Dac 8 early non DSD model not working properly on USB

franvlad

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Aug 5, 2011
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frank
Hi everybody can anyone advise on setting up of a dac bought from eBay Italy. Below is a copy of the email sent to Kog Audio who have kindly forwarded it to T + A.

But this is driving me crazy and I don't know if I should return the unit or if I am missing a vital piece of info. I have advised vendor and he claims Dac was working perfectly when sent.

I have recently purchased a used T+ A Dac 8 from Italy. This is the original non DSD version serial no 3244-42101-43     2509 3244 00983.

I am hoping that you would be kind enough to offer advice regarding a problem I am having with it on USB replay from a Macbook.

When Usb is selected the dac plays but is very distorted and obviously not right.

I have checked all connections, tried both balanced and unbalanced connections and these are all correct.

The display on the dac reads  AES / Usb 2 and is playing beautifully with a CD player on AES.

USB is a distorted mess.

I have read the instructions online, these are for the later DSD Dac 8 but presumably apply?

I would be most grateful if you could advise me whether the DAC is, in your opinion faulty, or am I missing some fundamental set up procedure.

My other two Dacs operate fine on the same system.

I would be happy to ring you and let you listen to the Dac if you would be prepared to do this.

Thank you very much.
 

franvlad

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frank
Kudos to KOG AUDIO and T+A for their great service. Thank you very much!

Reply as follows in case it may be of interest to anybody else.

Apple has chosen not to accept older drivers in their latest OS versions any more.
For the older TENOR USB receiver (as used in MP3000HV and DAC8)  there will be no new drivers released, 
because the manufacturer of this chip went out of business. So the problems with playing audio files from a Mac are caused by these new OS versions. Up to the older OS X Mavericks (10.9) it must function.

Please note:
The chips of this manufacturer were used by a lot of companies (like Accuphase, Marantz, TEAC, Lindemann, and many other).
All these manufacturers are facing the same problem with the new versions of MAC OS.

The key to solving this issue lies with Apple.
They only have to accept the old (and flawlessly working) drivers in their current OS and everything is ok.

I hope, these informations are helpful.

 

bencat

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Andrew
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Sorry this is in the Spirit of the Wam thread because ?

 

Man in a van

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 So the problems with playing audio files from a Mac are caused by these new OS versions. Up to the older OS X Mavericks (10.9) it must function.
What they are saying in the e-mail, is that the driver will work in  Mavericks, so you will have to (presumably) downgrade the OS that you have installed currently.

I can't advise about your position with regard to returning the dac if this is not acceptable to you.

Ronnie.

Like Andrew, I think that you are in the wrong place, Frank.

 

MrSammy

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This is another reason to prefer SPDIF or ethernet as connections over USB. If the hardware requires a driver then newer OS versions mean the old driver may no longer work as in this case. Even if the company behind the chip hadn't gone bust there is rarely incentive for them to update drivers. I have a perfectly decent flatbed scanner, from a well known manufacturer that is still in business, that won't work on anything post MS Windows Vista. I may be able to get a hacked together Linux driver for it but unless you can reverse engineer protocols you are out of luck. With OS signed drivers it becomes even harder as the OS will refuse to acknowledge your hand crafted driver fix unless you have a proper signing key.

 

Andrei

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Are you not able to copy the old driver to the new OS?  This sort of thing was not uncommon round the era of Win 95, 98, XP.  I have not had to try it out for a long time.

 

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