[Starchild]

Please see the link below.  What do you think? 

DIY improvements to the Schiit Yggdrasil

[WGH]

What do you think? 

I think reusable Christmas stickers will work just as well as the WA Quantum stickers.

[jtwrace]

What do you think? 

Laughable and pathetic. 

[Folsom]

Bypassing the power switch while leaving in the pathetic, harmful, EMI IEC socket is just nonsense. You want better sound, replace the it with a Furutech IEC socket and bypass it with an X capacitor. But I think bypassing the fuse or using an "audiophile" one is a good call. Bypassing with copper foil however , just solder in a piece of wire.

LED's are noise generators, but I can't tell from photos whether it would make any difference. I'm inclined to think no.

[Don_S]

I have never heard of dampening heat sinks.  Insulating them seems counter-intuitive and counter-productive. 

[bladesmith]

Let the tweaking begin. ........... 

[Starchild]

I'd go for putting a better quality fuse in my Gumby if I didn't have to open the box.  However, I'm intrigued by the suggestion that single ended users (like me) can get better sound by using a xlr to rca adapter on the balanced outs.  What do you guys think?

[MttBsh]

As an owner of the Yggdrasil, I have been reading with great interest the discussion about these tweaks over on Head-Fi, particularly the advantages of using the balanced outs from the Yggy, and the merits of using an XLR to RCA cable for those of us who only have RCA inputs on our amps/preamps fed by the DAC.  http://benchmarkmedia.com/products/benchmark-xlrfm-to-rca-adapter-cable-pin-3-floating was cited as a way to take advantage of the "superior" balanced output, and for $23.00 per cable, it would be a no-brainer if it in fact made a positive difference.

What's a little frustrating is that some experts have been irritated by the mere suggestion of this tweak, saying it's a joke and will provide no benefit whatsoever, while at least one person has said that he had cables made to send the XLR to RCA with a resistor to match the impedance of his amp, and that it made a huge difference in his Yggy, opening up the soundstage and the improving resolution. Does he just "think" he's hearing that huge improvement?

[Starchild]

As an owner of the Yggdrasil, I have been reading with great interest the discussion about these tweaks over on Head-Fi, particularly the advantages of using the balanced outs from the Yggy, and the merits of using an XLR to RCA cable for those of us who only have RCA inputs on our amps/preamps fed by the DAC.  http://benchmarkmedia.com/products/benchmark-xlrfm-to-rca-adapter-cable-pin-3-floating was cited as a way to take advantage of the "superior" balanced output, and for $23.00 per cable, it would be a no-brainer if it in fact made a positive difference.

What's a little frustrating is that some experts have been irritated by the mere suggestion of this tweak, saying it's a joke and will provide no benefit whatsoever, while at least one person has said that he had cables made to send the XLR to RCA with a resistor to match the impedance of his amp, and that it made a huge difference in his Yggy, opening up the soundstage and the improving resolution. Does he just "think" he's hearing that huge improvement?

What's also confusing is that Mike Moffat has said (if I understood him properly)  there's no difference in the quality of the signal between the single ended and the balanced outputs.  This is what he said on Headfi:

"Any rumor that the SE out on the Gumby has been gimped is pure bullschiit.  The implementation is as on the Yggy, where the individual balanced outputs are summed algebraically.  This inherently cancels common mode artifacts."

If memory serves, some Yggy & Gungnir owners on Headfi have said they didn't hear any difference between se and xlr.  It may be a system dependent variable.  I might just cough up the $15 from here to satisfy my curiosity. 

[JLM]

Of course I can't find it now, but I thought somewhere on the Schiit site it strongly implied that balanced sounds better than single ended (with their typical "duh" attitude) expressed.

[MttBsh]

I might just cough up the $15 from here to satisfy my curiosity.
[/quote]

Looks like a nice adapter and a great potential solution... but it doesn't address the issue of changing the impedance to match that of the amp it's feeding. Or is that even a real issue?

Some claim the balanced outs from the Yggy are much better than RCA, others disagree, and those darned threads are hundreds of pages long! I think I'll have to try it for myself.

[Starchild]

Of course I can't find it now, but I thought somewhere on the Schiit site it strongly implied that balanced sounds better than single ended (with their typical "duh" attitude) expressed.

The limited search capacity on that web site can be frustating either that or I just haven't mastered it yet.  Anyhow, I think its the users that have been going back and forth on it more so than Jason Stoddard & Mike Moffat.  You know Mike is really not a big fan of usb but includes it on his products due to market realities.

[Starchild]

I might just cough up the $15 from here to satisfy my curiosity.


Looks like a nice adapter and a great potential solution... but it doesn't address the issue of changing the impedance to match that of the amp it's feeding. Or is that even a real issue?

Some claim the balanced outs from the Yggy are much better than RCA, others disagree, and those darned threads are hundreds of pages long! I think I'll have to try it for myself.

Apparently, those adapters are $15 a piece but still a good price.  I placed an order.  I'll let you know what happens.

[MttBsh]

Apparently, those adapters are $15 a piece but still a good price.  I placed an order.  I'll let you know what happens.

Thanks Starchild. Unfortunately the interconnects I use now between my Yggy and preamp are RCA to male XLR with an adapter to make it RCA to RCA,  so rather than adding another adapter I kind of have to start over! I'll buy female XLR to RCA cables and report back also. Let's hope we get some good results!

Matt

[rklein]

Of course I can't find it now, but I thought somewhere on the Schiit site it strongly implied that balanced sounds better than single ended (with their typical "duh" attitude) expressed.

I am interested in the Ygdrassil and am also looking at passive preamps, most notably the Tortuga passive.  I also wanted to know the balanced vs SE question regarding this DAC as this would dictate if i built a single ended or a balanced version of the Tortuga.  Below is my email and Schiit's response:

Hello:
 
I have been considering purchasing the Ygdrassil for some time.  Is running balanced superior to running SE?  This will determine my choice in a preamp. (currently looking at the Tortuga passive kit - either balanced or SE or a used Bent Audio AVC-1 which is only SE).
 
Obviously, running SE will be a less expensive option but I  am interested in the best sound quality that the Yggy is capable of.
 
Regards,

If ultimate performance is the goal, native balanced is the way to go.

[Srajan Ebaen]

When people comment on sonic differences between a DAC's XLR and RCA outputs, do they consider the XLR and RCA inputs of the preamp/integrated following? True balanced circuits will have to symmetrize their single-ended inputs which will mean a somewhat more complex circuit for the RCA than XLR. In a very resolving system, that could hurt the RCA input. Conversely, a really single-ended circuit with convenience XLR will have to sum its pseudo balanced input, perhaps with an op-amp. Now its RCA input may sound better quite independent of the DAC. And so forth. Pinning performance variations on just the DAC without considering what follows it overlooks half the picture...

[rklein]

Pinning performance variations on just the DAC without considering what follows it overlooks half the picture...

+1  Very good point.

[werd]

It's a real shame they attached the power supplies to the the same board as the dac.

[Starchild]

After discussing the matter with folks at Echo, I decided not to buy the xlr adapters.  They essentially said they didn't think I would realize a major sonic benefit from using the xlr outputs in a single ended system so I cancelled the order.

[SHjb]

I'm using Neutrik XLR-to-RCA adapters with the #3 wire cut from my (non-Yggy) DAC to my preamp. FWIW, they make a difference. Not sure about better, I need to give it time, but different for sure.

With this DAC using XLR avoids going through an opamp doing the bal/unbalanced conversion in the single-ended path.