I’m going to get some loaner usb today but interesting note. I noticed last night that my left tweeter was sounding weird. I thought I had a blown something, tweeter or resister or something. So I shut everything down, including roon and the hard drive. I pulled the tightly fitting usb’s. swapped them around and ensured they both got seated good. fired everything back up and problem solved. Well, I should say, (tweeter problem solved), lol… the buzz still comes at same time as always. So today I pick up a soundcast VG7 and I’m going to get some cables while there to borrow. I will also talk to them about borrowing other links in the chain like possibly a DAC ect… to test till we find the problem.
Good luck!
My sound chain is Nuc>DAC (MSB Analog DAC)>Pass amps>speakers. If I turn my amps on when my DAC is switched off I get hum and buzz. But if the DAC is on there is dead silence. I don’t understand that electrically, but I think I understand what you are hearing.
Good idea to get some other parts to swap out. Nice dealer.
ok so I did some testing and elimination today but no fix yet.
changed out the usb from nucleus to dac and nucleus to hard drive
changed ethernet cable from comcast router to nucleus
switched the nucleus from comcast router network to my lynksys router to be on different network although the lynksys is essentially plugged into the comcast router at the end of the day.
all of the above produced the same problem.
Can I eliminate the network all together as a test if I get a usb C to usb and plug my surface directly into the usb port on the nucleus? I suppose I could run it from there without being on the network at all or am I missing something.
So at this point I’m not sure if I’ve eliminated the network or how to do that.
It appears the only two items other than that are the nucleus itself and the DAC. and or the surface go controller but not sure if that could be in the loop of trouble cause or not.
I think I can borrow another nucleus that is on display at a nearby audio shop. Should I bring that in and could I just plug and play after setting it up on all the same account and all?
other than that its the DAC which I’m sure I could borrow a dac from someone if that is the last piece but that would likely be the most difficult so will likely wait till last.
Let me see if I can do that. so if I connect the surface go which currently is my controller remote directly to the DAC I can control it there without the nucleus in the loop? (is that what you are saying to attempt)?
I don’t have any other zones. the only test I have done is plug in Sonos with ethernet to the router and played through sonos via the Roon Nucleus. It played fine doing it that way, no issues.
I haven’t set up any other zones and didn’t plan to. this is purely my 2 channel system I plan to use.
Not sure if the soundcast vg7 is a roon end point but I doubt it because I think it only uses 3.5mm aux in or Bluetooth only. not wifi I don’t think but I just unboxed so haven’t read up on it yet. So not sure if there is a way to set it up.
audio signal path is
comcast router plug into nucleus ethernet
nucleus to DAC usb
dac gryhon kalliope to gryphon diablo 300 integrated to Wilson sasha daw speakers
all controlled by the surface go over the network
there is also a hard drive connected to the nucleus with albums stored on it
stream is from Tidal
Not exactly. The Nucleus is still in the loop - it’s running the heart of the Roon ecosystem, the Roon Core. What @dylan is suggesting is to disconnect the kalliope from the Nucleus and connect it to a PC or Mac with Roon installed on them. So you’ll be moving the Roon endpoint, which is the kalliope, from being connected to the Nucleus to being connected to another device. Now, the thing is, you can’t readily use the Surface Go for this, because as I pointed out earlier, it has a different physical USB connector than the kalliope cable (a USB-C socket is physically different than the USB-A plug on your cable). Do you have another Windows PC or Mac that has a USB-A socket?
What you can do is use the System Output on your Surface Go as a Roon Endpoint and test that. Yes, the speakers of a Surface Go aren’t up to much, but you should be able to hear whether the buzz is still there.
Go into Settings/Audio and you should see something like this:
I guess I got good news. I figured out how to make the annoying buzz stop. I tried 3 different streamers and tried them with and without roon. The only one that played beautifully with all resolutions and didn’t have any hiccup was the sonore Signature REdu se. So I’m guessing some kind of noise in the usb that the kalliope wasn’t handling well and somehow the sonore has less noise or something because I couldn’t get it to do it with the sonore… Guess I might have to buy the damn sonore lol
thanks, I need a streamer anyways for SQ. also looking to add hqplayer with roon to improve that as well. Found a interesting place for stuff like this though. Shiit audio decrapalfier lol.
It sure does. I mean, you really have great equipment, so it’s not like the manufacturers had overlooked basic design essentials. I hadn’t heard of the gizmo’s @xxx recommended. The (fortunately) few times I’ve had these I would have loved a simple fix. But it seems it does come down to fundamentals of how certain pieces of equipment are powered up (e.g. across different power circuits).
Glad: a) it WASNT your USB cable, that sucker is pricey! and b) you’ve found a way around the problem. Thanks for closing the loop (no pun intended).
if it were a ground loop why would it fix the problem by pausing playback for maybe 10 seconds, unpause and it plays fine. if it were a ground wouldn’t that always be there. But again with the sonore it plays without any problems at all. all 5 other ways I tried it, the buzz problem just upon resolution change. I’m not purchasing a wyrd just like the name of it lol when I saw it. I’m going to buy the sonore plus the optical
You got me.
My system is very simple. Signal comes into MSB DAC (via ethernet), goes out RCA cables to Pass monoblocks into speakers. The system is dead silent when my DAC is on. If I turn the DAC off I get a low level hum and buzz, even though both amps are wired to the same dedicated outlet. So there is some condition when the DAC is not engaged that creates that sound (the DAC is on another circuit). It is only superficially similar in the sense that when your DAC is not sending out a signal you get that same sort of noise.
I don’t worry about it because it doesn’t affect me in practice. It sounds like the Rendu also isolates the problem for you, which is great.
Today for the first time I notice buzzing/clicking sounds in my speakers when no music is playing. (I guess after spending enough time on this forum, one starts listening for such things.) From the right speaker, I hear a very faint sound vaguely like a lawn sprinkler’s noise. I seem to have traced it to my router. When I unplug it, the noise stops. When I move the 12v wall wart from the power strip to the wall outlet directly, the noise stops briefly, then gets worse (and now sounds more like a cat purring). Maybe I should try a 12v after-market PS such as the iFi?
Update (after ~1hr): moving the plug to a different outlet does not stop the noise. But, moving the Orbi WiFi satellite router about 1 foot away from the other (audio) gear does stop it.
