Quote Originally Posted by pete_mac View Post
I had the Bushmaster for two months in my system with similar results to the short half-day shoot-out in my friend's system. The results were similar each time.

As I mentioned in my posts, system synergy plays a substantial role. We felt that the bushmaster over-egged the pudding compared to the other DACs that we had on hand at the time. If we had less revealing speakers and amps at the time, who knows.
I agree, it could be that Bushmaster found a sweet spot in my audio chain. Prior to using the BM, my system veered toward the bright sound. I have attributed that to me using big Magnepan speakers (big as in the size of barn doors). Maggies, as we call them, can be extremely, almost unpleasantly revealing. However, the moment BM entered the picture, the brightness got tamed, and now the overall sound is more on a darkish, brooding side, which I totally adore! So in my experience, BM did the exact opposite -- instead of over-cooking or over-egging the sound, it substantially reduced the overall nervousness (digititis) and made everything sound pleasantly warm, darkish, analog-like, while at the same time preserving every intricate detail.