Omni USB

Reviewer: Srajan Ebaen
Financial interests: click here
Main system: Sources: Retina 5K 27" iMac (i5, 256GB SSD, 40GB RAM, Sonoma 14), 4TB external SSD with Thunderbolt 3, Audirvana Studio, Qobuz Sublime, Singxer SU-6 USB bridge, LHY Audio SW-8 & SW-6 switch, Sonnet Pasithea, COS Engineering D1, Laiv Audio Harmony; Active filter: Lifesaver Audio Gradient Box 2; Power amplifiers: Kinki Studio EX-B7 monos & Gold Note monos on subwoofer; Headamp: Enleum AMP-23R; Phones: Raal 1995 Immanis; Loudspeakers: Qualio IQ [on loan] Cables: Exact Express Flame, Furutech; Power delivery: 2 x Kinki/Vinshine Tai Hang on amps and source stack, Furutech DPS-4.1 between wall and conditioners; Equipment rack: Artesanía Audio Exoteryc double-wide 3-tier with optional glass shelves, Exoteryc amp stands; Sundry accessories: Acoustic System resonators, AudioQuest FogLifters; Room: 6 x 8m with open door behind listening seat; Room treatment: 2 x PSI Audio AVAA C214 active bass traps
2nd system: Source: FiiO R7 into Soundaware D300Ref SD transport to Cen.Grand DSDAC 1.0 Deluxe with POW; Preamp/filter: Lifesaver Audio Gradient Box 2; Amplifier: Kinki Studio EX-M7; Loudspeakers: ModalAkustik MusikBoxx + Dynaudio S18 sub; Cable loom: Exact Express Earth; Power delivery: Vibex Granada/Alhambra, Akiko Audio Corelli Corundum & Castello Solo; Equipment rack: Hifistay Mythology Transform X-Frame [on extended loan]; Sundry accessories: Furutech cable lifts, Furutech NFC Clear Lines; Room: ~3.5 x 8m
2nd headfi system: DAC: Cen.Grand DSDAC 1.0 Deluxe with POW; Headamp: Cen.Grand Silver Fox; Headphones: Raal 1995 Magna, HifiMan Susvara
Desktop system: Source: HP Z2 work station Win11/64; USB bridge: Singxer SU-2; DAC/headamp: iFi iDSD Pro Signature; Amplifiers: Topping B200; Speakers: Virtual Hifi Viper; Headphones: Final D-8000, aune SR7000
Upstairs headfi system: FiiO R7; Headphones: Meze 109 Pro, Fiio FT3
2-channel video system: Source: Oppo BDP-105; All-in-One: Gold Note IS-1000 Deluxe; Loudspeakers: Zu Soul VI; Subwoofer: Zu Submission; Power delivery: Furutech eTP-8, Room: ~6x4m
Review component retail: €899

That's effed up! Why do we so often follow it with "excuse my French"? We're speaking proper English. The French would say "c'est foutu" but not dream of following on with "excuse my British". In any event, what was that about? On a certain day of Mercury retrograde or whatever cosmic entanglements cause PC gremlins, my trusty Singxer SU-2 USB bridge in the office stopped passing signal. My Windows 11/64 control panel showed active output, my iFi iDSD Pro Signature DAC no signal. When I seated the same iFi USB3 cable in the DAC instead, I had sound. I tried an old Audiobyte Hydra X USB bridge. Same nonsense. That was weird. A PC should see right through any USB bridge or hub to look straight at the DAC connected to it. And, a PC shouldn't distinguish between outputting to a USB bridge or DAC. But that day it did. I capitulated and ran my DAC USB direct, hoping silently for Mercury to resume business soon. A day later it did. But on that bilingual English/French occasion, it persisted. A short while later I opened Photoshop. Instantly the sound crackled and dropped out. Eventually that misbehaviour stopped then returned when I used Opera for some web surfing whilst Audirvana Studio continued streaming Qobuz. Such audible interference never happens with my USB bridge. Now it reminded me. USB shares resources with other devices and processes across the USB tree with its many intermediate layers, drivers and OS. There's no direct CPU connection or failsafe error protocol. It's why JianHui Deng of Cen.Grand developed the patented POW protocol based on PCIe. It eliminates USB in favour of I²S transmission executed with fibre-optics for the music data and BNC for the clock. It circumvents USB's resource sharing and associated issues. It keeps parallel traffic in its own lanes to avoid collisions.

Seeing how my desktop used an iFi DAC, I checked on iFi's site for their most current problem solvers. Et sacre bleu—excuse my English—there on the companion SilentPower site hovered their new Omni USB with externalized fibre-optic isolation, reclocker, powerline filtration and pure battery mode. That should put messed-up Mercury back into proper orbit and keep it there. At €899 it wasn't Dubai but Dublin coin though make no mistake, the Republic's capital has become one expensive city to live. It's why I stay as far West as possible; a roughly 4-hour's drive from the airport in fact. To close the still farther distance to Blighty one island over where iFi headquarter in seaside resort Southport, an email went off to Karina. I'd interfaced with her before. Hopefully she was still there. Being mid July, holidays might have whisked her away though to sunnier climes. It's the same price I pay to live on the Emerald Isle. To stay green in the summer when in California and Spain everything goes brown relies on regular rains. You can't have a lush life without lots of moisture. As for the Chinese flag above, it's where iFi's factory locates. Management and design happen in the UK. With geopolitics and the weather handled, let's get Omnivorous.

[At right an architectural CGI image for a proposed waterfront development in Southport by Manchester-based firm AFL.]

Omni pulls down from the webstore's 'conditioner' tab then opens on its 'digital conditioners' page. Competitors might call this class of device DDC for digital-to-digital converter. But there's a small difference. My USB bridges from Singxer and Soundaware convert USB to I²S over HDMI and/or RJ45, AES/EBU, BNC and coax. There's no USB out so except for I²S, a 24/192PCM and DSD64 ceiling is in place. Here SilentPower offer two coaxial and one Toslink output with the same data-density limit but then major on unlimited USB with 4 x USB-A and dual USB-C. If we go in and out on the same protocol just de-noised, de-jittered and generally de-crappified, Omni behaves as a signal conditioner not converter. Two of its USB-A ports only output purified 5V power, no data. They can take full advantage of split aka dual-header USB cables with separate data and power plugs. There's a 75Ω 10MHz clock input which accepts sine or square-wave signal; and twin SFP ports for the included fibre-optic modules. Those come in 1.25G and 10G flavours. The smaller OptiLink box accepts a USB-C input which doubles as its power source then converts to light via 1.25G and 10G fibre-optic outputs. Should our source be insufficient to power the media converter over USB, we must use a standard 5V/2A power adapter. The 8'000mA battery of the main unit promises 10-15 hours of uninterrupted play. Its display shows battery status and remaining time. Intelligent management maintains between 20-80% charge to extent the battery's life. The Omni's DC power input can take 9V/6A, 12V/5A or 15V/4A.

The most common hookup for this duo should be PC/Mac ⇒ USB ⇒ OptiLink ⇒ fibre-optics ⇒ Omni Bus ⇒ USB ⇒ DAC. That's quite the detour from a direct USB connection but builds in comprehensive galvanic isolation and clean 5V USB power. It should stop our computer's USB port we use for audio from passing wind instead of squeaky-clean audio data whenever we multi-task. On a PC that can run massively paralleled computing threads and programs which bleed noise and latencies into USB's infrastructure. Our mouse, keyboard and printer won't notice. Yet if working simultaneously in Word, Adobe, Outlook, Photoshop, WordPress and Chrome plus VPN and constant malware checks distorts our music stream, we'll be rightly sour. If using Omni improves our sound beyond stopping audible distortion, we can assume that isolation and reclocking have more benefits. The likely reason is unloading our DAC's conversion from interference. Here we remember CD and how their sound improved when we triggered less error correction. We might think that successful error correction should sound no different. 'Correction' implies as much. But digital engineers tell us that not making noise in the first place is better than causing noise then sweat its 100% extraction. The extra work of error correction or noise filtering complexifies circuitry, loads down processes and influences the sound. What produces better results, working relaxed and happy or stressed and uptight? It even matters to machines. Already a freshly tuned-up car drives better than it did the day before. If you hadn't caught on yet, Omni USB smiles at 'omnibus'. That's the means of transport otherwise shorted to 'bus' which is also the 'b' in 'USB'.