Khadas Tone Board for VIMs

Khadas Tone Board Unboxing Video on Youtube

4 Likes

I’ve get a tone board to germany ( tax etc. over 20,- € ) but where ist the user manual ? Thanx for the great board

just received mine as, well, is the DIY version supposed to have unsoldered 40pin socket ?

Actually, it’s Gerneric Edition, but you can solder by yourself :wink:

More info at:

Hi, hoffmann:
Sorry for the late response!

Please check following for the user manual:

Arrived this day…Excellent thank Guys and Gals
First we will have a play with Windows 10 and Headphones, no stereo gear here where I play (yet)

Should be easy, find a RCA to 3.5mm socket and plug Headphone direct to RCA.

That was not the case, could not find one…Looking everywhere high and low nothing,
Not even a 3.5mm socket I could Hack and connect to RCA, my pile of junk has let me down.

Can get one easy online or a run to the shop…takes time.

More Looking, Looking,

As always when pulling PC cases to pieces or anything keep the junk may come in handy,
Found while looking, a front USB Microphone and Headset thingy, this will do the job :wink:

Music to my ears,
Marked plugs are what normally plug into the MotherBoard of PC.
Soldered 3 Pins to the end of the Black cable that leads to 2 x RCA.
Plugging Sennheisers into the Green socket,

What a beautiful noise

Easy to set up in windows, Install driver. < Click
Plug in device to usb C and USB on Windows PC Done done

Find all the specs and set up http://forum.khadas.com/t/khadas-tone-board-user-manual-tbd/2478

Lots Features to be found





Just to mention a few,

Now to Purchase a few 3.5mm Stereo Sockets
and a RCA to 3.5mm Stereo cable…

Oh I would have done an unboxing but it had no Fancy box :wink:

Postman knocks, now we have the neat cable for the headphones.

7 Likes

Enybody nows how to connect an oled/display to the tone board?

Hello,
if I look into the shematic of the tone board at J10 (RCA Black ) it’s by default a spdif signal into the dac, but I can’t hear anything at the J5/6. There is no signal. What can I do, to get a signal ?

Which Edition you purchase? And you use with a PC or VIMs?

Thanks!

Hello Gouwa,
i’ve the vim edition and use it with the vim/vim2
Thanks for help

hi all,
I want to stick to ubuntu server linux on my VIM1 pro (no mate, no kodi, no vlc, only alsa or pulseaudio),
and I also need to test if my toneboard works well enough,
so what is the simple way to get good quality audio out of the RCA socket of the toneboard, from the command line , provided that a .mp4 or .acc or .ogg or .flac file is present in the current directory ??
tks !

I’ve installed and run moc on my laptop for now (sudo apt-get install moc; mocp&)
anyone knows it ?

edit: now moc installed on my fenix made ubuntu xenial:
toneboard plugged on vim1,
vims usb cable connected,
when mocp is run, it ends immediately with a core dump !

something else:
diconnect toneboard from vim1, connect toneboard to vim1 over usb-C cable

dmesg on vim1 says only this:
[ 169.731135] usb 1-1.3: new high-speed USB device number 3 using xhci-hcd

while when toneboard connected to my x86 ubuntu, it says:
[ 9067.620124] usb 1-2: new high-speed USB device number 3 using ehci-pci
[ 9067.785385] usb 1-2: New USB device found, idVendor=20b1, idProduct=0008
[ 9067.785395] usb 1-2: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=3, SerialNumber=0
[ 9067.785401] usb 1-2: Product: xCORE USB Audio 2.0
[ 9067.785407] usb 1-2: Manufacturer: XMOS

compatibility is a pity or I do not understand anything ?

XMOS driver is supported for both 3.14 & 4.9.

Can you try lsusb?

khadas@Khadas:~$ lsusb 
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0003 Linux Foundation 3.0 root hub
Bus 001 Device 012: ID 20b1:0008 XMOS Ltd 
Bus 001 Device 002: ID 1a40:0801 Terminus Technology Inc. 
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub

You will find 20b1:0008 XMOS Ltd .

And check the sound card:

khadas@Khadas:~$ cat /proc/asound/cards 
 0 [AMLMESONAUDIO  ]: AML-MESONAUDIO - AML-MESONAUDIO
                      AML-MESONAUDIO
 1 [x20            ]: USB-Audio - xCORE USB Audio 2.0
                      XMOS xCORE USB Audio 2.0 at usb-xhci-hcd.0.auto-1.4, high speed

Thanks.

1 Like

1、please check type-c connection for power
2、please ensure S/PDIF IN signal is OK。
3、S/PDIF IN and USB sound card switch logic:

  • When USB sound card mode is working (music player occupy tone board )then plug S/PDIF IN ,tone board sound card must be released(music player must STOP)then S/PDIF IN is working .
  • Certainly,if tone board‘s USB just for power(music player didn’t running or stop),S/PDIF IN will working when pluged.

Hi guys, been away for a while from the forums :relaxed: And there good news - a Tone Board! Already ordered and waiting one from GearBest, looking forward to trying out :slightly_smiling_face:

3 Likes

Do I imagine or there is really different sound quality when Tone Board is connected to VIM trough USB instead of pinout?
You use USB->XMOS->buffer->FIFO Reclock->DAC and not I2S even trough GPIO right?

Update: the problem was the cable i use :slight_smile:

I’ll buy it when I have enough money :tired_face: .Btw I think in next version this board may have balanced output to use with some supported headphone :heart_eyes:

@Terry, @Gouwa,
Question:
Friend of mine wants to replace the dac module in his DIY DAC, based on other brand SBC with Tone Board. But because he wants to put it in his DIY case and to power it with linear PS and not tu use USB-c interface he asked me: is it possible to connect Tone Board trough the GPIO on his SBC and which pins to use on the Tone Board pin-out? My understanding is that he want to take signal only from his SBC and to feed it from dedicated PSU.

this is what he sent me:

USB DP Signal -> ?
USB DM Signal -> ?
5V DC -> ?
GND -> ?

I don’t know the brand of his SBC but i can ask if this will help.

Thank you!

Yep, you are right, only USB signals are required for Tone Board.

As you expect, we did considered the balanced output and various kinds of impedance headphone supported in next version.

:grinning::grinning:

3 Likes