Beresford Bushmaster DAC Reviews

[Ali Tait]

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

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.

[StanleyB]

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.

It's actually 1.9V.

[Gazjam]

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

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.

[Jabberwocky]

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.

[Ali Tait]

It's actually 1.9V.

I was talking about my valve dac Stan.

[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.

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

[edmondwolfman]

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

[magiccarpetride]

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!

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!

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!

[edmondwolfman]

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!

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

[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!)