Bricasti M1 questions
 

Question for current owners or those with M1 experience...

I am considering a power conditioner and a power cable upgrade. Looking at Silver Circle Audio and Shunyata currently, but both brands are VERY costly these days for their better products. I've recently sold all my albums and turntable so I do not need many outlets as it is a digital only system going forward.
I run a Luxman integrated amplifier, a Bricasti M1 DAC and soon to be sourced by a Bryston BDP-2 in its newest iteration.
My system is currently run from two dedicated power lines, a 20 amp circuit for the amplifier only and a 15 amp circuit for both digital devices.
My cabling is all Audioquest currently, but I have never been a fan of their power cord efforts so looking for good recommendations. Bricasti uses Purist Audio cabling a lot at shows, but I don't have a dealer anywhere near me and their line is a bit confusing.
Which power cable and conditioner have you used and had positive experience with?

Crickets huh?
Anyone?

I am currently using Isotek power conditioning with Nordost Heimdall 2 power cables with great results.

Which model Isotek have you found to be best with them?
I would love to see photos of your Bricasti setup! Please post when you have time.
Used to have Nordost Heimdall 2 cable loom, but sold them about 5-6 months ago...nice cables. :-)

I use a PS Audio power conditioner and all WireWorld Silver 7 power cables.

dear Bavarian 5,

i am owning bricasti m1 for last 3 years and only use it with RED Book (MBL1621a), i tried few cables and all are listenable, the main question still not clear with 3 years of use is weather RCA or XLR IC more engaging.

but i found SPDIF RCA is the best compare with AES/EBU ( i tried Wireworld Platinum starlight RCA AND XLR side by side, RCA/SPDIF wins in term of focusing, presentation, ease on ear, engage-meant and over all precise soundsageing with reasonable placement of equipment with in. oh i compare M1 with sim 650d with 820s. clearly M1 is much more musical, i didnt like the big soundstage and acueracy and silence of tomb on SIM MOON 650D always M1 dragged me hard when i listen Led Zeplin 4, track 2 and the last track of the album "when the levee breaks... ouch what a precision of m1 simply mid blowing on m1. sim 650D is good but simply lost the soul of the music and stuck on hidden island and make the music dry and engagement losses severely.

POWER CORD POWER CORD AC POWER CORD I WISH YOU DONT EXIST AT ALL. yup most tricky part of any system.

i used from the beginning to end respectively.

#PS Audio Ac10.... very Dynamic, it will drive you high very high, it give you a feeling you have way too much boost... and strong feeling of very easy to lose control hit and crash on the soft corner.

# Cardas clear... the most decent ac power cord i came in touch with, very gentle, enjoying, engaging, fair amount of detail which has the guts to challenge full silver cables any day any time any where. i would made you life easy and smooth if you stick with you till the end. but we don't like easy exit.. we want more, we less likely want to marry peaceful girl in our life... we want unpredictable andreline and chase in and make our life parked almost close to HELL.

# WireWorld series 7 Platinum, silver and full copper electra... i used all 3 platinum is the best obviously but unimpressive of 650D, but with M1 is a cable not perfect but most close to our fantasy. huge sound stage, high precision, superb detail.... but at the end fantasy on daily life with daily basis is too much i think. but those of us want everyday surprise, every moments of our life... this is the cable bro... jump it over on it, its the magic carpet of Aladin.

# siltech RUBY HILL 2-- oh yes this is my final cable i am sticking with. its with furutech fi50 nema plugs... the gentle breeze the ultimate destination of your journey. buy hey its not perfect but sometimes too much perfect os not good. its a very precise and highly engaging traparent ac power cord. i choose to live with it for its gentle sound and musicality. please have a listen or atlas try to buy one 1m and try at your home. you will be happy. its need quite long time to settle down but i love them... everything else looked blurred to me, in front of Ruby HILL 2. wow.

i am using pure power + 3000 for a while yet i prefer to use no conditioning at all. now at the moment i am not using any power conditioner. instead please use oyade R1... highly recommended.

:)

Very detailed post bengal_finch, thanks for sharing and welcome to AA! :thumbsup:

bengal finch
That was a really good description of different power cables and good help, as it can be very expensive to buy many different cables to try out, at least i am not so lucky. And i have to choose what i think will be best.

Yes, it also makes me want to try different power cables and conditioners.

I mostly run a low noise fan-free pc based server but also use a PS Audio transport for RBCD, and likewise found a preference for unbalanced 75 ohm spdif over AUS/EBU.

My USB cable is nothing too special - a Nordost blue heaven but the pc is powered from a linear supply and USB via a JCAT PCIe with a dedicated low noise PSU, which all seems to help but I feel that a cable upgrade will improve things further.

I use a "Silver Circle Audio pure power one 3.0" for power conditioning. Have had it in the system for the past ~5 years and it works great.

For power cords, I've used several, and have settled on the Waveform Fidelity HE High Current for the Silver Circle and amps (BMC M2 monos) and the HE Source for the M1, Laufer Teknik Memory Player, and BMC BDCD transport. The Waveforms were a significant positive difference to anything I had used in the past, bringing extra "juice" while maintaining a sonic transparency. They're fantastic.

I'm running the M1 directly into the amps. Running Stealth Varidig V15T AES/EBU and WireWorld Platinum Starlight 7 USB from the Memory Player to M1, and Thales interconnect and speaker cables from the M1 to amps and amps to YG Acoustic Carmel speakers.

Does the Bricasti need to be powered through the USB cable?

I'm kind of off-topic for not having a Bricasti but what AudioQuest power cables let you down? I think NRG-1000 and above are simply amazing!
I also recommend IsoTek power conditioning products (as GreginNH1)! They work magic with your gear!
__________________
Amp: BAT VK-655SE
Pre-amp/Digital: exaSound e32 w UpTone JS-2 Power Supply; SOtM tX-USBultra w UpTone LPS1.2; Apple Mac Mini w UpTone DC Conversion Kit & UpTone JS-2 Power Supply; Squeezelite w Logitech Media Server 7.9.0
Speakers: Triangle Magellan Cello II
Cables: AudioQuest WEL XLR, AudioQuest Everest, AudioQuest Hurricane HC, AudioQuest NRG-1000, AudioQuest Diamond USB
Rack: Solid Tech Hybrid
Tweaks: Omicron Stabilizzatore Armonico & Gold Evolution SE; IsoTek Sigmas GII w Optimum EVO3; Furutech FT-SWS (R) AC Outlet; Synergistic Research Blue Quantum Fuse

Yes it does. The Bricasti M1 uses the popular XMOS input chip that's powered from the host device.

I know several M1 owners who use a variety of devices to inject a clean 5V supply rather than rely on the often noisy motherboard supply from their mac / pc.

I'm using a JCAT PCIe USB card that provides an external dc input socket, so for me it was a simple matter of powering it with a discrete low noise linear regulator, which uses a two stage series + shunt design with some RF filtering. My PC is also powered from a discrete linear supply and the internal SSD's are additionally powered by linear shunt regulators. The PC is also fan-less and uses a low power i7 quad core processor. Under normal operation the total input power is roughly 15 Watts.

I'm a new M1SE owner, hoping this thread is still good for questions.

What does it mean when the display reads "RELEASE"? I find no reference to it in the user manual. Any ideas?

I have noticed that recently, after updating the firmware. Seems to happen around power interruptions. Pushing the stand by button clears it. Manual (M12) is not up to date.

I asked the same question and got this back.

Direct from Bricasti…
Pressing a long press on the standby will invert the phase of the trigger in voltage, so how the M3 will act on the voltage being hi or low at the trigger in jack to go in or out of standby you can change this as some preamps might signal high for going in to standby or low. If you press and hold too long its telling you to let go and “release" your finger, you held it too long.

Thank you both for answering.

Strange, I wasn't pushing any buttons at the time. In fact, the M1SE was in standby mode and I played a track in Roon to the M1SE network input. Then the M1SE displayed "RELEASE" on its front panel, but did not otherwise wake up and play music. I had to press the "Stand by" button twice to wake it up and hear music. I suppose the lesson is to always bring it out of standby mode first. For comparison, I also have a MOON 780Dv2 and it will wake itself up from standby mode automatically when I send it a track from Roon.

I think the manual does need some updating. In fact, the printed copy that came in the box ("MDx 1.00 release 2/20") is newer than the PDF copy on the Bricasti web site ("V1.22 release 9/14").

Other issues:

The manual says the “Status” button on the front panel leads to 8 levels of menu, but only describes 7 levels:
1. Input Type/Running Sample Rate
2. Output Sample Rate
3. Digital Overflow
4. Temp Monitor
5. Version
6. Phase (has “PhaseNRM” and “PhaseINV” settings that turn phase inversion off or on)
7. Trigger (has “CtrlTRIGI”, “CtrlTRIGO”, and “CtrlREMOT” settings that configure behavior of trigger jack on rear panel)

However, I find that my M1SE has these menu levels:
1. Input Type/Running Sample Rate
4. Temp Monitor
5. Version (mine reads “MDx 1.04”)
7. Trigger
6. Phase
8. Remote (has “RemoteON” and “RemotOFF” settings that enable and disable the hand-held remote control unit)

#2 and #3 are missing and #8 is added.

The manual refers to multiple filters available for DSD playback (“Filter 0”, “Filter 1”, “Filter 2”), but does not explain how to select from among them. I've experimented a bit on the front panel, but could not discover how to do it. Note that these DSD filters are described as distinct from the 9 linear phase filters and 6 minimum phase filters selectable from the “Filter” button.

Pressing the "Display" button, then the "Status" button causes the display to show "RBalNORM". Turning the volume knob changes it to "RBalSTBY". Don't know what that means and it does not appear in the manual.

I find that the Stillpoints feet have some jiggle along one diagonal. That is, gently lifting the unit from the right front corner results in a little see-saw play. Lifting from the left front corner results in no play at all. This may be caused by imperfect flatness of my rack shelf. I have to experiment with that a bit more.

Well, it’s always fun to explore a new piece of equipment. I don’t want to give a false negative impression. I’m finding the M1SE to be a great performer both sonically and functionally. Listening is a real joy, and I’m very happy with my purchase. A user manual that needs a little work is hardly a deal-breaker.

The good news is the menus are not that deep and for normal use, you will settle on a config that works the best for you and have little need to change.

The only time Insee RELEASE on my M21’is of I have pressed on StBY too long.

I rarely need to ever look at any other options.

My routine is this for shutting down.

Lower volume to 45-50, hit mute, hit standby. Dead quiet.

Yes, I agree. I'm still in the "getting to know it" phase when new equipment arrives. That will pass.

Following-up on my post from last month… I didn’t have much luck via email, but Bricasti support was excellent by phone. I got around to phoning them directly last week. Here’s what I learned:

Regarding the M1SE not waking up from standby mode automatically when receiving a track via Roon. It does not wake up automatically. You have to wake it up manually first. Bricasti acknowledged this behavior. I don’t think they consider it a bug. I don’t really consider it a bug either - just a missing convenience. Though the display of “RELEASE” on the front panel in this situation does seem glitchy to me. Not a big deal.

Bricasti emailed me a PDF copy of the latest manual (“MDx 1.04 release 2/21”), which is newer than the printed copy that came with my brand new M1SE and newer than the one posted on their web site. It resolves most of the discrepancies I found between the manual and observed behavior.

The menu levels “Output Sample Rate” and “Digital Overflow” below the “Status” button described in the older manual, are in fact pro audio features not meant for consumer use. They no longer appear in the latest manual. The “Remote” menu level that was missing from the older manual is now included in the latest one. No issue here.

The DSD Filters described in the manual as user-selectable don’t seem to be accessible from the unit itself. So this remains an open question.

Bricasti explained that the “RBalNORM”/“RBalSTBY” feature turns out to be a way to change the behavior of the remote control unit. It allows the user to toggle the behavior of the balance button between a “balance” function and a “stand by” function. However, my remote control does not have a balance button. I was unable to try out this feature.

The jiggle in the Stillpoints feet, as suspected, was only a matter of imperfect flatness of my rack shelf. No issue here.

Well, again, I don’t want to give a false negative impression. The M1SE sounds great and is very easy to operate. I always do this with a new piece of equipment - explore the manual and controls to see what it can do and understand all the settings. Sharing my experience here for new users who may be searching the boards with similar questions.

Thanks to Bricasti for the post-sale support.

Brian and Joe at Bricasti have always given great service and follow up.