Power supply for the CAT

Although it seems everything matter with PC audio(CAT,CACP,PcHiFi...)

But as time goes by ,

We have found out that are only three key points to the hardware.

Power supply,clock & vibration.

All other things are connecting to them.

Same as analog audio devices,
The power supply is the elements of the most basic.
With a good linear PSU,
It will solve many problems with hardware.

Because a full linear PSU for CAT is big & expensive,
A dc to atx psu will be the appropriate choice.

This dc to atx is similar to picoPSU,
But it accept +16V to +24V dc input.
picoPSU accept only with +12 dc input
So picoPSU's +12V output is not a fair supply  for MB & CPU
And I choose this wide range input psu for my server

A 120W linear PSU for picoPSU is very important,
If you use adapter for picoPSU,
The SQ will be worse to a good atxPSU.

A single picoPSU is not enough for a full dynamic,
It is nothing to do with the power input.
That is because of MB's power supply circuit structure
You need another 120w linearPSU for CPU
Two linearPSU will improve SQ & dynamic.
 
Power cable is improtant,
But I won't recommend silver power cable,
Only if you have used linearPSU for picoPSU.
Power supply is the basic of CAT,
All hardware connect to  power supply.
Good power supply will improve every hardware,
EX. SATA cable,USB card,CPU,RAM................................................

Use a linear 12 V input for picoPSU will be fine,

But wide range PSU will have a better conversion efficiency.

For example,

A 120W picoPSU need a +12V/10A min. input,

A 120W wide range PSU could be use +24V/5A min. input

Linear PSU will have higher performance and lower cost & heat with low current output.

That is why I choose wide range PSU

A good linear PSU for the picoPSU is very important.

Although DC to ATX PSU will generate EMI,

But a linear PSU or battery PSU will decrease EMI,

And MB have many switching PSU for CPU,RAM.......

You should use EMI shield for chip & cables of course.

That is why I use aluminum block to shield the chips. 

And a separate linear PSU for CPU will improve the SQ,
Just insert the PSU with 4pin or 8pin ATX plug into CPU power socket will be fine 

Battery PSU is a clean power soure,
OS SSD,USB card with a battery PSU will increase sound stage,high & low extention
Very low noise floor & smooth sonic.

But battery need a vibration control,
It sounds quite different with a wood block for vibration control
Vibration mus be noted to battery supply

This is a battery structure digram,
It has large area of ​​the parallel structures
That is the reason why a battery afraid of vibration.

Unfortunately,
Cheap mobile battery PSU is design only for cell phone,
It will be no better than a linearPSU
So we have to build a audio grade battery PSU

But even so,
You could hear the improvement with a vibration control to this PSU