audio control dqx, eliminating hiss

Hey all, Happy post turkey day...
Im running into a slight problem where    im experiencing alot of hiss in the system in the car..
Heres the simple breakdown... 2008 Accord EXL-Navi

Im using the OEM headdeck cause of the navi.

Alpine H650 Imprint processor
going to
the Audiontrol Matrix Line Driver
going to
the Soundstream Tarantula mids highs and sub Amps..

As waynes   10 commandment stated, the amps gains are all the way down the matrix is about half way up..
The DQX outputs are just above minimum, and there is hiss.
When I disconnect the inputs to the Matrix there is no hiss at all.
reconnect the dqx and the hiss comes back.
I have tried to minimize every gain in order to eliminate the hiss    and in the end, I sacifice any and all SQ. Ive pinned it down to the DQX outputs..BTW   if the DQX inputs are disconnected   the hiss remains... I attempted to bypass the dqx and the hiss went Buh bye!     Has anyone else experienced issue with hiss noise with the dqx?I just got the unit back from the boys in seattle for a firmware upgrade so that the ddc controller would work.. So I know the unit is good as they bench tested it thoroughly..

RCA's are 8 -10 inches from any power lines even 16 guage power and ground for the unit, there is no neon in the car all and only LED's: Im going to try a different ground point for the dqx as it shares ground with the other components via German Barrier strips. the barrier grounds very close to thos from the amps but not the " exact same ground... its within inches though
   Opinions feelings comments, and guestimate fixes would be unendingly appreciated.....
Thanks,
J

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JHM

foot note: the hiss is coming from the mid bass' and mid/highs

the midbass' are Image Dynamics cx-62 6.5's
the mid/highs are Image Dynamics CD1-Pro LCD's

yes I know the LCD's are sensitiveand accentuate everything 10 fold, but I need to near completely elimnate this without losing SQ

BTW Hoping to run Rookie SQ ant SBN 2009, so obviously   it needs to be a good fix and not hack it...
Thanks!!!!!

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JHM

Have you tried turning the gains of the amp down until the noise goes away?

did that.. LOL the dqx is whats feeding the hiss... as per Waynes" commandments I followed theat guidelines and traced it back to the dqx... Im actually heading over to a friend who is an SQ Competitor05 rookie of the year...lol   were gonna see whats going on with it.... Ill follow up later today.

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JHM

Wow, an Audio Control piece with a noise problem.   And I thought I had seen it all.

try a fresh ground on the audio control. i had a noise problem with my HU and had to re-ground it a few times before it went away so just a thought

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i am an idiot wrote:

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Wow, an Audio Control piece with a noise problem.   And I thought I had seen it all.

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I'm not sure if you are being serious with this comment. I have seen MANY Audio Control pieces with VERY bad hiss issues, most ESPECIALLY the high output voltage devices, like line drivers.

Why do you feel you need the line driver? Ummm... One thing you need to know right NOW, is that ANY additional gain stage will cause noise. This is not a question of "will it", but more answered with "how much". In your case, more than you want.

You THINK you are losing SQ, because the system is quieter. It has been proven scientifically, HUNDREDS of times that the human ear will pick a "louder" system as a "better" system. Your line driver is fooling you. A line driver does NOTHING in the way of signal processing that the a destination device (the "amplifier") can't do by itself. I would be willing to BET YOU MONEY that if you remove the device, and set your gains properly, you'll find you don't even need that Matrix.

My system has no line drivers, and I start with a 2V Alpine deck, and at an iASCA SQ JUDGES recommendation, I joined iASCA for the SQ side of things. There are several people on this very board that can vouch for the SQ of my system, also.

Get rid of the extra gain stages. Period. Re-tune the system correctly, and revel in what you have been missing all this time!

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It all reminds me of something that Molière once said to Guy de Maupassant at a café in Vienna: "That's nice. You should write it down."

haemphyst wrote:

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i am an idiot wrote:

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Wow, an Audio Control piece with a noise problem.   And I thought I had seen it all.

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I'm not sure if you are being serious with this comment.

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If serious is spelled, sarcasm, then yes I was being serious.  I have been around for the EQl, the EQX, the EQQ and the EQTs.  The Epicenter, the entire line had noise issues. 

Just freeze, deep fat fry, or saute it.... that'll quiet er down!

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Did you try grounding the RCA's. This helped alot in my first sound system

ping7464 wrote:

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Did you try grounding the RCA's. This helped alot in my first sound system

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Not likely to help at all, here... this is DEFINITELY an issue with noisy output devices. There is no way to get rid of the noise, except replace those devices with a lower noise-floor device or remove the component from the system completely - which is my STRONG recommendation.

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It all reminds me of something that Molière once said to Guy de Maupassant at a café in Vienna: "That's nice. You should write it down."

All the Audio Control stuff I have installed has a high noise floor. The design concepts are very cool but the electronics just fall short.

They did sell plenty of EQTs back in the day and they sold wayyy to many Epicenters. The headaches.

Well   we spent a few hours matching up the gains within nearly 1/100 of a volt and it seemed to clear up near all of the issues.. which with compression horns, and the equipment, thats a bonus ( horns reveal all!)   A big part of the remaining issue was that for some reason the Alpine Imprint didnt like the High level speaker line level, and decided to clip   especially at volume 31 on track 15 of the 2005 IASCA Disc first snare drum caused a clip. Im Guessing that volume 29 or 30 is the ceiling for the clean output... I added the LC6i   and ran low level into the imprint.. We'll soon see if this cleans up the problem... In the mean time, the hiss has vanished...    :) Ill follow up and let yall know where things lay as they do...

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JHM

And again I ask... WHY DO YOU FEEL YOU NEED THE LINE DRIVER?

Seriously. I haven't ever seen a TRUE sound quality install with ANY extraneous gain boosting stages. In fact, more of them than not, they are trying to remove as many gain stages as possible - thus "passive" preamplifiers.

Line drivers are the realm of SPL systems. Do it right, follow the K.I.S.S. rule. (I don't mean you are stupid, I just use that as an example...)

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It all reminds me of something that Molière once said to Guy de Maupassant at a café in Vienna: "That's nice. You should write it down."