Vance wrote:

The Shunyata cord PLUS the Hyrdra conditioner represent the single best upgrades to my system aside from John's mods. I was skeptical about power cords and conditioners, but I'm a bit of a fanatic about it now. The testimonials from major studios and audiophile producers on the Shunyata website are also make interesting worth reading.

Vance, I respectfully disagree with your regarding Hyrdra. I have the first version of it and then sent it back as it sounded very grotesquely. In a few years I was told that they “fixed the problems” and had the Hyrdra-2 version but it sounded to me too covenant to believe – so I did not try it.

However, the subjects of my post are not the level of Shunyata solutions and it might be even slightly off the Bidat subject. I will do it once and will not continue it. Vance, there is no needs to dispatch anybody to manufactures website to read the “testimonials from major studios and audiophile producers”. At this site was are all in our own and only your own words and thoughts are counted and valuable. There are no needs to bring other testimonials or prove anything to anybody…

Romy the Cat wrote:

Vance wrote: The Shunyata cord PLUS the Hyrdra conditioner represent the single best upgrades to my system aside from John's mods. I was skeptical about power cords and conditioners, but I'm a bit of a fanatic about it now. The testimonials from major studios and audiophile producers on the Shunyata website are also make interesting worth reading. Vance, I respectfully disagree with your regarding Hyrdra. I have the first version of it and then sent it back as it sounded very grotesquely. In a few years I was told that they “fixed the problems” and had the Hyrdra-2 version but it sounded to me too covenant to believe – so I did not try it. However, the subjects of my post are not the level of Shunyata solutions and it might be even slightly off the Bidat subject. I will do it once and will not continue it. Vance, there is no needs to dispatch anybody to manufactures website to read the “testimonials from major studios and audiophile producers”. At this site was are all in our own and only your own words and thoughts are counted and valuable. There are no needs to bring other testimonials or prove anything to anybody…

I have no idea why Bidat is so hipper sensitive to electricity. I thought to big up the PS caps and to put there instead 4kuF something like 60kuF -100kuF. I did not do it. Perhaps it would be worth to try…

BTW, my Bidat now entered the day 15 of the Nichicon Syndrome. Now the HF are done completely. It sounds like a gramophone with 5-7kHz max range. Taking about the good sounding digital…. Anyhow the HF should be back in 10-12 days..

I'm slow. What's your view on the moray james cable? Heard about it? Do you have a bidat? What digitial cable have you found to work best with it.

Romy the Cat wrote:

Bidat, for whatever reason is remarkably sensitive to electricity, probably it is more sensitive than any other my priced of equipment. What however is ugly is that during different time, during the different problem with electricity the different methods to cure electricity had different impact to Bidat. Sometime sound dies and using a regenerator or balance isolator on Bidat it is possible slightly to reanimate the DAC. Another time no matter what you do it does not help – sure there is not known to me universal solution that does not crap sound and helps all time. I have no idea why Bidat is so hipper sensitive to electricity. I thought to big up the PS caps and to put there instead 4kuF something like 60kuF -100kuF. I did not do it. Perhaps it would be worth to try… BTW, my Bidat now entered the day 15 of the Nichicon Syndrome. Now the HF are done completely. It sounds like a gramophone with 5-7kHz max range. Taking about the good sounding digital…. Anyhow the HF should be back in 10-12 days.. The Cat

Generally the search functionality works, anyhow….

The thread about my digital cables:

http://www.goodsoundclub.com/Forums/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=5323

The thread about electricity:

http://www.goodsoundclub.com/Forums/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=2931

The Bidat’s volume control must not be used under any circumstances…

Form email I got from John Wright

“PS, In case you care, the Bidat gets better all the time with fresh updates ….I mean it will sound broken in comparison. I have made some very good changes to the power supply and the output stage that have made it more transparent and with real bass now.  It's even more musical.  And no, I didn't just change the op-amps and caps.  I made some actual circuit changes and further simplified things.”

That is tempting and I would probably go for it. Bidat does have own unique sound that woks in my view remarkably well with very aggressive had-reading CEC TL0. Having Pacific and Lavry Gold I still have Bidat paired with TL0 and frankly no motivation to change anything. The lowest bass was always Bidat’s weakest point and if John found a way to get more or it then it might be very good. Did anybody exposed recently own Bidat to the most resent modification and can corroborate on John comments?

Romy the Cat wrote:

Form email I got from John Wright “PS, In case you care, the Bidat gets better all the time with fresh updates ….I mean it will sound broken in comparison. I have made some very good changes to the power supply and the output stage that have made it more transparent and with real bass now.  It's even more musical.  And no, I didn't just change the op-amps and caps.  I made some actual circuit changes and further simplified things.” That is tempting and I would probably go for it. Bidat does have own unique sound that woks in my view remarkably well with very aggressive had-reading CEC TL0. Having Pacific and Lavry Gold I still have Bidat paired with TL0 and frankly no motivation to change anything. The lowest bass was always Bidat’s weakest point and if John found a way to get more or it then it might be very good. Did anybody exposed recently own Bidat to the most resent modification and can corroborate on John comments?

From an email I just got from the site’s visitor:

"I got my bidat re-modded by John about three months ago and a friend of mine had his done last month. We are both pleased with the changes. Mine already had the super mod package and his had no previous mods. The latest mods strike me as more "analogue." Break in continues to be lengthy for John's mods. The unit didn't settle until about 150 hours. During that time, it was very disconcerting. Some recordings sounded like they'd been "re-mixed." Fortunately, everything returned to normal but with improvements in bass (more tautness and more extension), less digital harshness and an even wider and deeper soundstage...."

Spoke with John last night. It seems that the comments of the folks who did the modifications recently are not relevant and the new 2010 modification were not yet implemented on any DACs out there. The new modifications are mostly in PS and analog stage, not the parts swapping but actually circuit change. John very positively commented about his new changes. It is hard to say. We never met him and we never were listening the same sound and correlate our notes after all. From different perspective 3 modifications that John did on my Bidat over the year never took me to the direction that I did not like. So, I decided to try and to see what would happen - the Bidat will riding to Canada next week…

I have a very good grip what Bidat does in my playback as it runs parallel to Lavry Gold and I know very precise what the difference is. It would be very interesting what the Bidat 2010 would do. If John will be able to get out of Bidat the same quality of bass that Lavry Gold has then it will be fantastic.  Let see how it goes….

miab wrote:

Do you think the Bidat will be back before the move for impressions on the mods? It might be hard to tell what/if the mods make a difference in a positive directions if you throw a whole new room into it. Your experimental control group will be dismantled. If it hasn't gone yet it might be wise to hold off on the mods until you get a thorough idea what your current Bidat does in new room. That is if you think the Bidat won't be back before the move and you don't have a second Bidat that sounds identical to the one you want to send to John.

miab wrote:

Romy, My Bidat being extremely sensitive to incoming electricity and now with Purepower in my mix I am getting to know my Bidat in a new light. I did think I had a grasp of what the Bidat could and couldn't do but feeding it through Purepower it has grown on it's previous strengths but added others. The space and imaging that is it's hallmarks are greatly expanded. A little confusion and smearing in complex passages is completely gone now. All sounds tangent independently now and can be followed as such but also in bigger space. It is wonderfull. It was my secondary dac for awhile but not anymore.

miab wrote:

Now that your midbass horns are dialed in and the electricity is back for you like pre-move days have you any observations on sub 140hz performance of your Bidat since latest power supply modifications by John? Does it approach the Lavry bass in particular? Do you still confirm that above 140hz it is still as was since your electricity is sorted now?

"Among the disadvantages I would name /

2) 20 Bit and 44 kHz maximum. It reads 20 bit but it toss the 4 bit internally and in reality it posses 16Bit."

miab wrote:

Romy,  You have mentioned somewhere in the Bidat-Lavry thread about the Bidat being a 20 bit dac but throws out 4 bits (quote below). But, you have also stated that you play 20/44.1 files from your pc set-up into the Bidat and more specifically to compare the Lavry and Bidat. I am now into recording files at higher rates and bit depth but will keep second copies to play through the Bidat. I'm specifically taking 24/96 and resampling to 20/48 which the Bidat plays fine. Can I ask where or how you came upon this info about the Bidat tossing the 4 bits internally? "Among the disadvantages I would name / 2) 20 Bit and 44 kHz maximum. It reads 20 bit but it toss the 4 bit internally and in reality it posses 16Bit."

miab wrote:

Yes the Bidat does lock 48khz very well and so does the Idat-m. Something even more suprising and coming from someone that knows these dacs very well is that on a few samples of Bidat they even lock at 96khz! Alas I am not so lucky. Mine is 44.1 and 48 only. I downsamle 88.2 to 44.1 and 96 to 48 for simplicity of computer processing and the elimination of any potential issue's.   About bits. The datasheet for TDA1547 clearly states 108db of dynamic range for this chip which would be in line with a 18 bit dac. A 20 bit dac should in theory be capable of 120db. I'm not sure what to make of this. I have played the same tracks at both 16 bit and 20 bit and at this time I believe the 20 bit to have the slightest of advantages. I must admit that I might not be able to tell in blind testing at this point. 48khz vs 44.1khz is easy to tell though. http://www.datasheetcatalog.org/datasheet/philips/TDA1547.pdf

Miab, Bidat specification said that it is 16 to 20 bit input.

http://www.museatex.com/bidat.htm

…but the last 4 bit of 20Bit signal will not be processed. I did research that subject in past myself and asked a few different people. I do not remember already who explained it to me, it might be John Write. You are in Canada, get in tosh with him and he can shade more light for you - ff Bidat has true 18Bit chip then it very much might toss out  not 4 upper bits out 20 bit stream as I said above but 2 bits. BTW, I do not recognize 18bit – it does not make sense to me. If you are in CD-compatible world then you at 16 bit and this is your threshold. If you jump out of the CD would and right-read uncompressed PCM files then why would you limit yourself with 18 or 20 bit – you for sure would go for full 24 bit. Well, there is no such a thing as true 24 bit or cause but why not to use the max bit depth is available? 

Also, as I said – I am very surprised that Bidat reads 48K. I was trying to feed Bidat with 88K and it does not like it. Bidat shall recognize the sampling rate in the incoming stream and PLL own clock to source. Usually the phase-locked loops in DACss are very narrow and this is why most of the DACs that do 44X and 48X has in fact two different clocks. Does Bidat has such a wide PLL window that is tune itself to 48K? That would be funny but since you report it I guess it is funny.