Subscribed.. Your wit and sarcasm is appreciated in this dreadful world where reviewers spout superlatives but lack any qualification and are often shills to companies that sponsor their videos.. Bravo!
Thank you for your comment. It is of course in RUclips's terms that reviewers disclose whether they have received anything at all of value in return for the review. My policy is to take no payment other than the gift of the item, and I say what I like without any form of approval. Unfortunately RUclips's disclosure system is not sufficiently granular to differentiate this from reviews that are paid-for, and in some cases scripted and approved by the manufacturer.
@AudioMasterclass As a student of music and audio equipment I get the feeling you have spent much time around music and audio equipment. I would love to see more content about your time in the recording industry. Thank You and Best regards!
In America they refer to 'flipping houses', that sounds way crazier, as I'm sure a house would fall into a million bits if you ripped it out of the ground and flipped it over...... So maybe the 'flipping' term has been abused to death, lets just 'roll' with it
I did opamp rolling once, my mates were impressed. Keep the part where I bent the pin and straightened them out with pliers. After "rolling 2 different sets of opamps" I am totally exhausted. I enjoyed myself so much that I now practised this every birthday just to prove to myself that I'm alive and kicking. Cheers!
If we're going to start being honest about stuff like tube or op-amp rolling I don't know how we expect those managers at hi-fi audio companies to keep feeding their children. Would love to see a wave file comparison between power cables, stabilizers, audiophile stones, etc. I bet the comment section would be a riot!
Totally can hear a difference. The second one made everything sound flat. If it were a choice only between these two, then the stock opamps would remain for sure! The difference wasn't subtle (to my ears)listening with my Mirage OM9 omnidirectional speakers. Thanks for the vid as this DAC is on my radar.
I got the DACZD3 for my two ZA3 last week. I haven't changed anything, no Opa´s changed. I wired everything with XLR. The preamplifier is a Weiliang 6010 D with 10 x Signetics Grandpa´s 5534an and 4 x grandpa opa2228pa Burr Brown. (It took me a very, very long time here until I liked the sound of the preamplifier with these Opa´s.) My speakers are the German ASW Genius 510. The sound is fantastic. Dual trigger cable is ordered. I have been listening to music for 50 years, having six music facilities, including three with Weiliang 6010d and it is still a lot of fun.
I'm honestly not sure I can hear a difference, so I'd just leave it as is. Not having audiophile ears-or an overactive imagination-definitely has its perks!
No one can hear a difference. Op-amp rolling is in snake oil territory, except that it's not nearly as costly as snake oil can be so it's quite harmless.
I can hear a difference but did not think either sounded disturbing or bad. The difference was so minor. That said I liked the sound of the stock opamp best.
I felt the 4580 sounded “fuzzy” relative to the stock op amps-they are both cheap cheap cheap. The NE 5532 I think is better than both of those and also very cheap. I bought some muses02 though. I liked the sound of them better in video comparisons I heard online… they are about $20 per op amp. The sparkos, which are quite expensive at over $40 per op amp, are the best in some products that are dull or flat sounding, but not as good as the muses02 in my opinion in products that are already very bright and punchy sounding…
Could you please advise me on the following question: I have a Fiio BTA30 DAC/AMP (bought for my PC) but noticed that when I connect my TV optical output to it and then from it to my A/V receiver, the sound quality improves noticeably compared to when my TV is directly connected to the A/V Receiver. My question is whether it is worth to spend on getting a good DAC/AMP to use between my TV and A/V receiver (which is an old Yamaha RX-477), or if I upgrade my A/V receiver to a much newer and better model, I would get the same quality and would not need any DAC/AMP in the middle? In other words, does a newer and better A/V receiver naturally provide better DAC/AMP that using an external one would be totally unnecessary?
An uneducated guy here: I feel like the 4580 sounds has some reverb (like in an empty room), which I do not hear in the 49720 sound. Maybe I should not have drinked coffee before.. 🙂
The original audio, which is the same for both opamps, is from Abbey Road Studio 2. Since there was only me and my assistant in there it is more empty than it would normally be for a recording. If one opamp makes this more apparent then this is an interesting difference if it’s what you hear.
@@AudioMasterclass Yep, its plenty noticable. At first listen, that is. Not after listening 5 or ten times to it and trying to find any differences. The JRC has more reverb, it sounds more airy. Not like the reverbaration of an enormous empty room, but a sizeable empty one. All that with a pair of 350 euro Senheiser Momentum 2 headphones, the headphone amp of a 1995 Kenwood KA2060 amp and a 100 euro Khadas Tone Board dac and cheap cables.
I also heard the same thing on the very first listen. The 1st sounded like an echoey room, the second lost that and the voice sounded more precise, and seems to have more bottom end. I think the proper way would be to put your favorite music on and determine it that way. What sounds better for just speaking, you may not prefer for music.
If my degraded ears don't deceive me, it looks as though an album of relaxing unboxing music is on its way! If my - also degraded - memory serves, the 741 was originally designed to do bits of the maths in late analogue computers, so that it worked quite well for audio applications might be seen as a useful fringe benefit.
Very true regarding the 741. Also interesting is that CMOS logic chips can handle audio - I've had fun with that in the past but I wouldn't rate it for quality. BTW, 'Irritating Unboxing Music' is already out - davidmellor.bandcamp.com/album/irritating-unboxing-music and streaming.
I'm amazed that someone can claim hearing a difference between op amps, unless something else is wrong. I suspect what might be happening is that the better low noise, high slew rate, wide bandwidth op amps might be oscillating up in the 10 MHz region at a low level. This can happen if the op amp is driving a load with too much capacitance. Even a few hundred pf can cause them to oscillate. At audio frequencies, the MHz oscillation would cause increased distortion and noise. Since the cabling capacitance and the load capacitance of the next amp are uncontrolled, this is a real possibility. Using lower cost op amps with lower bandwidth aren't as likely to oscillate at high frequencies. This might be the reason swapping out op amps in some cases improves performance.
There are QuantAsylum products that are not unreasonably priced. I would have to add the cost of a Windows computer. I'm not ruling this route out, but I don't have any current plans.
@@AudioMasterclass Great, exactly what I had in mind, I have the QA401 (now obsolete), running on an old Thinkpad x220, been using it a lot while designing Balanced MC/MM and complete preamps.
Sonic change may NOT be attributed to one component (DAC or opamp in this case). Shouldnt other gears in our signal chain be considered? Are they "sensitive" enough to the tweaks?
I received 10/25 my Pre-order ZD3 and also purchased from Fosi (20% off) Sparkos Labs SS3602. Waiting for XLR/RCA cables and iFi iPower X and will be burning the stock chips 1st. Also got in 3 weeks ago Geshelli Labs DAYZEE and what a DAC.
Did you get three 3602s? I just got my ZD3. I have 2 3602s. I will not be using the balanced out for now and am wondering if I can just swap the single ended op amp or need to change all three?
First sample has more reverb and more hall effect where the second sample is a bit muted and lack in ambiance like recorded in a studio with a lot of sound absorbing material. I personally prefer the first one~~
@@AudioMasterclass Okay thanks for that information. I have found that using a linear power supply noticeably improves the sound of dacs. However, I have noticed another improvement by using a mains noise filter to supply the PSU. I used a toroidal bifilar wound RF noise filter and a spike suppressor using VDR's. Also I found that the mains earth is full of RF noise so make sure the mains earth is not connected to the coaxial braids of the audio connection leads. Sadly the mains supply in the UK has become full of noise due to switch mode power supplies and triac controlled switching used in many devices.
When have you seen any product Fossi Audio makes come with a linear supply? Switching power supplys get a bad rep because everyone is using the cheapest switchers they can get their hands on. It is true all switchers are noisy depending on what you are using them for but their switching freq. can be manipulated a lot and filtering can be added so that you never know they are there in the circuit. It is another thing all together if someone is running ameuter radio gear nearby and picking up your noise. Solar Power Inverters are terrible for this. Copper and steel are expensive, heavy, and bulky just about everything we use would cost 2X to 4X as much as if they all used linear power supplies. The real problem is that bean counters at every company want to skimp on everything so you end up with a switcher or linear power supply that barley meets the needs of the gear with no head room to spare often and it shows. Linear power supplies are not magic!
@@AudioMasterclass Yes correct but only if the op amps are powered from a split centre zero supply from a transformer with a centre tapped secondary. That makes the noise on the power rail 180 degrees out of phase with each other. Therefore any supply noise cancels out. Many dacs have a power separate power supply that is not a balanced split supply. They use electronic means to create a balanced dc supply where the noise on each rail is in phase and therefore doesn't cancel out. The supply ripple and noise rejection of an op amp can only be realised when using a true split supply.
@@marxman00 The answer is that you need to have a system that can reproduce the sound in HiDef. Nobody needs to insert youtube into your system per se., just get some decent equipment that can already do it. Some of the sound quality of RUclips's content is outstanding.
You can hear the difference,the second sounded a smidge thinner,the first sounded slightly fuller,I'm listening from my Logitech external computer speakers.
I can hear a difference, even on my lg to. The low vocal frequencies on the first clip sound bloated, resulting in a sense of disjointedness between the high and low frequencies of the voice. The second clip keeps the coherence of a single voice. I wondered if this might be an anomaly of utube, but the second pair of samples exhibit the same characteristics. I was surprised to see such a small difference in the waveform considering the marked difference in sound. I’d like to request that you do a test of sound reproduction of your/any mobile phone, and test to see if an external DAC offers anything?
What if I tell you that what you think is bloated sound acutally is reverb from standing waves of the room the recording was made... Would thet make sence to you? Room reverb adds some low frequency harmonics to the recording. Too my ears 4580 do a better job than 49720 letting those reverbs through to your headphones.
Both sound compressed and don't let through the ambience. 4580 sounds slightly better to me since I can hear a tiny bit of room ambience of the speaker. Less so with the other Op-amp with the better specs (more feedback). I can hear that the recording occurs in a slightly reverbant room, and I think a non feedback tube circuit will reveal that reverbant ambience to the fullest. Op-amp more or less kills that ambience with negative feedback. Less so with 4580. 49720 sounds more like standing in a sound proof booth during recording.
@@artysanmobile Keep listening until you hear it too. If you have the time: ruclips.net/video/BmPNOVZTStM/видео.html ALL op-amps are a dead end compared to a good discrete circuit, but there are differences between op-amps. To my ears 4580 is the most musicaly transparent of these five under test. Keep those recorded harmonics intact as recorded. Don't mess them up with a bad op-amp and a lots of feedback.
@@flex-cx9bi I see you know nothing of the topic being discussed. Just a couple of common tropes. OpAmps far exceed the capabilities of the most carefully designed discrete circuitry. They are, after all, idealized and perfected discrete circuitry themselves. It’s not even close. Your comment is the equivalent to “a computer processor chip could never compare to 5 million individual logic chips.” You should learn more before making ridiculous statements.
@@artysanmobile I know a bit. Been in the business 40 years designing audio electronics so I have tested a LOT of different topologies. Op-amp is a far cry of perfect out of my point of view. Actually they are pretty bad in general and basically all of them have a sound character of their own. Had som success with AD825 when driven by a low impedance, but that was about it. Have no desire to start a fight with you so lets say we have different experiences and different point of view regarding what sounds good and what doesn't. Thanks Peter. Another gentleman from the business not favouring op-amps: ruclips.net/video/9Hvza7eABbA/видео.html
Obviously they're different, and it's not at all subtle, both from the sinewave picture and from the audio in your case. But in reality not every system can be as transparent and clearly show good enough different so it often considered as snake oil. I would not get into the detail but it had something to do with the speaker sensitivity and cable quality. The quality of listener's system, lack of technical knowledge and youtube platform's compression also not helping either in most cases. The cheaper op amp give a boxy distortion that many people would refer as warm and tube like sound, while the original pricey op amp sound like a clean amp that have less distortion and faster in transient. If you thinking it as a microphone, the original would be akin to a medium or small diaphragm and the extra would be akin to a large diaphragm tone. If you thinking it as an electric guitar, the original op amp is akin to a clean amp and the swapped op amp akin to an overdrive. As you can clearly see in both the microphone and electric guitar scenarios, cleaner sound and lower distortion doesn't always mean better production quality. In the hand of professional, it's a difference they will confidently abuse for variety and creativity purposes. But in a normal, non-engineer situation, with most of them don't have the knowledges, equipment, artistic taste, efforts and training to really making those to their full potential by proper design, you can just pick whatever makes you happy or according to the price tag. I mean that's really what differentiate between normal people and an engineer right? Normal people just need to know which button on the remote control do what things on the tv. Like switching channel and adjusting volume, they don't really need to know about how things work in the technical or fundamental level.
Its never going to sound different with opamps unless something catastrophic has gone wrong - high frequency power rail oscillation - or a bjt opamp dampening down a high impedance source (when say, you should have used a fet opamp instead). That said voice is not a great test. You need music with a lot of going on to tell things apart. This is because; - a) voice is too narrow to highlight frequency response problems; - b) any subtle harmonic distortion won't be noticed (it may actually make you sound "nicer") whereas mild distortion on busy music will then generate intermodulation distortion and you'll definitely hear that and it won't be nice. This is why cheap valve amps can sound so good on acoustic or orchestral music and yet fall apart with heavy rock or edm.
It would have been nice if both WAV files were provided so we could do a proper ABX test with Foobar and the ABX Comparator plugin. No offense to anyone, but claims about hearing a difference from this YT clip seem pretty worthless to me.
The ‘spec’ crowd generally knows nothing about said specs. Once they learn more = good, the die is cast and they will choose a part based on that simple, meaningless metric. After making a dozen or so such ‘decisions’ they can easily end up with the wrong part, due to their limited understanding. Simply swapping an OpAmp is not a valid move. Attached components need to change with it and virtually no one will do so. If a brand can be trusted at all, they can be trusted to choose an ideal component to show their product in the best light, especially if doing so adds close to nothing to the product’s cost. Ideal OpAmps are quite inexpensive so there is no incentive to skimp on this part.
In my humble Krapp opinion… there are fat-cats getting rich off of what people imagine they hear (cables, turntables, cartridges, etc.). While there are honest products that provide an improved experience, most do not. This is one of those instances (where many products don’t do jack… and a few do).
Better is better. SparkoS is better. It also may be a perfect example of diminishing returns. I don't have a ZD3 to play with, but I would give the SparkoS a go if I did. I would also invest in or build an abx switch. Or some means to compare the output using my laptop or PC. Is there an easy way to do that? My ears are no longer bat-like and the brain is remarkable at adapting to changes in sound. The rest of the system has to be resolving enough to reproduce the change as well. What you hear with headphones may not present with loudspeakers.
Why don't they put better op amps in it from the start? Now i have to do it myself by screwing the damn thing open to replace the op amps myself. I never buy things that can sound better but the manifacturer doesn't put the best things in it themselfs.
There is nothing wrong with the op amps they have installed. Do you expect them to put in op amps that cost more than the units retail price like Sparkos?? Do not be so cheap or so lazy. No one is forcing you to purchase their product you could purchase a more expensive unit that might come with op amps more to your liking. Do not be so lazy not like you are going to devote a day to making a wooden spoon and wooden bowl to eat with get over it! An allen key and a nut driver big deal. They where kind enough to give you sockets so you do not even need to desolder and resolder anything! Man-Up already!
@@buckaroobonsi555 Sorry if i offended you. Good Lord. But screwing things open which i bought new is not really one of my favorite things. But lucky for me the uploader gave me a much nicer comment and cleared things out a way better without calling me lazy or cheap.
I've been asking that question since the start of this chip flip fad. If there is a better part... put it in at the factory. The thing is that ... this is audio ... it's low frequency low level stuff, it's not that demanding... quite often the "better" chip brings no improvement whatsoever. But still these guys just have to tamper with everything.
Hearing thru my fostec mk4 over-ears via PC with a r2r DAC. For the 4580, sounds of you breathing in before reciting is very apparent. For the 49720, your breathing in before reciting is much quieter in the background. As someone mentioned yes, reverb seems to be more in the 4580. I would put in as vocals sound more upfront and isolated in the 49720. Currently, I am using my ZD3 paired with a smsl ao300 for streaming/movie watching and switched to the 4580 opamp. The 49720 also provides a pleasant movie night experience, out of the box. But i do find with the 4580 the volume is much higher by default, but i resist turning it up, as it strains the ears..
You jest, but who knows what abilities audiophile dogs might have? They could certainly hear CRT flyback and warn an older human engineer. One bark for good, two barks for bad. ruclips.net/video/Y4kwsg0z12Q/видео.html
Pure unadulterated nonsense, (and he knows it!). Anyone not listening to this through the original FOSI equipment (and op amps) has no hope of differentiating audio quality, as you are hearing it through whichever DAC is in your computer, tv, phone or hifi, not to mention whatever limitations of bandwidth, sample rate, bit depth, file compression, dynamic compression and other processing that youtube puts on the signals.
Yes I understand this line of reasoning. Best not to do anything, it's safer that way. I believe that my viewers are capable of making their own decisions on what they can and cannot hear. Clearly you would prefer to deny them that. It must be nice being so superior.
![I.N "HALLUCINATION" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/n5B5q1Hwt_U/mqdefault.jpg)
Subscribed.. Your wit and sarcasm is appreciated in this dreadful world where reviewers spout superlatives but lack any qualification and are often shills to companies that sponsor their videos.. Bravo!
Thank you for your comment. It is of course in RUclips's terms that reviewers disclose whether they have received anything at all of value in return for the review. My policy is to take no payment other than the gift of the item, and I say what I like without any form of approval. Unfortunately RUclips's disclosure system is not sufficiently granular to differentiate this from reviews that are paid-for, and in some cases scripted and approved by the manufacturer.
@AudioMasterclass As a student of music and audio equipment I get the feeling you have spent much time around music and audio equipment. I would love to see more content about your time in the recording industry. Thank You and Best regards!
My stories are really all rather boring. But if you want interesting then the book 'The Daily Adventures of Mixerman' is an excellent read.
@@AudioMasterclass I'll give it a look. Thank you
Love it. Facts and sarcasm. Killer combination
You cannot roll an op-amp, it is square, we should change the term to op-amp flipping
Way back in my service days it was called "Chip Flipping" ... if that helps.
It seem that “op-amp swapping” is a common term
In America they refer to 'flipping houses', that sounds way crazier, as I'm sure a house would fall into a million bits if you ripped it out of the ground and flipped it over...... So maybe the 'flipping' term has been abused to death, lets just 'roll' with it
I did opamp rolling once, my mates were impressed. Keep the part where I bent the pin and straightened them out with pliers. After "rolling 2 different sets of opamps" I am totally exhausted. I enjoyed myself so much that I now practised this every birthday just to prove to myself that I'm alive and kicking. Cheers!
Who hasn’t bent a pin ever? Best to give them a little squeeze before insertion. Doesn’t get better than this.
A bit of Deoxit Gold on tube pins equals zero bad connecetions also. I live by it. @@AudioMasterclass
Connections. Sorry on spelling.😊
Anyone that does not appreciate these vids should give it another try. It is just the best! I am a huge fan.
If we're going to start being honest about stuff like tube or op-amp rolling I don't know how we expect those managers at hi-fi audio companies to keep feeding their children. Would love to see a wave file comparison between power cables, stabilizers, audiophile stones, etc. I bet the comment section would be a riot!
Totally can hear a difference. The second one made everything sound flat. If it were a choice only between these two, then the stock opamps would remain for sure! The difference wasn't subtle (to my ears)listening with my Mirage OM9 omnidirectional speakers. Thanks for the vid as this DAC is on my radar.
I got the DACZD3 for my two ZA3 last week.
I haven't changed anything, no Opa´s changed.
I wired everything with XLR.
The preamplifier is a Weiliang 6010 D with 10 x Signetics Grandpa´s 5534an and 4 x grandpa opa2228pa Burr Brown.
(It took me a very, very long time here until I liked the sound of the preamplifier with these Opa´s.)
My speakers are the German ASW Genius 510.
The sound is fantastic. Dual trigger cable is ordered.
I have been listening to music for 50 years, having six music facilities, including three with Weiliang 6010d and it is still a lot of fun.
I'm honestly not sure I can hear a difference, so I'd just leave it as is. Not having audiophile ears-or an overactive imagination-definitely has its perks!
No one can hear a difference. Op-amp rolling is in snake oil territory, except that it's not nearly as costly as snake oil can be so it's quite harmless.
@@gurratell7326 Are you telling me that you are unwilling to pay $5000 for an audiophile grade Ethernet switch? :)
My Topping D10s has the 49720 by default too :) Still want to try the Sparkos SS3602 though ;)
This was fantastic!
Thank you. However I'm British - "Quite good" would be praise enough 😊
I can hear a difference but did not think either sounded disturbing or bad. The difference was so minor. That said I liked the sound of the stock opamp best.
As it should be. Chosen and applied for ideal behavior WITH the surrounding circuit.
Abbey road studio 2, very nice indeed!! Does Abbey road still use B&w 800 series monitors?
Yes, according to their website and, BTW, so do I.
I felt the 4580 sounded “fuzzy” relative to the stock op amps-they are both cheap cheap cheap. The NE 5532 I think is better than both of those and also very cheap. I bought some muses02 though. I liked the sound of them better in video comparisons I heard online… they are about $20 per op amp. The sparkos, which are quite expensive at over $40 per op amp, are the best in some products that are dull or flat sounding, but not as good as the muses02 in my opinion in products that are already very bright and punchy sounding…
Could you please advise me on the following question: I have a Fiio BTA30 DAC/AMP (bought for my PC) but noticed that when I connect my TV optical output to it and then from it to my A/V receiver, the sound quality improves noticeably compared to when my TV is directly connected to the A/V Receiver.
My question is whether it is worth to spend on getting a good DAC/AMP to use between my TV and A/V receiver (which is an old Yamaha RX-477), or if I upgrade my A/V receiver to a much newer and better model, I would get the same quality and would not need any DAC/AMP in the middle? In other words, does a newer and better A/V receiver naturally provide better DAC/AMP that using an external one would be totally unnecessary?
An uneducated guy here: I feel like the 4580 sounds has some reverb (like in an empty room), which I do not hear in the 49720 sound. Maybe I should not have drinked coffee before.. 🙂
The original audio, which is the same for both opamps, is from Abbey Road Studio 2. Since there was only me and my assistant in there it is more empty than it would normally be for a recording. If one opamp makes this more apparent then this is an interesting difference if it’s what you hear.
I hear the same thing and once detected it's not that hard to hear the difference.
@@AudioMasterclass Yep, its plenty noticable. At first listen, that is. Not after listening 5 or ten times to it and trying to find any differences. The JRC has more reverb, it sounds more airy. Not like the reverbaration of an enormous empty room, but a sizeable empty one. All that with a pair of 350 euro Senheiser Momentum 2 headphones, the headphone amp of a 1995 Kenwood KA2060 amp and a 100 euro Khadas Tone Board dac and cheap cables.
I also heard the same thing on the very first listen. The 1st sounded like an echoey room, the second lost that and the voice sounded more precise, and seems to have more bottom end. I think the proper way would be to put your favorite music on and determine it that way. What sounds better for just speaking, you may not prefer for music.
For anyone interested the lm4562 is the exact same opamp as the lme49720
If my degraded ears don't deceive me, it looks as though an album of relaxing unboxing music is on its way! If my - also degraded - memory serves, the 741 was originally designed to do bits of the maths in late analogue computers, so that it worked quite well for audio applications might be seen as a useful fringe benefit.
Very true regarding the 741. Also interesting is that CMOS logic chips can handle audio - I've had fun with that in the past but I wouldn't rate it for quality. BTW, 'Irritating Unboxing Music' is already out - davidmellor.bandcamp.com/album/irritating-unboxing-music and streaming.
I'm amazed that someone can claim hearing a difference between op amps, unless something else is wrong. I suspect what might be happening is that the better low noise, high slew rate, wide bandwidth op amps might be oscillating up in the 10 MHz region at a low level. This can happen if the op amp is driving a load with too much capacitance. Even a few hundred pf can cause them to oscillate. At audio frequencies, the MHz oscillation would cause increased distortion and noise. Since the cabling capacitance and the load capacitance of the next amp are uncontrolled, this is a real possibility.
Using lower cost op amps with lower bandwidth aren't as likely to oscillate at high frequencies. This might be the reason swapping out op amps in some cases improves performance.
When are the next generation op amps going to become available as the excellent TI models have been around for so long now ?
Hi,
did you find a reasonably priced Audio Analyzer?
Br. JCJ
There are QuantAsylum products that are not unreasonably priced. I would have to add the cost of a Windows computer. I'm not ruling this route out, but I don't have any current plans.
@@AudioMasterclass Great, exactly what I had in mind, I have the QA401 (now obsolete), running on an old Thinkpad x220, been using it a lot while designing Balanced MC/MM and complete preamps.
Sonic change may NOT be attributed to one component (DAC or opamp in this case). Shouldnt other gears in our signal chain be considered? Are they "sensitive" enough to the tweaks?
I received 10/25 my Pre-order ZD3 and also purchased from Fosi (20% off) Sparkos Labs SS3602. Waiting for XLR/RCA cables and iFi iPower X and will be burning the stock chips 1st. Also got in 3 weeks ago Geshelli Labs DAYZEE and what a DAC.
Did you get three 3602s? I just got my ZD3. I have 2 3602s. I will not be using the balanced out for now and am wondering if I can just swap the single ended op amp or need to change all three?
First sample has more reverb and more hall effect where the second sample is a bit muted and lack in ambiance like recorded in a studio with a lot of sound absorbing material. I personally prefer the first one~~
Is the power supply that comes with this dac switch mode or linear type?
Switching, as one might expect.
@@AudioMasterclass Okay thanks for that information. I have found that using a linear power supply noticeably improves the sound of dacs. However, I have noticed another improvement by using a mains noise filter to supply the PSU. I used a toroidal bifilar wound RF noise filter and a spike suppressor using VDR's. Also I found that the mains earth is full of RF noise so make sure the mains earth is not connected to the coaxial braids of the audio connection leads. Sadly the mains supply in the UK has become full of noise due to switch mode power supplies and triac controlled switching used in many devices.
When have you seen any product Fossi Audio makes come with a linear supply? Switching power supplys get a bad rep because everyone is using the cheapest switchers they can get their hands on. It is true all switchers are noisy depending on what you are using them for but their switching freq. can be manipulated a lot and filtering can be added so that you never know they are there in the circuit. It is another thing all together if someone is running ameuter radio gear nearby and picking up your noise. Solar Power Inverters are terrible for this. Copper and steel are expensive, heavy, and bulky just about everything we use would cost 2X to 4X as much as if they all used linear power supplies. The real problem is that bean counters at every company want to skimp on everything so you end up with a switcher or linear power supply that barley meets the needs of the gear with no head room to spare often and it shows. Linear power supplies are not magic!
It is another interesting opamp spec how much they reject mess on the power rails.
@@AudioMasterclass Yes correct but only if the op amps are powered from a split centre zero supply from a transformer with a centre tapped secondary. That makes the noise on the power rail 180 degrees out of phase with each other. Therefore any supply noise cancels out. Many dacs have a power separate power supply that is not a balanced split supply. They use electronic means to create a balanced dc supply where the noise on each rail is in phase and therefore doesn't cancel out. The supply ripple and noise rejection of an op amp can only be realised when using a true split supply.
Yes. I can hear a difference.
.
Obviously someone needs to make a system that inserts youtube into our systems
Quick! Patent that idea before someone makes it public.
@@marxman00 The answer is that you need to have a system that can reproduce the sound in HiDef. Nobody needs to insert youtube into your system per se., just get some decent equipment that can already do it. Some of the sound quality of RUclips's content is outstanding.
You can hear the difference,the second sounded a smidge thinner,the first sounded slightly fuller,I'm listening from my Logitech external computer speakers.
A friend of mine has a Geshelli dac and he has a few different op amps etc. there is drastic changes in sound.
I can hear a difference, even on my lg to. The low vocal frequencies on the first clip sound bloated, resulting in a sense of disjointedness between the high and low frequencies of the voice. The second clip keeps the coherence of a single voice. I wondered if this might be an anomaly of utube, but the second pair of samples exhibit the same characteristics. I was surprised to see such a small difference in the waveform considering the marked difference in sound.
I’d like to request that you do a test of sound reproduction of your/any mobile phone, and test to see if an external DAC offers anything?
It might be interesting to compare a £9 DAC with a £1000+ DAC, both of which I have. Guess which one I use more often.
What if I tell you that what you think is bloated sound acutally is reverb from standing waves of the room the recording was made...
Would thet make sence to you?
Room reverb adds some low frequency harmonics to the recording. Too my ears 4580 do a better job than 49720 letting those reverbs through to your headphones.
Interesting theory about standing waves. A comparison against a “reference” quality DAC might answer that question.
When it comes to Ne5532's Texas instruments sound better then JRC imho.
Of course we could tell the difference between your wav files. One had a light blue background and the other had a lime green background.
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Betty and Debbie taught me that laugh.
Nigel? What happened to Audio Phil?😢
Phil’s busy hardwiring the switch out of circuit so that it doesn’t degrade his resolution.
Yes, I could definitely hear the degradation caused by the switch!😂@@AudioMasterclass
Both sound compressed and don't let through the ambience.
4580 sounds slightly better to me since I can hear a tiny bit of room ambience of the speaker. Less so with the other Op-amp with the better specs (more feedback).
I can hear that the recording occurs in a slightly reverbant room, and I think a non feedback tube circuit will reveal that reverbant ambience to the fullest.
Op-amp more or less kills that ambience with negative feedback. Less so with 4580. 49720 sounds more like standing in a sound proof booth during recording.
🤦🏽♂️
So much nonsense. You have no idea what you’re talking about.
@@artysanmobile Keep listening until you hear it too.
If you have the time:
ruclips.net/video/BmPNOVZTStM/видео.html
ALL op-amps are a dead end compared to a good discrete circuit, but there are differences between op-amps.
To my ears 4580 is the most musicaly transparent of these five under test.
Keep those recorded harmonics intact as recorded.
Don't mess them up with a bad op-amp and a lots of feedback.
@@flex-cx9bi I see you know nothing of the topic being discussed. Just a couple of common tropes. OpAmps far exceed the capabilities of the most carefully designed discrete circuitry. They are, after all, idealized and perfected discrete circuitry themselves. It’s not even close. Your comment is the equivalent to “a computer processor chip could never compare to 5 million individual logic chips.” You should learn more before making ridiculous statements.
@@artysanmobile I know a bit.
Been in the business 40 years designing audio electronics so I have tested a LOT of different topologies.
Op-amp is a far cry of perfect out of my point of view.
Actually they are pretty bad in general and basically all of them have a sound character of their own. Had som success with AD825 when driven by a low impedance, but that was about it.
Have no desire to start a fight with you so lets say we have different experiences and different point of view regarding what sounds good and what doesn't.
Thanks Peter.
Another gentleman from the business not favouring op-amps:
ruclips.net/video/9Hvza7eABbA/видео.html
Obviously they're different, and it's not at all subtle, both from the sinewave picture and from the audio in your case. But in reality not every system can be as transparent and clearly show good enough different so it often considered as snake oil. I would not get into the detail but it had something to do with the speaker sensitivity and cable quality. The quality of listener's system, lack of technical knowledge and youtube platform's compression also not helping either in most cases.
The cheaper op amp give a boxy distortion that many people would refer as warm and tube like sound, while the original pricey op amp sound like a clean amp that have less distortion and faster in transient. If you thinking it as a microphone, the original would be akin to a medium or small diaphragm and the extra would be akin to a large diaphragm tone. If you thinking it as an electric guitar, the original op amp is akin to a clean amp and the swapped op amp akin to an overdrive.
As you can clearly see in both the microphone and electric guitar scenarios, cleaner sound and lower distortion doesn't always mean better production quality. In the hand of professional, it's a difference they will confidently abuse for variety and creativity purposes. But in a normal, non-engineer situation, with most of them don't have the knowledges, equipment, artistic taste, efforts and training to really making those to their full potential by proper design, you can just pick whatever makes you happy or according to the price tag.
I mean that's really what differentiate between normal people and an engineer right? Normal people just need to know which button on the remote control do what things on the tv. Like switching channel and adjusting volume, they don't really need to know about how things work in the technical or fundamental level.
At many popints I thought you were describing women.. the parameters are very similar.. dinner being the most remarkable output of said "device"
Its never going to sound different with opamps unless something catastrophic has gone wrong - high frequency power rail oscillation - or a bjt opamp dampening down a high impedance source (when say, you should have used a fet opamp instead). That said voice is not a great test. You need music with a lot of going on to tell things apart. This is because;
- a) voice is too narrow to highlight frequency response problems;
- b) any subtle harmonic distortion won't be noticed (it may actually make you sound "nicer") whereas mild distortion on busy music will then generate intermodulation distortion and you'll definitely hear that and it won't be nice. This is why cheap valve amps can sound so good on acoustic or orchestral music and yet fall apart with heavy rock or edm.
It would have been nice if both WAV files were provided so we could do a proper ABX test with Foobar and the ABX Comparator plugin. No offense to anyone, but claims about hearing a difference from this YT clip seem pretty worthless to me.
Are you saying that cheap audio man reviews stuff without even plugging it in? 😂 Sometimes it seems that most of those rapid fire reviewers do that.
I don't know. You should probably ask Nigel.
Cheapaudioman reviews stuff without testing it in a treated room. That's the same as "reviewing stuff without even plugging it in" in my book!
The ‘spec’ crowd generally knows nothing about said specs. Once they learn more = good, the die is cast and they will choose a part based on that simple, meaningless metric. After making a dozen or so such ‘decisions’ they can easily end up with the wrong part, due to their limited understanding. Simply swapping an OpAmp is not a valid move. Attached components need to change with it and virtually no one will do so.
If a brand can be trusted at all, they can be trusted to choose an ideal component to show their product in the best light, especially if doing so adds close to nothing to the product’s cost. Ideal OpAmps are quite inexpensive so there is no incentive to skimp on this part.
In my humble Krapp opinion… there are fat-cats getting rich off of what people imagine they hear (cables, turntables, cartridges, etc.). While there are honest products that provide an improved experience, most do not. This is one of those instances (where many products don’t do jack… and a few do).
Better is better. SparkoS is better. It also may be a perfect example of diminishing returns. I don't have a ZD3 to play with, but I would give the SparkoS a go if I did. I would also invest in or build an abx switch. Or some means to compare the output using my laptop or PC. Is there an easy way to do that? My ears are no longer bat-like and the brain is remarkable at adapting to changes in sound. The rest of the system has to be resolving enough to reproduce the change as well. What you hear with headphones may not present with loudspeakers.
Why don't they put better op amps in it from the start? Now i have to do it myself by screwing the damn thing open to replace the op amps myself. I never buy things that can sound better but the manifacturer doesn't put the best things in it themselfs.
The more highly specified opamps were installed already. As I said towards the end of the video, you can use this DAC as supplied.
@@AudioMasterclass I probably haven't heard that because it is already almost 12 am. Thanks for clearing that up for me.
There is nothing wrong with the op amps they have installed. Do you expect them to put in op amps that cost more than the units retail price like Sparkos?? Do not be so cheap or so lazy. No one is forcing you to purchase their product you could purchase a more expensive unit that might come with op amps more to your liking. Do not be so lazy not like you are going to devote a day to making a wooden spoon and wooden bowl to eat with get over it! An allen key and a nut driver big deal. They where kind enough to give you sockets so you do not even need to desolder and resolder anything! Man-Up already!
@@buckaroobonsi555 Sorry if i offended you. Good Lord. But screwing things open which i bought new is not really one of my favorite things. But lucky for me the uploader gave me a much nicer comment and cleared things out a way better without calling me lazy or cheap.
I've been asking that question since the start of this chip flip fad.
If there is a better part... put it in at the factory.
The thing is that ... this is audio ... it's low frequency low level stuff, it's not that demanding... quite often the "better" chip brings no improvement whatsoever. But still these guys just have to tamper with everything.
I have this , not so good sound 😢
It would help if you could describe the problem(s).
Hearing thru my fostec mk4 over-ears via PC with a r2r DAC. For the 4580, sounds of you breathing in before reciting is very apparent. For the 49720, your breathing in before reciting is much quieter in the background. As someone mentioned yes, reverb seems to be more in the 4580. I would put in as vocals sound more upfront and isolated in the 49720.
Currently, I am using my ZD3 paired with a smsl ao300 for streaming/movie watching and switched to the 4580 opamp. The 49720 also provides a pleasant movie night experience, out of the box. But i do find with the 4580 the volume is much higher by default, but i resist turning it up, as it strains the ears..
I need to train my dog to be be an audiophile with discriminating taste.
You jest, but who knows what abilities audiophile dogs might have? They could certainly hear CRT flyback and warn an older human engineer. One bark for good, two barks for bad. ruclips.net/video/Y4kwsg0z12Q/видео.html
@@AudioMasterclass I might be wrong, but I think you're barking up the wrong tree here.
Pure unadulterated nonsense, (and he knows it!). Anyone not listening to this through the original FOSI equipment (and op amps) has no hope of differentiating audio quality, as you are hearing it through whichever DAC is in your computer, tv, phone or hifi, not to mention whatever limitations of bandwidth, sample rate, bit depth, file compression, dynamic compression and other processing that youtube puts on the signals.
Yes I understand this line of reasoning. Best not to do anything, it's safer that way. I believe that my viewers are capable of making their own decisions on what they can and cannot hear. Clearly you would prefer to deny them that. It must be nice being so superior.
Stop making fun of audiophiles - AOCDs - people suffering from Aural Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Or not...
🤣
4580 sounds brighter to me. more harsh.
the other one i feel the need to increase volume.