USB Input problems - slow audio?

[Paulo83]

Hey all,

I'm back again with yet more questions, apologies and please be gentle!

So my DAC turned up as did the step down transformer I ordered online and I quickly got everything together into my system.

I have to start of by saying that I think this might be the audio bargain of the decade, I'm super happy with the results I've had so far but as yet I haven't quite been able to get everything working exactly right.

Once I had everything set up, my initial (attempted) testing was from the USB out of my HP Envy Laptop running windows 10. I say attempted because I just can't get everything working as it should. I followed the instructions including downloading the driver and disabling USB booting in BIOS but every time I try to play audio I get approx 3 seconds of very distorted audio before the DAC seems to shut off the input and I have to cycle power to bring it back online again.

Following that I ran a quick test from the USB out on my Samsung Galaxy S9 mobile phone, initially everything seemed OK so I moved on to setting up the coax/optical inputs. I currently have a raspberry Pi3 with an Allo Digione running the coax input and an Exposure 2010S CD player running the optical input and all seems well.

Today I went back to exploring the USB input and have found that when running Tidal from the S9's usb out the audio coming from the DAC seems to be slightly slowed down. I have A/B'd this with the same track running to my Mojo and it sounds fine from the Mojo so I'm assuming it's not an issue with the phone's USB out?

Any thoughts on this? I bought used for a pretty good price so wondering if I've picked up a unit not fully functioning but hoping i've missed something obvious.

Paul

 

[Doc B]

Sounds like maybe the phone is sending 44kHz and the DAC is running at 48kHz. What sample rate does the DAC display show when using the S9?

Regarding the laptop, what are your digital audio output settings?

 

[Paul Birkeland]

You can also explore the USB power saving settings in your laptop a little more.  I would go through and just turn everything off.

From my personal experience, going out and spending $200-300 on a stand alone desktop computer to use with the DAC makes things much smoother generally.

 

[Doc B]

Yup, a pre-2012 Mac Mini is pretty cheap these days and will work well.

 

[Paulo83]

So I have just tried to play from the S9 again and the dac display is showing 176.

I had considered using a stand alone computer but as the majority of my music is in 24/192 I don't know if i'd gain anything over my Pi3 setup. I run it headless with Volumio and an external hard drive, some tweaking has allowed me to hand off Tidal streaming to it as well but it's not perfect.

Having the laptop work would just be a little more convenient for some situations.

 

[Doc B]

I think there are known issues with Samsung phones and USB DACs (not just XMOS based DACs). I saw several comments about the slow play speed as well as distortion. It is worth doing a google search. Two suggestions I saw were to make sure all audio apps are off when connecting the DAC, and to turn off USB debugging.

 

[mcandmar]

Something to try.  Power off the DAC for a couple of minutes, then power up and re connect the USB.  The important bit is to make sure the first track you play is a 16bit/44.1khz track, then try a higher sample rate 96 or 24/192 track and it should properly detect.  If it still says 176 unplug and power down and try it again.

Once you get it to detect the second sample rate correctly it will work perfectly 24/7, its just fussy about the start up procedure.

 

[Paulo83]

Thank you both for your replies.

So the good news is tonight the DAC is playing gloriously in 192 from Tidal via the S9. The bad news is I have no idea how I managed it! ha.

As mentioned I guess the key is in the start up procedure, tonight I had everything powered up first before connecting the S9 then opening Tidal, worked immediately and sounds wonderful.

Thanks again for your help. Not sure how much I can be bothered to chase my tail with my laptop USB out to be honest, I have most bases covered now between my Pi set up, CD player and the phone/DAP USB option.

Have to say again, this thing is amazing and I have to admit I think I got it for a steal, easily the best upgrade I've made to my system in a LONG time, can't wait for my Mainline to arrive now!

Regards,

Paul