A Visit to Nicks and a Surprise Finding

[Scroobius]

First of all a big thanks to Nick and Claire for a great day yesterday. Ros and I had a great time and the bbq was much enjoyed by us hungry hifiers.

Nick has been hunting the source of noise breakthrough in his system for some time. Yesterday I took my PC with me to Nick's and the result in respect of the noise problems can be seen here

http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=2640.msg27394#msg27394

OK so what was the surprise? well Nick has been tracking down the noise problem because the SQ of his system has not been as good as it should be. The real surprise of the day is that with my PC in Nick's system the SQ is transformed - and I do mean transformed. Suddenly Nicks system sounded fantastic - a huge improvement. The difference was so large that I could here it down the corridor in the bathroom and Nick could hear it outside tending to the bbq. We were not listening for an improvement why would we? we just put my PC in to see if it displayed the same noise problem (which it did).

So it would appear that the noise problem is not the main issue affecting SQ in Nicks system. But of course that does not mean that fixing the noise problem would not improve things further.

To say we were surprised would be an understatement.

Mani - you have the same PC as Nick don't you? But I have to say I did not get the impression that your PC was holding back the performance of your system Mani when I heard it.

The issue for Nick certainly looks to be complicated maybe with my PC his system is somehow not affected so much by the noise? Or maybe the is something wrong with Nicks PC who knows? - not an easy problem to solve.

Paul

[PeterSt]

Thank you for sharing Paul. And on behalf of Nick, for the help. I know, this is about cosy coming togethers in the first place, but the tough problem Nick seems to have deserves a thank you to everybody who can contribute.

The man must have something in there we all overlook. Could be the colour of his car !
ha ha

Anyway, now we know that the audible noise is not coming from his PC as well.

To be continued in that other topic ...

Best regards,
Peter

[Scroobius]

Ah yes the car!!! - that should be for another topic as well what a beast it is I still have a silly grin on my face from the mad ride we had yesterday. Wow ....... Nick described the car as "Mad as a Box of Frogs" all I can say is I agree totally.

Paul

[Nick]

Ah yes the car!!! - that should be for another topic as well what a beast it is I still have a silly grin on my face from the mad ride we had yesterday. Wow ....... Nick described the car as "Mad as a Box of Frogs" all I can say is I agree totally.

Paul

Hi Paul,

It was a pleasure to spend the day with you and Ros and thanks so much for bringing your music components all the way here with you, it's such a help to have try components that are known to perform else where. You very nearly did not get to leave with your PC 

Regards our play in the car, a lot of people don't get too excited by the "race car chic" trim level and kick in the back delivery, preferring something softer  but you seem to appreciate the fun in these things  . It scares me to death when i'm a passenger in it but you never flinched once.

Cheers,

Nick.

[Scroobius]

Nick - It was a great flash back to my misspent youth racing cars I only get nervous if I don't trust the driver.

Probably the biggest smile for me is the thought of Claire taking Izzie to school in the Ultima - how cool is that? - Izzie must have a whole load of "street cred" - the coolest girl in school. What a hoot.

Anyway I am getting off topic now - great day hope you fix the speakers!! let me know how you get on.

P

[Nick]

Anyway I am getting off topic now - great day hope you fix the speakers!! let me know how you get on.

The tweeter problem was just the speaker cable as suspected so nothing to worry about an no problem to fix.

Cheers,

Nick.

[manisandher]

The real surprise of the day is that with my PC in Nick's system the SQ is transformed - and I do mean transformed...

... Mani - you have the same PC as Nick don't you? But I have to say I did not get the impression that your PC was holding back the performance of your system Mani when I heard it.

Yep, I think we use the same mobo and cooling system. I've also applied all of 'Nick's Tweaks', all of which seem to work very, very well IMO. My CPU is different though, so too other things like the power supply.

But I have a couple of other PCs here with XX loaded ready to go... and a couple of days coming up without wife/kids around. I'll endeavour to compare the following PCs in my main system against my current 'Le Monster':

1. The music PC in my office
- totally fanless design with Zalman TNN300 case
- ASRock Z77 Extreme4-M mobo
- i7-3770K CPU
- 16GB PC3-19200 memory
- single SSD with Win8/XX
- LAN 'on' with music 'streamed' from NAS before playing

2. The PC I use in my basement studio for capturing from the ADC via a Weiss AFI1
- totally fanless design with OrigenAE M10 case
- Jetway NF96FL-525 dual-core Atom mobo
- 4GB DDR2 800 memory
- single SSD with Win8/XX/music
- *Paul Hynes 12v linear PS*

Will report back (maybe under a new thread)...

Mani.

[Nick]

Just a quick update on working out what the difference is between Pauls PC and mine when we tried out both at the weekend.

I had lined up all of the parts to build a "PaulClone PC" ( haha ) but decided to buy the ancillery parts first and try them in my Socket 2011 Asus P9X79WS PC just in case it might be a single item causing the problem in my current PC.

So bought and fitted a new ATx power supply that is the same as Pauls. To say there is a transformation in SQ is an understatment. I will post more later when I have time on what has happened and the general effects on SQ and my noise problems.

For now the NEW ATx supply is a Seasonic SS-400FL2. I read a load of ATx reviews on line as research and indead the Seasonic SS-400FL2 does have very good specs on paper (no tests give traces of wideband noise but ill take a look with my scope).

The OLD ATx supply was a Coursair AX750, it is to be banished to the family office PC as penance . I know a few people are using these so, assuming that my model did not have a one off problem, this could be of use to other people.

Cheers,

Nick.

[manisandher]

Ah well, I use a Seasonic X-460FL in Le Monster. It's an older design but had the lowest noise/ripple figures when I bought it a couple of years ago. So maybe that explains why there seemed nothing obviously wrong when Paul was here.

I actually have two X-460FLs installed in Le Monster. The initial idea was to have one just powering the mobo and the other powering all the ancillaries. This idea seemed to work OK. However, a year or so ago I thought that maybe having two SMPSs is a bad idea - both interfering with each other and sending even more cr*p back into the mains than a single one. So I unplugged one - it's still in the case doing nothing. Maybe I'll try it again...

But I will try my other two PCs in my main system. I'm particularly interested in hearing how a system with really ZERO SMPSs sounds.

Mani.

[Nick]

Ah well, I use a Seasonic X-460FL in Le Monster.

But I will try my other two PCs in my main system. I'm particularly interested in hearing how a system with really ZERO SMPSs sounds.

Going on the reviews the 460FL seems to have the ~same noise performance as the 400w version give or take a mv of ripple or so. I can see why your satisfied with them.

Going Linear would be very interesting. I put a Watt meter on the mains lead to the Asus P9x79 PC. Running at normal CPU clock speed it consumes about 125 watts at idle and running XX it is the same so it should be possible to achieve linear supply even with a "fast" PC.

Have you see these ?

http://www.coreaudiotechnology.com/products/music-servers/atx-linear-power-supply/

It would easily deal with 125 watt draw. ItemAudio are reselling in the UK IIRC.

[manisandher]

Thanks for the link Nick. $2500 and $6000 for their S1 and S2 ATX linear supplies (in the US) respectively seems a little steep. But I've contacted Mark at Item Audio in any case to ask for more info.

Cheers, Mani.

PS. Time to collect my eldest from nursery... in the NSX me thinks

[PeterSt]

Going Linear would be very interesting. I put a Watt meter on the mains lead to the Asus P9x79 PC. Running at normal CPU clock speed it consumes about 125 watts at idle and running XX it is the same so it should be possible to achieve linear supply even with a "fast" PC.

Nick, despite of what I said before about my 130W cpu etc., do notice that I am using something like 830MHz max for processor frequency. Can be half of that just the same, and it depends a bit on what I did and how my PC liked me when booting it.
All it takes is being able to do this.
(I talked about this before and it requires a BIOS/OS combination bug or whatever it is which allows for it - which is also about my expression that my PC must like me ).

Peter

[Nick]

PS. Time to collect my eldest from nursery... in the NSX me thinks

Naturally, the only correct car choice for the journey 

[Scroobius]

Just a quick point I was talking to Nick this afternoon and I just want to point out that when Nick says the performance of his system is transformed it really is transformed in a very big way. I say this after hearing what my PC did to his system last weekend. Basically Nicks system was/is suddenly transformed into a system of the very highest calibre.

But the point is that when I changed to the Seasonic fanless it was just one part of an excercise on my part to get rid of all fans. I ended with a new case (my old case would not take the Seasonic) the Reserator water cooling system etc. And I junked an old power supply the spec of which I cannot remember other than it had a fan. So a number of things changed all at the same time. The difference I noted was evolutionary not revolutionary. My system sounded good before the changes and better after. The change in SQ was not anything like the change that Nick has just encountered.

I would have to think it possible that there was a problem with Nick's PS I cannot believe that for most people changing to a fanless PS is going to make the difference Nick just experienced. But what a great result!.

Nice one Nick

Anyway I have to get back to the S5 ITL's - can't wait to get them up and running. Watch this space - OK another space because it will have to be another thread ha ha!! 

Paul

[boleary]

Well, looks like I have a Coursair 750 for sale. However, I have been so pleased with my sound that I believe Paul's terrific description of evolution versus revolution will likely be my experience. Then again maybe not, cause I'm using the APEXI Capacitor card. Without the card my sound is less musical and  is a bit harsh. With the card the sound of "robots" goes away, everything relaxes and I believe i"m in the venue where the music is being made.  Also, my current Q5 setting is 2, which I attribute to my use of the capacitor card. Q5 at 5 is way too flat sounding. So I'll know more about evolution v. revolution after I give the Seasonic a listen. Will be ordering one in the next few days.

Thanks guys for being so damned determined in the quest for great sound!