emaspac

Light Harmonic Lightspeed USB: musicality, tone, detail, timing Tellurium Q Black Diamond: soundstage, extreme low and high frequencies response and dynamics I finally prefered the Lightspeed USB, but it could be too much analog for someone...

My Lightspeed 10G has just been shipped to Italy, and it should be delivered at the end of the next week. It will replace a Tellurium Q Black Diamond USB, which should retail in the US for $1000. Lightspeed 10G will connect my CAPS Zuma (full linear ATX with Teradak LPSU, JCAT Battery for OS Drive and Paul Hynes PSU for SOTM USB, silver rails) with a BADA Alpha USB feeded by Kemp Power Station 75, an AC generator with a frequency of 110 Hz, minimizing the ripple of LPSU inside BADA. So no preconceptions, lets just see what it sounds like.

I agree. One cannot compare these two sets of measurements IMO.

Congratulations Ben! to keep you informed, _I just received an email with my tracking number.

Dirac is the best improvement I have made in years. Effective, easy to set and now imprescindibile. No side effects. Nothing to say more.

Same for me. No tracking in my PayPal account.

that's wrong! red wines should be served at room temperature.

Merry Christmas and Happy Listening for the New Year!

Well, I don't agree. Most of problems we're talking about, with the partial exception of an asynchronously re-clock, they were already addressed in 1989 by Wadia. At that time Wadia's answer was an 64x upsampling with Lagrange interpolation (time based filter, not frequency brick-wall) plus linear interpolation with 4 DAC chips per channel in cascading configuration. Later, Genesis Digital Lens solved the source jitter problem in 1994, with its real asynchronous reclocking using 512Kb RAM buffer and precision crystal oscillator. In my honest opinion, since then nothing really special was done in digital domain. My personal tip now. If you want enjoy your listening, don't use a digital filter in frequency domain (Fourier domain). You could use proper time-based interpolation (Lagrange or spline domain, not linear) if you like it. But, first of all, you can really hear the differences in all this stuff we're talking about, only if you feed your digital equipment with the best AC power. I mean today you are able to "create" special and dedicated AC Power (i.e. regenerate AC power at higher frequency, 100hz minimum, with an analog oscillator). This will help each single PSU to work with lower ripple. After that, and only after that, you can check the difference between the formats, bit depths, frequencies, and so on...

can you explain us the technical motivation behind this premonition? try to convince me that your statement is not based on commercial implications only. if you can't, please let me be a bit rude: maybe you should double the effort to the JRiver development's instead of losing time writing fantasies everywhere.

The switch on the card has nothing to do with its external power via RW Black Lightning. If you have a DAC which doesn't need USB power, the switch on the card can be moved to the off position which will stop any power being sent from the PC to the DAC. Otherwise, don't move it.

audiophile lamp: Solid State Wandleuchte Gloho - Wohndesign Berlin

Well, Pico-WI (wide input) converts the voltage from 19V to 12V, 5V and 3.3V, but the standard Pico PSU (12V) doesn't convert the 12V rail, which pass as it is. Having DC-DC buck converters mounted on board, with 19V in input, means having all convertions embedded into the mobo, from 19V to 12V, 5V, 3.3V and also 1.9V. So it's really the worst scenario and we don't skip anything.

If I remember correctly, each Berkeley product has an universal mains power (100/120/240VAC, 50/60Hz) So you have just to set something inside the DAC and maybe change the fuse, too. Galen Carol can do it for you.

I've bought my BADA Alpha USB here. You can contact Galen Carol by email. As I know, they ship regularly their items in Europe. In my case nobody checked the RoHS or EU label during the custom clearance. I think nobody cares, since you are a private buyer, not a professional importer which resells the product. Of course if they check, then it's up to you to demonstrate the compliance (not GalenAudio, not BAD). And you can't demonstrate anything, so the risk is not marginal - loss a lot of money. But just think about it. There are a lot of "no EU/no RoHS" vintage hi fi items on ebay that you can buy without any risk. Most are included to the official GPS program, which calculates the custom duties in advance. I saw a Wadia 2000 DAC last week.. it's 1989. Do you think they will not pass the custom clearance? Come on'...