How the switching power in the NAS affects the sound quality

Posted by: bb7668 on 05 March 2012

After spending more than a week in:-

  1. setting up the NAS (the latest Synology 712+);
  2. copying the music files into the NAS while preserving iTune file structure;
  3. hunting for the cat. 7 lan cables;
  4. extracting the embedded album art from the 15,000 plus aiff formatted songs so that the album cover could properly displayed in the iPad; and
  5. trying out and comparing the different iPad remote software (e.g. n-Stream, Plug Player and DS Audio),

I finally managed to get the Naim ND5 XS up and running and the music files could now be streamed from the NAS to the player without a hitch. 

 

However, the excitement was rather short lived.  Whilst the instrumental presentation was analytical enough, I found the vocal part was a hint harsh and aggressive.  May be I was exaggerating, it sounded as if the singer's throat was a little bit too dry and there were very slight rough edges at times.

 

Some members in other forums commented that the main culprit is the stock 12v 6A switching transformer that used to power up the NAS.  This appeared to be some sense in this proposition as the NAS was essentially functioning as a CD transport to transfer the data.   Accordingly, the quality of the power supply of the NAS does play an important role in the overall scheme of things.  To tackle this problem, someone actually tried to use an Energizer 18000 Battery Power Pack (18000mah!) to power the NAS and claimed to achieve good result.  Personally, I would not go as far as that but I was currently very tempted to buy a linear transformer for the NAS.

 

Here, I would like to check if any member has found  the sound of the Naim ND5 XP a little bit harsh/hard when the data (music file) is streamed from the NAS.  Specifically, has any member actually replaced the stock switching transformer provided by Synology with a better substitute? 

 

Many thanks in advance!!

 

P.S.  Alternatively, I am thinking if the harshness or aggressiveness is caused by the cat. 7 lan cable.  I will try to experiment with cat.6 lan cable later on. 

 

 

 

Posted on: 05 March 2012 by PinkHamster

bb7668,

 

while I am not an advocator of SQ influences of servers and patch cables and will therefore and because of lacking experience refrain from an answer to your question, may I still ask to which conclusion you have come with regard to the control app? Which one do you prefer?

 

Also, why did you have to extract the cover art from the files? Was this due to the app which you have ultimatey chosen? I would have thought that the display capability was a matterof the server rather than of the control point. But I may be wrong here.

Posted on: 05 March 2012 by winkyincanada
Originally Posted by bb7668:

 This appeared to be some sense in this proposition as the NAS was essentially functioning as a CD transport to transfer the data.   Accordingly, the quality of the power supply of the NAS does play an important role in the overall scheme of things. 

 

Nope. Output data from CD transports are "clocked" and transferred in real time. That is, the bits need to be delivered at precise time intervals (failure to do this is "jitter"). Your NAS only transfers files to your ND5XS. There is plenty of redundancy in the way this happens that we can be sure the files are error-free. (Not so with CD transports trying to work in real time). Your ND5XS then reads these files and creates the data stream that is clocked into the DAC.

 

To me, the only plausible way a power supply on an NAS can affect sound quality is if some sort of interference leaks all the way to the analogue side of the DAC (or pre-amp, or power-amp). This can be via earths or transmitted through the airwaves as RFI. This is why the Naim goes to such trouble in the NDS with an optical decoupling and RFI screening to keep the analogue section as "clean" as possible.

 

Does power supply quality to your NAS matter? Maybe, but not in the way, or for the reasons, you perhaps think.

Posted on: 06 March 2012 by bb7668

Dear PinkHamster,

 

Regarding the control app, I would recommend DS Audio if you are using the Synology NAS.  It is free and fast.  Moreover, the "search" function really works and you can create playlist on the fly - very handy indeed.  Naim's n-Stream, in my opinion, is just OK and its "search" function never seems to work.  Further, I believe n-Stream intentionally lowered the resolution of the album art displaying on the iPad so as to speed up the loading the album art thumnail.  To me, this is rather annoying.

 

In relation to the display of the album art, it is a long story.  In the past, I am sort of stuck with Apple and naturally I choose its own proprietary music format (i.e. AIFF).  In all fairness, the AIFF is not a bad format.  First of all, it is a lossless and uncompressed format.  Further, the album art can be "embedded" into the music file itself and this make it rather "transportable".

 

Happy ending?  Far from it.  One of the biggest drawbacks of using this AIFF format is its compatibility.  For example, the media server of the Synology cannot read the embedded album art of a music file.  Foobar in Windows cannot display the album art of an AIFF music file in Windows either. 

 

To tackle this problem, you have to manually insert the album art (in the form of a jpg file to be named as cover.jpg) in the relevant folder of the music file.  The media server or Foobar will then look for this cover.jpg file and display it accordingly.

 

This is particularly painful as you well know that the album art is already embedded in each of the songs in that folder.   Fortunately, some of the learned members of this forum advised me to use a Mac-based software called "Image Fetch" and it is capable of extracting the already embedded album art and automatically creating a separate "cover.jpg" file in the relevant directory.  I almost bursted into tears to witness how "Image Fetch" helped me to automatically generate the requistie "cover.jpg" files for my entire music collection (over 1,100 albums). 

Posted on: 06 March 2012 by RaceTripper

WIll the Synology stream ALAC files to the Naim ND5/Uniti, etc.? I am interesting in getting a Synology DS212J to replace my MacBook Pro for streaming, and have only found ambiguous/inconclusive info about ALAC support on the NAS side.

Posted on: 06 March 2012 by PinkHamster

bb7668.

 

you have my full sympathy. I've been through that myself, but for a different reason.

 

I was simply fed up with having to embed the album art and found it much handier to simply copy it into the folder.

 

My tool was MP3Tag.

Posted on: 06 March 2012 by Simon-in-Suffolk

Hi, as said the NAS is completely decoupled from the synchronicity of the audio data samples (assuming you are not using USB or SPDIF but Ethernet).

Harshness can come fromvarious sources.

Your ND5 XS is new? Have you let it run in over many days for it to bed in?

If so  and you still find harsh and your other sources have not or not sounding harsh, the next possible culprit is RFI. As said RFI conducts through any dielectric such as air and any conductor that is looselycoupled like a mains lead, Ethernet lead, interconnect etc.

Try playing from a USB memory stick... Then

Disconeect the Ethernet or power off the wifi, is that nicer?

Poweroff and unplagg the NAS. Is that nicer?

 

( as you will see RF does not need to eminate from the active source to be a pain)

You will likely find something that changes the sound. Report back and we can suggest my ideas for mitigating it.

 

Ypu might find your NAS is injecting horrible noise (RFI)  on the mains or your Ethernet lead is very noisy etc or it is just possible you don't like the sound of the ND5 XS......

 

Simon

Posted on: 07 March 2012 by bb7668

Dear Winkyincanada and Simon,

 

Thanks very much for your messages.

 

Yes, my ND5 is quite new - less than 3 weeks old.  I am using the ethernet to stream the data from the NAS to ND5 exclusively.  I did not use the USB port for feeding the music files to the Naim.

 

Simon, you have raised an interesting proposition regarding the RFI.  Due to space constraint, my wireless router are actually place quite close to the back of the ND5 (with the wifi antenna crossing the RCA cables).  My bad.

 

I will try out in the next free days the various control test you have suggest and see if there is any improvement.  Many thanks.

Posted on: 08 March 2012 by 0rangutan

Hey bb,

 

I think the physical proximity is the issue then.

IP packets will be utterly unaffected by the NAS power supply and the ND5XS will reassemble these in buffer before converting them into audio.

Having a "noisy" power supply anywhere near the ND5XS is almost certainly a problem though.

One of the great things about a NAS is that it doesn't have to be anywhere near your player - can you move it somewhere else in the house?