There is a relay bypass when the unit is off. So you are adding a length of wire plus a pair of interconnects. It will depend on your hearing and system if you can hear that. As you can appreciate, it would be very bothersome to do an A/B with the unit in and off the chain.
Thank you for the responses. Kind of surprised since audiophiles (especially vinyl fans) can towards trying all sorts of tweaks to ensure that they are getting the best sound. Not a troll comment, just a thought from a fairly OCD audiophile
For my own future purposes, if I dont have a tape loop, would an rca splitter to 2 separate preamp inputs be a way to test this?
It sounds practically transparent when actually engaged.. so testing actual bypass is IMHO pointless, unless you are believer that several feet of RCA interconnect can "totally change the sound, (insert audiophile blabber here)". I am running (totally, to Sugarcube and back) 6 feet of relatively cheap Signal Cable Analog One interconnect and cannot hear any difference.
At this point I don't care. The SC is a game changer. There's no going back from it once experienced, and I wouldn't want to do anything to upset that position. This is one instance where this audiophile would take any hit in sound quality that might be discovered and keep the SC in the loop.
Question regarding SugarCube SC-1 PLUS - are most owners using the power supply that comes with the unit or upgrading to an aftermarket power supply?
many years ago, following an extensive investigation into stuff like that, I concluded that I was devoting time that could be spent enjoying music to trying to detect (or imagine) the trivial differences of a comparatively irrelevant phenomenon. Basically, I broke down and admitted that I listen to music in living room conditions, not in an anechoic chamber. (I'm not much for headphones, arguably the only way to critically audition the sound quality content of a recording.) This isn't just true of reproduced recordings, it's also true of live performance. In an ambient environment, there's no virtual perfect bubble of live music performance that transmits its purity to the ears of the listeners. Conceivably, you could get close to that, if you had a campfire concert out in the desert on a windless night. Except for that horrible crackling and popping, from the fire. And you never step into the same river twice. The response of a normally functioning human auditory system shifts back and forth more from hour to hour than the differences to be detected from the presence or absence of switches and cables in a monitor loop.
These look really interesting tools. I’m really careful to try and only buy NM or new vinyl but with over 1,000 albums of course I have some with clicks/pops. A weird phenomena I noticed is that sometimes when I get a pop I’ll clean it with a toothpick and it’s almost like it “bursts” and I’ve been left instead with a brief passage of “crackle”. It’s almost as if a dust ball has burst and disbursed dust into the grooves, sounding similar to non-fill. This has only happened a couple times but I’d be interested to see how the Sugarcube handles that. On that note, can it do anything to improve/eliminate non-fill? (Logic is telling me no, but it would be cool if it did.)
It would seem to me the only way to test this is to have it plugged into the Tape Monitor loop with it set to Bypass. You could then switch the Tape Monitor on and off. Then again if there was a difference, it could be something introduced by the Tape Monitor loop itself. You could not test this by removing the cables and getting it out of the circuit. Too much time would be lost removing/plugging in the cables and switching the source while doing this to avoid feedback. Sweet Vinyl says they use an "audiophile" quality relay, whatever that is. It sounds like they took the necessary steps to insure the SC in Bypass is pretty much going to be inaudible to most people. I know I really don't hear it when it is doing click and pop removal, nevermind Bypass mode.
I'm using a Farad3 with my SC1-Plus. All I can say right now is that this combo sounds significantly better than the SC1 with stock supply, but I have yet to do an A/B of SC1-Plus with the stock power supply. But, given these are digital devices, I would expect sound improvements to follow improvements of power supply.
The newer Sugarcubes claim an improved DAC chip. The original chip was an AKM which is no longer available since the plant burned down. It's a big deal to re-engineer around a different chip. Not sure what the new chip is but the original AKM was highly regarded. Makes me wonder if those of us with the original AKM units are better off sound quality wise. Just a thought.
I'm pretty certain that the chips are the same in the current production units. Dan has previously specified that they had put aside enough of the AKM chips to fulfill their pre-order quota of all units, and that future models/units would have to have a newly-engineered AD/DA system, utilizing a different chip. I'm sure he'll correct me if I'm mistaken, but that's my understanding of the situation. - Kevin
A nice little update for those of us who have been waiting so patiently...: ******************************* Dear SC-2 Plus Pre-order buyers, We are happy to report we have now built and successfully tested 25 units – 15 Black and 10 Silver – and we have the rest of the sub-assemblies programmed to assemble and test eight more over the next two days. The first batch has passed burn in – and the second batch is in burn-in now. The final batch will go in later this week. After that we do final assembly – another quick test – and then packaging for shipment. These are pretty complicated units to assemble and test and there were a couple of engineering items to work out different from the SC-1 Plus – but we are now close enough to let you know that over the next two-three weeks we will be reaching out to confirm shipping addresses, update any other information about your color choice and collect any shipping amounts for international destinations. So thank you being very patient this last few months as we got in the position to be ready to start final assembly next week. Best Regards. SweetVinyl ****************************** Almost there...! - Kevin
After using the SC1-mini for a couple of months now, I keep wondering if I should have just gotten a unit with the recording capability. I will keep an eye on this thread for reviews from SC-2 plus purchasers, to see if the needle drop function is stable and easy enough even for a klutz like me.