hey everybody. thanks alot for all your answers. almost forgot about the thread, since it was not approved till yesterday. i gathered further information during that time:
1 feedback of the german nuforce distribution > they checked my unit, and say the sound is normal, relay related
2 feedback of official nuforce support > muting relays kicking on and off, especially during low parts of the music (or in between tracks), is normal and audible within a range of up to 3 feet
3 feedback of a nuforce retailer in zürich > (we talked on the phone) "nothing, dead silent, oh wait a sec..." (he put the phone on the side to listen closer to one of his brand new units for sale in the store) "...true, sounds like hard disk, but should not bother you much when listening to music, since it is not very loud"
so, the whole chain, manufacturer, distribution and retailer tell me, yes there is a sound, and it is more or less normal.
on the other hand, you, the users, say nope, not normal, nothing should be heard. i even sent a mail to 6moons, srajan ebaen said he never heard anything, since he would have definitely mentioned it in his review. sometimes there might be a single click in the beginning, signal-path relay, but after that the unit should be silent.
i don't want to question your ears or hearing (especially not srajans)...but is it possible nobody ever heard this? or am i just too finicky?
let me specifiy the problem a bit. i want to change the name of clicking sound into ticking sound. still the best way to describe though, is the analogy with a (broken) spinning hard disk. i captured it with my phone (listen to it, here is the link >
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/60976365/Ticking%20Sound.m4a poor quality, but you get a sense of what i mean). i played with different digital cables (like john suggested) to connect different sources (not that i have that many, i tried a cd player and an apple airport with the optical inputs, usb connection to my laptop and a spdif connection also to my laptop with a m2tech usb/spdif converter) and i connected and disconnected speakers (85dB shelfies). the ticking always was there, it didn't vary while playback or in between songs no matter what things where connected. or not connected, since the ticking comes directly out of the unit, once you turn it on. there i thought for a second, maybe it is electricity related. i tried different sockets throughout my place, disconnected every other electrical device (especially router and such). nothing. the ticking kept going.
again, i want to emphasize, it is not loud, and true, during normal listening you probably can't hear it, cause of distance and the music being much louder. but well, once you know something is there...in fact, what bothers me more than the ticking is the fact, that apparently other users don't have the problem (so far i am not aware that my hearing is any special, maybe my appartment is very quiet) and that the ticking might announce a bigger problem rather soon. thats why the answers of manufacturer and distribution actually calmed me down, since they say this is not a problem but normal. and they should know. but why, if it is normal, nobody else hears this?! i checked all the reviews i could find, nobody wrote anything like it. maybe it has something to do with us vs european version? how can it be a muting relay kicking on and of, when there is nothing to mute, since nothing is connected and playing? and why is even a different brand new unit in a store producing this ticking.
so clean your ears, step closer to your dda and listen. hopefully nobody tells me "well that sound! so low and little, you shouldn't be that picky!" in fact i am just curios.
benjamin
