New Cary DMS 700

Thank you, most of my remaining kit is Benchmark.

Congrats on the purchase!  I've had mine for a couple of years now and no regrets.  I like the option to use it as a standalone streamer and add a separate DAC if and when I get the urge to try an upgrade as technology improves, but I'm definitely not there yet.  For reference, my other components are Reference 3A Reflector speakers, Backert Labs Rhumba Extreme preamp, and Coincident Frankenstein 300B mono-blocks.  Also, I think you're buying it at the best price they've ever offered.

Went with 700, should have it soon.

I know this is an old thread but I'm curious if anyone has first hand experience with the DMS-650 and DMS-700. Searching for as much information as possible, to determine which of those models to purchase utilizing Cary Direct upgrade/trade program.

benzman

Yes! I was curious about the difference(s) between a 600SE and 700 models. Minus the cd player capability.

Happy Listening!

600. The 600SE I believe is a CD player/dac

benzman

did you own the 600SE ?

Happy Listening!

i just bought the IFI Zen Streamer it $399 and sounds utterly transparent. looking for a new DAC to pair it with. i must say my venerable NAD D1050 is providing more than adequate for now running Roon.  Rega speakers and electronics.

@benzman Appreciate the reply!

Hello out there in audiophile land. I just ordered a DMS-700 arriving this week. Pairing it with an ARC LS-28 and a REF 75 SE.  A couple of questions regarding tweaking the sound.  Does a different power cable make an audible difference? I also read some of the post regarding the EtherRegen what does the device actual do? Clean up the ethernet signal? Is there that much noise in a ethernet cable?Has anyone compared the Cary DMS-700 to the ARC DAC 9 with and Aurender streamer?Feedback appreciated.

Sorry I missed this. So 6,000 new vs 3,500 used
the 700 does sound better. I would say 10-15%
the 700 has a much better interface. But if you are using Roon it becomes a moot point. So if I was a Roon user and did not have a hi resolving system and room I would look for a 600 ( although there may be a part that Cary says that can’t get anymore)
But if you have a pretty decent system and can hear changes in your system pretty easily go for the 700. Either way the both sound very good and easy to listen too

@benzman. I’m only interested in Qobuz/Roon at this point and do not own a digital library. In your opinion is a used 600 where I should spend the cash vs a new 700. Did I understand that correctly? The market is optimal right now, maybe because of UI but I don’t ever plan to use their app. Thanks in advance for your insight. 

Thanks Benzman！17 years ago I bought Audience aR6 power condition, expensive but I am very happy with the performance. I will try their power cord. Now I feel some accessories have to buy, EtherRegen, SOtM dcbl  Cat 7,and fuse. Good quality fuse improve SQ. This is my experience. My 700 will come next week, very excited !

Definitely upgrade the power cord. I have an Audience au24se MP on mine. You probably can upgrade for a couple of hundred. Check out the used section. A medium rating is fine. You do not need one designed for power amps. I threw a SR orange fuse in mine. Not sure it made a big difference but it didn’t hurt. The 700 stays on 24/7 so sure it’s broken in now and sounds pretty damn good. You made a good move. I know it cost you a few more bucks but the Cary will mate with much more equipment than the Lumin

Do you change the power cord? What power cord do you use? Lumin T2 or DMS 700, Finally I chose 700,  I have placed the order. Now I am finding the power cord. Do you have any suggestions? thank you!

Finally it was worth the upgrade from 600 ???

I went from the 600 to 700. 700 sounds better all the way around. Much more defined bass and an improved midrange. Vocals with much more texture. The interface is much improved.  If you are a Roon user I think there would be better ways to upgrade for the price diff. 6k new for the 700 and approx 3500 resale of the 600
I am happy with the 700 for a 1 box solution that sounds really good. 

Another happy DMS-600 owner here. I’m intrigued about the 700 based on the comments here. Would like to hear more from those who went from the 600 to the 700 in particular. 

Anyone have updates on this piece of kit? I’m curious as to how this sounds compared to the say and Aurender A30, which looks to have a much more sophisticated analog and power architecture, or the DirectStream DAC and bridge combo.

I updated the firmware on my DMS-600 and I swear it sounds better.  Maybe PG&E just delivering cleaner power all of a sudden? :-)

New software release. Please post any comments. 

UPDATE and warning !! Just installed the SR Orange after about 200 hours You only have to remove the 6 perimeter black screws on the bottom of the chassis. The seventh is a silver screw next to the rear left leg DO NOT REMOVE. It is actually the post for the IEC input connecting to the power board. The nut will come off inside the unit and when you flip it over who knows where it will go. I was lucky as it fell right out along with the lock washer. Super easy by just removing the perimeter 6 screws. I won’t comment on sound as I always give the fuses a few days. Just wanted to get this out there.
I would like to edit the first post but once it’s commented on it wont let me. If a mod sees it please remove
thanks,
Russ
cool. I was able to delete the previous post. 

I have been running the unit continuously since Friday ~40 hours. Sounded excellent right out of the box but continuing to improve. Streaming Tidal through 5G and using my flac files on ssd. I have excellent 5G reception. This piece does so many things right. Soundstage is very wide and deep, On Ron Carters Foursight Complete Stockholm Tapes it recreates a live concert experience. 
Upper octave Violins and vocals are smooth and airy. Cymbal clash and decay is solid also if maybe slightly less than my vinyl rig. No digital harshness which is sweet. It did freeze up once will running over night and had to be reset.

 Agree with prior comments that while improving substandard cd source material it helps them but is not a miracle worker. I have not heard the Lumin’s but like benz I suspect that in my system this is a better match as my Magnepan’s and Thiel’s  are already very detailed. 
I have not done much A/B with my vinyl rig or tried hard wired ethernet yet since I have been so happy with what I am hearing thus far. Plan on that over next few days. 

What’s kinda cool with the Cary,if the remote talks with any of the other equipment ( as mine did with the Rogue RP 7) their is a second remote code. 

Thanks jmbumgarner01. At the 2V setting my BHK Preamp volume is often set to between 15dB and 20dB of signal attenuation (i.e a vol of 40-50) .. and thats with my amps set at their lower 23dB gain setting. But 3V is only 3.5dB more than 2V so I will try that too at some point.

Thanks Benzman. I see now it says in the manual that the Fuse is not user serviceable. Hopefully it doesn't void the warranty if you replace it. I'm interested to know if you hear an improvement!

Congrats on the upgrade. I am going start at 2.0 V when mine arrives tomorrow as my pre has a lot of gain already. Will provide additional thoughts once I break in. Looking forward to the fire up of the 700. It should be a significant upgrade for me as I have been streaming through an Astell&Kern portable.

Upgraded to DMS-700 from DMS-600. Breaking in now. Liking that Pure Audio Mode works for both 2V and 3V max outputs as I am using 2V to my BHK Signature Preamp. Fingers crossed for Roon certification soon. Using Tidal or 1TB external SSD Drive until then. Benzman you are planning to open up the unit to replace the fuse then? - I noticed there is no fuse holder by the power supply.

My ssd’s are 1 TB so looks like that is no problem.

My thinking on the 5G is that if I have no ethernet cables etc that there is no way to introduce additional noise (and $ to me upgrading everything). My 5G router from verizon gives me north of 100 Mbps so if the Cary antenna can pull that in reliably all should be good. Will have to experiment and see.

Has anyone played with the upsampling yet?
let us know how the fuses go.

I understand up to 7or 8 TB attached storage for USB. Not sure how big a card you can get for SD.  You should have no issues.
 I am hardwired at 2.4 ghz.  Everything runs and sounds pretty damn fine.
I have had streamers from Bryston, Auralic,Aurender, and streamer/ dacs   from Aurender ( A10), Lumin (T2),  and the Cary 600.
The Lumin T2 had wonderful transparency and detail but would get tiring after a while. The 600 did not have quite the transparency but was close and you can listen all day.
The 700 I feel ( 5 days in) has the transparency of the Lumin but the smoothness of the AKM chipset. Really liking the vocals . I would really like to hear the Lumin X1 vs  the Cary 700. Even though the Cary is 6k list cheaper I think it would give it a battle.  I am going to give it a few more days and the install the SR orange fuse. In the past the SR fuses have made a bigger jump in the pre and power amps than in my digital equipment. We shall see  

Excellent thread and info. Greatly appreciated but now you guys finally convinced me to pull the plug on the 700, ordered on today.
Yippee....after reading all the potential ethernet upgrades I guess it is silly to ask but I will anyway.....has anyone tried the 5 G wifi connection to see how much sound quality suffers? 
Also,  I have my 800 or so cd’s all ripped to flac on a usb ssd and plan on attaching them to the 700, any issues with that ? I absolutely love my vinyl on Rega P8 and am hoping the 700 will help bring my digital to a similar affection in my system.

@joseph and benz....agreed the only unfortunate side effect of upgrading to better equipment is the highlighting of poor recording/mix/production flaws....alas it is not a perfect world...ha

I hear ya Joseph. They say that you listen more attentive to new equipment and maybe thats why there is a perceived improvement. You don't have to listen very hard with the 700. That's going from the 600, so from the 550 you must really be digging it.
    

I am about 220 hours in on my new 700. At 200 hours I noticed another layer of resolution, depth and clarity opening up. The one thing I have realized as a major difference between the 550 vs 700 is on lesser quality recoding's, not the digital resolution per say by the actual recoding itself. The increased resolving power of the 700 highlights and creates a high level of noticeability around the music's production flaws.   

Benzman, Thanks for the info. I’ll look into it. Give your new 700 at least four days before you start any critical listening. Image focus and depth really locked in around day 4.  I've noticed additional improvements in detail and ambience up through day 12.  I can create playlists using Tidal, USB and NAS. When viewing the playlist page, icons for each source are in the bottom left corner of each album art. This is how I compare SQ of each source to each other. Same song from Tidal, USB and NAS. Makes it really convenient and fast.

Hey Gary. Hard to put a number on it but the EtherREGEN is a solid upgrade for the 640 they are asking. But you can then spend another 1,000 on a LPS and a boutique Ethernet cable. Head over here:   Audiophilestyle.com.  Look for the Uptone sponsored forum   All the info you need and more. 
Have the 700 installed. Sounds pretty good out of the box. Will report after a few days. The app is a big upgrade but was hoping I could have all sources in a DMS playlist but looks like just local attached files . Would have been cool to have Tidal,Qobuz,USB and SD in one playlist. 

I found it. Also, I forgot to mention that I have a Roon Nucleus. Will I still need it?

Sure! What’s the link?

Agree w/thyname. You can add all the other goodies down the road. Sablon is another good cable. Supra is pretty nice in the $ 50 dollar range. 

EtherRegen is sold out until mid-March. I saw a unit for a good price in US Audiomart if you want to get one sooner.

Since you already have a good Ethernet cable, that’s all you need to get started. Perhaps later on you can buy a good quality linear power supply for EtherRegen 

Hello Benzman. Can you give me an exact list (EtherRegen, SoTM dCBL-CAT7, etc.) of items I need to purchase for my Cary Audio DMS600 to increase the sound quality? For my Ethernet cable, I’m using the Audioquest Vodka. I’m also thinking of getting the Cary Audio DMS700. Let me know what your thoughts are. 
Thanks

The EtherRegen in my system is as simple as it gets. Router > EtherRegen> SoTM dCBL-CAT7 cable > Cary DMS 600.  I think it gets me within 5% of the attached drives. Of course the attached drives have Higher resolution files than on Qobuz and Tidal so that may play a part. I have heard that with and LPS and Fiber you can actually surpass locally stored files. The weather delayed the 700 till tomorrow.  It looks so close to the 600 that I thought I could could slip it by the wife. I came clean today and feel like a new man. :) 

My DMS-700 continues to improve and now exceeds SQ of all sources in my system.  I've been using Tidal, NAS and USB input on the front with a Sandisk 256Gb flash drive.  The USB has best SQ.  Benzman have you found the SD to be better than USB?  I haven't tried any of the Ethernet upgrades either.  How much of an improvement do you get out of an Etheregen?

^ .. and an Uptone LPS 1.2 for the ER .. and another LPS for the Clock ... custom Ghent power cables .... down the rabbit hole we go!

+1 for the EtherRegen. I am also using a Sonore OM upstream of that with Fiber to the EtherRegen. And a BG7TBL clock for the EtherRegen ($100 well spent - see https://audiophilestyle.com/forums/topic/59419-master-clock-for-your-etherregen/#comments)

Yea I have an Audience AU 24Se power chord on the Cary. Also an EtherRegen in front of it. Sitting on Stillpoints Ultra Minis.  Everything adds up. 

Wow you bit the bullet and did the upgrade - congratulations! It will be very interesting to hear your thoughts on how it compares to the 600.

Yes - the SD card is my best sounding source. I keep my highest resolution material (128/256 DSD and 192/24 352/24 PCM) on a couple of Lexar Professional 633x 1TB SDXC UHS-I cards (formatted to NTFS).

I am amazed that other manufactures don’t include SD Card capabilities, I wish Cary Audio would have included two slots.

Will you also use an upgraded power cable?

Joe do you find the SD being your best sounding source?

Mine is coming tomorrow. See how it stacks up against the 600. Have an SR orange fuse waiting. : )

I upgraded from the DMS-550 and I am about 140 hours on my new DMS-700 (ran the first 100 hours on a repetitive PSAudio burn-in CD). Daryl at Cary Audio has been awesome to work with. I have the DMS-700 connected to a T+A PA3000HV integrated amp with a PSAudio PW CD Transport connected to the DMS-700 via digital XLR.

I find, that the DMS-700 has an exceptionally natural sound signature with no sense of listening fatigue, especially compared to some of the equal or higher priced competitive products that I have tried in my system (Lumin and Aurender). Listening to my reference material on the DMS-700 reveals greater resolution, a larger more transparent sound stage with a wonderful analog warmth and smoothness. One area the DMS-700 excels is its ability to reproduce very heavy deep bass. The implementation of the AK4499EQ DAC chips (R2R ladder DAC) with FPGA technology has significantly improved the performance over the DMS-550.

Some great new features on the DMS-700 include the ability directly copy files over the network to the SD card and USB drives that are attached to the DMS-700. All in, I think Cary Audio has created an excellent digital source - streaming - pre-amp - DAC.