Which USB reclocker is as good as the Innuos Phoenix USB?

Musician Phoenix? Must be a Chinese Gaia knockoff… This thread was supposedly about the InnuOS version

There was an update due to this: Musician Phoenix DDC Review.

This is an update specific to my dac (Aquarius), basically it states that I2S is the best for the Musician dacs. I wrote about it 3 posts up.

By the way Musician and Denafrips DACs/DDCs are developed by the same team, hence share many similarities.

I thought that was it, the best performance for my dac is achieved by a good DDC using I2S and not the PhoenixUSB.

But then I noticed something a reviewer called Blake wrote, which brings the ball back to the PhoenixUSB court.

According to Blake and another reviewer on this thread the best performance of the Terminator Plus is achieved using I2S from a good DDC clocked by the Terminator’s clock-out signal. However, the issue with the Musician line of DACs is that they don’t have a clock-out signal. Hence, Musician DACs can’t satisfy the first condition in Blake’s list.

I wrote about it in this thread: musician aquarius r2r dac any good?

Here is a curved ball.

The Musician Aquarius/Pegasus DACs don’t have a clock out for syncing like the Terminator. Therefore, " if " the ranking Blake wrote (below) were correct, then:

Aquarius/Pegasus + PhoenixUSB (USB interface)

would rank higher than

Aquarius/Pegasus + Gaia without its "clock in" feature engaged. (I2S interface)

Oh dear lol

 

the ranking of best sonic performance was:

1. Terminator Plus + Gaia with the Terminator Plus "clock out" feature engaged upstream to the Gaia.

2. Terminator Plus + PhoenixUSB

3. Terminator Plus + Gaia without Terminator Plus "clock out" feature engaged.

4. Mutec MC-3+ USB

Hi.  A slightly off-discussion question. 

Assuming I bought the best reclocker (the Phoenix?), does the quality of the USB input cable matter very much? 

Clearly, I wouldn't put an Amazon Basics between my Zenith Mk3 and the Phoenix, but I really can't afford another FTA Sinope to partner the Sinope I currently have which feeds my DAC

Here is the answer 🙂

20:34 Impact of USB cables on DDCs

According to the "Passion for Sound" video:

USB input cable to DDC doesn't matter

USB output cable from DDC MATTERS