Rega Dac

[synsei]

Personally I couldn't give a fig about the technicalities, it's what comes out of it that matters to me and it is pure gold...

On a finer point, this thread is entitled Rega Dac so the BM has no place here...

[Marco]

Yup, although I believe that the BM was cited for comparison purposes, and thus is relevant because the OP (Bev) used to have one before obtaining her Rega.

I've not heard a BM, so can't comment there, but I've listened to the Rega extensively in a familiar system, and it is unquestionably a very good DAC, capable of outperforming some rather more expensive units, so you guys have defo made an excellent choice!

Marco.

[synsei]

And as I have already stated there are distinct similarities in the sound of the two DAC's when one employs the s/pdif input on the Rega, it's just that the Rega goes that extra mile, in my system and to my ears, compared with the BM. In many ways I am grateful that the BM I had for such a short while was a faulty unit otherwise I might never have discovered nirvana. Just as well really as I am banned from buying another Beresford product

[wee tee cee]

I trust my ears and believe me I am really enjoying the music

Dave,
Sincere apologies if you felt that was a thread crap, Im glad your Dac is letting you enjoy your music........really that's what its all about.

[Maximum]

According to the TI page the PCM2707 has a USB receiver built in, which maybe why it is in there. It also has SPDIF out, so whether it passes this on to the Wolfson afterwards is anyone's guess.

[synsei]

Here's Rega's own take on this:

Technology

The input stage comprises a Wolfson digital receiver with a high stability low jitter clock. The receiver and PLL have their own dedicated power supplies. The DAC stage comprises of a pair of parallel-connected Wolfson WM8742 DAC's, which are driven via a buffer stage, which ensures the integrity of the data being fed to the DAC IC's similar to the arrangement used in the Isis (Rega's refrerence CD player). Great care has been taken to remove noise generated by the PC and other input sources. During development this was identified as a major drawback with many DAC's on the market today.

The output amplifier employs a discrete differential multiple feedback filter and output amplifier, with a high cut-off frequency for use with higher sample rates. We decided not to use a sample rate converter and process the data at the incoming sample rate which keeps the signal processing to a minimum. Jitter was minimised by synchronously clocking the digital data with our receiver PLL (removing any jitter from the input signal).

All the capacitors associated with the analogue signal path are Nichicon FG bypassed with MMK polyester capacitors, and low impedance conductive polymer capacitors are used for DAC decoupling. The power supply utilizes a toroidal transformer, fast rectifier diodes and again Nichicon FG capacitors. There is a power supply for the control microcontroller, separate from the digital & analogue audio stages. Special attention being paid to the inter IC control signals ensuring the control data noise is kept to a minimum.

[Ninanina]

In many ways I am grateful that the BM...........was a faulty unit otherwise I might never have discovered nirvana

I think exactly the same Dave, I am somehow glad that my BM developed a fault otherwise I would never had tried a Rega Dac in my system and been totally blown away with it's easy going and analogue sound, it really is superb.........

[Gazjam]

Not heard the BM2 personally.

A while ago, I had the original BM in my system with a few other Dacs (including my Rega) and a bunch of us Scots AOS'ers did a comparison.
The thread is here, but the short version is we all preferred the Rega.
By a large margin.

Stan's got the Bushmaster 2 out now and from comments here its better than the original one.
No massive increase in price either, so good on Stan for keeping to the affordable quality idea.

[synsei]

I had an interesting experience earlier. I bought a Pioneer PD-S 801 CDP on behalf of a friend this week and I've had it in my system for a few days hooked up to my Rega and I was impressed, although it didn't quite live up to my Arcam CD72 as a transport. However today, before he took it home, we hooked it up via it's analogue outputs and we were staggered at what we heard, there's a damn good DAC circuit inside that unit. It's given me something to think about

[Yomanze]

The Pioneer DACs / filters have a very smooth sound.