Review of Kora Hermes DAC



My Kora Hermes tube DAC was purchased used at around $1,000. It bested a long list of DACs. Two similar sounding DACs which were also great were the Audio Note 2.1.X and Monarchy NM24.

I asked Steve Sank of Talking Dog Transducer Co, Tucson (he has done several mods for me with stellar results) to modify the Kora and within my budget constraints he installed Nichicon's highest quality KZ capacitors, and Audio Cap Theta film capacitors.

Some of the many changes included altering the circuitry to allow me to switch between 6DJ8 or 12AU7 tubes (this model only used 6DJ8 tubes, unlike the newer one). The result of the changes were that the Kora was taken to a whole new level with increased musicality across the board including increased midrange richness, warm, & saturation, increased soundstage, more 3D depth spaciousness and dynamics, blacker less noisy background, and better extension at both ends of the spectrum.

Mullard Long Plate 12AU7 tubes with square getters sound best in the Kora to me (Mullard short plates sound hard to me and are not recommended). However, Telefunken's were also musical and provided more detail.

I use the Kora Hermes DAC primarily to stream my music from my computer's itunes library through a modified Logitech Squeezebox Duet, controlled by my iPad with wonderful results.
128x128plangco
completely underrated DAC imho. Ive had mine for almost 8 years and it still outperforms anything Ive tried including some expensive latest and greatest gear. Best tubes so far have been Siemens followed by Mullards. Enjoy.....
I liked the Siemens in the Kora Also. I found the Telefunken 12AT7 to sound a litle bit more musical for my taste while maintaining the lovely highs of the Siemens. The Mullards won the midrange but gave up something in the naturallness and smoothness of the highs, which worked in my slightly bright system.

I was nervous about the mods, but the results were stellar.
Hi there, I am about to purchase a Kora Hermes DAC MKiii. Apparently, it was imported from Europe, and used by the head audio engineer at Kora, and is a native 24/192 model. Not sure what the chip is. It also has a different tube output stage. Has anyone heard of this DAC or any experience with it? It is not an upgraded DAC - but rather, a stock MKiii. Also, any thoughts on Steve Sank? There are mixed reviews of his reliability online...
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Doukhobar did you ever get the Kora Hermes Dac?
I also have the Kora Hermes.  I'm using it on a  Denon DVD-9000 DVD CD Player which i'm using as a transport.  
The Denon 9000 makes a very good transport.
My Kora Hermes Tube dac was modified by Jerry Ozment of Audio Logic. Sadly Jerry Passed away in 2010.  I never heard the Kora Hermes tube Dac before Jerry modified it.  But the Kora Hermes is a great sounding dac. Its got that nice tube sound that's really sweet sounding.
I haven't used Steve Sank, so i cant comment on him.