2. digital
  3. 173762-149317

Clocking: again!

There are all manner of folk claiming that clocking is irrelevant to Ethernet and USB connections. While this is obviously ignorant of the RMI/EMI and ground level effects on DA conversion and the analogue stages of a DAC, the level to which digital clocking matters was again brought into stark relief when I changed the clock cable between the Antelope 10m clock and the Etherregen from the cable supplied by Antelope to a Shunyata Clock75 Sigma cable. Shazam! Everything jumping into focus and significantly more snap and reverb. In our hobby everything matters and we are only at the very beginning of optimizing streaming.

antigrunge2
charles1dad's avatar
charles1dad
10,250 posts
 

@antigrunge2 

Is the LPS superior to the SMPS wall wart strictly due to having less noise or is there more to it than that? This change in power supply seems to be universally recommended. 

Charles 

antigrunge2 OP
1,402 posts
 

What you get from the switch is foremost a lowering of the noise floor with resultant increase in blackness and impulse. In addition there seems to be less spurious noise affecting the DACs conversion and analogue stage, leading to higher resolution and better rendition of instruments‘ attack and reverb, thereby rendering them more 3-dimensional. The impact of the LPS is though lesser compared to the improved clocking

charles1dad's avatar
charles1dad
10,250 posts
 

@antigrunge2 

Thank you.

Charles

sns
3,199 posts
 

I'll  throw this out there again. I tried audiophile switch (TXCO clock) with LPS, unfavorable results. Overly precise cookie cutter image outlines and performer placement on sound stage. I prefer spaciousness and air around performers on sound stage, much more natural.

 

At this point I'm making the presumption one can encounter situation where there may be excessive clocking and/or incompatible clocks over an entire network.

 

Has anyone else heard the above sound staging and image effects caused by adding more clocking to network? Still waiting for satisfactory explanation for above. Its been offered up my network switch inferior, cause of above. My response is this clock is doing exactly what it designed to do, I've previously heard greater ss and image precision, along with more detail with prior clock upgrades, adding switch concurred exactly with prior clock upgrades.

 

The Master clock referred to above makes sense if issue I'm having due to incompatible clocks.

antigrunge2 OP
1,402 posts
 

I am afraid a TXCO clock, possibly with a generic BNC cable in most cases will be inferior to the internal clock of your DAC resulting in a very pointy and ultimately unpleasant sound. As I said in my original post superior cables are needed if you go to an external master clock and that clock has to be OCXO or Rubidium to be better than the Dac‘s own. The idea is not to add more but better clocking, both in terms of accuracy and phase noise.

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