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Looking for a vinylesk sounding DAC

I cannot say I wasn’t satisfied with my system.

Laptop (Quobuz Studio) - > Schiit Bifrost 2 - > Ocellia Reference RCA - > Werner Acoustics, Selene (active tube preamp using two VT-231 from RCA) - > passive preamp - > Ocellia Reference RCA - > First Watt F6 dual mono custom built - > HEDD Audio’s "Heddphone" / Hifiman HE 4

From the beginning I started to built it I had a quite concrete idea of what it should sound like in the end: vinylesk without using vinyl. It took me a while to get there and now I really thought I got it: Due to the F6 the outcome is brutally powerful and incredibly fast while the tube stage adds lots of body, depth and a rich organic undertone. Finally the RCA’s from Ocellia were adding the fine raffinement and a nice holographic soundstage. Nothing smears, in just every situation everything stays transparent, well controlled/articulated and the separation is just excellent.

BUT when listening to streamed vinyl I still feel the need for action - I just want EVERY track from quobuz to sound like this. Please take just some seconds and listen to this:

https://musicandvinyl.blogspot.com/2020/08/haruomi-hosono-from-aegean-sea.html?m=1

There is just MORE elasticity, MORE tonal density, MORE plankton, MORE concentration to the point, MORE light-footedness and MORE palpability (compared to a "disdainful" quobuz stream). Do you know what I mean?

I still think and hope a new dac could be the nirvana-solution. But which one would manage the job to sound just like vinyl (99% would be ok...)?

Happy to hear your suggestions!
barrista0611
georgehifi's avatar
georgehifi
10,312 posts
 
George's suggestion for channel mixing to more center the image (gives a sense of immediacy), and you may capture much of what you love about vinyl.
Not with todays magic digital, only like I said with those bad early CD that had ping pong left and right sounds.
Todays cd blow them away, and there's absolutely no need to bleed left into right, as with the channel separation of 120db you have it all and more with proper sound stage, that even goes outside the speakers now. Which I remember never ever did, no matter how good the vinyl was.  
jjss49's avatar
Ag insider logo xs@2x
jjss49
6,612 posts
 
@barrista0611

well implemented digital can sound somewhat 'vinyl like'... but it will never sound like vinyl as vinyl has its own unique and sympathetic colorations (not mention issues)

but i would agree with posters below suggesting various r2r type dacs, and ones with tube buffering of analog outputs, they head in the tonal direction you seek - there are Delta Sigma dacs and ones w/o tubes that do this as well...

you do not mention your budget for the dac - if you stay in the schiit bifrost range of cost it will be hard to get there

you need to be at least in the $750-1000 price range to get a very nice somewhat tonally denser ’analog sounding’ dac

from the list of gear you mention you seem to be a headphones guy -- there is tremendous discussion on mhdt, audio mirror, denafrips, etc etc on the couple well subscribed hp boards
dseltz
150 posts
 
May I suggest the ExoGal Comet?  I think very vinyl sounding
audio2design
1,351 posts
 
Fake -- Lack of a reconstruction filter in a typical NOS DAC allows high frequencies (aliased images of the original signal from the stair step) to pass which when they hit things like tube amps and speakers with high distortion, they generate frequency components in the audible range that are a mix of aliased images with frequency shift (IMD), random distortion products, and signal modulated noise.  While sounding complex and awful, some people like the way it sounds. The general description is "airy".


"Fake air?" All I hear with my Audio Note Dac is a natural sounding top-end with air and space between instruments.

No, what you think you hear is "natural". It is not, no more than vinyl sounds "natural", no more the analog tape is "natural". They are not natural, they are colored. You just happen to like that coloration and associate that with natural.

Maybe there will come a time when most "audiophiles" will accept that what they like, and hence what they attribute as "natural" and accurate is anything but, at least if they put vinyl or tape on a pinnacle. It is not the pinnacle of accurate sound reproduction. Digital is. Very few audiophiles have heard the difference between a live microphone, a digital loop and a tape loop, let alone the eventual vinyl cut. And that is completely okay. It does not matter if you prefer the vinyl cut. All that matters is you like what you are listening to. However, describing it as natural is wrong because it is not.


Here, have a read:
http://recordinghacks.com/2013/01/26/analog-tape-vs-digital/
I will excerpt a pass from the article,
"It is my belief that much of the pain of switching over to digital recording was due to the tools that engineers had mastered for analog recording. For instance, applying EQ and compression (or no compression) to tape to make up for the color that the tape added didn’t sound so great when recording to digital. Bright FET microphones and harsh transistor preamp tones became rounded off in a pleasing way on tape, and by the 100th mix pass, the high-end was rolled off and the transients smeared so much that the final mix sounded phat, warm and fuzzy. It took experienced engineers a minute (or years) to gather their thoughts, re-examine their tools and learn how to take advantage of the clarity, quiet, and unforgiving purity of digital recording. At that point recordists moved towards super-fast, ultra-clean and high-gain preamps and transparent compression. Low cost digital processors stopped using transformers and tubes, which lowered costs and also lowered THD, while widening frequency bandwidth specs from DC to light. We had finally found it: perfect, clean, sterile audio!

rajugsw
194 posts
 
11-11-2020 8:26pm
Just going on the many reviews other impressions I’ve read, if I were you I’d gravitate toward a tubed R2R NOS DAC such as the Audio Mirror Tubadour Mklll SE, etc. I believe several companies (AM, MHDT, Denafrips?) offer trial periods, and I think that’s the way to go.

Personally, the best DAC to me is the PS Audio DirectStream DAC Sr. Easily upgradable, very flexible inputs, and a volume control with 20dB attenuator if required. It is as close to Analog Vinyl like LP playback as you will get. TDA1541 chips are more than 33 years old ! So that's a no go in my book and I've heard those DAC's. Denafrips does not do a 30 day trial so they are out as well.

I did a head to head comparison between The Terminator and the PSA DSSr. There were times where I didn't know which DAC I was listening to but on certain music, the PS Audio DAC edged out the Denafrips especially in the upper midrange (where I personally am more sensitive)
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