Beresford Bushmaster DAC Reviews

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Originally Posted by DaveK

Hope this is relevant but I found with my Caimanised 7520 that feeding it 16.3v DC (from a linear PSU followed by a JLH Ripple Eater) actually improved the SQ to my ears. Stan recommended that as the maximum it would take and I have been feeding it 16.3v for well over a year now with no apparent ill effects :) .
Dave.

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To anyone reading this and contemplating doing the same with the Bushmaster: DON'T!!!

Just opened my BM for the first time (to replace the Eprom with the update that Stanley kindly sent me - it wasn't reliably 'seeing' my Apple TV after power off of the source, etc) -

WOW is it a beautifully designed and constructed bit of kit or WHAT?

Well done Stan:cool:

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Originally Posted by Jabberwocky

Just opened my BM for the first time (to replace the Eprom with the update that Stanley kindly sent me - it wasn't reliably 'seeing' my Apple TV after power off of the source, etc) -

WOW is it a beautifully designed and constructed bit of kit or WHAT?

Well done Stan:cool:

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Pics?

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Originally Posted by Jabberwocky

Just opened my BM for the first time (to replace the Eprom with the update that Stanley kindly sent me - it wasn't reliably 'seeing' my Apple TV after power off of the source, etc) -

WOW is it a beautifully designed and constructed bit of kit or WHAT?

Well done Stan:cool:

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Hi Malcolm,

I'm having Source selection issues with my apple tv too.

Let us know how it works please.

Cheers,

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Originally Posted by Jabberwocky

WOW is it a beautifully designed and constructed bit of kit or WHAT?

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Yes, I took a peek inside too. Lovely bit of single PCB design.

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Originally Posted by Fi-Wi

What colour is the band of the connector that fits the Bushmaster?

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Looking at your signature it the blue one ( 2.1mm) to fit your squeeze upgrade PSU.
If you contact where you bought the PSU from in the Netherlands they will send you an an adapter.
I send them out for free to my customers so that people with a PSU from previous Beresford Dacs dont have to spend any more money when they upgrade to the Bushmaster. All part of the service :)

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Originally Posted by Jabberwocky

WOW is it a beautifully designed and constructed bit of kit or WHAT?

Well done Stan:cool:

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I remember commenting on the very same when I saw the PCB layout of the prototype that Stan put a picture of on the forum quite a way back :)

No idea what thread that's on, but if it's still similar or the same....

:cool: :D

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Originally Posted by Russell Turner

For testing the evaluation PSU Nick had kindly sent me to evaluate I had the Stan provided PSU, a 13v 1amp hefty PSU I had "discovered" at work and Nick's evaluation unit.

The qualities Nick's PSU has above the others is ultimately it is cleaner sounding, its not as brash as the Stan unit, the hefty one isn't far off Nick's so I am guessing it is a Linear supply, hence the clean audio.

As a consequence of this cleansing of the audio signal you can interpret low level detail slightly better, perhaps its more coherent and better organised if you know what I mean...

Its also less fatiguing as well, I was sat listening to one of my reference CD's (The Art of Noise's Seduction of Claude Debussy) and I was not finding it hard work.

I think the stock Stan unit you get is louder, I would say by about 1dB or so (my Leema amp has 0.2dB volume steps), and I mentioned previously to Nick the low level detail is there with the stock unit, it just gets uncongested with the higher spec PSU.

Ultimately I guess the question would be “would you buy one”? I am unsure on this, don't get me wrong it does make a difference but I wouldn't say it made a £200 difference like the Squeezebox Touch power supply made, its better but its not jaw dropping difference better than the Touch one.

I guess this is a testament as well to Stan's DAC design more than anything, as it must have a good noise rejection front end that cleans up as much as it can before it gets to the audio parts.

Russ

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Which power supply are you using for your Touch?

Nick's LDA one distributed by Dave:-

http://www.mains-cables-r-us.co.uk/p...er-supply.html

Worth the £200 in my opinion...

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Originally Posted by Mark Grant

Looking at your signature it the blue one ( 2.1mm) to fit your squeeze upgrade PSU.
If you contact where you bought the PSU from in the Netherlands they will send you an an adapter.
I send them out for free to my customers so that people with a PSU from previous Beresford Dacs dont have to spend any more money when they upgrade to the Bushmaster. All part of the service :)

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Thanks for this info Mark, I will contact Wiebren Draaier when I order a BM. He's a nice guy who obviously selects his resellers with great care.

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Originally Posted by Russell Turner

Pics?

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Sorry - too late - it's back together now.

Hi,

I'm having troubles too with my AirPort Express..

I am also interested in an EEPROM update.

Kind regards,
Tobi

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Originally Posted by Martinh

Hi Malcolm,

I'm having Source selection issues with my apple tv too.

Let us know how it works please.

Cheers,

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Try contacting Stanley Beresford directly rather than posting on a forum!

Val

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Originally Posted by Val33

Try contacting Stanley Beresford directly rather than posting on a forum!

Val

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Sorry, you were right. The update comes with an updated chip, just like as if you change your BIOS chip on your computer main board. Anyone having similar problems should just get in touch with Stan directly.

By the way: First class support. I am deeply impressed Stan!

Cheers,
Tobi

If anyone has Er-4s, can they be kind enough to let me know how the bushmaster pairs with it. Many thanks.

been running one of these for a while now and I am mighty impressed BUT this is the first and possibly the only component that I have ever noticed significant differences between output cables.

The cables connecting the dac to my pre make a huge difference, for example old kimber PJB have great clarity but at a huge loss of bass, I even thought my subs had stopped working it was so noticeable,

Blue Jeans Belden 2m gave the opposite effect flat and boring distinct quietening of treble,

I have some old 1.5m Belden component cable in place at present and it seems a good balance -

Might try some Canare tomorrow or maybe some solids silver I made years ago if I can be bothered to re-solcer a loose connection

There's summat on the AVI forum about the latest ADM9's doing this.Apparently, Apple have software and model changes which are causing this apparently and there's a lengthy thread there about it.

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Originally Posted by Mr.Ian

been running one of these for a while now and I am mighty impressed BUT this is the first and possibly the only component that I have ever noticed significant differences between output cables.

The cables connecting the dac to my pre make a huge difference, for example old kimber PJB have great clarity but at a huge loss of bass, I even thought my subs had stopped working it was so noticeable,

Blue Jeans Belden 2m gave the opposite effect flat and boring distinct quietening of treble,

I have some old 1.5m Belden component cable in place at present and it seems a good balance -

Might try some Canare tomorrow or maybe some solids silver I made years ago if I can be bothered to re-solcer a loose connection

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I'd venture to suggest that the BM will indeed be more sensitive to cable changes because it has a passive output stage I believe, so changes in impedance matching due to use of different cables will have a greater impact on sound.

not to muddy the waters, but at the recent dac comparison chez Gaz, swapping out my Mogami for Ali's TQ Black improved things across the board, not just with the BM but with Ali's valve Dac too.

In this case the effect was pretty astonishing even with an "insensitive" valve dac!

Go figure...I've stopped trying to work it out :)

In other words: using the Bushmaster to test different leads makes it a lot easier to differentiate the performance characteristics of the various leads.

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Originally Posted by Gazjam

not to muddy the waters, but at the recent dac comparison chez Gaz, swapping out my Mogami for Ali's TQ Black improved things across the board, not just with the BM but with Ali's valve Dac too.

In this case the effect was pretty astonishing even with an "insensitive" valve dac!

Go figure...I've stopped trying to work it out :)

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Yes, but it's more a case of the dac having good "drive" (meaning impedance matching with amp/pre would be less of an issue, so a change of i/c would be less obvious) and also that it outputs about 2.5v I think, so a little more than standard. Which might mean you would hear less of a difference swapping the i/c's from dac to pre than you would with a more conventional dac. Maybe. The TQ certainly did vastly improve matters, but I think that had more to do with amp-speaker interface than anything else.

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Originally Posted by Ali Tait

Yes, but it's more a case of the dac having good "drive" (meaning impedance matching with amp/pre would be less of an issue, so a change of i/c would be less obvious) and also that it outputs about 2.5v I think, so a little more than standard.

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It's actually 1.9V.

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Originally Posted by StanleyB

In other words: using the Bushmaster to test different leads makes it a lot easier to differentiate the performance characteristics of the various leads.

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no...wouldn't say that Stan tbh.

We heard the same improvement going Mogami>TQ Black with all the dacs we tried.
The BM sounded good, it was only when compared with the other Dacs that we got a better idea.

I'm running Stanley's digital input cables (coax and optical) but to my (valve) preamp I'm running hand-made twisted gold-plated solid silver with the same from pre to power.
Speaker cables are custom-made silver plated stranded OFC in low-cap foam insulation. No terminations to dilute/confuse things.
Sounds pretty good to me.:eek:

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Originally Posted by StanleyB

It's actually 1.9V.

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I was talking about my valve dac Stan. :)

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Originally Posted by Ali Tait

Yes, but it's more a case of the dac having good "drive" (meaning impedance matching with amp/pre would be less of an issue, so a change of i/c would be less obvious) and also that it outputs about 2.5v I think, so a little more than standard. Which might mean you would hear less of a difference swapping the i/c's from dac to pre than you would with a more conventional dac. Maybe. The TQ certainly did vastly improve matters, but I think that had more to do with amp-speaker interface than anything else.

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In case there's any confusion, I was talking about my valve dac in the above.

Well, I ordered a new Bushmaster today. Probably won't go out until Monday as I'm in the US and the order will show up late for Stan. I'll be comparing the Bushmaster with my DACMagic and if it betters the CA DM then it will have a new home here. I've seen some comparisons where the listeners liked other DACs better in their system than the Bushmaster and I've seen several others that think the Bushmaster bests their current DAC by a long way so what I took from those reports is that one needs to listen to it in their own system. I'm not going to go for the "better" power supply for now, my DACMagic still uses the wall wart so it will be a fair comparison.

I do use a Magenta ADE-24.1 in the signal chain to tame some of the harshness I hear from some female voices and other high pitched sound but will remove it and have each DAC going straight into my preamp.

Of course you all know that once your order is placed you start watching for your tracking information to show up even though you know it won't ship for a couple of days:D

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Originally Posted by jandl100

Mine arrived today, so I thought I'd kick off a review thread. :)

I know that StanDACs need to run in, but just out of the box it's a stunner! :wowzer:

Stereo focus and fine detail is a step-up from what I have heard before - from StanDACs or anything else for that matter.

Delicacy, fine detail, articulation - all exemplary.

Blimey, Stan - at first listen, it's a stonker! :thumbsup:

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Well, after living with the Bushmaster for the past four weeks (that's almost one month, if my calculations are correct), I must say that this product had completely won me over. Either the DAC is getting better with constant use, or I'm getting gradually accustomed to its sound, whatever the case may be, I'm finding it to be more and more enjoyable with each passing day.

Last night I was listening to Iron Butterfly "Slower Than Guns" (off their 1970 album "Metamorphosis"), and the sparkly sound of acoustic guitars has to be heard to be believed. Never before have I heard acoustic guitars sound so good. Amazing!

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Originally Posted by magiccarpetride

Well, after living with the Bushmaster for the past four weeks (that's almost one month, if my calculations are correct), I must say that this product had completely won me over. Either the DAC is getting better with constant use, or I'm getting gradually accustomed to its sound, whatever the case may be, I'm finding it to be more and more enjoyable with each passing day.

Last night I was listening to Iron Butterfly "Slower Than Guns" (off their 1970 album "Metamorphosis"), and the sparkly sound of acoustic guitars has to be heard to be believed. Never before have I heard acoustic guitars sound so good. Amazing!

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Hey mcr that's great to hear. I have mine on order but Stan wanted to check to see if the new eprom was in it so I won't have it this week but look forward to getting it and start the burn in process:eyebrows:

Can i ask what the "eprom" is and what problems is causing apple tv?

(purely selfish reason for question as I use apple tv and I will be ordering the bushmaster when I come over to the uk for a visit!)

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Originally Posted by jajh2204

Can i ask what the "eprom" is and what problems is causing apple tv?

(purely selfish reason for question as I use apple tv and I will be ordering the bushmaster when I come over to the uk for a visit!)

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Hi Jason,

I have an ATV and Stan kindly sent me an updated EEPROM. I will be giving my feedback to him later today. PM me if you want any details.

Great service from Stan, as usual.

Cheers,

From Wikipedia
An EPROM (rarely EROM), or erasable programmable read only memory, is a type of memory chip that retains its data when its power supply is switched off.

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Originally Posted by allsorts

From Wikipedia
An EPROM (rarely EROM), or erasable programmable read only memory, is a type of memory chip that retains its data when its power supply is switched off.

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The chip Stan sent me was a PIC16F88 Microcontroller, which has a built in EEPROM.

The chip doesn't have a UV window, so can't be an EPROM.

By the way, the PCB and internal components are very nicely laid out and manufactured.

Cheers,

So how can folks in Australia order this? I have thought hard enough and owning the gator I am sure the BM will be a worth upgrade.

You can order the Bushmaster on Stanleys website although it says out of stock until end of July.

They appear to be very popular judging by the 'out of stock' and the amount of Sboosters and Linear PSU's that people are buying from various parts of the world.

http://www.homehifi.co.uk/products/TC-7530DC.html

http://www.homehifi.co.uk/PP/TC2D753...DIF_INPUT.html

^thanks, contacted his Australian reseller they also said the same thing to me.

I will buy it via them. I really hope Bm synergy with Er4s is as good as the caiman.

PS:Mark any chance of you entering LOD and Mini-mini interconnection cable world?

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Originally Posted by audionewbi

So how can folks in Australia order this? I have thought hard enough and owning the gator I am sure the BM will be a worth upgrade.

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You can try emailing me if you wish to order one :). Many happy Australian Bushmaster owners on this forum.

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Originally Posted by Mark Grant

They appear to be very popular

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This relatively new thread has over 56,000 views :eek:


...and the BM thread in Digital Expressions has over 104,000 views.

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Originally Posted by Mark Grant

You can order the Bushmaster on Stanleys website although it says out of stock until end of July.

They appear to be very popular judging by the 'out of stock' and the amount of Sboosters and Linear PSU's that people are buying from various parts of the world.

http://www.homehifi.co.uk/products/TC-7530DC.html

http://www.homehifi.co.uk/PP/TC2D753...DIF_INPUT.html

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Can anyone point me to an sbooster or linear psu equivalent that can be obtained in the US?

I have been making 120v versions of the MCRU linear supply if thats any use.

Just ordered the BM DAC, i am sure I will love it. I was told the headphone output impedance is less than 0.1 Ohm! Insanity!

*cough cough* I hope Stan sends me a free optical cable on the house. :-D

Cant wait to use my gator again with my studio monitor and use the BM as my bedside DAC/amp.

If the headphone section of the BM is as good as the gator I will be a very happy man.

What are the list of compatible opamp for BM?

It's a very very short list.

In fact, it could not be shorter ;) .

Ok, I received my BM today. Honestly I don't know how Stan does this but it was in Taiwan on the 12th, Los Angeles yesterday and delivered to my doorstop around 1 today and I live in the middle of the country, Oklahoma.

Anyway I have it hooked up and music running through. I listened to it immediately out of the box compared to my DACMagic and at fist listen the DACMagic has more upper range detail but I've been using the DM for a couple of years so I'm not jumping to any conclusions yet. I'm going to give it a fair break in period and form no opinions until after it has had a few days to burn in.

Since the Logitech Touch has both the optical and coax outs active at the same time I left the optical plugged into the DM and ran coax to the BM. This way I can have music playing and change back and forth on the fly and never miss a single beat of the music.

I'll listen this way for a while and then I'll connect the optical to the BM and the coax to the DACMagic. I'm pretty sure the optical output from the Touch sounds better than the coax or I wouln't have had it setup that way. I can say that the BM sounds very good right out of the box and the 2 are very close right now but with the DM having slightly more upper register detail. That may be the "brightness" that bothers me at times with some female voices and high pitch musical instruments when I've applied a generous amount of volume.

I've seen some of you say you have your cable or satellite box running to your BM, are you listening to 2 channel television?

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Originally Posted by edmondwolfman

I can say that the BM sounds very good right out of the box and the 2 are very close right now but with the DM having slightly more upper register detail.

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Hi Bobby, can you do a break down for me of the differences in the upper register detail between the two DACs? I am particularly interested in such things as:
Instruments and vocals separation.
The presence, or lack of them, of instruments or certain notes or musical passages played with those instruments.
Additional sounds in the back ground etc.
Reverberation of vocals and instruments.
Louder.

Don't forget: I am after the difference in the detail that you can hear and only in the upper register.

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Originally Posted by edmondwolfman

I've seen some of you say you have your cable or satellite box running to your BM, are you listening to 2 channel television?

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Yes, I run optical from my Sky HD box (a UK satellite service) into the BM for 2-channel audio. It sounds superb.

Yes, I do similar, though with a different dac

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Originally Posted by StanleyB

Hi Bobby, can you do a break down for me of the differences in the upper register detail between the two DACs? I am particularly interested in such things as:
Instruments and vocals separation.
The presence, or lack of them, of instruments or certain notes or musical passages played with those instruments.
Additional sounds in the back ground etc.
Reverberation of vocals and instruments.
Louder.

Don't forget: I am after the difference in the detail that you can hear and only in the upper register.

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Stan after I do some more listening today I'll try a describe what I am hearing in more detail but I'm not very good at putting it into words and like I said that may be what comes across as bright when I listen to certain music at louder volumes. I can say for now that I might be listening to something with acoustic guitar or the lead voice through the DM and when I hit the switch to the BM the guitar or vocal seems to move back a bit, not quite as distinct or prominent.
I will swap the optical and coax later today and see if I hear a difference after doing that also.

Has anyone else with a Touch hooked up both outputs at the same time and run to their preamp so they can just change from AUX1 to AUX2 or similar? You can compare without having to shut everything down and don't have minutes between hearing the different DACs, you can compare within milliseconds.

***And remember, these observations came with the BM being plugged in for a few short hours.

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Originally Posted by edmondwolfman

. I can say for now that I might be listening to something with acoustic guitar or the lead voice through the DM and when I hit the switch to the BM the guitar or vocal seems to move back a bit, not quite as distinct or prominent.

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Thanks for the clarification. That's good enough for me.
What you are hearing is the effect of the opamp MFB or Sallen-Key anti-aliasing filter in the DM. The feedback employed in those filters has the effect of pushing mainly the midrange part of the audio forward. The TC-7510 had a mod to counter act that by removing the capacitor in the feedback loop, and the Gator PCB has the feedback removed altogether. The BM doesn't have an opamp output stage so you won't get that type of pushed forward response.