msb Ilink vs. wadia 170i ipd docks

Nrostov,
my compliments for taking so much trouble in finding out the info from both Wadia & MSB. You certainly have gone above & beyond all other members who have participated in this thread.

>> They also gave me misinformation about the Wadia. I
>> don't blame them it's just part of the business.
Yes, it is unfortunately the truth in this country! It just plain sucks!
From where I come from, no negative advertising is allowed - You want to sell your product more? Advertise the positive things about it & show the public what benefits they would be getting if they bought your product compared to the others WITHOUT bashing or providing misinfo on the competitor's product.
I personally think that this is a better way to do biz rather than getting your sales up by bashing the other guy.
I think that MSB could have easily made their point by advertising their 7pS of jitter & stating that it was the lowest in the industry for this type of product (if it turns out that it actually is. we need to wait for Justin to post the info from Wadia) WITHOUT giving misinfo on Wadia. I would have had more respect for MSB than I do now. I think that this is piss-poor attitude from MSB. :(

Unfortunately, this trend of bashing & misinfo on companies does not stop at manuf only; many of the members here are happy to post misinfo & bogus data on companies' products. Worse, they state/write it with much conviction as if it were the truth! :(

>> How could two different publishers come up with
>> different measurements that are so different? 115ps is
>> very low and 3000ps is very high. That's really weird.

Nrostov, it's not so weird afterall - jitter is a difficult measurement to make. The setup has to be carefully done so that you are not measuring the equipment by mistake. If the person taking the measurement is not experience there could be a host of pilot errors. Altho JA of Stereophile often gets bashed on AA for his measurements, he does state the perils of making jitter measurements in the vignets of the articles. If you have a Stereophile issue that covers a CDP review his comments on this matter might be published. Most of the time people make jitter measurements using a 1KHz tone - it's much harder with program material.
Also, what units is the jitter measurement - RMS jitter? pk-pk jitter?

Nrostov,
did Wadia ever get back to you re. how much jitter they actually have in their i170? I remain interested in this bit of info. Thanks.

I believe that Hot Rod Audio Mods (HRAM) also mods the i170 along those same lines (as does GNSC & maybe a bunch of others).

>> The new clock put inside will reduce jitter below 2ps.
>> This is lower than the MSB's claim of 7ps.
does the jitter really have to be sub pS?? I know that lower is better but beyond a certain low number, it makes no further difference (besides it being a marketing gimmick to charge more money!). Do you/anyone else (Audioengr?) know what that low number is??
Thanks.

Jsadurni,
>> I got an early version of the Squeezebox, then got the
>> best modded version and when the excitement cooled down
>> I compared the highly modded Squeezebox running direct
>> with only WAV files harvested with EAC, against my old
>> Musichall cd25 the cd player was sooo much better as a
>> transport it was ridiculous.
I believe that you ran an experiment with the wrong sort of device for a transport. I have read in another thread in another forum that the SB was basically not upgradeable in sound. This particular owner tried a bunch of mods: upgrading the power supply, upgrading parts, damping, Bybee filters & the like. If I remember correctly he did not replace the DAC (I think it's an AKM DAC?). He tried very hard to upgrade the sonics but finally gave up.

Now, I have not run any experiments w/ the modified i170 but I have a feeling that this gadget might be more amenable to sound upgrades after mods & it just *might* change your mind. Just a recommendation - (I have not done this myself). Looks like you are already on the job of doing the comparison soon.
DO post your results in this thread at the appropriate time. Thanx.

To all forum members who have vigourously participated in this thread:

I got tired waiting for Justin to provide some feedback re. the 170i Transport jitter which he was supposed to get from Wadia. I was surfing the 'net & I found this info re. the Wadia 170i Transport which was posted by J. Gordon Rankin. I'm surprised that nobody else discovered this info (which seems to be available since Summer 2008. OR, if you did you been mighty quiet about it) given that most of the participants here *appear* to be avid computer audio enthusiasts.

*** cut & paste from 'computeraudiophile.com' *******

FYI it appears the jitter (Prism dScope III, Nirvana T2 cable, BNC input to Prism, RCA->BNC adapater on the Wadia side) is actually pretty good for the SPDIF port at better than 4ns and deviation of only 63ppm with a differential data stream of about 850mv (correct).

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you can read all of the tear-down info & the flurry of posts thereafter here:

http://www.computeraudiophile.com/content/Teardown-Wadia-iTransport#comment-7413