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In Reply to: RE: Galvanic isolation?why are posted by fmak on September 09, 2014 at 04:13:52
I've been running optical USB (1.0) for years. The receiving end was powered by a TeddyReg. I considered this a great solution. Unfortunately USB 1.0 wasn't sufficiant anymore.
iFi states 5db noise reduction with the iFi purifier!
You just need to read the specs.
They (those passive filters) get the noise that low that the bits are no longer that much affected. (That's what the marketing says). That doesn't mean though that the remaining noise -- whatever noise and other distortions or interferences we're talking about - won't creap into the DAC to affect other critical parts of it through the backdoor.
Obviously there are other effects with USB. Such as crosstalk between the lines. That's why you'll even find highpriced split USB cables to buy nowadays.
Or People cut the power line. Shorten the cable....
These problems are also gone with optical.
Cheers
Follow Ups:
A filter that colours sounds in high quality systems.
You're talking about iFi products. Same technology inside.
High quality devices (should) come with sophistcated filtering built-in.
If any of these devices respond to any of those tweaks in a positive way, I wouldn't consider them "sophisticated".
In case you own such a "sophistcated" device and you then apply "double" filtering, by e.g. introducing an USB filter, you can easily make things worse.
You might run into overdampening. You can't blame iFi for that.
Unfortunately you never know what a manufacturer has done about filtering.
That's IMO one reason why, for some those tweaks will work, for others there's no difference, for you it makes things worse. Fair enough.
With optical you wouldn't run into the overdampening trap.
Easy test. It worked on my Fireface UCX. Just add a small resistance to your the USB ground lead. And then you increase it.
You'll hear the difference.
There's no black or white.
Enjoy.
Absolutely different
There are plenty of theoretical reasons why Toslink (yes, yes, I know, it's not the same) should be superior to SPDIF. There are (were) plenty of people insisting that it's indeed better, citing galvanic isolation.
None of that changes the fact that it sounds thoroughly inferior - whether by design, or most likely by implementation. In case with optical USB, just citing reasons why it should be better is just as meaningless - and non-experiential - as with Toslink.
The problem with optical links lie in the imperfect transducer, due to signal conversion and refractive index and light scatter issues.
Toshlink just sounds inferior. I have only ever found one cable that seems to produce the goods. The touted glass ones are only just ok.
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