REVIEW: Sony HAP-S1 [by Allan Folz]

Editor's Note:

Life has been extremely hectic over the last few weeks! As a result I am extremely grateful that some fellow hobbyists like Raoul Trifan a couple weeks ago and this week Allan Folz have been able to dream up some relevant content for me :-).

For the post this week, Allan has worked on a review and discussion for the Sony HAP-S1 high-resolution audio player with integrated hard drive storage. I appreciate Allan's honest look at the device, discuss real-world situations, benefits, blemishes and quirks encountered, and by the end, provide a thorough pros/cons evaluation. Enjoy!

Sony HAP-S1 Review

Guest Post

by Allan Folz

A Look at the Oppo UDP-205 & The Great Audiophile Debate AK vs. JA of 2005.

Oppo UDP-205 and Black Panther.

Although I have already collected quite a bit of objective testing results from the Oppo UDP-205, I have not had the time to analyze the data or constructed the graphs and charts due to time constraints. Rest assured, the number, graphs, and charts will come :-).

At the time of this writing, I see that while the UDP-205 is in very short supply if even available any more (excluding the speculative price gouging on eBay of course), the UDP-203 is still available.

Today, as a start, let's just spend some time talking about this device and the features. By now there's no mystery since reviews over the last year have been thorough such as from TechHive and Audioholics. Oh yeah, even The Absolute Sound put in a review. In fact, the Audioholics review provides some excellent data on the performance of the Oppo UDP-205 versus its sibling the Oppo UDP-203.

MEASUREMENTS: Computer USB +5V Power Noise by Raoul Trifan & MQA's Bob Stuart Speaks Again...

Editor's Intro:

Hey there guys. One of the joys of running this blog has been the opportunity to meet some of you and connect through E-mail with folks from around the world with shared interests.

Every once awhile, I get the chance to see some of the measurements and work you guys have done. Today, I want to show you some work from Raoul Trifan from Romania.

In the last year, we've been in contact about his work with USB ports using the various computers he has at his disposal. What he's sharing today is literally the "tip of the iceberg" in terms of the data and measurements collected over the last while. He has done all kinds of other work with power supplies, modifying audio gear and such which I'll leave for future discussions.

Today, let's just consider the noise on the +5V USB line from computers:

Using a PicoScope 2204A, he has produced some interesting screen shots to consider with the various machines.

MEASUREMENTS: MSI X370 SLI Plus AM4 Motherboard Audio (RealTek ALC892 codec). [And the importance of measuring the "low end".]

Image on the right shows the multicolored multi-channel "speaker" audio output. The standard "front" stereo channel is the left middle-from-top light green one.

Hey guys, I managed to find some time this week to write up the measurements on the inexpensive MSI X370 SLI Plus AM4 motherboard I described in my AMD Ryzen 1700 CPU workstation build from last year (note the other details like the Antec power supply used).

GlÜÜkZ reminded me that I had not posted the results which I had already collected on the motherboard a number of months back. As you'll see, I also gathered a bit more data to show what happens with the internal DAC when the computer is strained with high processor and GPU loads.  You may recall that years ago, I showed that indeed we can detect noise from a computer running at high load with my old ASUS Xonar Essence One DAC. Let's see what that looks like these days with integrated motherboard audio output!