dCS Rossini vs. Berkeley Reference dac 2


Has anyone compared the two?  I have heard the Rossini side-by-side with the Berkeley Ref. dac 1.  Long story short, the Rossini justified its higher price.  I'm now wondering if Berkeley's second try has narrowed the gap? Meanwhile, kudos to both dCS and Berkeley for striving to provide upgradeable products.
aldenberry

Showing 2 responses by khrys


I have heard both the dCS and Berkeley DACs in comparison but not in my system. Maier Shadi at The Audio Salon in Santa Monica carries Berkeley, dCS, Wilson, D’Agostino, Transparent etc and is a most accommodating proprietor. I chose a partial dCS Vivaldi stack ( no transport since I use a NAS directly into the Upsampler) but easily understand the allure of the Berkeley. I also run the DAC directly to my Momentum S-250. I had Transparent XL Gen V balanced ICs custom tuned to interface between the Vivaldi DAC and the Dag and have yet to find a preamp that improves on that setup.
Heresy, I know!
Imgoodwithtools I have heard the Berkeley Rv2 and still feel the dCS Rossini is preferable. The Rossini is so good and got so close the Vivaldi 1.0 that they needed to release the Vivaldi 2.0 update way early to mollify that siituation. 
The Berkeley is sweet, polite, pleasant and eminently listenable. But somewhat homogenized to my ears. It is airy and diaphanous but also somewhat amorphous. To my ears it only worked well with high end transports. Data files and streaming were subpar. 
The dCS is a chameleon. Fire breathing dragon or  2 day old lab puppies depending on the file. 
Texture, front to back sound stage, precision of instrumental placement, lack of upper midrange glare, precise articulate bass, noise floor, body and density of the instruments/voices were superior with the dCS. 
The Berkeley's interfaces make it instantly obsolete IMHO.
I think people will like delta sigma DACs or r2r DACs ultimately.
dCS makes the best delta sigma DACs and I'm still deciding if MSB  or Lampizator makes the best r2r. And boy do they sound spectacular. What a golden age for digital.