XXHighEnd

Hi Peter,

A number of my audiophile friends in India & abroad are switching over to Optical fibre cables in place of Ethernet or USB for “better” SQ. Most of them are raving about the improvement. In many cases it implies change in hardware where as in some cases it’s modification to the existing hardware.

Is there really any truth in this or is it just a gimmick?

Best regards,

Arvind

Just a question. You have Lush 3. Do you think an optical cable would out perform it? I don't really know for sure, but I doubt it.

Admittedly, things change. So I could be wrong, but in the 90's when separate CD transports and DAC's were just becoming popular, I did a lot of experimenting with cables between the two. I never liked the optical back then, but then again this isn't the 90's is it? Or is the optical still the inferior connection in almost 2021?

Hi Kenny,

Valid question, however when I/we moved over to the Lush^2, we were all of the opinion that nothing could outperform it. Then came the Lush^3 & the Lush^2 is forgotten. Something to ponder....

Best regards,

Arvind

Hi Arvind,

For Ethernet I can not tell.
For USB I can, as this was tried a long time ago and it sounded like sh*t. I tried it, and Nick tried it.

Generally, "glass" won't sound because of the extra processing required to convert from and to electrical. This processing adds more noise than it does good.

Maybe if you try today, things are different.

Personally I would only trust "ears" on this forum. You know how (and some time also who) we are ...

Best regards,
Peter

Re: PC electrical isolation from DAC (http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=2089.msg21556#msg21556)

Keep in mind that back in those days we had no form of galvanic isolation in the NOS1 (not in i2s and not in USB). This seems to make the result "worse" (see the posts behind the link).

That was also in the era that we could not perceive differences in USB cables (see Mani's post in there). This means that all round it (like the DAC, our speakers, general approaches, XXHighEnd, Operating System) improved so much, that today we here differences in "everything" - USB cables ahead (haha).

Peter

There is always going to be someone who will come up with something better. The only one to come up with something that sounds better than Lush 3 will be Peter St. It won't be the competition, because the competition is way far behind Lush 2, let alone Lush 3.
Ill be honest here. The day I received Lush 3 is the same day I sold my Lush 2. I didn't even want to go back for one song. I became spoiled in one hour.

Trust me, I think your friends in India are just hearing something different that they enjoy, but not really better. After a while they will realize that, and come back to a non-optical connection.

Give me a good designed star quad any day. I use Hovland star quad interconnect (which is over 30 years old and still sounds awesome today) from DAC to speakers. I use ghentaudio star quad DC cable from Uptone LPS 1.2 power supply to ISO REGEN. The only optical connection in my house is between my television and my Wife's wireless headphone charger/connector. We watch TV in the bedroom and I fall a sleep before her. Good place for an optical since I don't listen to them.

Kenny, thank you for you kind words. But I am no St really. :)


The XLR^2 is that ... haha

Regards,
Peter

I've been eyeing that XLR^2 for a while now. I'm curious to hear them next to the 30 year old Hovlands. I love your grounding options. I have experienced the Hovland's in different grounding configurations. They were all soldered connections (or the lack of :smile:), but I'm with you on the huge differences heard in analog wire.

One day in 2021 you'll just see a pair added to my cart when my curiosity reaches its point of no return.

:) :)