— Est. 1999 —
 
The all too common effect of jitter has seemingly prevented us from extracting musical satisfaction from digital playback for over two decades. Its characteristics {hardness, lack of dimensionality, weak undefined bass, grit, etc....} epitomize the term "amusical" We at RAM highly recommend the solution to jitter-The Superclock 4! This modification has provided us to re-think the possibilities of just how good digital can sound. Engineered and produced by Audiocom-UK, the Superclock 4 is based on a unique circuit to minimize the effect of jitter. Your music will profoundly step into the room with greater clarity, much improved imaging, higher "palp" factor, and most of all greater musicality. To our amazement, the improvements do not seem bounded to lower priced units. Reference Audio Mods is the North American Distributor for Audiocom International Products! -Worldwide installation available! RAM highly suggests combining the SC4 clock with the dedicated SC4 Power Supply, and in addition to this, power supply mods/rebuilds and analog output section rebuilds to your player for a whole new sensation in digital audio playback.
Superclock 4 Technical Data: Supply Voltage: - + 7V - +18V DC. Temp co. +/- 2ppm accuracy. Jitter:- Less than 2 ps RMS (10Hz to 100KHz). Size:- L= 63mm x W= = 31mm x H =15mm. Mounting:- 2x 4mm fixing holes. Clock output voltage:- Adjustable 3.3V or 5.0V p-p. Clock Output:- Gold plated SMB jack and SMB cable assembly The Journey of Jitter Compact Disc or CD as it is more widely known arrived with us in 1982 and was set to be the musical format which offered ‘perfect sound forever’. The phrase used to promote CD was soon to become words of ridicule since the sound reproduction from CD’s was regarded as a disappointment by many and the format was largely ignored by users of LP records. Why? Early CD’s were flawed for a variety of reasons. Early CD’s were mastered with full respect to the 96db loudness limit stipulated by engineers at the time. The mastering process did not use any clipping; the level of the recording was not pushed and often with a great amount of “headroom” went unused. Digital was only perfect at full level; at lower levels it was very imperfect and distorted heavily. This behaviour as well as CD’s being made from LP cutting masters, poor implementation of dither; poor A/D converters and jitter, and we start to understand why the majority of early CD players sound brittle, edgy, grainy & harsh. Technology advancements have seen CD mastering techniques improve, A/D converter quality is now capable of high resolution, but one aged problem still plagues CD and any other digital format right through to the playback system; “jitter”. In this decade jitter is a known and understood problem, but the majority of digital playback systems continue to use simple, poor quality passive master clocks with high levels of phase noise, power supply noise, the net result of which is high jitter. Inside your CD, DVD, SACD Player A standard, OEM (original Equipment Manufacturer) master clock will be derived from a CMOS hex inverter gate. This inverter can be in the form of a dedicated chip (HC74U04), or a similar gate available from a servo processor, digital filter, DAC or PLL chip of the player. Alternatively, a commodity oscillator is used; an inverter based oscillator sealed in a metal screening can. This type of oscillator is normally a TXCO (Temperature Compensated), the only advantage of which is higher accuracy, lower drift in terms of frequency and screening. Such clock oscillators have poor audio performance for several reasons; the oscillator circuit (pierce) is based on feedback and has very poor Signal to Noise ratio, thus giving the oscillator a poor S/N ratio or high jitter level. The selected crystals have low Q and a used in parallel mode, a method which is highly susceptible to digital noise injection. The phase noise of the OEM oscillator is degraded further by the CD players 3-terminal, generic regulators which have poor bandwidth, poor ripple rejection and high noise. The oscillator uses a shared power supply with high levels of noise injection from associated circuits, i.e., digital servo. This results in varying levels of power supply and data related jitter. Jitter which is manifested by reduced resolution, reduced dynamics, closed-in sound-stage, tonal hardness, compression, poor timing; an unnatural, unrealistic reproduction of music. The End of the Road for “Jitter”. A radically better solution is required to solve the problems with the industry standard master clock. That solution has been made possible by extensive research and development by Audiocom in to very low jitter master clock oscillators. The developments arrive with the Superclock master clock series which has seen considerable advancements since its inception. Now in its 4th generation, the new Superclock 4 moves the game forward for the standard of digital playback. True sine wave oscillator. The Superclock 4 uses discrete high-performance oscillator topology to provide a pure sine with lowest phase noise. The oscillator utilises very high-Q crystals; low noise, wide bandwidth RF transistors; thin-film resistors & NPO capacitors. Fast Sine-to-Square. The integrity of the pure sine wave is maintained by fast and accurate conversion to a square wave by employing an ultra-fast comparator circuit. The comparator features separate analogue and digital power supplies, achieves an extremely fast rise time and very low jitter. Ultra-Low Noise, Ultra-High Precision Regulation. Excellent rejection of power supply noise is a key step in rejecting jitter. Superclock 4 has two onboard regulated power supplies dedicated to the analogue and digital circuits. The regulated power supplies use a central voltage reference with Ultra-Low noise, Ultra-High precision. The proprietary low noise reference produces an extremely low 35nV of wideband noise and 1.2µV p-p @ 0.1-10Hz and excellent PSSR. The precise, stable reference voltage is amplified within a closed loop, wide bandwidth noise cancelling circuit. Optimised PCB Layout. The design and layout of the PCB is critical to success. The Superclock 4 adopts RF layout techniques with controlled-impedance lines, Gold-plating to minimise skin effect, short RF signal paths, no vias in the RF circuitry and low inductance vias for power supplies. Music to Drench Your Senses The Superclock 4 takes a significant step forward in producing a more resolving & analogue like presentation from any digital medium. With Superclock 4 installed in your CD, SACD or DVD player the music is no longer locked in the loudspeakers and has an expansive, focused sound-stage with a real sense of presence in your listening room. Music is free flowing, agile, controlled, without compression or strain and remains coherent even with the most complex recordings. All digital formats have a significant increase in resolution & dynamics realising the accuracy, depth and control available from the digital medium. The ‘kick drum has accurate timing and pitch, while piano notes are full-bodied, vibrant with natural timbre. Vocals have a tangible ‘in the room’ feel and presence with a cleanliness and natural rarity. Subtle differences, meaning and expression in vocals can be clearly discerned. Get the Superclock 4 Experience Digital audio has the potential to give a realistic, natural and convincing reproduction of the real event. While new formats extend the resolution of digital audio, jitter prevails and remains a limiting factor. Superclock 4 is the solution for jitter and will allow you to get an engaging, realistic and musical listening experience from CD, SACD & DVD-A, while improving picture quality and surround sound for DVD-V. Contact us today to book and schedule an installation of Superclock 4 and other high performance modifications to revolutionize the performance of your digital source. | ||||||||||
|
|
|
||||||||||||||
|
|
|
||||||||||||||
|
Privacy Notice | Terms and Conditions | Copyright © 2007 Reference Audio Mods. All rights reserved. |
||||||||||||||||
|
|
Kyle Takenaga
Reference Audio Mods Worldwide Hello music lovers! My name is Kyle Takenaga owner of Reference Audio Mods. I have been a passionate audiophile for over 30 years. Please enjoy our website!!. |
|
Why Choose RAM over the competition?
Reason number One... We use the World's finest parts! We only deal with the best. Our exclusive parts suppliers Audiocom and Audio Consulting are arguably the best in the world at what they do. |
|
Why Modify?
We can Modify any make or model of CD/DVD/SACD Player/transport, Processor, Digital to Analog Converter, Preampliers and Amplifiers on the market. Every single stock piece is manufactured to a price point and uses sub-par quality parts. If you have something you would like to inquire about modifying that is not on the list on the left side of your screen, Please email to inquire for custom quotation! We can accomodate all budgets!! |