Roon Core on NUC i3 with 8gig Ram; Library connected directly to a Samsung 2 Tb. SSD. NUC is connected directly to the router. Connected devices include a Cambridge Audio CXN v2 connected directly to the router, and the Dacmagic 200 which is connected directly to the NUC with an Audioquest Pearl USB cable. The CXNv2 is connected to the Dacmagic via Audioquest digital coax.
Problem: If I play directly to the Dacmagic, after about 3 or 4 minutes the music stops. When I go to Settings/Audio and click on Device Setup by the Dacmagic, it spins endlessly and then vanishes from the devices, or I have to disable it, power it off, and then reenable in the settings to get it back. At this point it also vanishes from audio devices. Sometimes I have to reboot the NUC to get it back. I can switch to the CSNv2 as the selected device and it plays fine through the Dacmagic 200 so I know there isn’t a problem with the DAC dropping out. I hope someone has some suggestions for this royal PITA! Thanks!
You folks have always been very helpful so I hope someone can shed some light on this.
Yes, running Rock on Linux.
Yes, I can play directly to the CXN v2 as it is connected directly to the network switch. The problem is that the CXN v2 upsamples everything to 24-bit/384kHz. regardless of native resolution, and DSD is limited to 64 via the digital coax. Going directly from the NUC via USB gives me lossless native file resolution, MQA, and up to DSD 512. For casual listening, the CXN v2 is fine, but when I sit and listen alone I want to hear things as they are if that makes sense.
Thanks Jim, I believe I understand. I looked at the Cambridge Audio support site and the CXN v2 does not support a full MQA decoder, so won’t play full resolution MQA files. However, there is a configuration that is a bit different than your current configuration, where the CXN v2 can receive MQA files, pass them without change via digital output to a DACMagic digital input, and then outputs to the DACMagic for full decoding of the file The DACMagic’s analog outputs then connect to an amp. This is outlined by Cambridge Audio here:
In this configuration, you do not need to connect the DACMagic to the Core via USB. I’m posting this only as another option.
Just to confirm, are you running a Linux OS with the RoonServer software, or are you running ROCK on the NUC? The reason I am asking is that the former may need a USB driver while the latter may not need one.
Not at all. Every DAC that is not of the rare NOS (Non Over-Sampling) type, does over-sample. The reason that it is listed for the CXN is that a proprietary DSP based up-sampling algorithm (ATF2) is used instead of what is usually built-in into integrated DAC chips. This proprietary algorithm doesn’t have to be – and likely also isn’t – inferior to the built-in over-sampling of integrated DAC chips.
Interestingly, after posting, it occurred to me to try another USB port on the NUC. So far so good. I have been going about an hour without the usual dropout so I may have found the culprit. I will keep you posted.
The CXN v2 passing through to the Dacmagic indeed does not upsample, but I am limited to 24 bit/96khz. and DSD 64 via the digital coax or Toslink. Going direct from the NUC gives me lossless native resolution.