Schiit USB Modi Cap Upgrade

derek92994

Veteran and General Yakker
Joined
May 1, 2013
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Australia
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Those who enter the man cave will get WOPLed
#1
Acquired this one, big thanks to VSAT88 for sending it to me for the cost of Postage.

The purpose was to upgrade the poor sound on the new PC, since the upgrade I have lost the Asus Xonar as it is not PCI express and wont work in the new mainboard, so it remains in the old PC. I tried the Schiit and it was a big difference to the onboard sound, there is also zero latency unlike a very noticeable delay with my very old sound blaster external dac, so another improvement.

IMG_0667.JPG IMG_0668.JPG

Couldn't help but take the lid off and see what was inside:

IMG_0669.JPG IMG_0671.JPG

Was half way through working on it when I took this pic ^^, underside with the C-Media CM6631 USB Input Chip, 24-bit AKM4396 DAC, and Analog Devices AD8616 OPamp.

The simplicity of it surprised me, for what it does. Time for a capacitor upgrade.

10v 2200uf Nichicon VZ replaced with Nichicon UKA
2x 6.3 100uf Nichicons replaced with Elna Silmics
2x 50v 2.2uf Wimas replaced with Wima MKP10

When these caps arrived it was a WTF moment, they look like motor start capacitors, huge, so I had no choice but to use some wire.

IMG_0672.JPG

I looked these up and they are very good for audio, but I had no idea they were so big. Fills the Schiit quite nicely, looks like there's a bit more to it now. They are now attached to the board, are removable, but wont move.

It sounds very good, the caps are working well, break in point will be interesting. I will need to compare it to the Xonar, which is internal, has a lot more to it and runs a OPA2134A OPamp.
 

VSAT88

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Like my BlueTooth ?
#2
Damn, I guess I better get busy ! Thanks for the post. I had thought in the past about hot rodding the Modi and now I gotta jump right on in. I have not had mine apart so, we will see.
 
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