Allo USBridge board

But it powers both from the DC with the j28 removed surely it should just power the bridge?

Nope, thatā€™s explained in the manual as I mentioned beforeā€¦ see the quote from Allo (Rahul) above explaining exactly thatā€¦

If thatā€™s the case then surely it should ship with the jumper removed all ready as it serves no real purpose being in of you can power it all from DC . They recommend not to power it individually by usb from the off so just disable it from the start, would save having to open it up to remove it. Very confusing to.

But you can also power the USBridge directly without opening it. Just a single PSUā€¦ Thatā€™s the recommended way anyway (as above).

I know that, your not understanding my point. You can do the same with the jumper removed to, but gives you the extra option of using 2 if you wish. So just leave it out from the start and you cover all bases.

I definitely get your point (Iā€™ve tried all options at some pointā€¦).

I really only replied to you comment ā€œIt seems odd it works with just oneā€, just to explain that itā€™s not odd at all.

Fair enough

Been listening to the Allo USBridge with my Oppo Sonica DAC up sampling to DSD512 using the Ethernet on the Sparky and USB Host output with no issues or breakup for a whole album. I guess like my RPi running DSD512 is no issue.

Do you hear any difference between USBridge and RPi?

Highly subjective of course but itā€™s fun sharing different observations.

Cool ! No pops, no drops, no ticks ?
Did your monitored ETH bandwith with NetData playing native DSD512 ?
SONICA USB receiver is XMOS ?

I do have the same experience with onboard ethernet. 40-50 mbit with dsd512 and simmilar woth PCM768khz. All good.
Pro-ject S2 dac which has XMOS USB chip on board.
With USB Gigabit ethernet adapter i think CPU utilisation is even lower.

I did was quite a difference to me, the Allo seems more balanced and less bright and not at all fatiguing. Also seems to reveal more detail. But the Hifiberry was more stable overall. But I am working with Allo support on my issues and hopefully its now resolved.

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@volpone @dabassgoesboomboom Iā€™m seeing around 40-50mbps too with native DSD 512

Iā€™ve yet to really do any quality listening and none directly a/bā€™g with microRendu as yet.

Iā€™m awaiting my kali and piano2.1 replacement boards. But for now Iā€™m comparing the Sonica dac on the usbridge and the ha-1 on the sparky just on usb2 port. Both are running on LMPS but nothing too fancy.

Iā€™ll post more comments in the coming days when I get some listening time.

The emmc copy over process took me a few goes to get something that worked but seems to be running now.

The netdata info Page is awesome. Total geek candy :smiley:

After I bricked the USbridge with the faulty dietpi update, I bricked my Usbridge on a hardware-level. The holder of the sd-card broke loose from the Sparky. Damn! If there was no faulty update I wouldnā€™t have touched the Usbridge. And now, because there was this faulty update I broke the Sparky. I know, itā€™s my fault, but I handled it with care, and still the sd-cardholder broke from the sparkyboard. Grrrrrrrrr. Very frustrated!

16 posts were split to a new topic: DietPi update 6.7 > 6.11 fails on Sparky/USBridge

I am looking at buying a new DAC for my lounge set-up and I thinking of using the Allo USBridge to feed it (from my NUC connected via ethernet).

I have a few questions, which I have asked Allo directly but I have not had a response so I thought I would try here.

OS
I would want to use the bridge with Roon and therefore I think I would want Volumio, what are the proā€™s and conā€™s of Volumio and DietPi?

Power
I have read a number of posts where people are powering different parts of the USB Bridge, could you explain why that might be useful or advisable?

DACs
I am in the UK and I considering pairing the USB Bridge with either a Chord Qutest DAC or a Mytek Liberty DAC. Would anyone have any experience of the bridge with either of the DACs? Are there any other DACs in this sort of range worth considering?

Thanks all.

I have a USBridge (running dietpi, never used Volumio) connected to the Chord 2qute. Works like a charm and sounds wonderful. Iā€™m using a ifi powersupply for the USBridge (which in turn powers the sparky). The chord 2qute is also on a ifi power supply.

Do buy the metal case, runs much cooler and the device stays put if you use a rigid usb cable.

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Er, if you want to use the bridge with Roon, you do NOT want Volumio, but DietPi. The former does not support Roon, AFAIK, the latter doesā€¦

I just use the Allo-supplied wallwart to power my USBridge/Sparky. Folks who seem to be able to hear differences with more expensive power supplies and/or expensive cables may seek alternative ways to supply power. Itā€™s lost on me.

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Sorry to hear thatā€¦ However, after reading about your misfortune i was very careful when inserting the MicroSD into my alloy-cased USBridge.
To no avail though, the slot is mis-aligned and i had to dismantle the whole thing and add a couple of well placed washers as distances to even be able to insert the microSD.

I canā€™t hear a difference either. It was worth a tryā€¦ifiā€™s are not that expensive.

I do have one more expensive psu (sbooster) for my brooklyn dac and that made a small difference (tighter bass) but imho not worth the ā€˜upgradeā€™.