Gazjam
12-11-2018, 10:07
Well...
kinda. :)
PS Audio released the latest FPGA chip firmware update for their Directstream dac today.
Since it first shipped in 2014 the dacs been improved NINE times through software updates to its programmable FPGA chip.
For free.
Talk about looking after your Customers?
The dac’s got a cool backstory too...
https://www.psaudio.com/directstream-dac/ (under ‘Backstory”)
All the updates are named after mountains in Colarado, where PS Audio are based, I jumped aboard with the previous update “Redcloud”, they are calling this one ‘Snowmass”.
Bit of useless trivia there...
Whats more important is that this one was a major code rewrite, the dac’s wizard Ted Smith (He of the epic beard and hawiian shirt in the previous link) hasn’t just written new code to make better use of the Xilinx FPGA, but written his own programming tools to get better performance than Xilinx’s own.
Sidenote:
wouldn’t you WANT the guy who designed your Dac (and continues to improve it) to be one of THOSE guys?
Must be some link between length of beard and audio guru status...I dunno. :)
Anyways,
feedback from users is this update is the most significant sound quality upgrade in the dacs 5 year history.
Took day off work today to do the upgrade.
Here goes...
kinda. :)
PS Audio released the latest FPGA chip firmware update for their Directstream dac today.
Since it first shipped in 2014 the dacs been improved NINE times through software updates to its programmable FPGA chip.
For free.
Talk about looking after your Customers?
The dac’s got a cool backstory too...
https://www.psaudio.com/directstream-dac/ (under ‘Backstory”)
All the updates are named after mountains in Colarado, where PS Audio are based, I jumped aboard with the previous update “Redcloud”, they are calling this one ‘Snowmass”.
Bit of useless trivia there...
Whats more important is that this one was a major code rewrite, the dac’s wizard Ted Smith (He of the epic beard and hawiian shirt in the previous link) hasn’t just written new code to make better use of the Xilinx FPGA, but written his own programming tools to get better performance than Xilinx’s own.
Sidenote:
wouldn’t you WANT the guy who designed your Dac (and continues to improve it) to be one of THOSE guys?
Must be some link between length of beard and audio guru status...I dunno. :)
Anyways,
feedback from users is this update is the most significant sound quality upgrade in the dacs 5 year history.
Took day off work today to do the upgrade.
Here goes...