Current Lash Up:
TEAC VRDS 701T > Sony TAE1000ESD > Krell KSA50S > JM Labs Focal Electra 926.
I heard Jerry's Young DAC in my system. I wasn't enamoured with it.
With a WE 396A in the Xiang I would say there's little point in going for anything else. It is such a good valve IMHO you'll be hard pressed to find anything better. That said there's no accounting for taste.
Dear friends (allow me to call you that),
What do you think of these specs?
https://ibb.co/hTiq2y
I know specs are not the way to go, but certainly gives an idea.
Location: N Ireland
Posts: 71
I'm Wesley.
Recently obtained an Audio Analogue Vivace dac and have to admit to being rather impressed sonically at least. Bit cumbersome physically and in user friendliness but very musical presentation to my ears. Anyone else familiar with it?
Working on the fact that the £1000 ceiling was introduced 5 yrs ago, I would like to recommend the Chord Qutest dac at £1195. This dac is the best I’ve heard against the commonly mentioned MDac and MF etc. So much so that I put my wallet instead of my mouth into it and purchased this very small and unpretty box. Sound wise the Qutest out performs DACs at considerable more money with its neutrality and definition. Just my opinion of coarse.
SOURCE:OPPO UDP-205 BluRay, SkyQ, Technics SL1210M5G/HexMat Eclipse/MN Bearing/Origin Live Gravity One puck/Isonoes with Boots/Jelco TK-850S Tonearm/Hana Umami Blue, PS Audio Stellar Phonostage. I also have an AT-OC9XSH as a spare cartridge.
AMPLIFIER: Bryston BR-20 Pre/DAC/Streamer & Bryston 4B3 Power Amplifier
SPEAKERS: Spendor D7 on Iso-Acoustics Gaia III’s
HEADPHONES: OPPO PM-1 with Atlas Zeno cable, B&W Pi7 S2 and B&W C5 v2.
CABLES: Analogue: Speaker Atlas Mavros Grun. Interconnect - Atlas Mavros XLR x3, MCRU Silver Tonearm cable
Digital:Audioquest Carbon Ethernet x 4, Audioquest Carbon digital, English Electric 8Switch, Chord Optichord, Atlas Optical.
Mains: PS Audio Perfectwave AC-05 x 5, Isol-8 Powerline Extreme with Quantum Science yellow fuse on input cable, Sounds Fantastic 6way Mains Blocks.
STORAGE: Synology DS216J NAS with 2 x 3Tb WD Red hard-drives. Samsung 500Gb SSD.
TV LG55B7 OLED
Location: cardiff
Posts: 266
I'm Tristan.
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.
Location: cardiff
Posts: 266
I'm Tristan.
The T+A Dac 8 is tempting (but possibly not enough of an upgrade from a Young dac).
I heard a DCS cd player with a Nagra amp and Harbeth speakers at Scalford which sounded sublime.
Loving my current dac, a PS Audio Directstream.
More musical than a very musical thing, its good.
Free ongoing upgrades to the FPGA code, this one will see me out I think.
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
Transports and the quality of the digital cable used, can make a massive difference.
Current DACs in use AMR DP777 and a Veracity Mystra. The Esoteric D5 I consider part of the Esoteric player (P5 Transport) but it is a stand alone in its own right. Only other DACs kicking around, unused at mine, are an MSB Link DAC and a Luxman DA100.
Regards Neil