Wyred4Sound - Do clocks age?

Do the clocks degrade with time? I have wondered about this as well, but I think the electrolytic caps will give up long before the clocks do.

Do the clocks degrade with time? I have wondered about this as well ...

I have no particular knowledge regarding that question, but it wouldn't surprise me if such concerns arose as a result of flawed extrapolations from the fact that over time digital watches and clocks gain or lose time.  "Flawed" for two reasons:

1)That would occur to some degree even if nothing at all in the watch or clock changes over time, just as a consequence of its initial inaccuracy.

2)If the master oscillator in such a device were to gain or lose the equivalent of say a minute per year, due to some combination of initial inaccuracy and changes in accuracy that may occur over time, that would amount over a period of 10 years to an error of less than 0.002%.  In a digital audio device that would result in a corresponding change in pitch, which would seem unlikely to be perceivable even to those having perfect pitch.  0.002% would mean, for example, that a tone of 1000 Hz would be reproduced as 1000.02 Hz.

What might matter is significant degradation over time in the jitter performance of the device, but FWIW I am not aware of any credible evidence that would raise concern about that possibility.

Regards,
-- Al
  

So have any of you received your Remedy reclockers yet, and have you had a chance to listen? I began writing about my experience with it (it's doing some very nice things in my system) but haven't posted it yet because it has turned into a full-blown review and I'm still editing it. I hope to have it ready soon.

Mine should arrive tomorrow.  I probably should get my ARC DAC 8 out and start warming it up.

My test bed will be using a Logitech Squeezebox Touch to the ARC.  Based on Hi Fi, the ARC is quite sensiutive to jitter except in the USB portion. We'll see if I hear anything.

I really regret ordering it, right now the Mytek DAC's are on sale and I should have ordered one instead. :)  Well, I'm sure I'll have it on Audiogon soon. :)

Best,


Erik

Mine has just arrived. My DAC has been cold for weeks, so it's hard to tell. At the very least it does not suck. I'm listening to my local classical station via the Squeezebox. 

The direct connection is via coax, while the W4S is via opticals.  I looked inside, it uses one of the best Crystek oscillators.   Considering the overall price point not bad.

Erik