BrianLS

Thank you, Ponzi! This happens to me from time to time as well. On some evenings, I just can't believe how beautiful the music is that proceeds from my system, track after track, hour after hour. It's nearly enough to make me swoon at times. What a wonderful way to end a day that I'd sometimes like to forget. Honestly, I can't even talk about it to most people - I just get odd looks (lol). That's ok. It's just for me.

So it's not just a myth, but a false myth? Ok. This is such a silly thing to argue about given that the point of the post was to talk about what I heard with the new Aurender update. We don't even disagree for the most part. Do you just object that I say 'protocol' and you say 'shell'? DoP is a system for stuffing PCM frames with DSD data. I think we can agree on this. The DAC, including everything that is on the receiving end of the USB cable, must recover the DSD data from the PCM frames before processing it as DSD data. I would guess that we even agree on this. Amazing what we agree on, isn't it? No 'false myths' so far. Perhaps where we disagree is on the impact this extraction could have on the ultimate sound quality. I guess if your point is that "I can't possibly hear the difference" or something, the conversation is over since we're now just speculating about each other's systems and ears. All I can say is that I can hear the difference without any difficulty, as can everyone who has heard me demo the new Aurender feature. The update makes me happy. I'm glad iFi supports this mode. Does this mean that the iFi will replace my Vivaldi for all future listening sessions? Not at all. Does it allow me to listen to my DSD256 tracks that the Vivaldi doesn't support? You bet. Take care - Brian.

Sorry - "Mack the Knife"... Ugh.

I installed the latest Conductor update last night for my Aurender N10. My Vivaldi doesn't support Native DSD (Are you listening, DCS?), but I do have an iFi iDSD Micro in the rack, normally fed by a modest laptop for serving up YouTube music and such. That iFi does support Native DSD, so I connected it to the N10 and started some listening tests. I started with some DSD128 tracks because that allowed me to A/B between DoP and Native DSD. The improvement brought on with Native DSD was immediately obvious. The sound was more relaxed, less congested, quieter, with more realistic-sounding instruments. This all makes sense because the DAC is not working as hard receiving the DoP data and re-assembling the DSD stream. Then I flipped to a DSD256 version of the same track. The sound was even better. This time the improvement was due to the increase in resolution. And what a wonderful improvement it was. Listening to Louis Armstrong's live album called Jack the Knife, downloaded from nativedsd.com, Armstrong's voice was more three dimensional, as was every instrument in the band. Everything was more solid and alive. Thank you Aurender, and thank you iFi, and what the hell - Thank you Louis Armstrong, for making my world a little nicer. Brian.

This happened to me recently. I ended up deleting the current app and then installing the new version. I was all ready to have to re-register the app with my N10 and reconfigure my Tidal account, but I didn't have to do anything; it just worked.

Funny you should say that... I've been trying to clone my N100H to my N10 lately, and just get to that same screen indefinitely. I'll be asking Aurender about it shortly.

I'd be thre with an armload of wine and beer, but I'm in Colorado. If you're in NJ, have you ever made it over to GTT Audio? The have the new AudioNet Heisenberg amplifiers that I'm eager to hear. Let us know how the shoot-out goes.

Hi Vincent - LOL! I know! I've heard the W20 in other systems and it always sounds great. But you can't really grok a component until you've heard it in your own system for a while. I have no doubt that the W20 would sound better in my system - But I just did a major upgrade with the N10, cables, and some other goodies. If I don't stop and remodel the kitchen soon, my wife will kill me. And then she'll have the stereo all to herself. I can't let that happen. And to be honest, I'm really waiting to see if Aurender and DCS will ever support DSD-256. Anyway - Consider me jealous of your W20 Brian.

Hi Foxman50 - Sorry about that I know what you mean. I absolutely will not audition the W20 in my system. I'm using a Nordost USB cable to a DCS Vivaldi DAC. I lived quite happily with that N100H for some time, though - It's a really nice sounding streamer/server.

Sure - I love the N100H - quiet, reliable, looks great and sounds great. But the N10 is in another class. Upon first turning it on, the soundstage width, which I thought was pretty amazing with the N100H, and the accurate location of sound sources within the sound stage were spectacular. After some break-in time, the sound sources became more resolved, solid, and colorful. And that sound stage just keeps getting more solid, too. The N10 is turning out to create greater dynamics as well. I suspect a lot of the improvements come from a reduction in noise. Whatever the underlying reasons, the N10 just crushes the N100H. Also, I am waiting for some isolation pucks from HRS, and may end up getting an isolation base for the N10. This will improve things even more. I'm sure the W20 has some sonic advantages over the N10, but the N10 is the sweet spot for me. Brian.

I'm breaking in my new N10 after upgrading from an N100H. Unfortunately, I updated my iPad to iOS 11 at about the same time. I'm having quite a few issues with the Conductor app on iOS 11, and am wondering if anyone else is having issues or what the official story is with Conductor and iOS 11? I'll downgrade back to iOS 10 if I have to but I'd rather not.

Hi - Just breaking in my new Aurender N10 after upgrading from an N100H. Unfortunately, I also updated my iPad to IOS 11 at about the same time. I'm having quite a few issues wit the app in IOS 11, and am wondering what the official word is wrt IOS 11 support. Anyone know?

Hi Ray, I'm totally blind, too. When I approached the good folks in the Aurender room at the 2015 RMAF, they saw my cane and said that their Conductor app works very well with Voice-Over. As this was the opposite message I got from the also fine folks at Roon (and almost everyone else), I had to grin So I now have the N100H, which I can use just fine. (Although I can no longer find the button to switch over to the Tidal part of the app after the Mar 1 Conductor update.) Good luck - Brian.

I agree with your sentiment about the room at The Sound Environment. I live in Colorado and have made the trip to Omaha several times just to audition one bit of gear or another in that room. The Vivaldi is modular in the sense that it has the DAC, clock, upsampler, and transport, so that a customer's system can be composed of different components. It also allows for firmware updates to improve/optimize the various algorithms inside the DAC. But I don't believe the Vivaldi will support more than DSD-64 via a firmware update. Perhaps they will have a factory-update program in the future, though. I'm wondering if they won't let this Rossini breathe a little, and then release a new flagship to replace Vivaldi. Brian.

I've been to that place in Omaha - The Sound Environment. I was there a few weeks ago for a DAC shootout between my iFi iDSD Micro (yup), the great Playback Designs MPS-5, and the splendid DCS Vivaldi. They had the mighty Rockport Altairs and the D'Agostino Momentum amplifiers/preamplifier. The system was wired up with all Transparent cables. BTW - The guys at The Sound Environment are a *rare* combination of passion, experience, and knowledge - Just my $.02. Anyway - I'm considering the Vivaldi, but wouldn't get the clock or upsampler initially. But as sweet as the Playback Designs MPS-5 DAC was, the Vivaldi crushed it with pure resolution and soundstage. And it's not just a detail factory, either. We could hear the top of a cello's body as a 3-dimensional sound source in all of its woody goodness being played by a skilled musician in Rachel Podger's latest DSD project - Beautiful. What I learned was that the Vivaldi only supports DSD-64, though. So I'm hesitating on the Vivaldi purchase in order to hear the Boulder 2120 and the DCS Rossini, both of which support DSD-128, and neither of which are available for an audition at this time. Perhaps by RMAF... Brian.