Discrete R2R Ladder dac from Soekris, Absolute Sounds review.

Listening to Bill Evans "Another Time". Eddie Gomez’ bass is sounding the best I have heard it with my setup.

Tight extended dynamics now, and the rest will be also, once you fine tune the system to this new sound.
And you probably could have got the top Soekris, with the money from the sale of the  CJ 17LS2 preamp.

Cheers George

Sorry dsper had to delete the last two, thought I was talking to the "anti Soekris" one.

Consider if the DAC has a remote control for the volume.

3 of the 5 Soekris dacs do have remote control, only the bottom 2 don’t and you have to turn the knob.

Cheers George

 If this was a delta-sigma, you would probably say he was no good.

And there it is!

Wow!!! well don’t buy one then, what’s your beef with the Danes, are you Swedish or Norwegian they don’t like them, suppose you don’t care for Gryphon amps either?

Like I said

Very affordable highly regarded discrete R2R dac from the Dutch

Find something else around $1k that competes sonically with discrete R2R ladder design, with all the features it has.

Really? By who? I have never heard of him

Settle petal, don’t get around/couldn’t be bothered searching.

I said in my opening post "digital designer" not just dac’s

Just search at DiyAudio with conversations he has with digital gurus over there and with the likes of Nelson Pass and John Curl etc. Then look at his family digital communications business in Denmark.
I believe this Dac part is just for his musical passion and had to get involved in it.

Cheers George

Yep, that’s the way I read it too.

What a great thing to have, to know when volume is too high and the load is too hard for the dacs output buffer. It’s got a distortion sensor that blinks the red led, nice. This will prove to you if it’s not loud enough direct and you need more gain from an active preamp.

" “CLIP” indicator: Will blink when the DAC output signal is clipping. You should not turn the volume knob higher than to where the red “CLIP” LED will not blink."

And it may blink at different volume positions, depending on what load the dac’s output buffer sees, (the 10kohm of the DNA-500 or the variable input 30k -120k of the CJ-17LS2 depending on it’s volume position.)

So if you’ve just turned it back down a little from where it blinked, what’s that volume like when you go direct to poweramp?

Cheers George

If I am hell bent on hearing some "tube magic" with a solid state amp, I need to use a tube preamp. In that case, where should I set the volume on the DAC? Is it the same answer as above?

At least 70% or more so your sure it's not "bit striping"
If your hell bent on tube sound, use a tube pre with little or no gain. A Schiit Saga+ is tube and 1 x tube gain, and can also be used as a passive pre as well. 
https://www.schiit.com/products/saga-2

Cheers George

Okay, I think the affair is over with the Soekris direct into the amp .

This is how it starts, you’ll be back, maybe not tomorrow looking for things you mentioned by going direct that are now missing with the pre in.

More detail
More contrast between highest and lowest notes
More ambient information - deeper soundstage, maybe?

I’d add to those maybe also bass definition and depth.

Same happened to me. It just a matter of fine tuning when going direct, like you spent with the tube pre in, not just over night tune, probably months?

Cheers George

Maybe I have to get used to it

Yes and fine tune just like you would have with the preamp in, speaker angle maybe don’t now sit on tweeter axis, angle speakers outwards more this will also give more imagining outside the speakers, and soften the tweeter a touch like the tubes do, interconnects also, etc etc
Cheers George

Try direct also for a while and let us know where on it’s volume control you are?
As I’ve found with my discrete R2R, what I thought were "so so" old recordings were actually very good, and it just took a discrete R2R dac to make me realize it. Now I’m listening to all those old ones I never liked in a very new light.

Cheers George

That's good to know, are you using it direct or through a preamp, if direct where are you on it's level control for a good volume level?

Cheers George

MHTD?, old hat  TDA1541A chip based.
I mean Discrete R2R dacs

Cheers George

And that's the cheaper one.
Cheers George

Ooops!

These are not mega dollar units, and are "discrete R2R", yet they're getting the reputation as being giant killers, that why I said "very affordable" at $899, see if you can find a discrete R2R dac at or near that price??
And the reviewer put it up against far more expensive units at twice the price. 

Cheers George