A DAC that ought to be better known: RME

jjss49, I don't find RME "zippy" in my room. I also have a highly modded MHDT Labs dac to compare it with and the RME is far from zippy when played side by side in the same system. I do have the Teddy Pardo on the RME with JPS Labs digital cable and Acoustic Zen silver ref 2 going out to preamp. You would think the silver wire would make it zippy but that's not the case. I find RME is very transparent and warm but in no way "zippy". I did find it took over a month to break in, I leave Teddy Pardo and RME on 24/7 and notice even being on 24/7 it take 20 or so minutes of music running through it before it sounds right. 

Mofojo, I did compare the Pardo vs stock after a few months of break in. Pardo expands soundstage, improved spl in the room, midrange became much more natural and put nice weight and body on the highs, it just made everything more musical, bigger and smoothed things out but your mileage may vary.

jjss49, I'm going to order the adapters just haven't got around to it. I have a lot of 6sn7's, ken rads, RCA gray glass and so on plus amprex, bugle boy,SQ's, valvo and many other 6922. I very interested where that would take the MHDT, thanks for the suggestion.

If you check out headfi forum they have an on going forum on the RME and most do not believe an upgraded lps will help. They say "RME doesn't recommend it" So I guess everyone believes different. I bought the RME and waited about 2 weeks for Teddy Pardo. Breaking it in with stock power supply I thought sound stage lacked and it was treble forward but that could have been break in. jjss49 I know what you mean by "zippy" no offense taken and RME was 2 dimensional and treble forward with no meat on the bones and most of all not engaging. Before the RME I tried the Qutest but it wasn't for me. I was looking to move on and sell RME. After about 6 or 7 weeks It became big and warm 3 dimensional with very inviting midrange and very smooth non fatiguing crystal clear highs. Crystal clear very transparent highs is something the MHDT can't do as well in my system. As good as RME soundstage became MHDT stage is a little better or different not night and day but very noticeable. I do find the RME responds very well to footers. I have the MHDT stock feet sitting on top of a preamp power supply with a fairly cheap USB and XLO signature output cables so it may be an unfair comparison while RME sits on Nordost footers under the maple and golden sound jumbos footers under the RME . I do find the MHDT can fall apart on fast complex fusion, jazz or busy music but can be more engaging than the RME at times certainly with small acoustic jazz which is very important to me. I think these dacs are very system dependent, what sound good to me sounds bad to others. Honestly I wouldn't want to be without one or the other depending on the mood I'm in. Sometimes I will listen to the RME for a week or so and then the MHDT for a week or 2 or switch between the 2 in the same night. I need to get the MHDT a better input cable and platform to see what happens, both the RME and MHDT source is Auralic g1.