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Digital clock - any recommendations?

Recently heard an Esoteric setup with and without a digital external clock and the difference was not subtle.  I have a marantz sa11 s2.  Any recommendations?
tzh21y
dgarretson
2,599 posts
 

+3  @folkfreak 

With an Esoteric DAC it's easy to perceive the improvement of an external 10mhz atomic clock powered by a good LPS.  Why would Esoteric market the interface were this untrue?

Also, if your networked computer audio components have master clock inputs(e.g. SOtM renderer and ethernet hub), or if you have a PCM/DSD digital recorder with clock inputs(e.g. Tascam), it is beneficial to sync everything to one master clock, just like in studio environments.

That said, I have no experience with Marantz.  To Erik's point, at an early stage in digital evolution I had good results with Audiocom Superclocks inside a Sony SCD-1.  The idea there was to position the clock within a few centimeters of the PCB input.   

soix
9,482 posts
 
It depends on how good the reclocker is in your Marantz.  It's really DAC dependent.  The Empirical Audio Offramp is a well-respected design. 
lalitk's avatar
lalitk
5,512 posts
 
@soix,

I agree with you, the only way to find out is to try one of the aforementioned recommendations on external clock’s. The OP may hear improvements or may not, in any case he will squish that upgrade ‘bug’ for good.

May be someday, I will give it a go as well 😊


mzkmxcv
777 posts
 
@folkfreak
If it is a good DAC, then what OP heard is not real. People wanting to believe expensive “tweaks” actually matter. However, going off the Stereophile measurements of the Esoteric D-07, even $100 DACs have better jitter than that, so...

If the Topping DAC did not benefit from a reclocker (meaning the issue is internal jitter and not external jitter), then why would the Esoteric be worse.

@dgarretson

Same thing, no. The better your DAC, the less improvement an external clock/reclocker makes.

To restate, if your >$500 DAC benefits from an external clock, it’s a piece of junk. There is no reason why it should not internally reclock it’s inputs, that’s just a company selling a lamborghini body with a corolla engine.

For any good DAC, the only jitter is internal, meaning external clocks, which affect external jitter, will have no effect.


dgarretson
2,599 posts
 

@mzkmxcv  OK, you rooted me out:  Esoteric and DCS are expensive junk, and so are laboratory instruments like my Stanford Perfection 10 Rubidium clock specified +/- .05 ppb and < -150dBc/Hz@ 10kHz phase noise.  None of this matters with any DAC >$500.

I'm done.   

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