bixby

I run my main file share computer to the router, router to switch and player computer (allo in your case) to switch. I use this ferrite on the wire coming from the switch outboard power supply and wrap several turns through the ferrite, then plug into swtich. Also all my computer equipment, router, and switch is on different power circuit from player computer, dac and amp. This makes a difference in my house. https://www.newark.com/fair-rite/2675821502/length-15mm/dp/70W1683 The Pass stuff I have heard is excellent. Congrats!

A rather inexpensive option that I have used to good effect is to insert a switch in between the router and your Allo. I think most home routers are pretty noisy. When I did that with a good used HP Procurve switch things got a bit better on my playing computer. Less grain, blacker background. I also threw a ferrite on the power supply cord for the ethernet switch to audible effect, but no benefit from another switch at the playback computer. I know how good the Allo stuff is, since I compared a Roon core setup with an Allo USB bridge and my beloved tweeked desktop as an end point. Let's just say the scale tipped in the Allos favor. Not huge but audible. I think there is more to be gained with the source feeding the dac than swapping out dacs randomly. Doesn't mean a new dac cannot add more good ness though, if you have the cash. Also, do not be afraid to look into amplifiers. My local team of geeks is finding more bang there than the slim differences in dacs.

thanks seems like it was for a few days, but back up now.

Is Audiocircle.com dead?

Best sound I heard in years at RMAF was coming from the Voxativ room. Sorry cannot remember which models though. After 40 years of dynamic, conventionally crossed designs, I finally made the move to a full range driver based setup myself and could not be happier. Unfortunately, my solution is nowhere near as good as the Voxativ sound but is a tiny fraction of the cost. good luck with your search!

I let my main speaker system computer update to 1803 figuring it has been months since it came out and most bugs sur4ely had been squashed. I was foolish and wrong. My ASIO driver for Prism Lyra 1 dac would tick upon playback and then go all nuts with high frequency distortion in the same spots of a simple piano piece. This issue was consistent with jriver 24 and Foobar 2k. A+ and Musichi had even worse problems. Lucky for me rolling back to 1709 cured the issue (not for A+ or Musichi). To note a driver upgrade to the onboard Intel nic caused the same issue with the rolled back 1709. Rolling that 2015 driver back to a 2012 driver cured the problem and so far things appear stable. On another daily desktop machine the 1803 broke my Bravo HD ASIO driver for my little JDS dac. Waspi works but I may roll that OS back as well. So if you are thinking or letting 1803 come in the house, be aware it seems to be quite a bit more buggy in regards to audio. If anyone has similar experiences you can post here, I like to learn more.

1. Yes you could just add a piece of sw to play your files to a nas in the event of computer failure, assuming th eos supports it. But an older Win computer can make a great nas and the benefit with a good revealing system is that the delivery to a player computer via ethernet usually wins out SQ wise over any direct attached storage IMHO. So benefit is better sound via ethernet file delivery to your player computer and one less thing on your usb bus if that is how the digital gets to your dac. 2. It may depend on which NAS. Why spend for overpriced low power nas when a simple win 10 box can share a drive to the network. I did that for years in two systems, Total cost minus usb drive was about $150 per computer used. 3. Space is cheap now. I use a shared drive on my workaday computer that is 4TB. I only have about 1.5TB of music, but I dedicate a player computer for main listening. I think this is a key to very good SQ. Using a machine that you use for serious music listening for everything else is not the best. good luck!

until the donee sells them, haha

Sorry to beat a dead horse, but trying to be cheap. I finally picked up a 256 Sandisk Ultra 3D ssd and copied a bunch of music files from my network drive over to listen with Foobar. Really a nice subtle increase in fidelity. I am still using a HDD for the win 10 OS. but when I hosted a micro Headphone meet last week another Foobar user suggested I try the Ram disk Component for Foobar. Holy cow, now that is good. So wonderinig if anyone has experience with the OS on a partition on a single SSD with music in another partition of same ssd? How does it sound and do you think it might give benefits of ssd for OS and let me use ram disk with same of better results than with hdd and ramdisk? Hope this is clear. Thanks in advance.

@jtwrace - If you have a list, I still buy cds. Just sayin!

Yes, I am sure it is quieter, but once Foobar is loaded into memory the only thing the os drive does is housekeeping and cache I suppose. Fan is usually on very low and heat is not a concern at all since it is a big ole desktop. Yet, I suspect it might be nice to have an ssd in there, just a matter of time and $$. and yes fidelizer pro is in use and I like it a lot. any feedback on the newest version, he did not do a great job of marketing what is better about it other than streaming, and some other stuff that I don;t know is about improving sound. Any impressions on the upgrade if you have done it?

Monoprice short usb cable with the thicker wires beat out my fancy stuff including wirerold and even custom build powerless leg variants. My old self used usb with ferittes until I got all the other crap off all the usb ports except dac. Now ferrites soften leading edges and take away some dynamics. One thing I can agree on is usb cables do sound a bit different. Better is up for debate and preference. IMHO biggest problem with usb cables, certified or not is construction. Years ago a test was done on usb 2.0 cables. 60-70% failed to meet spec iir.

If you like the sound of the v-Modas why not just order the xtra large cups? Unless your ears are like mine 67mm top to bottom. As for over the ears, they all are going to be ...let's say a bit less stylish than the V-Moda and most downright geeky. If you are okay with that some of the better ones that I have heard and used, I would grab the Sennheiser HD-569 new for under $200. Extra comfy and should be big enough, with great osund a bit less bass than the vmoda, better mids and more balanced hihgs. If okay with used and ears not too big, NAD Viso HP-50 or Focal Spirit Professional are tow that I have owned that are hard to fault and all three of these can be driven amp less. I never heard a BT headphone that would compete with wired, fwiw. Then again lots of folks listen to mp3s, so take that with a grain of salt. Good luck and enjoy the music.

Thanks @davide256 and @acousticmood for the input. I remember back when I used a laptop for a headphone system and it had an ssd for os. Music played from that drive did not sound as good as usb connected spinner and of course when I went networked drive for the music files, standard desktop killed the poor lappy for music reproduction. wondering if there really is not that much difference running the os of the hdd vs ssd when all I am running foobar and letting a quieted down win 10 do its housekeeping writes and pulling files every so often into cache for foobar???

I am getting nice sound from a networked externally powered USB connected hdd on a win 10 computer that connects via ethernet switch to my playing computer using foobar. thinking about buying an ssd to use for music files in the player computer and eliminate the networked drive. My player computer uses a hdd for the os. I know from experience the networked drive is better sounding than any firewire or usb connected drive on the player computer. For those who have gone down this path, can you offer me your experience?