PS Audio Direct Stream MK2 DAC

Listening review of the MK2 vs. Chord TT2 and PS Audio MK1. Not really worth the effort to consider the MK2 I'm sad to say. The sound was lacking in dynamics, depth, and detail. The sound stage was fine but then again I have nearly full range towers for that. Listened across a wide range of music from cutting edge indie - Dirty Projectors "Right Now" to Zepplin II to Coltrane "Giant Steps" at 196kHz on Qobuz. One of the telling moments of reproduction isn't musical but a playing mistake about 2.65' in on Giant Steps when the string is misplayed off the fingerboard - you can here the non-musical quality for a second which creates a nice juxtaposition. The clarity of the detail in the high horn notes and the cymbals shone on the TT2.  The deepness and detail of the bass were both severely limited in the MK2 by comparison.  

A five month wait to ship it while sitting on my money to receive a device that is noisy and doesn't have any purpose for it's network card. Maybe one day they will make the network card do something. Actual sound couldn't hold a candle to the Chord TT2. I'm not sure I would say it is even better than the MK1. Maybe PSA can upgrade the firmware and decoding algorithms to improve it's competitiveness but why wait? 

There is no hum and this is a fantastic DAC.

acmaier3:  boy somebody is trolling PS Audio.  What are you going on about?  This is a great DAC and your comments seem to be intended to slam PS Audio.  You have an agenda.  I have listened to this DAC for about 3 weeks.  It is amazingly good with great dynamics and soundstage..clean your ears or your mind.

I can understand being upset with a company that advertises that their DAC has streaming capabilities, but did not provide such capability.  Assuming that a MKII product has the same features as a MK1 product is on the consumer.  This assumes that the manufacturer provides information on the feature set of the MKII product.  I was very interested in the MKII DAC, but the timeline didn’t fit within my purchasing timeline.  I never wanted a DAC with streaming capability.

I received my PS Audio DS DAC Mk2 a couple of weeks ago or so. I have given it an initial listen and it gives a nice soundstage with good detail and imaging. No hum at all. A nice DAC. Much more listening to go. But so far so good. As for the streaming, they never advertised that the Mk2 had streaming. Lots of good DACs don’t have built in streaming. I have other great streamers. I don’t need PSA building in streaming and increasing the price further. This whole complaint about steaming is a lot of nothing.