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Tour of Supercapacitor powered Ciunas devices

Sams, do you have impressions of the ISO-SPDIF to post?
Steve Taylor, have you finished with the ISO-SPDIF & can post impressions, please?
Can you ship to Beameup? PM sent of his address
 
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Sure John

I had no problem slotting the ISO-SPDIF into my system between a Sonore UltraRendu and Chord Hugo DAC using your supplied USB cable. For the SPDIF conection I used a
Neutrik BNC to RCA Lead - Van Damme 75ohm Coax Cable which I picked up on ebay for £13.

My reason for experimenting with the ISO-SPDIF was to discern for myself if the Hugo SPDIF Coax input was superior to its USB input, which has been reported elsewhere. I let the system play on a loop for 24 + hours before doing any listening and later comparisons.

To my ears there were not any immediately obvious differences to note, unlike my experience with your DACs. At first I thought the ISO-SPDIF may have portrayed a slightly firmer foundation with sweeter and better articulated highs, but on returning to USB Hugo I found the foundation just as solid with maybe just a slight hardening of the highs, but this became difficult to identify on subsequent comparisons. So maybe there is something in it but it is very subtle to me.

I also tried the different grounding/isolated modes and again couldn't discern any real differences.

I can only conclude that the USB implementation of the Sonore is very clean in its own right, and any differences in the Hugo USB input vs. Hugo Coax input are slight to my ears.

For certain the ISO-SPDIF didn't sound worse in the chain so I assume that it is delivering a very clean signal at least on par with the UtraRendu.

Thanks for the audition.
Sam
 
Thanks John for letting me try the latest ISO-SPDIF, I've forwarded it today.
This has been an interesting trial, since owning a HiFace (not JKenny modified) I've tried all of the Ciunas iterations and am the happy owner of a battery powered ISO-SPDIF. I also have a Schiit Eitr purchased to try while my battery powered ISO-SPDIF was back at base (good but no cigar).
I have a resolutely "flat earth" system of nDac, 52/scap/135s/Briks plus some Teddy Pardo supplies (possibly important).
The latest converter maintains the "boogie" PRAT etc that my preferences would indicate. I was happy to see all cabling attaching to the rear of the unit, I was also pleased not to have to worry about batteries (though these have caused me no problem with my existing unit - I just have little experience of battery powered hi-fi).
The sound of the supercapacitor is immediately very similar to the battery unit yet taking bass solidity a bit further. It also gives greater clarity/insight in the treble range and offers an improvement in imaging. It also seems to change the focus on certain instruments which may be more accurate.
My system needs very little encouragement from components or recordings top be a bit relentless, shouty even, if the listener is not a "flat earth" fan and this brings me to the reason why I won't be changing again just yet. With the added upper range clarity came a touch of harshness. This could well be my system or perhaps it's the SMPS supplied with the new ISO-SPDIF (Naim gear is known for not being keen on these and I found early Lingos intolerable for this reason) though I know John is very careful with his supplies. My own battery powered ISO-SPDIF is powered by a Teddy Pardo toroidal which adds a fair bit to the cost, sadly neither of my TPs supply enough amps for the new converter so I had to stick with the SMPS.
These are my findings, in my system (with my lug holes) YMMV and probably will. Johns converters are by far the best I've tried and I would have the latest in a heartbeat if my own broke. I'd want to try an appropriate toroidal ps with it, but, for now I'll stick with my battery powered Cuinas.
 
Thanks Steve for your impressions
Pity you didn't contact me as I've no doubt you could have swapped in your Teddy Pardo PS once the supercap had reached charge.

I'm trialling PS isolation with the latest ISO devices i.e a switch that allows grounding or isolation of the power supply. It may have eliminated the bit of harshness you heard? It's effect is very system dependent but a touch of harshness would be one of the aspects I would anticipate with ground noise

If you wish, I can send an isolated ISO-SPDIF to you so you can assess if what I say is true (& try the Teddy Pardo PS also)?

If this proves to be correct, I would take the other one out of circulation
 
I'd be very happy to try it John, I have a Teddy Pardo 2x 5v 3A ps and a 2x 12v 2A supply.
Would I be able to bring the latest version up to charge with the 5v ps or should I charge it for a while with the smps before swapping over?
 
The new version with switch for isolation/grounding requires a 12V charging supply
Either 12V SMPS or 12V TP PS would be fine for charging up supercap or maintaining supercap charge
 
The ISO-SPDIF is with me and rather than continue in a private conversation with you John I thought I'd add my understanding of your comments to me to the thread before asking any new ones.

Even though it has been run for many hours by previous testers it will still require some warm-up and to do this it wants to be actively converting from its USB input, so playing tunes rather than just powered up.

The follow-on question is for how long do you think? It's been running a few hours today so I'll be putting it thought its paces soon, but any thoughts on how long it takes to be at its best would be welcomed.

So far I haven't noticed any grounding issues irrespective of which way the isolation switch is set, but what would you recommend as the default setting?
 
I said this being conservative - one person reported that the supercapacitor DAC gets better when it warms up.

I suggest that people try it cold Vs warmed up & see if there is a noticeable SQ difference? if there is a difference what number of hours warm-up makes a difference?

As far as grounding is concerned - it is provided in this version to again let users test if there is a noticeable difference in sound - if there is a difference, note the position of the switch.
IMO, some system have an issue with grounding but most don't
 
Ta John

I'm no engineer so appreciate the pointers that many more techy types might consider obvious

Will do some sucking and seeing now
 
No problem - engineering aside - if it doesn't improve the sound, then it's not really important.
The isolation switch & burn-in are two such considerations - if they make no difference in your system, don't worry about them
 
Was planning to post my take on the ISO-SPDIF today but don't have anything much to say yet because I've been a plonker.

Set it all up and was listening over most of the weekend, then last night went to change back to my existing pre-ISO_SPDIF setup to do an A-B comparison and noticed that I hadn't actually changed the input on my DAC so all weekend have been listening to my existing setup.

It was sounding lovely though too, which perhaps has taught me a valuable lesson about expectation bias.

John, if you want me to move this on to the next fish on the list I will, but if there's no-one after me / you aren't desperate for it back would you mind if I had another couple of days with it please?
 
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