Schiit Eitr Preview Thread

Discussion in 'Digital: DACs, USB converters, decrapifiers' started by Rotijon, Jul 17, 2017.

  1. sheldaze

    sheldaze Friend

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    @willsw is the DXIO Pro3Z what you guys were using?

    If I recall, it "flavors" the sound. While the Eitr might not be as clear as a good transport feeding COAX, I sense no flavoring (frequency shifts or otherwise changes to make one's perception of the sound as being better). Eitr is one of the few things I've heard to simply cut out the noise.
     
  2. Garns

    Garns Friend

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    I dunno, I find the bass has a bit of an emphasis and a rounded, slightly tubby quality through Gen 5/Eitr. It's super clean, but I don't think it's completely neutral. It definitely has a sound.
     
  3. Maxx134

    Maxx134 Dunning–Kruger effect poster boy

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    How old is your Yggdrasil?
    I had a similar smoothed sounding characteristic on Gen5 untill they swapped me a new PSU motherboard.

    Then the Gen5 came alive, and closed the gap of USB to almost level of the Spdif, but the Spdif was still a bit better...
     
  4. Jerry

    Jerry Friend

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    How do you swap the PSU? You send it back to Schiit for a fee? There are 3 PSU inside the Yggdrasil, right? You swapped all of em?
     
  5. willsw

    willsw Friend

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    That's what I had for a bit, and had even picked up a little linear PSU for it. I sold it and picked up an Eitr around when the Eitr came out. I never consistently used the DXIO, but I have used the Eitr for several months with my Audio Mirror Tubadour. As I need to troubleshoot the USB input on the Tubadour and never used the DXIO for long periods of time, I can't remark on any differences between the two.
     
  6. Linkgoron

    Linkgoron New

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    I'm also facing the same issue. If a light switch is flipped in some other part of the house (or similar), the Eitr will sometimes go out for a second.
     
  7. dmckean44

    dmckean44 In a Sherwood S6040CP relationship

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    It's stray inductances in your house wiring that is the issue.
     
  8. willsw

    willsw Friend

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    I also get this, and with most of a Summer ahead, I'm not enthusiastic about the AC on/off skips. I'm in an apartment so larger wiring changes aren't possible; would an isolation transformer solve this?
     
  9. dmckean44

    dmckean44 In a Sherwood S6040CP relationship

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    Probably no, because isolation transformers use capacitive coupling so the stray inductance will still be passed through. I'm not really sure what the solution is, I suspect there are other members here that are smart enough to guess though.
     
  10. Garns

    Garns Friend

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    My Yggdrasil does this over AES/EBU if I power on or off any nearby equipment. I don't really care, so haven't tried to fix it properly, but physically separating the digital cable run from any other wiring and keeping it as short as possible seem to help. I would guess that a double shielded cable would help too.
     
  11. willsw

    willsw Friend

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    I found Mike Moffat's original post and decided to move my Eitr's plug from the power strip where switching supplies live to the Chang Lightspeed 9600 Mk.II ADVANCED POWERLINE FILTER (got it in a trade, seems cool?) that other audio things plug into. I know the Schiit warts aren't SMPS, but the form factor is always confusing.

    Probably most importantly, I noticed that the SMPS strip and the Chang Lightspeed 9600 Mk.II ADVANCED POWERLINE FILTER are plugged into different wall outlets, on different walls.

    I think I've gone one AC rotation without a skip. Currently waiting to hear it click on again, ideally not very well because my music won't stop playing.

    I think it's good. Cool. Will update if not good. At this point I can recommend the different outlet method.

    Thinking about ways to fix this that wouldn't work, I did realize that if you really wanted to upgrade the power supply of the Eitr or other Schiit products, you could put a bigger, nicer transformer of appropriate voltage in a box. This fella is $20, and then you can stick it in an aluminum foil ball with an AC plug hanging out one end and a barrel connector out the other and possibly not hear any improvement at all.
     
  12. Renekton

    Renekton Acquaintance

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    Yeah, my EU eitr is also prone to dropouts - sometimes momentary, other times out cold - just from flicking light switches. Or unplugging random stuff. AND I have it on the furman ac210 P-conditioner, like, wut.

    @Garns after having got used to my nervosa inspired wyrd-wyrd-eitr, bypassing the wyrds would result in the tubby coloration. Like, smeared, wobbly-hobbly bass. Back to wyrds, bass gets a bit tighter, much deeper, cleaner and more transparent, like, tonally. Headstage wise - bit wider.
    As long as the wyrds are not on the same outlet as eitr (so actually not on the P-conditioner in my case), the inherent eitr mids and highs clarity is maintained.

    Offtopic, I settled for Modi Multibit and valhalla 2 plugged directly into wall outlets. Power strips take away a bit of dynamics. The P-conditioner takes away a lot. Off of each. Tested separately. More noticeable than different amount of wyrds. Anyways, in the end only eitr is on the conditioner, lmao. BTW rolling in a random power cord I had lying around onto valhalla gave a more mids-powerful, coherent and full bodied tone with awesome, natural transition into the precise, sandy highs as opposed to the disjointed, harsh highs from the sucky stock cord.
     
  13. buonassi

    buonassi New

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    yes to that. I played around until I found an outlet that didn't punk out the Eitr. No more "DAC screen of death" from Audirvana (i.e. no complete knockouts so far) and only one "pause" (momentary dropout). Been rockin through several cycles of air cond. off/on and feeling optimistic here after 2 hours of music play.

    thx @dmckean44 for your post. I cancelled my order for an isolation transformer just in time before Amazon shipped it. Out of curiousity, why would I be getting better performance from a different circuit in my house vs. an isolation transformer on the same circuit? Is it because there is no capacitive coupling between circuit zones in my house wiring?
     
  14. willsw

    willsw Friend

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    My Eitr just started skipping for a full second or two every several seconds. Couldn't figure it out and was going to put my Wyrd back in to try USB, when I remembered that the Wyrd and Eitr use the same AC brick. Plugged Eitr into Wyrd's brick, all was well. Retried original Eitr brick, skips returned. Switched back, we're cool. Did the Chang Lightspeed 9600 Mk.II ADVANCED POWERLINE FILTER damage my Schiit? I guess we'll see if two bricks get bumped.
     
  15. willsw

    willsw Friend

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    Bought a Hammond 266JA12 transformer (6V, 2A) and put it in a box. Found the switch in a drawer, it works but doesn't light up. Oh well. All is playing well, Eitr isn't getting warm or anything. IEC inlet and a 3-pin XLR for the AC umbilical on the back. I know I need to clean up my power cables.

    I'm too tired lately to do any serious comparisons between transformers. If someone would like to, let me know and we can split shipping if you want to borrow it.

    I was also thinking of wiring up a similar box that could be used with the Magni. I don't have a Magni but probably already have the parts, so if you wanna try that out, I'll put it together for science and you can borrow it. Via PM.

    [​IMG]
     
  16. buonassi

    buonassi New

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    bless your heart - I haven't the cods to try DC with my Eitr.
     
  17. willsw

    willsw Friend

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    It's not DC, it's just a larger transformer than in the wall wart. There is still 6V AC travelling from the box to the unit.
     
  18. buonassi

    buonassi New

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    update on "dropout gate" I've been able to mitigate dropouts by using an outlet on a different circuit. had to run a 12 gauge extension cord (of decent quality). This greatly limited the dropouts. Mostly presented my HVAC events as light clicks instead of complete converter failure. This was good.

    Then, I played around quite a bit with ferrites and winding techniques for the Eitr's power cable to no avail. This actually made things worse - like I made an antenna for RF by looping the power cable through the ferrite ring multiple times. It seemed to fail very regularly. The same happened when i coiled the cable up using a three finger wind technique. This was not good.

    Then, I decided to wrap the Eitr's power cord around a 14 gauge power cable feeding my DAC (which pulls 30 watts AC). They are close to each other so this worked out well. Zero dropouts, Zero clicks. This was encouraging.

    I also experimented with twisting the eitr's power cord with a 12 v DC (24 watts) power cord that feeds an amp I have. The cords are easier to get more of a true twist vs one wrapping around the other. Zero dropouts, Zero clicks. This was a cause for elation.

    So, I've been listening for several days without any clicks or drops. I'm starting to think that Eitr's power cord picks up on RF through the air?
     
  19. Maxx134

    Maxx134 Dunning–Kruger effect poster boy

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    The main PSU board was replaced by Schiit after it was sent back a second time when it died (transformer dislodged.)

    It is already common knowledge that a switching PSU wallwart is pure garbage to use, especially for USB power implementation,
    Where it is known to be uber sensitive to improve with clean power.

    Look at the size of the wallwart.
    I know schiit says its not a switching PSU, but it is an "AC" out PSU.
    No DC filtering then.

    Just because the unit is branded "Schiit", does not make them immune to these problems.
    You can't use a cheapo power supply and just expect to achieve same performance as a good linear power supply.


    Or it is sensitive to it's garbage wallwart "RF" that you think is "ok" to use because it came with the Eitr.
    Try a better power supply.
     
    Last edited: Jul 21, 2018
  20. TraverS

    TraverS New

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    Transformer doesn't pass DC to secondary so there is no need for DC filtering.
     

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