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Voyager/Ipod 3.5mm i-lead (at last!) |
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Darren/Audio Elevati 
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Joined: 13 Jan 2008 Location: South Yorkshire Status: Offline Points: 144 |
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 Topic: Voyager/Ipod 3.5mm i-lead (at last!)Posted: 13 Dec 2008 at 3:13pm |
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Thanks to Graham for allowing this blatant plug!
Audio Elevation's bespoke 3.5mm - 3.5mm i-leadAt last, we have a fantastic solution to offer all customers who have been asking about an upgrade to the 3.5mm lead supplied with the Graham Slee Voyager as standard. Thank you for waiting. As those of you who have been following us on this quest, there have been many failures, mainly concerned with producing a lead which would go directly from the ipod dock connector to 3.5mm jack input on the Voyager that didn't fail. If you have seen the inside of the ipod dock connector, you'll appreciate how flimsy they really are. We couldn't get a solution that proved reliable so there was no point in pursuing that option any further. Instead, we concentrated on producing the best 3.5mm - 3.5mm jack lead of short length that we could. That meant the best wire, best connectors and top quality assembly here in England. That's the story, now here's the technical blurb for anyone who's interested. Audio Elevation's bespoke 3.5mm - 3.5mm "i-lead" utilises current military aerospace materials to ensure exact signal reproduction. On the outside are 2 Gold plated stereo jack plugs, between the 2 connectors is a jacketed cable, the jacket of the cable is made from DR25, an extremely flexable elastomer, offering excellent cable strength and flexibility. Within the jacket lie 3 Silver plated multistranded copper conductors to optimise frequency transfer. Each conductor is soldered to the connectors with Silver loaded solder. The length between backshells of the Neutrik connectors is 100mm (tolerance +/-5mm). The cable construction means flexibility is not a problem in using this cable in restricted space environments. That's the best 3.5mm lead sorted, then. The best option to bypass the volume limitations of the ipod's 3.5mm output seems to be to use the Sendstation connector that a customer mentioned on the Graham Slee forum recently. The difference is marked but the cost is high. We're working on getting to supply them in future and will keep you posted In the meantime, we have one on dem and one boxed available to the first order at £29,99 (that's what they cost retail so we're not making anything ourselves). Here are a couple of pictures...   Pics show my very own Voyager/Ipod - my lead is slightly longer than the production model.
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mrarroyo
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Joined: 28 Jul 2008 Location: Miami Beach, FL Status: Offline Points: 1401 |
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Posted: 13 Dec 2008 at 3:48pm |
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Good luck! PM sent.
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Miguel
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Darren/Audio Elevati
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Joined: 13 Jan 2008 Location: South Yorkshire Status: Offline Points: 144 |
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Posted: 14 Dec 2008 at 1:13pm |
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Sold 4 already!!! What a great result. Thanks for support folks.
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stephenlines
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Joined: 30 Dec 2008 Status: Offline Points: 3 |
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Posted: 31 Dec 2008 at 2:00am |
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Graham,
Whilst I agree that the iPod dock connector plugs are flimsy, easily damaged (e.g if you fall asleep and end up lying on it during a Rioja-fuelled listening session), and with such tiny, closely-spaced terminals must be a total nightmare to solder reliably, the bottom line is that the iPod feeds the 3.5mm headphone socket pure CRUD (because of it's low quality amplification).
Therefore, no matter how good a cable you plug between it and the headphone amp you'll still get CRUD. Slightly better CRUD than normal maybe, but still CRUD. By CRUD I mean no width, depth, height, dynamics, musicality, or emotional involvement. Short term you can overcome this with pure volume, which the Voyager can provide, but all volume controls have an end-stop and all ears are damaged by dangerously high volume levels (even extreme volume levels will probably still leave you feeling underwhelmed by the music).
The difference between the sockets is easy to measure objectively - via the iPod's 3.5mm socket every glass of wine requires an increase in volume to maintain emotional involvement. Via a decent iPod dock/3.5 cable and an excellent Headphone amp like the Voyager, you can keep the volume at the same level, enjoying the music more and more until you finally fall asleep and break the i-plug.
All you do then is order a replacement from those nice folk at Graham Slee, or at least you could if they did one...
There must be a way of making a good iPod dock to 3.5mm cable that lasts - the cheap sync cable (iPod dock to USB) that comes with all iPods is immensly reliable, even though it has no i-diophile pretensions whatsoever, and is CHEAP. Shame they don't include one with a 3.5mm plug at the other end as standard. The fact that they don't is GOOD NEWS - it opens up an entire global market for whoever cracks this one AND makes it as easy to find on the net as the horrible "telescopic" items that Google usually points you to.
Two main problems with the iPod plug in my experience:
1) Poor cable retention - one good tug and all your careful soldering is undone. One cable I used tried to solve this with a generous blob of clear mastic inside (it eventually failed the "sleep test" after about 4 months). So, resin injection?
2) Terminal damage - absolutely NOTHING you or anyone else can do about this unless you manufacture the plugs yourself, as this occurs when the plug is pulled sideways and bends the little spring terminals to the point that they no longer make contact reliably. You are totally reliant on the quality of the plug that you buy, and I guess there are not too many of them.
GOOD NEWS - Rioja quaffing i-diophiles will become regular repeat customers if they like the way your cable sounded before they (embarassingly) fell asleep on it and broke it. DEEP JOY.
PLEASE think again - the gains from using a moderately decent cable connecting the iPod dock to a Voyager are light years ahead of the "diminishing returns" of uber-fi cables that, at best can only propogate unsullied CRUD. (GIGO).
C'Mon Graham, you're SO CLOSE to cracking this, don't fall at the last hurdle, please...
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kintrainer
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tg [RIP]
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Joined: 19 Jan 2008 Location: Sydney Status: Offline Points: 1866 |
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Posted: 31 Dec 2008 at 3:43am |
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Link removed now that provenance has been established. Guess this is the Kimber that you found ? http://www.sendstation.com/us/products/pocketdock/lineout-usb.html These look handy. Prolly not nap-proof though Edited by tg - 31 Dec 2008 at 10:55am |
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stephenlines
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Joined: 30 Dec 2008 Status: Offline Points: 3 |
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Posted: 31 Dec 2008 at 9:58am |
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tg,
yes, that was the cable I was talking about - didn't post a link as that would be advertising the competition!
The mini iPod dock gadget looks good, but agree it's probably not as nap-proof as a well made cable would be. Also another connection in the signal path (but we're talking iPod as the source, so although very good I doubt if I'd be able to hear the extra connection)
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kintrainer
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Graham Slee
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Retired Joined: 11 Jan 2008 Location: South Yorkshire Status: Offline Points: 16298 |
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Posted: 31 Dec 2008 at 12:24pm |
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The insurmountable problem in making an ipod dock to 3.5 jack cable is not being unable to source the connectors, nor being able to solder the tiny little contacts, or even being able to source quality cable of suitable performance...
No, it's worse than that! It is Apple! Any commercial opperation wishing to make anything at all for the ipod must obtain an Apple licence to do it! And Apple licences are not cheap. And Apple have people zealously checking up to see if any commercial opperation is selling anything ipod related that doesn't have a license. So, very sorry to all, we just don't have enough money to give our profits to Apple! |
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That none should be able to buy or sell without a smartphone and the knowledge in how to use apps
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