Tír Na HiFi

Well, was hoping it might open a whole new world of holographic sound!

Will try it anyway to hear if anything good happens.

Wanted to know if there could be any harm. I guess, at worst, it would not work at all.

For those breathless in anticipation of my getting this thing to work:

Had some stupid (of course due to my haste and not checking things properly) power supply problems.

Easy enough to get the board to run with 5 volts but I had disassembled my SOEKRIS completely and it has taken longer than I would have thought to put it back together again.

It should be working this evening.

I ran the I2S leads from the SDTrans to the output pads of those isolating chips. The ground wires to the star ground. Same thing with the outputs - grounds to the star ground.

I was able to make sure the green light stays lit with signal from the player. This was very satisfying.

Starting off with just the single five volts battery running the whole thing. Just a matter of time before using the multiple power inputs for the various parts of the board.

AND then to replace the clocks with really good ones.

Hope I get used to having all of those little memory cards to choose from. If it sounds as good as I want it to it will be worth it. Rarely do any of us get what we want when it comes to audio.

Well, the bad news is I doubt the computer will ever deliver music like this.

Of course, I have not had time to be sure of anything but one can hear quickly that music has a wholeness more like the phonograph and a whole lot less like the computer.

At the moment I cannot hear any digital noise - of course, some is there, but it is plain that there is so much less that it seems non-existent.

I think I am hearing a wholeness to the music that I attribute to the fact that it is only getting chopped up by the clock and not the additional chopping from the CPU with its jumping around to do various tasks - even with no extra tasks to do it is still giving those non-existent tasks a chance. For folks running WINDOWS based music players there is a tremendous amount of polling of the CPU.

I know this is early to make pronouncements but I would say to continue with the computer is like the story Arthur Jones would tell. (he was the guy who came up with the original Nautilus exercise machines) I worry my re-telling of it could be as ludicrous as he telling it since the Nautilus machines were not going to replace more traditional forms of weight lifting but it is a good story and it is quick.

There is this fellow walking through a desert (I have no idea why he is walking through the desert) and he comes upon a man digging a hole with his hands. The fellow shows the man a shovel. Why he had a shovel with him is another mystery. Nonetheless after the fellow demonstrates to him how much quicker he can dig with the shovel and subsequently hands the shovel to him the man throws the shovel as far as he can and returns to digging the hole with his hands.

So time will tell whether the computer or the SDTrans is the shovel. My initial impression is the SDTrans is a front loader in a very petite package.

Will try powering the clock with its own battery after I find a relay I trust.

my sd-player arrived
doesnt actually look like a piece of shit so im a bit surprised
doesnt sound particularly bad
but the i2s goes through the mill more than i like
spdif seemed to be the bigger priority
mods should be relatively simple
ill not hijack your thread ill start another
system clk seems to be 8mhz and there must be a real time clock as theres a 32.768 khz crystal too along with the 22/24 mhz and both of them screaming away at the same time.. tut tut
seems to reg to two 5v and then to two 3.3v with a smd ldo so ill likely just tap in here for starters then lift the clocks then see about getting the i2s out closer to the chip

So how much was the SDTrans card?

And I HATE you guys!!!

randytsuch wrote:So how much was the SDTrans card?

And I HATE you guys!!!

I never liked them!!! :)

rickmcinnis wrote:Well, the bad news is I doubt the computer will ever deliver music like this.

Of course, I have not had time to be sure of anything but one can hear quickly that music has a wholeness more like the phonograph and a whole lot less like the computer.

<SNIP>

Rick,

Thanks for this. I'm glad to know my impressions (and those of all that I cited) are confirmed. With virtually no opportunity to compare to anyone else's setup (Hey, I REALLY DO live in rural Mississippi, USA... I probably have the only tweaky HiFi setup for more than 100 miles in any direction), it's good to get confirmation.

Greg in Mississippi

Randy, I never took you for a CARTMAN!

Just to torture you I am eating sixteen bags of CHEEZY PUFFS as I write this and you cannot have any of them.

In my unhumble opinion you are going in the wrong direction with that OS in RAM stuff. All computer tricks are band-aids but that is akin to a full body cast. You will respect my authoriTY (yes, Cartman and I share a similar amount of authority, 0).

Nigel, YOU hijack a thread? Get serious, no thread is complete without your input. If I did not want your opinions and thoughts I would not post at all!

From Mr. Yamazaki's email: (CBL29291@nifty.com)
SDTrans384 JPY 49,800
shipping cost to USA by EMS mail JPY 2,800
Amount JPY 52,600

There is a remote available for approx $100.00 but I did not want that. I am too cheap and did not want any extra junk. Not sure if there are any available at the moment and would hope they would make another run.

Once they finally shipped it I got it in a little over a week.

I now understand those who preferred their CD transports to the computer. And with no moving parts I cannot imagine any CD transport competing with this cute little thing. I look back and fear I was too influenced by the novelty of the computer as player.

Mr. Yamazaki recommends a minimum of the 5 volts general supply and a separate 3.3 volts for the clock as a minimum. He is the fellow who handles the shipping of the units. He is an audio parts distributor in Japan (SEIDEN switches are one of his lines) but obviously is part of the near space phantasmagorical Japanese audio world.

More I think about it - I must go ahead and get that clock a separate supply.

Greg, I live in the Atlanta suburbs and know no one with a serious audio system. At least your electricity is good.

Cartman??

Well $500 isn't in the budget right now, so I'll live with my PC audio for now.
I'll be curious to see what Nige does to his, and how it compares to his PC.

Randy

I thought you were making a reference to the TV show SOUTH PARK.

There is a character named CARTMAN who is obnoxious and is always telling the other kids that he hates them.

And I am sure you have assumed his favorite snack food is CHEEZY PUFFS.

Oh, well ...