Received my Denafrips Venus 15th


It has been burning in for a week. I am very happy with my purchase. The bass is much more present and detailed than my previous Venus ii. The vocals are also improved. They have a much more 3D sound and are sitting out in space. 

zaxx40

@vthokie83 Really great point about the rapidly changing USB tech in recent years, and I agree that listening with your own ears should be the final deTerminator wink with a DDC like with everything else in audio.  I always thought that a decent DDC would likely improve sound (and at worst do nothing).  I have a few DDCs, and with most streamers I have had, there is definitely an improvement with adding a DDC to the chain and going I2S out to a I2S capable DAC.  However, two instances where I favor no DDC over having a DDC is with my now years old dedicated PC streamer with a JCAT Femto USB Card powered by a Keces P8 LPS (not sure if this JCAT card just has a really good USB implementation) and my Topping D90III Discrete DAC (USB always sounds better than I2S no matter what DDC I have tried with it).  Also, from my experience, DDCs have really made a big difference when they have a master clock input and I am able to sync my entire chain with the same external master clock (though this is not really something that can be done with the Denafrips and Musician DDCs as they don't have 10 MHz master clock inputs and only have dual 45 and 49 kHz word clock inputs).  I know its only with my ears (n = 1) and applicable to just the 4 streamers I have tested (Wiim Ultra, Eversolo DMP-A6 Gen 2, Fiio SR11, and Auralic Aries S1), but I have noticed that using a Musician Pisces slaved to the Venus 15th DAC's OCXO clock and going I2S into the Venus results in an improvement for all of them.

@skasundr and @@vthokie83 so far with the Venus 15th connected direct USB to the Eversolo A6 Standard it sounds ok and a definite upgrade from the Pontus II 12th but with only 150 I think it's still running in. What I'm hearing from you two is "it depends"...the Iris may or may not sound good with the Venus 15th so I'll play the in and out game to see which I prefer before selling the Iris. 

@vthokie83 I connected my Iris last night, selected i2s on the Venus 15th and it just worked. Do I still need to go through the settings above? 

ejspain2020

No need, it either works or it does not in my experience. That said, once you have the Iris/Venus combo set up, I'd now try the oversampling/non oversampling......and in oversampling mode, the sharp/slow filter. The link I posted previously for mact333 shows all configurations for the Venus......your preferences before the Iris may not be the same with it added into the mix