same but the latter has slightly less high frequency emphasis. Leaving the filter set to SLOW-M (Minimum Phase for no pre-ringing) is best for the whip-crack attack on things like Mark Knopfler's guitar, and adjusting DPLL to BW06 has helped the soundstage.
There is simply humongous detail coming through but with it is a more musical, less edgy presentation.
Next step is the QP-1 modification so that I can make best use of it to power the streamer with separate 5V lines.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 3, 2019 20:00:00 GMT
Having owned this dac, you could contact SGS for some grounding leads, it really responds well to them.
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Post by MartinT on Mar 3, 2019 21:00:55 GMT
Yes Tony, I have one of the normal green ones connected to my smaller SGS box. I plan on having a couple more white ones made up (with phonos rather than crocs). They are quite a lot better.
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Post by MartinT on Mar 4, 2019 13:39:30 GMT
I've just received the Crystek 950X femtoclock upgrade for my LKS from Mouser. Pretty fast delivery! This is for later, after my QP-1 PSU modification work has been done.  |
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Post by MartinT on Mar 4, 2019 18:29:46 GMT
I managed to find another set of four RDC Combi Bases on eBay so snaffled them quickly for the other EB shelf. |
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Post by MartinT on Mar 8, 2019 7:00:57 GMT
RDC Combi Bases received and put underneath the 'transport' EB shelf so both now have equal isolation...
DAC / Streamer
-- Black Ravioli Big Pads
Electric Beach S1NX shelf
-- RDC 1 Cones (upside-down)
-- RDC Cone Cups
-- RDC Combi Bases
Solid Tech Duo system rack
-- RDC 1 Cones (upside-down)
Granite tiled floor
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Post by MartinT on Mar 13, 2019 9:05:17 GMT
Nothing much to report except that the system continues to improve as all the I2S components (streamer, cable, DAC) continue to burn in. Most of that initial relentlessness has gone but the edge detail, dynamics and insight remain. It's also gratifying that Qobuz continue to add more albums to their catalogue and more of them are appearing in hi-res. I continue to listen to all manner of music and now need to get to grips with Qobuz playlists as I have already done with Spotify.
The QP-1 power supply goes off for its upgrade on Friday to give me separate 'clean' and 'dirty' 5V feeds. That will then be the Audiophonics with Kali streamer completed.
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Post by MartinT on Mar 17, 2019 16:17:59 GMT
It's very interesting to hear what impact the power supply has on digital circuits. While my QP-1 is away being upgraded, I've lashed up my old Chinese 12V-5V buck converter to feed the two 5V lines to the Audiophonics streamer. 12V comes from a standard SMPS plugged into the P10. It's surprisingly good, but interesting to observe what remains as good as before and what changes.
As good as before are the dynamics, which are the outright best I've ever experienced since moving to I2S. All the punch remains although bass extension is slightly less potent.
What are lost are soundstage width and depth, the whole image somewhat flattened. Air and space suffer a little, too.
The final change is that the slightly bright/relentless character has returned, just a little.
None of these things are showstoppers and, had I not heard the sound with the QP-1 in place I would still have been pleased.
However, it's notable that the QP-1 is only powering digital circuits: Pi, Kali, HDMI. There is nothing analogue being fed by it. Yet the quality of the supercap power supply still shows through. With split 5V supplies, I look forward to hearing the modified PSU back in the system.
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Post by MartinT on Mar 19, 2019 22:00:50 GMT
I've had a very interesting session this evening when Tony of Coherent returned my modified QP-1 power supply. He stayed to have a listen and helped me with his understanding of how grounding boxes work and also how they can be very counterintuitive. Several hours later, after building up my grounding arrangements from scratch and substituting his RTZ and many Coherent grounding cables, I heard the changes for myself. The benefit of all this? When I reconnected my own grounding leads to a single SGS box in the way that he had, duplicating it as much as possible, that together with the improved PSU has given me the tonal balance I was looking for with greater midrange bloom and warmth, even better dynamics and reduced glare. All without changing any system components! Tonight's learning: - A PSU can make a great deal of difference to purely digital components (my Audiophonics streamer)
- Two grounding boxes are worse than one! In reworking my grounding arrangements, we heard the 2nd SGS-1 box (connected to my DAC) degrade the sound quality
- My Pass preamp loves grounding and responds even more to 4 ground connections (2 input, 2 output)
- The LKS DAC responded well to both analogue output grounding and digital input grounding
- I2S really conveys a lot more of the music compared with S/PDIF, a point driven home tonight
- This one's the killer - the SGS white (silver) cable degrades the sound compared with the standard green (copper) cables
This last point was very surprising yet easily heard. Tony said he had tried and tried to develop a silver grounding cable and gave up. He now carries one with him to prove the point.
I rebuilt the system using my three green cables and it sounds much better than before. One of them is very long so I'm going to cut it in two and re-terminate the ends, giving me four cables which is pretty much the maximum the single terminal on the SGS-1s can handle. I'm going to enjoy my day off tomorrow  |
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Post by John on Mar 20, 2019 5:17:25 GMT
Brilliant result Martin. Let me know when I can come over to have a listen.
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Post by jandl100 on Mar 20, 2019 7:13:57 GMT
I kind of expected the RTZ box to win you over, Martin. But you seem happy with the SGS.
Interesting that the copper cables beat the silver ones, that goes against 'received wisdom' with these enigmatic devices.
Seems that it would be worth me investing in another 2 copper cables for my SGS box.
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Post by MartinT on Mar 20, 2019 7:39:49 GMT
Yes Jerry the SGS-1s, when configured as closely as I could with three greens, got a large part of the RTZ's soundstage, depth and air which I was missing by using two grounding boxes. You live and learn!
I've ordered the parts to make two greens out of one and convert one of them to crocodile clip.
John, no problem, we'll set a date.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 20, 2019 8:15:07 GMT
It was good to catch up with Martin last night and find out how things are progressing in land if PI  I feel Martin has made great progressing in obtaining a sound he truly feels is getting towards his audio heaven what was quite obvious is that the dac can be coaxed towards a more three dimensional sound with trailing note decay and sustain the difference that correct application of grounding equipment made significant progress towards that goal was very surprising for Martin but pleasing at the same time we only used the RTZ 1 as to keep things on an even keel though this allowed us to use more leads to demonstrate the effect in great spectrum of the system We did explore more music that Martin was quite pleasantly surprised to listen as well a good evenings work with no pressures just fun exploring the possibilities |
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Post by MartinT on Mar 20, 2019 8:23:33 GMT
I'm greatly indebted, Tony, I learned a lot last night.
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Post by MikeMusic on Mar 20, 2019 10:46:59 GMT
All good stuff.
Wondered if one grounding box would be better than 2
We learn more about grounding boxes
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Post by MartinT on Mar 20, 2019 16:40:53 GMT
The PSU continues to burn in nicely and the new grounding arrangements (with three green cables) are a lot better.
I'm hearing a tonal balance that is now spot-on. Depth, air and space are much better and it now beats the modified Caiman SEG in this regard, no mean achievement. Dynamics, slam, detail, bass extension are in another class completely. I've played rock, classical, prog, jazz and electronic and the system is handling them all even-handedly. It's been a great day of listening with no fatigue setting in, just the desire to play more.
I've also taken the chance to build up my Qobuz playlists in the same way as I did with my Spotify ones. This and the faster search in Volumio are keeping me happy.
I'm getting closer to my audio nirvana.
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Post by MartinT on Mar 21, 2019 13:03:44 GMT
I've just received a Chinese Mps HD-280 silver plated high performance HDMI cable from AliExpress. This cable has a bit of a reputation for I 2S transmission and one user, at least, has the same LKS DAC as me and raves about it. For $54 I thought it worth trying against my Audioquest Cinnamon silver plated cable which cost £58.  I'm also going to be trying a Blue Jeans FE HDMI cable soon. Watch this space! |
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Post by MartinT on Mar 21, 2019 21:05:49 GMT
This evening I made four cables from three green grounding cables (one was much longer so I cut it in half). I had to repair two others where the cotton surround was fraying, too. I used screw-terminal crocodile clips and did not solder any terminations, in keeping with SGS's practise. I also used hot glue heat-shrink, wonderful stuff that shrinks and glues itself in place, so there should be no more fraying (the black heat-shrink in the photo). I placed the four cables as follows: - Pass preamp spare input (L) - Pass preamp spare output (L) - LKS DAC S/PDIF phono input - LKS DAC spare output (L) Getting three of those big fork connectors into the Cardas terminal was a right squeeze. The fourth cable has a 4mm plug going into the end of the terminal. There was an immediate improvement but I went and had something to eat to give it time to settle (the RTZ may be immediate but the SGS needs an hour to reach its peak, something to do with the capacitor inside). Upon return, I hear a big improvement in depth, air and space. Some sounds come from outside of the two speakers. Transient impact is even more dynamic. Bass is noticeably taut and powerful. Tonal balance is good, much as Tony and I achieved on Tuesday. The whole has taken a step-change upwards in musicality. I played a couple of Yes tracks and was amazed at the power in the bass where I have always thought their recordings are somewhat lightweight. Heart of the Sunrise especially so, but To Be Over to a lesser extent, too.  All very pleasing. I shall continue tomorrow and will try the new HDMI cable at some point, too. |
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Post by julesd68 on Mar 22, 2019 1:00:50 GMT
What kind of terminations do you have on the other end of the grounding cables Martin?
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Post by MartinT on Mar 22, 2019 6:21:18 GMT
They are all crocodile clips, Jules. Easy to clip onto the end of a phono socket, gripping only the earth as required.
I could have swapped to phono plugs (ignoring the connection to the centre pin) but croc clips keep things easy to move around.
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