Inexpensive AW-D3 Dac kit <3k

[kaushik]

AW-D3 is a USB dac..has optical and I2S out
based on Philips TDA1543,

looks like using several good components..
Step by step assembly guide:
Audio Workshop
See ordering page : 460 HKD i.e 2.7k Rs approx

 

[santhosh]

Thanks Kaushik. The DIY instructions here are pretty good too. I have never been involved in electronics DIY, would love to do something like this if someone can guide me. I have some tools for this and some soldering experience. Anyone?

 

[kaushik]

I can see people are afraid of electronics DIY,
I would be more than happy to assist anyone related to
assembling..diy ..specially electronics..
all for free ..this is possible on weekends...

That board is very easy build ,the SMD chip comes presoldered, rest are very easy...even smd chips also I can
do even 200+ pins

If you decide feel free to PM me...
Also dont worry for enclosure..you can have many in <Rs500..locally available...with a few mods applied.:clapping:

 

[mnhegde]

Hi Kaushik. I have a teac 1160d cdp. Is this DAC of any help to the mentioned cd player??

 

[kaushik]

mnhegde,
As cranky said (also previously i added)..it has optical out
only...not in,good for very starter dac for PC as source ,preferably laptop.

with optical from cd player ..
y2 DAC fits well ..it is pretty well designed..
info:
The &gamma;2 Compact High Performance DAC

let me estimate ,w/o the cabinet parts... it will cost very less...for cabinets just 'trust me'.

 

[iaudio]

I can see people are afraid of electronics DIY,
I would be more than happy to assist anyone related to
assembling..diy ..specially electronics..
all for free ..this is possible on weekends...

That board is very easy build ,the SMD chip comes presoldered, rest are very easy...even smd chips also I can
do even 200+ pins

If you decide feel free to PM me...
Also dont worry for enclosure..you can have many in <Rs500..locally available...with a few mods applied.:clapping:

That is one great offer on your part! If I do make it to Bangalore as planned in Dec this year, I will catch up with you, and hopefully our other hifi ers too.

 

[kaushik]

That is one great offer on your part! If I do make it to Bangalore as planned in Dec this year, I will catch up with you, and hopefully our other hifi ers too.

just ping me with your schedule.. just before coming.

 

[iaudio]

just ping me with your schedule.. just before coming.

Sure, will do that.
One question to Kaushik, Cranky: Is it good or bad that this dac would work on usb 1.1? (not 2.0)

 

[iaudio]

USB 1.1 = sync operation, very prone to jitter and dropouts. It's not because of the lower speed, but because the protocol requires the host to be basically free all the time. Windows is *not* designed to be a real-time system, so it creates problems. The PCM27xx use a clock recovery mechanism called SPact that is pretty good so they're better than most other USB 1.1 DACs, but that is relative.

The PCM2702 is a very good DAC, uses USB 1.1 and has excellent analog performance. The Alien DAC ($40) uses this chip (as does the $150 Keces DAC), and offers excellent value, if one is looking for a cheap entry into PC audio from a laptop. It still suffers if Windows plays truant, but I've been lucky as I run optimised systems anyway.

USB 2.0 systems will require drivers. They are not Plug and Play like the ones above, but they solve the transport issues precisely because of the custom drivers.

Thanks for the detailed reply Cranky. I get the idea.
Another thing I have understood from your post is that the same chip is used in the Keces DAC(151/131?). So will this give similar performance?
Are there any such usb dacs which can also be used along with a cheap dvdp or cdp to improve sq?

 

[iaudio]

The SPDIF model of the Keces does not use this chip, only the USB version.

The analog performance of the Keces is much better than the Alien, due to the better power supply arrangement and post-filtering/buffering. It is still prone to USB issues, though, so in a problematic Windows system, it may suffer dropouts and pops. This is common to all USB DACs that do not need drivers, even the eMu 0202 is not immune. Linux mostly solves this completely, so Linux users don't have to worry about these kind of issues. It's not something related to the DAC, FWIW, but to inefficient I/O management by Windows.

The PCM27xx is a all-in-one USB chip. The 2702 is a specialised analog chip, with very good analog performance, the rest of the line have very basic analog sections.

You can't use a USB DAC with a CDP/DVD. The USB port on a DVDP is a read-only port, it cannot supply data.
Yes I know, but was thinking of an all in one solution, usb input for laptop and maybe optical/coax for cdp, dvdp. I had Kaushiks idea for a cheap diy cdp in mind.

The problem with SPDIF (optical/coax) is that there aren't many cheap all-in-one chips that will do both receive and conversion, so the cost goes up as it's two chips, larger boards, more power supplies, and so on.

The cheapest decent kit I can think of is actually the Audiosector NOS DAC green version, it used to be around $100 but may be around $150 now. There are some Chinese offerings for around $50 (eBay is your friend) but I'm not really sure that they will improve performance over an entry-level DVDP. One place where you can find lots of discussions about cheap DACs is Head-fi.org, both completed and kit offerings.

I do visit headfi once in a while and I will check out audiosector nos dac too.
Thanks again!

 

[kaushik]

yes head-fi is one place for rich info.


the one thing that dac build, promises is the knowledge
part...hands on with hardware (if feasible)will be useful for future projects... ...

for now diy for USB 1.1 is an option...
USB 2.0 may be done in future...writing drivers for windows is a real pain ,as winddk is very confusing,long time back I did one for a modem...


diy cdplayer pending ....we need senior diy peoples support for making it a success....