Tír Na HiFi

found this on youtube
demonstrating were ps noise can come from

go to 9 min, if you think life is short youll get the point

Good vid, Nige.
So what is clear from this vid:
- CM noise is a real pain - if a good scope doesn't deal with it, what are the chances that our audio equip does?
- cables do make a difference as demonstrated

Now, there are those who say that if a cable alters the sound of an audio device then the audio device is not competently designed/broken/sub-standard, whatever. Like all such simplistic statements, it's a refusal to deal with the non-perfection of components & the devices built from these components.

BTW, CM noise is one reason I favour battery power, if possible. Batteries have many benefits - by avoiding connection to mains, it eliminates this source of CM noise (as well as the noise of rectifiers in PS) - it also eliminates or reduces the effect of any CM noise coming in on input lines.

Yes was just to demonstrate how fickle it can be, and possibly why the isolation so many components on my audio PC with a battery has helped
If noise can be created by simple devices on the same power line, and we all have em.
This hardly won't stop at the pc but through the whole hifi

likely part of the reason why the power regenerators seem popular

Quick report on my visit to Nige's home place on Saturday with my Zuma and Meitner under my arm!

To save anyone reading further some quick outcomes:
Nige's MQN 7.3 with OS Optimiser, reg tweaks and VS2013 sounded better (detail & tighter bass) than my JPlay 5.2 with OS Optimiser.
Nige's Linear & Battery PC sounder a little fuller and a little more dynamic than the Zuma with just Linear Power.
PPA Red USB cable did not beat Nige's home brew USB cable as far as we could tell so excellent result for the stubby Copper Braided cable with no burn-in!!
Detail, body and overall delivery of music was far ahead of what has been heard at previous meets, (Ken can confirm).
PPA USB Card sounded better, sweeter than stock USB port with separate PS....we think!
Inboard music SSD drive with PPA SATA cable we think may have added a little over external USB music drive....not too certain on this one!
Meitner sounded great on the Dubh's as usual particularly on those Oscar Peterson tracks.

Other than that it was 6 rewarding hours with a lot of food for thought after the event.
Must not forget one of the highlights which was mothers home cooked roast beef dinner with real gravy which was a nice bonus, shame we never managed to pull ourselves away from the music long enough to try out that serious looking coffee machine.....now there was a piece of kit!!!

Thanks again to Nigel for all his work and I am back experimenting again with MQN and LMS after a quick demo as well on the day.
All booked up for Scalford next month with van hire, ferry and hotel booked, expect to demo MQN, JPlay and maybe Gordon's LMS developments the way things are going, should be an interesting day :-)
See you all the weekend after next at Fran's for some more PC based playback discussions and thoughts.
Cheers, Pearse.

You're doing Scalford? Tell us more! (Maybe on a separate thread...)

Hey, nobody mentioned a roast beef dinner to us or we'd have stayed longer.
I spent a brief period in Nige's Saturday afternoon and listened back and forth to comparisons between PC's ,Dacs and software. Most impressive to me was the current stunning sound of the Eist Dubh's combined with the Meitner Dac and Nige's PC on MQN.
The new MQNSqueeze was good but not up to the standard of MQN , but that seems to be rapidly improving.
Great sounds and a good way to spend a miserable Saturday.
KM

i suppose best to describe the testing done and the methodology

1 nige pc mqn vs pearse pc with jplay
2. mqn on usb3 vs jplay on card cf
3 nige pc mqn usb3 vs pearse pc mqn usb3 (same os)
4 PPA usb card on nige pc (mqn) vs mobo rear usb3
5 meinter vs ciunas on nige pc
6 PPA red usb cable 1.5m vs nige cable 250 mm on ciunas
7 underclocking vs std on nige pc
8 music storage on ppa sata cable+ssd vs on os usb3 vs usb3 spinning hard drive

did between 3-6 swaps over and back on the testing with same track or section of same track
so i think we were happy with our findings

these are my thoughts following the testing

order of importance (cost not a factor) based on the very high standard of the two configurations

MQn
direct to mobo supply (no dc converter)
multiple isolating batteries 

then to a lesser extent
ppa usb card
underclocking
music storage with ppa data cable

I’ve a PPA usb card on route, and am considering storage options

thanks to pearse and ken for coming
we will crank up the espresso machine next time (it seems i might need reminding)

thanks Pearse again for letting me play with your toys

nige

Nige,

Could you tell me more about the usb cable that you put together? If it sounds better that PP's red I am very interested.

Thanks,
Mark

mjock3 wrote:Nige,

Could you tell me more about the usb cable that you put together? If it sounds better that PP's red I am very interested.

Thanks,
Mark

Hi mark
At best it was a draw
Pauls is far longer
The longer ones I've made loose detail with length
maybe more cores would wire would fix dunno

Mine are made from solid silver in Teflon sleeve braided and shielded in a copper net or braid

nige2000 wrote:

mjock3 wrote:Nige,

Could you tell me more about the usb cable that you put together? If it sounds better that PP's red I am very interested.

Thanks,
Mark

Hi mark
At best it was a draw
Pauls is far longer
The longer ones I've made loose detail with length
maybe more cores would wire would fix dunno

Mine are made from solid silver in Teflon sleeve braided and shielded in a copper net or braid

What gauge was the silver wire that you used?