@mitch2 Many, many and many thanks for your incredibly detailed reviews of all these DACs! Truly a gift to us all as mentioned above. I was very interested and leaning towards upgrading to the LTA Aero but after reading your reviews I pulled the trigger on buying a used Mojo Mystique Evo. Wow what a nice sounding DAC just as you reviewed. Very happy with my choice and extremely appreciative of you spending your time and expertise to help us understand the performance of these DACs. Threads like these are so helpful to less seasoned audio addicts and the reason I follow Audiogon. Cheers!
Six DAC Comparison
I am in the middle of comparing the sound of six different DACs in my system. I own them all (I know weird) but one of them is still within a trial/return timeframe.
Not to share specific comparisons today, but a couple of observations so far are that first, they all definitely sound different from each other. On one hand, they all sound pretty good and play what is fed to them without significant flaws but on the other hand there are definite sonic differences that make it easy to understand how a person might like the sound of some of them while not liking others.
Second, raises the observation that most of them must be doing something to shape the sound in the manner the designer intended since one of the DACs, a Benchmark DAC3 HGA, was described by John Atkinson of Stereophile as providing "state-of-the-art measured performance." In the review, JA closed the measurements section by writing, "All I can say is "Wow!" I have also owned the Tambaqui (not in my current comparison), which also measured well ("The Mola Mola Tambaqui offers state-of-the-digital-art measured performance." - JA). The Benchmark reminds me sonically of the Tambaqui, both of which are excellent sounding DACs.
My point is that if the Benchmark is providing "state-of-the-art measured performance," then one could reasonably presume that the other five DACs, which sound different from the Benchmark, do not share similar ’state-of-the-art" measurements and are doing something to subtly or not so subtly alter the sound. Whether a person likes what they hear is a different issue.
Showing 5 responses by tksteingraber
@mitch2 Wow that is an amazing streaming set up…can only dream. I found adding optical, a quality switch and network streamer really made a difference. I can’t justify top notch but I still came away with a nice set up at a modest price. I have thought about switching out my streamer for an Optical Redu Deluxe but not sure what improvement if any would be gained🤔. Set up: Mesh Router-FMC-Optical-FMC-EtherRegen w/clock-Stack SmoothLan-Bricasti M5-Mojo DAC. Also use a Sonic Transporter i5 as roon core in separate room and LPS’s on all. The Mojo DAC really made it! |
@fuzzbutt17 Thank you for the detailed USB and I2S explanation. Very helpful in that there is quite a bit of chatter using a DDC to covert USB to I2S, coax, AES… I never understood or had the need and have used USB on all my DAC’s. I am currently really enjoying your Mojo Mystique EVO B4B 21 happily using USB. Keep the Mojo rolling! |
@brbrock Read this on line…“The PCM58 DAC chip is a true multi-bit R2R (Resistor Ladder) DAC and not a Delta-Sigma DAC” |
Posts like @fuzzbutt17 's latest add a lot of value to this forum imo. Thank you for taking the time. Agreed! +++ |