New Wondom ADAU1701 DSP Unit

[Weeb Labs]

Greetings,

While plumbing the depths of AliExpress as one tends to do in the middle of the night, I encountered a new product manufactured by WONDOM. It is effectively just an ADAU1701 in a convenient enclosure with all of the analog IO exposed, along with potentiometers and switches on the front panel. An additional potentiometer is included on the rear panel. All controls are labelled with the name of their GPIO pin, which should simplify identification in Sigma Studio.

The unit is powered via USB-C and a USBi (for Sigma Studio configuration) is handled by a JST connector which matches that of WONDOM's existing ICP board. Incidentally, I would recommend purchasing the Tinysine USBi rather than WONDOM's ICP, as it is far more stable and robust.

The price is €38 (add €20 if you need a USBi interface), which I believe to be excellent value for money and I will likely be ordering one (or two).

 

[TonyJZX]

another intriguing device for almost no money


to me the first thing that springs to mind is that you're subject to an ADC DAC when it shouldnt be necessaruy??

Shouldnt this be done in the digital domain?

such a device would be better sitting BEFORE your dac before the signal is amplified... with toslink and coaxial digital in?

no?

 

[Weeb Labs]

another intriguing device for almost no money


to me the first thing that springs to mind is that you're subject to an ADC DAC when it shouldnt be necessaruy??

Shouldnt this be done in the digital domain?

such a device would be better sitting BEFORE your dac before the signal is amplified... with toslink and coaxial digital in?

no?

SPDIF would be nice but the ADAU1701 does not have onboard SPDIF RX/TX. Its ADCs and DACs (even cascaded) are perfectly adequate for almost any purpose and have been measured here. Four I2S IO are potentially internally accessible but this unit targets those in search of a more "plug and play" solution. It is effectively a cheaper, vastly more functional MiniDSP 2x4 (which also makes use of the ADAU1701).

 

[Weeb Labs]

I received my unit this morning and disassembled it to evaluate the board layout. In short, this is a very nicely designed unit for very little money.

All audio IO is exposed via three headers with very clear labelling. Even the default I2S format is specified on the silkscreen.

We even have onboard digital analog volume control in the form of a PT2259 for each output channel pair, with a PIC12 microcontroller to read the value of the volume potentiometer. This is unexpectedly sophisticated for a EUR 45 board and will serve to further reduce the ADAU1701 DACs' noise floor at normal listening levels.

I have not yet tested this unit but will be writing a Sigma Studio program for it momentarily.

 

[Jeromeof]

They released a video about this unit now:

 

[Hue]

What adapter cable is required to program this device? The USBi JTAG features the standard 10 pin cable, where the Wondom box has a smaller 6 pin interface.
I haven't located an adapter cable online so far..

 

[Weeb Labs]

What adapter cable is required to program this device? The USBi JTAG features the standard 10 pin cable, where the Wondom box has a smaller 6 pin interface.
I haven't located an adapter cable online so far..

Dupont connections will be perfectly adequate for this.

 

[net-david]

Glad you found this, I just ordered one. I've been playing around with the evaluation modules and was working on adding the pots, etc., this saves a TON of time and money. The PT2259 volume controls are a nice bonus.

 

[Kartoffel]

Has anyone successfully used the USBi JTAG for programming Wondom DSPs? I can't seem to make it work...

This is what I tried:
DSP.......................................................USBi
RESET ---------------------------> nRESET
+5V -----------------------------> 5V
GND ---------------------------->GND
WP -----------------------------> not connected/ connected to GND of the DSP
SCL ----------------------------->SCL
SDA ----------------------------> SDA

The right settings are set in Sigma Studio; it did previously work with the Wondom Programmer, until this faulty DC-DC converter fried it and the DSP.
I have a 2nd DSP that I'm trying to get the JTAG to work with.
The JTAG drivers are correctly installed and up to date.

Any help is greatly appreciated


P.S. thanks Weeb Labs for the help via "conversations" so far.. but at this point I think this might be of interest to others, too

 

[net-david]

I got my Wondom AA-AP23123 in the mail yesterday and got it hooked up to my QuantAsylum QA403 to test. With whatever the default project is loaded and all controls maxed, I got this:

Full disclosure, I'm new to the QA403 and am probably doing something wrong. The right channel was a loop back through the same cables as the left channel.

Also, I tried to read out the default program using the "E2prom Read/Write Window" in SigmaStudio 4.7 and not really getting anything. I am getting a green "USB" under Hardware Configuration.

 

[Weeb Labs]

I got my Wondom AA-AP23123 in the mail yesterday and got it hooked up to my QuantAsylum QA403 to test. With whatever the default project is loaded and all controls maxed, I got this:View attachment 324912
Full disclosure, I'm new to the QA403 and am probably doing something wrong. The right channel was a loop back through the same cables as the left channel.

Also, I tried to read out the default program using the "E2prom Read/Write Window" in SigmaStudio 4.7 and not really getting anything. I am getting a green "USB" under Hardware Configuration.

It looks like you might be clipping the input or output. You can’t decompile the default program to a project, if that is what you are attempting to do.

For measurement purposes, I would suggest beginning with a new project and simply routing the ADCs directly to the DACs.

 

[net-david]

It looks like you might be clipping the input or output. You can’t decompile the default program to a project, if that is what you are attempting to do.

For measurement purposes, I would suggest beginning with a new project and simply routing the ADCs directly to the DACs.

Thanks for confirming @Weeb Labs, I was afraid you couldn't read from the EPROM to a project.

I'll make a simple in-out project and post the results, I was hoping for more output level than the ADAU1401 evaluation modules. I did get decent results when I skipped the EVMs onboard DACs and went with some PCM5102 boards.

 

[net-david]

I made a simple SigmaStudio project with just an in to an out with a level meter:

The only control that should be doing anything is the far right "VOL" pot that drives the PT2259 volume control chips. The last 1/4 turn does not increase the volume any higher, I think the scaling could be better. The minimum insertion loss is -3.81dB.

With 100mv in I'm seeing -24dB on the internal level meter, turning the "VOL" down another -3dB to a total of -6.76dB loss I'm still seeing 0.115% THD & noise.

 

[Weeb Labs]

That is in line with my expectations. H2 is about 60dB down. The PT2259 is not a particularly high performance IC but this looks perfectly adequate for most purposes.

 

[kemmler3D]

Man I would pay about double for this if it just had SPDIF I/O intead of analog! As it is the next best thing is to cobble something together with an RPi, which I'm willing to do, but not eager for.

Still, very interesting. This is absolutely the sort of thing that SHOULD be more common! I admit I was flabbergasted when I realized that MiniDSP was about the only game in town and charged hundreds to get very basic DSP features into your signal chain.

 

[Weeb Labs]

Man I would pay about double for this if it just had SPDIF I/O intead of analog! As it is the next best thing is to cobble something together with an RPi, which I'm willing to do, but not eager for.

Still, very interesting. This is absolutely the sort of thing that SHOULD be more common! I admit I was flabbergasted when I realized that MiniDSP was about the only game in town and charged hundreds to get very basic DSP features into your signal chain.

It is fairly straightforward to add a SPDIF RX/TX PCB, if you are so inclined. The headers and standoff mounting holes are there.

 

[net-david]

Here is the frequency response, much better than the evaluation boards:

 

[kemmler3D]

It is fairly straightforward to add a SPDIF RX/TX PCB, if you are so inclined. The headers and standoff mounting holes are there.

Hmm, you say that as if I've ever soldered before.

 

[net-david]

Has anyone successfully used the USBi JTAG for programming Wondom DSPs? I can't seem to make it work...

This is what I tried:
DSP.......................................................USBi
RESET ---------------------------> nRESET
+5V -----------------------------> 5V
GND ---------------------------->GND
WP -----------------------------> not connected/ connected to GND of the DSP
SCL ----------------------------->SCL
SDA ----------------------------> SDA

The right settings are set in Sigma Studio; it did previously work with the Wondom Programmer, until this faulty DC-DC converter fried it and the DSP.
I have a 2nd DSP that I'm trying to get the JTAG to work with.
The JTAG drivers are correctly installed and up to date.

Any help is greatly appreciated


P.S. thanks Weeb Labs for the help via "conversations" so far.. but at this point I think this might be of interest to others, too

I've been able to get the AA-AP23123 to work with my USBi, only needed the 4 wires: +5v, GND, SCL and SDA. I did have to use a power supply to power the unit via the USBC connector, it doesn't power up from the USBi like the eval modules do.

 

[Weeb Labs]

I've been able to get the AA-AP23123 to work with my USBi, only needed the 4 wires: +5v, GND, SCL and SDA. I did have to use a power supply to power the unit via the USBC connector, it doesn't power up from the USBi like the eval modules do.View attachment 324992

You do need to bridge WP to GND in order to write the EEPROM.