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Thread: Beresford Bushmaster DAC Reviews

  1. #501
    Join Date: Oct 2008

    Location: Glasgowshire

    Posts: 9,651
    I'm Gary.

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    Thanks for coming over guys.
    The TQ Black was made for the Rega RS3's...wow!
    Big step up from my Mogami...

    Like a component upgrade, seriously.

    Will post tomorrow on todays schennigans
    off to my kipper.
    AC POWER
    Hardwired 10kVA balanced mains powering entire system
    AMPS
    Meridian 557 power Amp (Modded) / PS Audio BHK Preamp (Modded)
    SPEAKERS
    Wharfedale Evo 4.4
    DAC
    PS Audio Directstream (Modded)
    TURNTABLE
    Pro-Ject X8 balanced output via XLR / Ortofon Quintet Blue cartridge
    PHONOSTAGE
    Pro-Ject DS3 B balanced Input (TT and Phonostage powered by Pro-Ject Power box RS2 linear psu)
    DIGITAL
    OPPO 203 (Modded: Linear PSU, i2s output to Dac) - Roon Endpoint, HDMI input used for all things Streaming/ PS5 /AppleTV ... also good for movies apparently?
    MUSIC PLAYBACK
    Tweaked AP-Linux based Roon Server into Oppo 203 as Roon endpoint
    Ipad Roon Remote.
    Apple Music/ YouTube via AppleTV, fed to Dac via Oppo HDMI input/i2s output to Dac.
    SPEAKER CABLES
    Biwired: Duelund DCA10GA (Bass) Duelund DCA16GA (mid & treble) Duelund 12DCA used as jumpers (On
    "Blackcat Cable" Chris Sommivigo's advice - yup, even with biwire it sounds better - and it does)
    INTERCONNECTS
    All Balanced: Ghost+ recording studio XLR cables

  2. #502
    Join Date: Mar 2008

    Location: Galashiels

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    I'm inthescottishmafia.

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    Aye, there was more of a difference between the cables than all the dacs.

  3. #503
    Join Date: Dec 2011

    Location: Sydney, Australia

    Posts: 142
    I'm Pete.

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    Quote Originally Posted by magiccarpetride View Post
    There is a school of thought (and I'm using the word 'thought' in a very special sense here) that claims that a shitty $20 DVD player from Walmart, when used as a digital transport into an outboard DAC, sounds exactly the same as the ultra high-end $20,000 digital transport.
    Definitely not in my experience! Although, some high-end DACs do have better on-board technology to deal with jitter et al, so these are potentially less sensitive to transport quality than cheaper DACs which lack this technology. I've found that mating cheaper DACs with quailty transports often elevates them to a similar level as the higher-end DACs.

    Sorry for going a bit off-topic in what is the Bushmaster thread after all, but anybody who does believe that all transports sound the same should grab a Metrum Octave DAC which is a superb DAC but includes no filtering or jitter reduction technology. It is brutally revealing of its source. Compare a cheap DVD player and a decent transport via this DAC and the difference is plainly obvious. Not all digital transports are the same.

    I'm a big fan of SPDIF reclockers to get the most out of any entry-level transport (DVD player, cheap CD player, SB Touch, Sonos etc). The audio-gd DI is a great bit of kit for the money, and the Empirical Audio Synchro Mesh lifts the bar yet again.

    BTW, looking forward to hearing the Bushmaster once it makes its way to Australia!
    ••• Logitech Squeezebox Touch > audio-gd NFB3(2014) w/ E9018 > fully recapped/restored Sansui AU-X701 and AU-719 > a healthy sprinkling of expectation bias > PMC GB1i speakers > Aurealis and Audio Principe cables •••

  4. #504
    MartinT Guest

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    Can we now please reserve this thread for reviews/listening experiences of the Beresford Bushmaster?

    All other Bushmaster related discussion should go here: http://theartofsound.net/forum/showt...14017&page=104

  5. #505
    Join Date: Mar 2008

    Location: Galashiels

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    Hookay, here are my thoughts on yesterday. This will probably ruffle a few feathers, so can I say at the outset that we all agreed on our opinions about what we heard. Plus the fact I will always give an honest opinion and speak as I find regardless.

    Firstly, thanks again to Gary for hosting us, the pizza and beer were first class!

    I took across the valve dac, my PP EL84 amps, my WD Pre 3, TQ Black cables and some pairs of AG Audio silver foil i/c's.

    Gary had on dem the new Rega dac and amp (which were very nice BTW, commercial kit at this price level has certainly moved on in the last few years IMHO) and all listening was done with his self built music file server using JRiver and SSD etc. etc. (very nice indeed). The dacs we listened to were- the Rega dac, the Bushmaster, Gary's fully tricked out Caiman and finally my AK4396 valve dac built by Nick Gorham.

    One of the main reasons I went across was to try the valve dac on Gary's server. I have recently fitted some custom O'Netics output transformers to the dac that Nick had specced with Bud Purvine specially for this purpose. O'Netics are one of the top audio transformer makers on the planet, and I had high hopes for these trannies. These hopes were mostly realised but there was occasionally something not quite right about the sound at home that was very difficult to put my finger on, so I wanted to try the dac with something other than the Touch in order to pinpoint the problem (turned out not to be the trannies at all, but that's another story)

    I'm not going to write reams about how each dac sounded, cos I can't be bothered and I'm a crap typist, but I'll go though what we did.

    We used the Rega amp for all comparisons, running Gary's RS 3's. We started with the Rega dac. We liked the sound this gave, nice and with little if any grain. A smooth listen, easy on the ear but still good detail. Soundstaging was good too.

    From this we moved on to the Bushmaster. We found this a touch brighter and/or more detailed in the mid, but inferior to the Rega at the frequency extremes. The soundstage was noticeably smaller than the Rega.

    We then moved on to the fully tricked out Caiman. This had a smidge less clarity in the mid compared to the BM, but we found it was superior at the top and bottom. Better soundstaging too. A bit of a surprise to me and not what I was expecting frankly!

    If memory serves we then went back to the Rega and swapped in the TQ Blacks in place of Gary's Mogami (?) cables. This was an absolute revelation in Gary's system. I can honestly say I have never heard a cable make such a difference in a hi fi system before, it was a vast improvement, making as much difference as changing the speakers would have. Gary at this point was cursing me cos he's now got to save up for a pair of Blacks!

    We then swapped Gary's Mike Grant 2000 i/c for my silver foil jobbie, which again was an easily noticeable improvement, with gains in clarity and better tighter bass. A good result given the relative costs of the cable.

    Finally we moved on to the valve dac. I was keen to hear if the same problems were reproduced that I was getting with the Touch at home. Thankfully this was not the case, so it would appear that the dac has now got to a level that is showing the limitations of the Touch, or that it is showing up some other deficiency in my system. In any case, this was the preferred dac of the day, easily outstripping all the others in the SQ stakes. Much bigger soundstage, better clarity but with no edginess, and stonking bass that frankly put the other dacs to shame. Given Nick's design skills, and the relative costs of the dacs, not an unexpected result really.

    We then plumbed in the EL84 monoblocks and my Pre 3, giving Gary and Brian their first listen to some valve kit. I noted the fact that this was now a full valve system playing file audio- valve dac, preamp and power amps. This was again a big step up in SQ, much bigger soundstage and better everything really. Nice as the Rega amp was, it was totally outclassed here. On having a listen to Tubular Bells, Brian commented that he had been listening to this album since it came out when he was 16 and he was now hearing things he'd never heard before. I think he was quite taken with what he was hearing, and several comments were made about how good things were sounding. An enjoyable day all round I think.

    So, we all agreed, the dacs in order of SQ were-

    1. AK4396 valve dac.
    2. Rega
    3. Caiman
    4. Bushmaster

    Please don't think we are dissing the Bushmaster, we are not. At it's price it remains excellent value and great sound and in isolation it sounds very good.

    So there you have it. If my memory is faulty at all (quite likely) I'm sure Gary or Brian will correct any details.

    Thanks again to Gary for hosting, and Brian it was good to meet you.

  6. #506
    MartinT Guest

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    Interesting findings, Ali, as my Bushmaster on battery easily outperforms my fully tricked out Caiman/Gator on Paul Hynes PSUs. Especially noticeable for me are the frequency extremes!

  7. #507
    Join Date: Mar 2008

    Location: Galashiels

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    Aye, I guess just goes to show how system dependant things are.

  8. #508
    Join Date: Jan 2008

    Location: gone

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    I'm gone.

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    Gosh. That is a surprise, Ali.
    As with Martin, my BM easily beats my Caiman (admittedly a standard one).

    The BM also saw off a multi-Łk well-reviewed DAC/pre unit I plumbed in yesterday.

    I remain in awe of what the Bushmaster can do. Very difficult for me to reconcile your group bake-off outcome with the stunning sounds I am now getting from my system with the BM. The best sound quality I have heard chez-Jerry, especially the soundstaging, and not by a small amount.

    I agree with your take on the Tellurium Black, though!
    .

  9. #509
    Join Date: Nov 2011

    Location: Newcastle UK

    Posts: 3,745
    I'm Rich.

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    Thanks for this review Ali, as a bit of Rega fancier myself I found it v interesting.

    Think my all Rega system is going to become a reality very soon.
    One of these days... I'm going to cut you into little pieces.

  10. #510
    Join Date: Mar 2008

    Location: Galashiels

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    Quote Originally Posted by jandl100 View Post
    Gosh. That is a surprise, Ali.
    As with Martin, my BM easily beats my Caiman (admittedly a standard one).

    The BM also saw off a multi-Łk well-reviewed DAC/pre unit I plumbed in yesterday.

    I remain in awe of what the Bushmaster can do. Very difficult for me to reconcile your group bake-off outcome with the stunning sounds I am now getting from my system with the BM. The best sound quality I have heard chez-Jerry, especially the soundstaging, and not by a small amount.

    I agree with your take on the Tellurium Black, though!
    Aye, though this is the same dac that is having problems playing from a laptop, so perhaps there is a problem with it?

    As for the Black, yes it's quite something. As a user of valves I've not heard cables make much if any difference in the past, but I guess that's not the case with SS!

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