Originally Posted by
clap
I love mine (it's the one I bought from you!). I remember telling you that I wasn't impressed that impressed with it initially. But, then it grew and grew and grew on me. I find it musical, non fatiguing, I like the upsampling. It is detailed but I don't find it fatiguing at all. I do use it with either a valve pre or a Stax valve headphone amp. I'm not sure I'd like it so much in an all solid state set up. I've only ever run it from a lithium battery and wouldn't fancy using it from the supplied cheap walwart.
I have got an itch at the moment to try something else, a valve dac appeals but I suspect I would be disappointed with the Xieng Sha (pleasantly disappointed but still). The Chord Hugo TT seems to be a giant killer but £2k for a pretty small improvement it is not sensible. If I was listening using my monoblocs and valve pre all the time an upgrade would be more rewarding, but via a Stax T6-001 it might well not show through.
I was very tempted by an older MBS platinum dac last week but managed to avoid temptation. By the time I'm using my monoblocs again a Chord Hugo TT will be about £500 and even Lampizators might be affordable.