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.
@ debjit_g You are 100% correct, which is my point: You have to look at ALL the factors in order to evaluate what is potentially better. But there are some hard and fast facts... One of these facts is that the problem or advantage with this or that clock has to do with the noise they generate that can be heard in the audible spectrum. No one can hear the accuracy difference between a .005% and .000005% clock. There are many approaches to resolving this noise issue: One is using the lowest noise clock like an OCXO. Another is using an external master clock. Another is using well isolated power supplies and shielding to prevent the noise from the clock from effecting the sensitive analog circuitry. Some companies use all of the above. Something to note that most companies don't have equal sound quality on all of their inputs. Some DACs sound better with USB...some sound better with AES balanced/coaxial...some sound better with Ethernet...some sound better with I2S. Those are not criticisms of the specific input formats but rather a specific company's implementation. Another thing that is a FACT is that I2S is not approved by the Audio Engineering Society (AES) as an external data transfer protocol. That alone should make any rational person question what these companies are doing and why they are doing it. Have you considered that those companies who are promoting I2S are putting less $$$ into their other inputs so that their I2S input sounds relatively better? As with most companies, Mojo Audio is attempting to build a high-performance product to meet a price point. As with most companies, in doing so we have to make certain compromises. Of course if you looked at the cost of parts inside of all of the other DACs you named and compared their DACs with our DACs that sell for around the same price point you would find that we spend SEVERAL TIMES the amount on the parts that go into our chassis when compared to those other companies. And that's not to mention the cost of the chassis or packaging. Mostly what we compromise on at Mojo Audio is how fancy looking our chassis and packaging are. We also compromise on the number of inputs we have since each of our inputs is engineered to potentially have the highest level of performance. Did I mention that we also compromise on advertising? Don't think that you're not paying for those fancy ads in audio magazines! Going back to compromising on our chassis... That's not to say we skimp at all on our chassis: every piece of hardware we use is non-magnetic stainless steel, we use laser etching vs screen printing for the lettering on our chassis, we use an EMI shielding Alodine primer, we use extensive anti-resonance treatments, and we use an extremely durable polymerized finish. All things that add to durability and performance as opposed to aesthetics. As for internal vs external + internal clocking... If your internal clock is of a lower performance than your external clock it will degrade performance. Plus any internal clock will create noise that has to be dealt with. By having no internal clocking on AES balanced and coaxial inputs Mojo Audio is eliminating any potential clocking noise inside of our DACs as well as allowing the best-of-the-best of external clocks to meet their full potential. And yes, it is a compromise to save manufacturing cost and allow us to sell our DACs for under $10,000. We certainly could add $1,000 to our MSRP and create an internal clock that will rival (I said "rival" not "beat") the ones in a Jay's CDT-3 MkIII or the dCS network bridge...but why would we do that when those products already have exceptional clocks inside of them which in effect act like a master clock with our DACs? And we could add $1,000 to our MSRP to include an I2S input that would perform as close as possible to our existing inputs. But since over 80% of the streamers and servers on the market exclusively use USB or consider USB to be equal to or better than their other outputs. And since 100% of the CD transports and many servers and streamers have an AES approved balanced and/or coaxial output. Why would we want to raise the price of our products so that we could interface with some fringe technology like I2S that less than 10% of our customers are actually using? |
I do not think anyone claims I2S is the be all, above all interface for audio, in fact, USB wasn’t to be either. It just so happens that in some DACs they simply sounds better for whatever reasons. Most off-the shelf DAC chips will have an I2S interface to talk to and hence some manufacturers thought it would be wise to make it available externally, even though I2S is only meant for short connection, typically few centimeters. Now we see more and more DACs coming up with this interface - maybe they just want to have it for convenience and be competitive or maybe the designer have really put some effort to do it correctly (and there are good examples of it).
I have not seen any manufacturer claim or promote their I2S input sounds better. All I can tell is I had two DACs with I2S input and in both DACs, there was no compromise on the USB implementation from the manufacturer side and I do not typically use AES/SPDIF as my DIY server doesn’t have it. To have I2S or not is a choice for the designer/manufacturer and the market they want to serve. I still believe a well implemented USB both in the DAC and Transport (along with an optimized s/w) would be sufficient in most cases, however we cannot really generalize it and at the same time nobody is bashing Mojo DACs for not having I2S either :-) |
@fuzzbutt17 Thanks again for all the good info, and it makes sense. Could you clear up if using a DDC and SPDIF, AES, or i2S connection to a DAC if both the clocks in the DDC and DAC are in play? The clock in my DDC is better than the one in my DAC, and my hope was the clock in the DDC by sending a better signal to the DAC it would have less “work” to do and help it sound better. Am I off base in that reasoning and are both clocks in play? The sound is notably better with the DDC BTW. Thank you for any thoughts. |
Usb wasn't developed as an interface between streamers and dacs, this interface has no inherent advantage over I2S. I2S interface not universally used due to the fact I2S clock best placed closest to data lines. So, we can then all agree I2S clock in an external device not ideal. Now not being ideal doesn't necessarily mean it can't or won't be superior to usb or some other interface for any specific dac. My Musetec dac has a highly developed custom build usb board, far superior to what I see in vast majority of dacs, Laiv has far more pedestrian implementation, this approximates what I see in most. My specific streaming setup and implementation of both I2S AND USB interfaces provides me with superior results via I2S. I posit quality of any input interface INTO DDC is critical, output is only part of the equation. In direct comparisons of my optimized usb vs optimized I2S, I2S wins out. And I will continue to state YMMV, this just as others should admit. |
