My 2019 Update Thread - My final system I think.

[Jimbo]

I am glad the Red does UPNP as this would be my route for using it with Audirvana and Qobuz unless Qobuz Connect is made available to the Holo Audio RED. As its a ROON endpoint you are well sorted Gary so at least that part of the conundrum is fine , now its a matter of working out best implementation into the MAY I guess. I know the MAY has fabulous galvanic isolation on the USB input but not sure about I2S? Lots of folk using HQP using USB so they can max out the upsampling opportunities! BUT as I have found NOS is sublime and OS for me is a step backwards.

I would certainly like to hear what the MAY does compared to the CYAN 2 with all that fantastic dual mono power supply etc. The Cyan 2 sounds amazing so I expect the MAY is mind boggling!

[Gazjam]

Happy to bring it down at some point James, let you hear it in your System.

Cant wait to hear what the May can do once its ran in properly, will take quite a while to bed in by all accounts.
This things been over engineered as far as possible, so lots to come I think.

Meanwhile,
I'll just enjoy the day to day stuff as it happens.

Yeah,
Have Terrabytes of albums in Flac, and a lot in DSD so Roon is a good solution for me.
Cant beat browsing your music on the big Ipad.

As I wasn't getting the Fizz playing music from Roon via the Oppo, I let my Qobuz subscription lapse.
Time to get it back up and running now I have the Holo Audio Kit.

So good to have my own music sounding great in Roon again, been enjoying YouTube and Apple Music, but Roon sounds a lot better. Especially with the new gear.


Must admit to being curious about HQPlayer upsampling, especially knowing the Holo gear can take full advantage of it.
But that's WAY down the line, just gonna enjoy what I have as the reported sound quality starts to come out.

I can now play around with the upsampling options in Roon, the Holo Dac is still in NOS mode, so still get the advantage of that.
Its just that as with HQ Player, there’s upsampling being taken care of outside the Dac, in this case my seperate PC running Roon software.
Can adjust it on the fly in Roon from the IPad, so pretty handy.
Just something else to try going forward.

Just a couple of days in it’s already by far the best digital I've had, this Dac just hits different.

[Jimbo]

Yes a trip down will need to happen sometime. Great to hear you have advanced your digital system by quite a margin I think what with the May Dac and the RED streamer.

Over on head fi I was yabbering to a guy who upgraded from the RED but he had to spend a lot of cash £5000 on an Innuos Pulsar and even then I think it was only marginal differences and a big lesson in diminishing returns!

[Macca]

Seems like there's a lot of options, which is good. I think I am too old to learn all that, or too lazy.

[brian2957]

I'll be over soon mate

[Gazjam]

I'll be over soon mate

Anytime Brian.

[Gazjam]

Yes a trip down will need to happen sometime. Great to hear you have advanced your digital system by quite a margin I think what with the May Dac and the RED streamer.

Over on head fi I was yabbering to a guy who upgraded from the RED but he had to spend a lot of cash £5000 on an Innuos Pulsar and even then I think it was only marginal differences and a big lesson in diminishing returns!

Crikey!
Good to know…

In other news…
I found a fancy fuse of the same rating I could use in the Red, an SR Purple.
These worked well to give a nice improvement with other gear in my system, so fitted it to the streamer.

Won’t do any harm, might as well use it!

[Gazjam]

Seems like there's a lot of options, which is good. I think I am too old to learn all that, or too lazy.

Sometimes a CD is alot less faff, thats for sure.
Not lazy, just "set in your ways"

[Macca]

Sometimes a CD is alot less faff, thats for sure.
Not lazy, just "set in your ways"

A bit of both I think!

[Gazjam]

Change in cabling

I use an AppleTV hooked up over HDMI input to the Oppo 203, for Apple Music, YouTube, streaming TV 'n such.
Not being able to use the Oppo's i2s audio output into the new Dac, I tested its coaxial digital output?

That said:
i2s will probably work if I switched the Dacs internal PLL off.
I'll test that after the Dac has run in properly, see what happens.

Anyhoo
I've never used the Oppos Spdif output?
And as I removed the Oppo's internal Dac circuitboard when modding my 203, I didn't even know if the socket was still connected to anything!

Plugged in a scrapper RCA cable to test it, and it works fine.

Anyone else remember these Tandy Gold interconnects?
Sat in my spares box for many years... they were a big thing back in the Day!


Been listening to Apple Music, YouTube n stuff through it last couple of days, sounds pretty good.
New Dac is making everything sound better so not unhappy with that.

If I'm using Spdif digital to the Dac from the Oppo though:
I'm not going to keep using an old analogue interconnect as a digital cable into the new Dac...

So picked up a 'proper' digital Coax cable to use.
Final piece of the puzzle I think.







Read about this one, its is supposed to be quite good.
The 'magic' 1.5m length too.

Got it 2nd hand from a Dealer, like new condition so that's cool.
Picked it up for just over half price compared to new, bit of a bargain.

So plumbed it in and I'm happy with the improvement over the old RCA cable.
Sounds good, really like what it's doing.