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Hagene
3
Feb 26, 2016
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One thing I've noticed is that when I connect it to my power amp, the noise floor is significantly higher than when I connect my Emotiva DC-1 to the amp. But I guess that has its natural explanantion in that I use balanced XLR cables with that. Is there anything I can do tho, shorter cabels, better shielding? I bought shielded RCA cables for it off ebay but I guess there might be better brands who work more effectivly.
CalebRoberts
56
Feb 27, 2016
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HageneYou could examine the grounding of the components of your system. Note that the Emotiva DC-1 is earth grounded by its AC power cord. m9xx is grounded only by the shield and ground conductor of the USB cable. You'll want to make sure that you're not conducting ground currents from your computer to your power amp through the m9xx via the cable shields. Are your computer and amp properly earth grounded (to the same ground point)?
Notebook computers typically have isolated power supplies typically leaving the cabling (through m9xx) as the only ground path - and any such isolated supply can be suspect for leakage from the primary (AC inputs). And, any USB power supply you have connected to the 5V 2.0 jack on m9xx could be leaky - creating multiple ground loops. If you're using a notebook, this could be a tricky problem to solve - to make a solid low-impedance connection from the chassis of the computer to the same earth ground as your power amp.
I was just helping a friend debug his noisy system the other day. He was surprised to find that of 4 adjacent power outlets in his listening room , two had common earth ground, 2 had grounds that were unconnected and none were the same potential as neutral - they should be connected together at the circuit breaker. That room had been re-wired by a professional a decade ago. His expensive audiophile CD player had a leaky power supply and its RCA connections were not earth grounded and so had a 50VAC potential with no connection. There's plenty of ways to go wrong if you don't have proper grounding.
Notebook computers typically have isolated power supplies typically leaving the cabling (through m9xx) as the only ground path - and any such isolated supply can be suspect for leakage from the primary (AC inputs). And, any USB power supply you have connected to the 5V 2.0 jack on m9xx could be leaky - creating multiple ground loops. If you're using a notebook, this could be a tricky problem to solve - to make a solid low-impedance connection from the chassis of the computer to the same earth ground as your power amp.
I was just helping a friend debug his noisy system the other day. He was surprised to find that of 4 adjacent power outlets in his listening room , two had common earth ground, 2 had grounds that were unconnected and none were the same potential as neutral - they should be connected together at the circuit breaker. That room had been re-wired by a professional a decade ago. His expensive audiophile CD player had a leaky power supply and its RCA connections were not earth grounded and so had a 50VAC potential with no connection. There's plenty of ways to go wrong if you don't have proper grounding.
Hagene
3
Feb 28, 2016
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CalebRobertsThe electricity in the room is of an old type which doesn't have grounding in the outlets. They are all on the same cable tho. Non of the emotiva gear actually has the capability to go to ground either since they have the connector type which indicates they are but if you look closer they actually only have 2 pins in the connector, not 3. But no I'm not using a laptop, my pc has a corsair AX860i power supply. But the funny thing is when I tested the m9xx with my amplifier, I was using optical output from my computer, so no power through there. And I had it connected to a battery bank. So I don't know, I guess the amp could still be picking up noise tho from other electric sources
Hagene
3
Feb 28, 2016
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CalebRobertsWhat I could do I guess is lay it all out so no cables are crossing eachother etc and disconnect any gear in the room I'm not using. Or try it off another outlet. Not sure if the battery bank could be a source of noise but that seems wierd in my mind.
CalebRoberts
56
Feb 29, 2016
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HageneNot sure - battery pack may have a switch-mode voltage regulator. Probably not the issue but you can determine by using an alternate source. Damaged or defective cables are commonly found to be culprit when problems occur. Try testing with other RCA cables.
Hagene
3
Apr 18, 2016
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CalebRobertsI think I forgot to reply to you, so I'm using the m9xx as my preamp now with some diffrent amps and it works great. I tested the battery pack again now to see if that was the issue but didn't seem like it. So it could have been that my emotiva amp had a high noise floor on the normal rca connectors vs balanced. Thats the only change I made. My plan all along was to use it with a new amp eventually so it worked out.
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