Putting together a reference level system. My Source is predominantly standard 16/44 played from a MacMini using iTunes and Amarra. Some of my music is purchased from iTunes and the rest is ripped from standard CD's. For my tastes in music, my high def catalogues are still limited; so Redbook 16/44 will be my primary source for quite some time.
I'm not spending DCS or MSB money. But $15-20k retail is not out of the question.
Upsampling vs non-upsampling? USB input vs SPDIF?
All opinions welcome.
And I know I need to hear them, but getting these ultra $$$ DAC's into your house for an audition ain't easy.
Looking for musical, emotional, engaging, accurate , with great dimension. Not looking for analytical and sterile.
As Matt knows, I'm very much into portable audio also. I have the Mojo. It's very nice for the price, but I don't like the chunky case. I"m awaiting the new Macntosh DS50 I believe it's called. I'm hoping I like it more as it also has crossfeed if you want to try it. I have the ZMF ORi's, Nobel Savants and will be getting the ref CIEM's from Empire Ears soon. The headphone balanced out on my Ayre QX5 is simply amazing and hte best headphone amp I've ever heard and I've heard the top ones on the market many times at stores and shows.
As for phones, I personally don't like the built in DAC's. One of the LG phones has a good built in, but it's still not better than even my bounce around Audioquest Dragonfly Red. The newer iPhone DAC's to me are terrible. If you have good IEM's or cans and a decent portable DAC, just listen and it should pop out at you.
Would I use a Mojo as my main DAC in my home system? Yes I would....if I was just starting out and needed a DAC until I could afford or find a better DAC. As good as DAC's are now days, I greatly miss my analog system that I recently had to sell. I think it just comes down to timing issues that digital has. I've spoken to some designers or gear other than DAC's and they all feel that it's still the timing of digital being off a bit. To my ears analog is just so relaxed when you play the same cut with digital. It will be interesting to hear how the Boulder will sound as their gear is usually pretty awesome and with a server built into it, I'm assuming that takes care of what connection, what cable and what clock to use. They know how to isolate their products and how to use the best power supplies for each part of their gear, so they can solve so many of the problems that are inherent in digital audio replication.
I'm assuming that it should best everything and for 65k plus any discounts, it should. I also feel strongly that digital has come a long way each year. I know two who own Steves' new piece (I owned and loved his old one) and the differences between the two are night and day from what I've been told. That says a ton as he's only one man designing his gear and not a team.
This thread will continue for many years to come as long as Matt decides he wants to keep up with new and latest, lol. Thanks for keeping it on track as that's not easy to do these days. I'm also thankful that it's not full of manufacturers' or dealers selling their gear. Steve and some others have been incredible in their candor and their love of music/gear and not trying to push their stuff. THANKS...
Hanz Zimmer - Absurdity Hanz Zimmer - Mombassa Saint Sean - Danse Macabre LadySmith - People Get Ready Yes - Leave It Stimela - Coal Train Natalie Mechant - The Peppery Man Aaron Neville - Everybody Plays the Fool Dance of the Tumblers Michael Buble - Today is Yesterday’s Tomorrow Pictures at an Exhibiiton
there are other classical, jazz and rock tracks I use. But those are the primary tracks that I know REALLY well.
Its actually a GREAT question!!
Lets all post our top 3 tracks we use when auditioning gear!!!!
Steve - I have conspired several dap’s and several portable DAC’s. The Chord Hugo 2 is REALLY good for portable use!!! My iPhone with the Hugo2 and Kennerton Odin’s makes a world class portable audio experience!!!!
if interested, I did a comparison of 67 headphones on Head-Fi. It’s a good read. It also includes several portable DAC’s. 👍🏻
Steve, the newer Antipodes is excellent but was not the equal of the Aurender N10. I did not run it with any upsampling, which is supposedly it’s best source mechanism. But it requires a computer which defeats the purpose (to me) of a solo server. And it was highly quirky software wise compared with the “it just works” N10. The Aurender products are just SO good!!!
geoffkait - you got it, however, I would start by selling the CD transport and look for a good computer audio source. Too much mucking constantly with CD's, besides you end up listening to tracks that you don't want to hear, and only 10 or 12 of them.
Then, of course, you have servers or playback software and digital cabling and Ethernet cabling and isolators and LPS for this and that, and then there is format....
I don't consider these tweaks, but they are essential to getting the best sound from a computer source.
There is one tweak that I actually use:
Plasmatron from VHAudio. Highly recommended AC regulator.
DACs in newer better smart phones are not bad. As is the case with many good quality products at various price points these days. Need not cost much. You might need a good outboard amp to drive many good quality headphones well. At that point an external DAC may often come into play as well. I very much like the Chord Mojo. Its just very cool looking and different in addition to sounding good and not expensive by high end audio standards.
And if THAT doesn’t work - the room acoustics and the speaker location things - or if you just want to see just how far you take this stuff, you probably need to get into vibration isolation, aftermarket fuses, wire and cable and power cord directionality, CD treatments, CD bevelers, coloring CDs, demagnetizing CDs and interconnects, silver holographic foil, crystals, Mpingo discs, and whatever else you can think of.
The only constraints are the ones you bring with you. Extracting ALL the information that’s buried there in the recordings is not at all unlike an archaeological dig of massive proportions. ⛏ Time to pull out all the stops.
"When the going gets tough....the tough get going." - Blutarsky
Here is a good test to see if your system is "truly resolving":
Take a FLAC, uncompressed FLAC, ALAC or AIFF track and convert it to .wav using DBpoweramp or XLD. Play both tracks alternately.
If you cannot hear any difference and the .wav does not sound better, you need to tune the position of your speakers or add acoustic treatments. If you still don’t hear any difference, you have an offending component or cable in your system, maybe more than one.
When I hear people say that all DACs sound very close, I have to wonder about their system.
BTW, Baja - that Antipodes is a very good server. IMO, to get the best out of it, you should be using a good USB converter or USB DAC, not S/PDIF from it.
I'm retired needed another hobby to keep myself busy. I've had stereo systems for most of my life. My first receiver was a Hearthkit AR15 which I built from a kit while in the Navy stationed on an old WWII aircraft carrier during the Vietnam War. After I left the Navy I worked in IT in a Data Center for 42 years so going digital was very interesting to me. I used dBpoweramp to rip my small CD collection of 500 cd's to FLAC uncompressed on my Dell tower running Windows 10 Pro with windows spaces configured to mirror 3 internal drives. I have a Antipodes DX-1 but didn't use their drive or software to rip because I wanted to get the metadata right. Getting the metadata right, I use MP3Tag, is lots of work but I have plenty of time. Look into a free Microsoft utility called SyncToy to synch your folders (needs Netframework installed to work). I have three folders on my Dell (Ripped Music, HDtracks, Acoustic Sounds) which I synch to one folder on my Antipodes. Just setup three folder pairs in SyncToy in echo mode and run one of them when an album is added to your collection. It's great for synching your backups also.
Matt, I would love to now what albums you pick to test your components!
Billions are listening to music off of their phone digital to analog convertors. I'm guessing most are quite happy with that performance.
Perfectly good DACs from pennies on up. Relatively speaking $30 to say, a dollar, can also be considered outrageous.
I started my DAC journey with similar outboard cards/convertors. Absolutely fine sound.
@mattnshilp Very respectful move. I'm sincerely curious.
@markolino72 You are the one who has the privilege of removing your posts. The only one I'd deem worthy of that is the one made at
10-25-2017 12:37pm , but that's still your call.
These days its much harder to find a bad DAC than a good one. Very good DACs are pretty much commodity items these days. Not to say they all sound the same.
I got to listen to very highly regarded Chord Mojo portable DAC yesterday running the $3000 Focal headphones. Source was Tidal via a Bluesound streamer.
I was comparing to various more modest headphones I run off various DACs at home all of which I find quite "musical" and fairly detailed.
Needless to say it sounded very good. How much better/different? Hard to say without extended compares. So it was not a total blowout as one might expect.
Matt - Focal speakers!! At the LA Audio show I heard at least three exhibits using Focals. All sounded really good. I have added Focal to my list of recommended speakers, along with Vapor and TAD.
BTW, did you ever compare the Aurender N10 to the top of line Antipodes server?
Mark and Will. Let’s put this conversation to bed for now. I’m honoring your suggestion and giving it a try. Most would have just shut you down altogether. I don’t want a half a page discussion about a $30- DAC here. I’ll post my findings just to be respectful. But out of that same respect, let’s wait quietly until I post findings. Please and thank you.
i second you willemj, there is no miracle! i just tried to give an example! a very good dac can cost 30$ and an excellent dac don’t need to cost 60k$ mattnshilp: maybe take a look at the Dangerous Convert 2 i’m use to hear music 8h/day so for me ultra resolving dacs don’t do it. with the uca202 i don’t listen to my gear anymore! YouTube p2T5nUsAaq0
The uca 220 is technically the same as the uca 202. The only difference is the colour of the case and some software. Anyone who wants to do a listening test should realize that the uca 202 has a quite low ouput of 1.2V, compared to many DACs that comply with the cd red book standard of 2.0V (or more). A low output level is not a bad idea, given the high input sensitivity of many amplifiers, but in a direct comparison it will not be as loud. Since the brain interprets louder as better, the differential should be compensated (and very precisely) for the comparison to be meaningful. I do want to repeat that I would never claim that this modest unit is as good as e.g. a Benchmark. It is, however, remarkably good for the price, much better than any laptop sound card, and excellent to upgrade a secundary system composed of legacy gear.
Since you've been tuning to less musical and totally "un-cap-able" with complex music passages, with your go to DACs, I'm very much looking forward to your impressions and findings. : )
Ok. Markolino. For $30- amazon prime, I’ll bite. It’s ordered. Hopefully this miracle $30- DAC will help me wake up from the 30 years of useless audiophile wandering I’ve clearly experienced. I can’t wait for my eyes to be opened to this Behrenger miracle!!
i’m not throlling! i just tried to say that i enjoy more this little dac FOR REDBOOK(and my collection is 99.9% of redbook) than any other i had (ex:audio note dac 3) which was more natural, more palpable, more realistic BUT LESS MUSICAL! SOTA? hummmm BUT NO MUSIC? Something is wrong with ultra capable dacs! i also had a 1bit native dsd cs4398 dac very good in dsd but atrocious with 44/16. Top tier dac for redbook is probably a dac that does only redbook!!!!! the uca202 seems to output what is on the cd and it has no preamp or analogue output circuit as high end dacs. so you can add your own preamp!!! 2. SOTA DAC working on usb??? bah. AND AGAIN i insist that with such SOTA devices 50% of your collection is inaudible (i hear a lot of classical music not recognized to be well recorded) and when the message goes very complex a lot of those SOTA dacs are totally UNCAPABLE. if you wanna buy a 30.000$ dac just for hear Diana Krall or only some jazz trios is up to you! 3. some high end music servers are build around a 40$ raspberry like boards! and it will be sold for 6000$. IS TIME TO WAKE UP IDIOPHILES!
Wow. Leave the house alone for a few weeks and look what happens. Lol.
Ok. I’ve been enjoying the crap out of my earthshatteringly good Davinci 2. I cant explain how good it is other then to say that it creates visual cues within the layers of musical eddies and currents. One of my friends feels it lacks the last molecule of accuracy compared to something like the Emm product. But I feel it’s representation of accuracy is proper and not meticulous; musical and not overly analytical.
I have moved my beloved ODSX to my office system, which has turned into a kick ass system on its own: Aurender N10 Empirical Audio ODSX DAC Constellation Virgo 2 preamp Constellation Centaur stereo amp Torus RM20 BAL conditioner with dedicated 240V balanced dedicated stranded 10ga circuit Focal Sopra #2 speakers
Shhhhhhh. Wanna hear a secret???
I have a Boulder 2120 DAC incoming for audition ($65k)!!! It has a built in music server. I’m school girl giddy to compare it to my N10/Davinci 2 combo!!!
Well now that we have that on good authority it's settled, so we can end any further discussions about such sound quality differences. What a relief! ;~)
Perfection is easily defined in theory, and pretty easily in practice. It is the quality level above human hearing acuity. The good news is that with DACs that level is reached quite easily, and for fairly modest outlays. Quality wise, DACs are the most accurate part of the audio chain, so they deserve least attention. Next down the quality pecking order are amplifiers, and then, much further down, loudspeakers (and cartridges).
Glad you believe to have found "perfection" in DACs at such modest prices. Apparently there are different ways to define exactly what perfection means, unless you've compared them to the best existing DACs available at any price. If you haven't done that such declarations are essentially meaningless, and really just saying nothing more than you've found some low cost DACs which meet your standards. Others may have higher goals and more resolving systems which reveal flaws that you may be willing to live with. To each their own, that's why we have free markets! Let the competition for the ultimate DAC continue here...
See here for a test of that Behringer DAC: http://nwavguy.blogspot.nl/2011/02/behringer-uca202-review.html It is in fact remarkably good, and a masive improvement on for example inbuilt laptop DACs. I do enjoy having a few for less demanding applications. It is not perfect, that is true. However, it is also not true that it should cost an arm and a leg to produce a top quality DAC. Moreover, these days standard Red Book CD resolution is no longer a challenge for any DAC chip set. See here for an example: https://www.jdslabs.com/products/39/odac-objectivedac/ Perfection has been achieved, and for a small outlay
Mark, this thread is about state of the art. Who are you, or anyone to tell folks how to spend their money? You have no idea what is inside top DAC's and how much they cost to produce. Please top trolling this thread as it's a long running thread and we'd been able to keep things on track for hte most part. Thanks.
sure some dacs are better than this little thing! but i think for less than 1000-500$ you can find a excellent dac, DON’T BUY THOSE RIDICOULOUSLY PRICED DACS(with allmost Nothing Inside) , to stop and force the industry stolling you! Go Pro Audio
to add to the $30 dac post . Now that you bring up how your $30 dac makes all recordings sound good reminds me of a Apoggee dac i had that was also a studio recorder as well as volume control . That thing played all music i threw at it with equal frequencies being delivered . Makes me think audiophile dacs are merely additional tone controls . Juice the frequencies that make "hifi" music and recordings sound a smidge tilted for the wow factor ?
i use a 26$ dac uca202 no stupid drivers needed works on every device excellent dac, musical,prat,timbre now i’m hearing all my music AGAIN i had expensive dacs that only sounded good with excellent recorded cd’s, all other were inaudible!
ps: complemented with a little tube preamp pa-10se search YouTube! 30$ audiophile
I have a friend who used to post in this thread who also got a Davinci mk 2 this week. He's got to finish burnin it in, but he too got the N10 server to go with it. I got him in touch with Matt and they are will no doubt share some notes etc...My friends system is Vandersteen 7's, forget the amp name and SR cabling.
I have a good feel for how Matt listens as well as how my other friend does, so for me it will be really neat to hear their differences as both front ends are identical.
as a former Lampi Golden Gate owner i did listen to the new Lampizator Pacific dac at the RMAF show this past weekend. i was impressed by it's greater clarity and more transparent and refined character. it plays at a higher level than the GG and will likely synergize in more systems.
at 22k euro's it's not cheap but at an attainable level.
and it's footprint is now conventional so it will fit into more racks better, and auto switches between dsd and pcm. it is not MQA compatible; that would not stop me or even slow me down choosing a dac (even though my MSB Select II has MQA I can take it or leave it).
it's one that must be considered as a contender. and you could buy it with one set of tubes and never think about it again. it does not need particular voicing to system fit like more colored dacs might.
I love tube stuff Aziz. I just chose to avoid tubes for my own personal system because I have a propensity to obsess about trying everything and would end up falling down the rabbit hole of tube rolling. I was quite impressed by the Golden Gate I heard years ago. I was not blown away by the Big 6 I heard years before that.
Both. I compared the S1 using its spdif output into my DAC versus the N10 using its spdif output into my DAC. And then we compared the S1 using its internal DAC to N10 with my DAC. THEN, we compared the $9k Lumin S1 to the $6k Aurender A10 (both server/DAC combo’s) and the A10 won in both my home and office system (my offfie system is Constellation Virgo 2 preamp/Centaur stereo amp/Focal Sopra 2 speakers.
I think the Lumin’s server section is better then its internal DAC section. But I would put the Melco above the Lumin U1 from a stand-alone server standpoint. But the Melco is a nightmare to control currently, and a bit finicky as far as connections and control. The Lumin control software is my favorite other then using Roon. And you CAN use Roon on the Lumin as well.
@mattnshilp , thanks for the review. Were you comparing the S1 to the N10 with it’s built in dac or digital out? Or both? To put it into pricing perspective the U1 which is Lumin’s player only model ( almost the same as S1 minus dac) is £4500 and the N10 ( no dac) is £8,500.
well, I see you have opened the floodgates to the Boulder 2150 server/dac at $65k list price. so maybe you need to now hear an $84.5k dac/passive analog preamp.....the MSB Select II.
standard with a single powerbase and 77 femto clock. I just upgraded to the second powerbase and mine has the 33 Femto clock.
after hearing the Select II at a show a few years back I could not escape that reference in my head listening to other dacs in my system, and eventually it wore down my defenses and I acquired one.
I hope you can try one at some point. even if it's just at a show. that's the only place I heard one (3 different times) until I owned one. it's really on another performance level beyond other dacs I've had in my system (Trinity, Aqua Formula, Nagra HD, Lampi GG) or at shows and more in very good vinyl playback performance territory, and includes an exceptional passive analog preamp and analog inputs, modularity for future proofing, and a 10 year warranty and 'upgrade at retail difference' program that keeps it cutting edge relevant for a decade. when 'some' here look back 10 years and add up their digital investments + preamp investments, this starts to pencil.
no worries if some get their panties in a bunch over the price, comes with the territory. I just had to throw this idea into the hat, now that the hat is so much bigger.
Before final deceision between Adagio and Pavane level 1 I put it directly to my Manley Shrimp preamp. And finally Adagio has less body and impact tham pavane level. So Manley Shrimp giving some tube character doesn't affect the initial impact and body. If it is here the Shrimp - will give, if there is no, shrimp will not give that. Audia Flight 100 is fully transparent - it provides what you give.
Finally pavan level 1 in more engaging for me.. its more musical despite doesnt give a minute details and leayer as adagio. But gives more full mids and impact.
I Will stay with Pavane despite i liked Adagio for its technical excelence and molecular details.
Mitch2, can you give some more information about your pre. Some link, price range? is it possible to buy?
Lumin S1 and Melco N1ZH/2 servers compared to Aurender N10. The sneak peak at the end reads that the N10 is still the champ.
Heres the skinny:
Lumin S1 - sexy, heavy, built like a fine Swiss Watch! Separate dedicated LPS built equally well. I didn’t like the extended shroud over the back plugs; but if it was living long term with me, and rarely accessed, it wouldn’t be an issue. If it’s sitting out or in a top shelf of a rack, it’s a nice touch aesthetically; otherwise it’s sort of useless. Sound wise? It’s punchy, lively and energetic. The bass is deep but lacks coherence and the midrange and treble lacked layered detail and that proper sense of instrument texture. It was listenable and not unpleasant, but didn’t convey a listening experience that conveyed me into the recording studio or concert hall. Although not Hi-Fi, it was not conducive to being lost in the music the way that other servers I have heard were. I see a tube system with a warmer tonal signature mellowing it’s flavor and making it more palatable to long term listening and a permanent home. I sold my S1. The N10 did everything better, top to bottom. Inside and out. From depth and width of soundstage, leading and trailing edges, dynamic presence, harmonic structure, layering, etc. Just better, much better. That all said, I like the Lumin software and Tidal search features better then the Aurender software. It worked. Period. Every time I turned it on it just worked. No quirks. No issues. Like the Aurender. Rock solid stable. The only 2 so far that are rock solid stable.
Melco N1ZH/2 - Not as well built as the S1 or the Aurender; think Seiko vs Vacherone Constantine or Piaget. No native software app (yet), no Roon compatibility, just upnp compatible. I used the Arcam control software App as others couldn’t find the server and DAC and make them work together. Quirky. Once I got everything to sync I was afraid to change anything. Sound wise it’s simple to sum up (and I give my friend Merrill of Merrill Audio the credit for the summary) - it doesn’t do anything wrong. It’s not offensive. It’s presentation is proper, staging is enjoyable and overall sense of music and aire is correct; it’s just missing information. It simply doesn’t extract it all; or my system is SO resolving I can hear it more easily. It’s not a noise floor thing (or maybe it is). In El Tren Del Quinto, there is a hollow echo clearly evident in the room on the N10 that gives the room presence and realism; it’s not sound really, it’s the hollow echo of an open church when no sound is happening. The N10 captures this. The Melco misses it. It’s a terrific product for its cost, and it’s doesn’t need to apologize for all the things it does right. But i don’t think it knows what it doesn’t do; because it doesn’t hear what it’s missing. As a required caveat, I have to say that the Melco offers a feature that will eventually be offered on every server- a direct Ethernet out specifically designed to plug directly into an Ethernet input DAC without running through a switch. I would imagine this would be its best output, and is probably the best digital path from server to DAC other then I2S. I don’t have a DAC with an Ethernet out. I’d love to compare the USB out to that dedicated Ethernet output. THAT would be a great comparison and very helpful for everyone here.
That is all currrntly. So the N10 is still here.
Next up, I believe, is the Memory Player, and the Baetis if I can find time to get Dave over here with it. The mighty Boulder will be coming after RMAF!! Can’t wait for that!!!
Thanks Mitch2, great stuff right there. And thanks Dave, for always adding just the correct amount of dealer input and offer without overdoing it! It's great having enthusiasts, dealers and manufacturers all here to add and help this thread to progress and grow.
Mitch2 thanks. The Aqua La Scala is exceptionally musical with big images and a warm rich punchy sound.
The Mk 2 Optilogic is supposed to extend the treble detail and increase the openess and sound staging while still retaining the overall superb quality of the La Scala.
We are selling our Lascala to move to a Formula, so if you know of anyone looking for a great dac driven by a little old audiophile to listen to Gregorian chants on Sundays let me know.
audiotroy, I auditioned the Aqua Hifi La Scala MKII, but not the recent Optologic version.
gibalok, my pre was custom
made by SMc Audio - Steve McCormack, and is very close to his VRE-1. It is a unity-gain, buffered preamp with the VRE-1 outboard choke power supply, a Shallco volume control with AN Tantalum resisters, and Lundahl output transformers that are wound with Cardas copper wire.
For more about the Metrum DACs, I suggest reading Srajan's 6moons reviews all the way through the March 2017 Adagio review and his comparison of that DAC to the COS, LaScala, and Formula DACs.
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