Device and DSP Settings for T+A DAC 8 DSD

Vladimir_Tomin · October 28, 2018, 1:59am

I purchased roon a few months ago and the problem is a stable DSD playback. I have tried many different options recommended in the community support and Roon FAQs but it appears unsuccessful. I would be grateful if someone and @support can help me solve this problem of instability. I only play DSD256 and when it runs it is of an exceptional quality. My system spec is as follows:
T+A DAC 8 DSD running latest ASIO drivers downloaded from their site
Dell Precission M4800, i7 4930MX CPU and 16 GB RAM
Win 10 Pro 64bit
This computer is only used to play music and core is therefore installed on it. I don’t use roon remotes.
I will add images of my current setup for DSD playback

My device settings

My DSP setup
image|666x500

I had to erase 2 pics as a new user I can only post 5 , shame.
My headroom adjustment is enabled and it is set to -3db with clipping indicator enabled
Roon version is 1.5 build 354 stable 64bit

Any help highly appreciated.

Vladimir_Tomin · October 28, 2018, 2:03am

Missing pictures in my first post.

wizardofoz · October 29, 2018, 11:08am

Turn on the Paralellize Sigma Delta setting that will help…you are running out of puff I think with processing speed down at 1.5X.

Larry_HV · October 29, 2018, 5:17pm

I would recoomend to use the “PDP3000 USB ASIO” driver instead of the WASAPI.

To do this select "PDP3000 USB ASIO" under Settings/Audio:

For MQA Capabilities select “No MQA Support”.

See the following pictures for the settings I use.
With these settings everything works fine for me.
Please be aware that for converting/upsampling to DSD512 a quite powerful processor is needed…

Vladimir_Tomin · November 6, 2018, 4:56am

Hi,
Thanks for the recommendation. I have however experienced dropouts with or without the sigma delta perallelization. So, I assumed that wasn’t the case. I am keeping it on now. My machine should be powerfull enough for dsd 256 , it has a very good Nvidia quadro graphics as well. It is a workstation laptop. I have tried using Fidelizer as well to optimise win for audio. I’ll see how that goes.
I have a question for 5th and 7th order clans modulators, what are they in comparison to the regular 5th and 7th order once? @support

Vladimir_Tomin · November 6, 2018, 5:04am

Hi,
Thank you kindly for your help. I’ll be trying out the settings and will post the response shortly. Just to comment on you remark about the WASAPI driver, I have been using it only for PCM files, asio was used for DSD. I have noticed a discrepancy in your. Settings, tell me if I am wrong? For the MQA decoding core, that was set as enabled whereas the MQA capabilities were set to no support. How does that work out to be correct, if you don’t mind me asking?

Thanks

Vlad

Larry_HV · November 6, 2018, 7:56am

Hi Vladimir,

regarding MQA: roon implements a MQA core decoder which outputs a PCM stream @ 88.2 or 96 kSps. This stream can then be converted by any DAC - even if the DAC itself has no MQA decoding or rendering capabilities.

For further details please follow this link: https://kb.roonlabs.com/Roon_x_MQA

Best,
L.

Vladimir_Tomin · November 6, 2018, 10:32pm

Hi Larry,

Thanks for the advice. I tested a few times and realised the situation. In addition, with parallelising sigma delta mod. I can do DSD512 with no issues. However, I am now testing DSD256 for the stability.

Many thanks,

Vlad