I recently bought a Nucleus to stream Tidal and Qobuz. I do not use a computer but hard wired Nucleus.
Does anyone know if the Curious Evolved cable will improve my sound if connected USB to my Mscaler/Dave?
Steve
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Hi @Steven_Dean
Welcome to the Roon Community.
Iâm just a fellow Roon user.
Do you already own the Curious Evolved cable?
If so, try it and see/hear what you think.
Be prepared for many views on this, and the bumpy ride ahead.
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No, I do not own it. A friend lives it. I currently have the MoonAudio Silver Dragon cable.
Steve
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How does your system sound to you?
No, it most propably wonât. USB is purely digital and the only thing that could be changed by a better cable is if in your situation USB is not functioning correctly with your current cable.
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Excellent. I am at the small tweek stage. I am planning on getting Wave Storm cables to eliminate RF noise from the Mscaler (I can tell the difference when playing vinyl on an analogue set up).
A friend uses the Evolved cable but is running a direct hook up to his Mscaler from his computer. He does not stream through Roon.
Curious cable told me it will improve the sound but je is a salesman.
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Like Ethernet cables, there are cheap ones and there are good ones. You do have to be very careful of the snake oil that is out there.
Speaking of snake oil, for my Audio USB cable I use, it has a Ferrite Bead to remove unwanted noise interference in the audio. There are USB cables with this built in or you can purchase this Ferrite Bead from the likes of Amazon and they are cheap. To me, I have found that it makes a difference. But that is me.
âMD
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An âaudio USB cableâ canât âremove unwanted noise interferance in the audioâ, as itâs all still digital. There is no audio in an usb cable and the filter is not able to interfere with specific bits representing audio within a datastream.
To be clear: if you are happy with this cable than thatâs totally fine!
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Never gave it any thought that it could be used this way. Good to know.
I came across these that were built into the USB audio cable that came with a DAC I had purchased.
âMD
Spot on. We see these all the time in the HVAC industry on PCB interlink cables to reduce interference/noise.
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Ferrite beads are pretty specific. They attenuate certain signals, but usually only in a fairly narrow frequency band. If you know there will be RFI noise on the cable of a particular frequency (perhaps you are operating a ham radio transmitter in the next room, for instance), you can get the correct bead for that frequency. And their effect also varies by the power flow in the cable, and the length of the cable.
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And the numbers of ferrite beads you place on a cable
Torben
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True, but thatâs not a issue with low-power circuits that can operate with voltages of 2V or less.
For audio, Ferrite beads should be placed where they wonât create problems with voltage drop. They also absorb energy as heat, but this is only a problem when the ferrite bead dissipates high frequencies at high current.
Using it for a USB audio cable with low voltage would not be an issue.
âMD
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I am looking for a good USB cable, and the Curious Evolved one is on my short list.
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If you have too much money, you can do lot good things with it.
Buying an expensive digital cable is it not.
Buy a good stock cable for 10-20 bucks and you will have the same result.
It is digital and transmits data!
Do you think this cable will improve Word or Excel files on transmission? If not why it should improve an audio files. All these are only files send other a digital cable and will be received at the end (or not if the cable is defect). A digital cable will never alter the data! Otherwise all the banks would have big problems with online banking.
And no, audio is nothing special and noise did not crawl over a USB cable. Only audiophiles are special and the audiophile manufactures trying the make money with audiophile angst.
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Yes, sounds good to me.
I am a bit skeptical and on the fence!!!
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âCuriousâ is primarily notorious for very proudly not knowing, and not wanting to know, what USB is and how USB works.
Occasionally, their cables work (sometimes they donât, as was reported here a while ago), again, because the guy has no idea how to actually design a USB cable, so itâs all trial and error.
One can certainly convince oneself (especially after shelling out for something like this cable) that for that much money of course it sounds better. But it doesnât. There is not a single physical reason why it could.
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Thanks for your feedback on âCuriousâ, that would save me some troubles if I bought it.
Youâre welcome.
Generally, if you had bought it, it probably would work â pass bits from one device to the other. Exactly the same way a cable costing 1/100th of Curiosity would.
There is no such thing as âdigital noiseâ (well, you could get a single transmission error over USB in a month of non-stop listening, but you would not hear it anyway) and the dreaded âjitterâ does not apply to asynchronous transfer mechanisms like USB or Ethernet (again⌠one could build something that would be affected, but that would be a super-esoteric, audiophile product priced as a couple of Bugattis).
There is a possibility that the source device puts enough analog noise on the USB port that somehow penetrates the receiver circuitry and becomes audible, but this is super-rare in reality and isnât something a cable like this would help with anyway.
There is a possibility of the cable picking up some interference, if it is not properly shielded, but well-shielded cables are dime a dozen.
To put it short, enjoy the music, and use the retail price of the Curiosity cable to get a lifetime Roon subscription, or a few years of streaming, or a nice dinner at a Michelen-starred restaurant Either would be both much more satisfying and have better ROI.
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