MarcelNL

I'm using red copper crimp lugs from the electrician's supply, available in many sizes. I use the Dremel to cut out the upper half of the crimp connector to allow soldering in wire. 3 x AWG 12 is no issue :-)

Those final steps towards more natural and organic sound are IMHO huge, yet they come at great expense... I do not consider a difference of 20-30% for 10K an unreasonable amount, it's a hyperbole... I am transitioning from a gigabyte Master with Ryzen 16 core to a dual 4210 Xeon board right now, and what i heard from the Asus Sage using fans is WAY more refined than what the Ryzen is capable of....I did the full ante, went all the steps starting at a dual core NUC ..step by step so I have loads of cash invested but the journey is worth it IMHO.

I only ever used the Taiko ATX DCDC, but that was a huge improvement over a switching corsair 1200aix The saligny power GaN v2 was a very nice improvement over the taiko active rectifier, the v1 was already slightly better.

nice work! Turn off everything you do not absolutely need was my take home message using a NUC a few years ago, also; try feed the SSD externally and EMI shield the cables and wrap the SSD and RAM in the same stuff.

not having a c;lear demand also means there will not be many products...a year ago even Emile from taiko denounced using I2S as a silly exercise in futility ;-) Folks like nenon also go through continuous learning, what I held for great sound 10 years ago is not something I'd want to live with today....just look back at the discussion about chokes in the ULPS... @seeteeyou I have never heard the 'superiority of JL sounds...I2S over USB sounds like a silly idea to me in comparison to a well executed I2S. I have been using I2S since the late 90ies and have never heard a format that outperformed it but who knows...I'll continue this quest ;-)

interesting stuff, but none of it thus far is going to deliver I2S from a PCIe slot.....can we stay on topic please?

I know someone who powered his streamer with the ULPS and Taiko ATX, with good result! For sure a DAC will benefit from a great PSU, when I have time enough I may get around to modding the Adagio at some point, its PSU is good but likely not stellar. I'd be looking at an active GaN v2 rectifier by Saligny followed by a CLCLC using Martin Mug Hi-B cut chokes ,plenty of Mundorf 4 pole AG caps and Sean Jacobs DC4 modules and loads of ultra high end bypass caps to get rid of all the digital crud

the beauty of Angelo's case is that you have some room between the heatsink and motherboard....in my enthusiasm I forgot to take that into account...so I ended up making a slide out carrier for the MB but the sequence of assembly gets a bit weird....I need to connect the MB side of the ATX and EPS cables first, slide in the MB, and then wiggle the heatpipes through in likely through my wiring loom as I doubt I can bend the ATX loom made of 14AWG solid core UPOCC... getting close to a test run, then to dissassemble everything for EMI and paint...yuck.

thanks!, did you bend the loom sideways? I was planning on suspending the ATX module from above the motherboard as to use shortest cable possible, Obviously I'm not using the Taiko or Angelo case but a DIY case allowing the heatpipes to go straight horizontally out of the case through the slits you see in the picture before going up to the heatsinks...my best bet is likely to connect the ATX wires before putting the heatpipes in place and pushing the heatpipes through in between the cables.

@AngeloVRA I just noticed a stupid oversight by me....the power connectors to the Sage MB are directly below the heatpipe adapters....making it a serious challenge to use stiff 14 AWG UPOCC...and another major challenge to thread the heatpipes through any wiring. The uper CPU in the picture below is doable with some fuzz, the lower one probably is a new nerve wrecking game...

just measure the bend radius of the tool and measure the angles you need that with the required lengths should get you close enough since you can manipulate the final product a bit. The less bends the better but that is probably out of your hands....in my DIY case I'm going straight up, one 90 degree bend is all that is required.and 'water' flow will never be an issue I reckon.

Thanks a million Angelo! I'll be giving my heatpipes a final try later today and if the tool works I'm done if not I'll contact Quick-Ohm as that likely is as fast as getting a forth bending tool ;-) EDIT: as I was typing the brake line bending tool arrived, I just made a test piece and it works perfectly. Not as small a radius as the factory bends but a 90 degree angle within ~2.5cm is good enough for my use.

@AngeloVRA Did you get a response from the company? I need some 90 degree angles bent and can not get the current batch of heatpipes to behave, as a last resort is a bending tool for car brake pipes which is on its way but if that fails I need someone to do it.

I'm refurbishing/restoring a 16"transcription turntable for that sort of stuff in mono

there will be a difference in temperature, and perhaps in perceived Sound Quality, yet who else then you can make the final conclusion whether its worth it?