PS Audio NuWave DSD - Use only a high quality shielded power cable; Playing DSD; Playing DoP

®
Quick Start Guide
Owner’s Reference NuWave DSD
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Quick Start Guide
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Once everything has been connected, use a high quality AC cable to power the NuWave DSD.
DACs in particular are quite sensitive to AC power and produce a bit of line noise themselves.
Make sure you have a high quality, shielded power cable to power the NuWave DSD, such as a
PS Audio AC Series cable.
Power matters greatly. If you consider that everything we hear and see in our audio and video
systems is modulated AC from the wall, you can begin to understand the impact power has on
quality. The power supply in the NuWave DSD takes the AC from the home’s wall outlet and
converts it to DC, like battery voltage. Musical signals are then used to modulate the DC to feed
your preamplifi er or power amplifi er. The quality of the DC power modulated by the musical signal
is critical to the sonic success of the system.
Use of high quality power cables and appropriate power conditioning, like PS Audio’s AC
regenerating Power Plants is essential for great sound.
The NuWave DSD is capable of playing DSD as its name implies. DSD is a one bit format that many
regard as the closest to analog recordings and prize for its naturalness in musical presentation.
Few physical discs contain DSD recordings. SACDs, Sony’s proprietary Super Audio Compact
Discs, are among the few that contain DSD recordings. SACDs are encrypted so the raw DSD
cannot typically be extracted for playback via a computer, requiring the use of a SACD player.
SACD players typically do not output DSD as doing so can be in violation of Sony copyrights
agreements with their artists. Digital outputs on SACD players output PCM from the SACD’s Red
Book layer and these will not light the DSD indicator on the NuWave’s front panel.
Most DSD fi les available to play through the NuWave DSD will be acquired through downloads
from providers that support the format. Thus, most DSD is played from a computer or server over
USB.
The NuWave DSD will only accept DSD in DoP format. DoP (DSD over PCM) conversion is
available through many popular programs, such as JRiver, DSD Master (Bit Perfect), and other
player programs, as well as built into some servers. Use of DoP does not impact sound quality in
any way.
There is a common misconception that DoP conversion changes 1-bit DSD to multi-bit PCM, thus
destroying the 1-bit advantage. Nothing could be further from the truth. Conversion from DSD to
DoP simply breaks the continuous DSD 1-bit signal into discrete blocks of virgin 1-bit data with
an added header for ID purposes. Once received over USB, the PS Audio NuWave discards the
DoP header data and reassembles pristine 1-bit DSD information back into a continuous stream,
places it into a RAM buffer, where it is output as perfect raw DSD to the DAC itself.
Native DSD that has not gone through the DoP process can be played on the NuWave DSD only
through the I
2
S input.
Use only a high
quality shielded
power cable
Playing DSD
Playing DoP
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