NDS in its new home.
So I recently moved (mid-August), HiFi was packed up, transported the few miles within this Dublin suburb & rebuilt in a new apartment. Very different to the previous old Manor house building, but a newish build (2018), 3rd floor “Penthouse” style, with floor-to-ceiling windows, but very well insulated for heat & sound. There is also internal CAT wiring, with 4 ports presented in a Utility room.
Connected into the 4 ports is a Cisco VPN Router (Firewall, NAT, DHCP) with a WiFi AP (upgraded to a Unifi U7 Pro Wall on a stand - this is a single storey apartment).
One port is to the Cable modem, in “Modem mode” so providing the WAN connection into the VPN Router. Second connection is to the NAS & Roon server ROCK on Intel NUC) in a storage room (Netgear switch) Third is to the Study for wired connection to the desk, docking stations (Cisco switch) & fourth is to the Living room.
Here the feed is isolated through an EE1 before an EtherREGEN switch. ‘A’ Ports to UltraRendu running SonoreUPnP Bridge, RPi running Asset UPnP server & an AppleTV. ‘B’ Port to the NDS.
However between the other unpacking, sorting out the networking, day-to-day work and a business trip for over 2 weeks, the HiFi wasn’t set back up until the 28th of September.
The EtherREGEN (which I had since May 2019) is powered by Farad3 power supply with an AfterDark OCXO ‘King’ with matching power supply. This feeds the NDS Network player with Roon through the SonoreUPnP Bridge running on a UltraRendu with UltraCap LPS 1 power supply. The NDS has twin power supplies for separate Analogue & Digital, with a 555DR for Socket1. Most all components & cables the same, in similar positions & configuration. Additional AQ Cinnamon from wall to EE1, before AQ Vodka from EE1 to EtherREGEN (as needing to a further distance)
Initial listening was good, and only a bit of slight speaker positioning undertaken in the last weeks, just to check the initial placement.
But here we are, 30th October, 30-days in and something happened over the last few days, as the sound has come together and got so much better - soundstage, separation, transients.
The reports are that these AfterDark OCXO need over 35 days to fully ‘warm up’, settle down and stabilise getting better during this period, something I have just heard and can confirm. When I first got the OCXO into the EtherREGEN, I was sorting out the placement of it and the power supply, changing Coax & power cables as well as internal mains fuse, so wasn’t a straightforward ‘plug-in’ & left to settle down. Can’t wait for the next weeks for this process to complete.
The velvet blackness, wide soundstage that I had from the NDS before is back.
The externally clocked EtherREGEN is certainly bringing a significant contribution to the table within my configuration, networking arrangement, and the “Roonify” NDS, sounds great.
