Click title to read one, or click date to read all below it.
03-17-06
I highly recommend the bel canto dac 1.1, at around $550 use ... Mwilson
03-17-06
Thanks for the great response, i'll add the bel canto to my ... Hudsonhawk
03-17-06
Out of curiosity, what are your thoughts on the old channel ... Hudsonhawk
03-17-06
About the older ci dac, i was well impressed with it for suc ... Mwilson
03-17-06
The birdland odeon-ag. it's small (weighs about 3 lbs.). it ... Tfkaudio
03-18-06
I would add the scott nixon , audio note and audio sector d ... Gmood1
03-18-06
If you value music over hi-fi, you need to hear a nonos dac. ... Brooks
03-18-06
Gmood, the non-filtering, non-oversampling dacs are defini ... Hudsonhawk
03-18-06
My advice (worth what you are paying for it) it to treat aud ... Brooks
03-18-06
Brooks, a good point and well made. i'm definitely not af ... Hudsonhawk
03-18-06
Hudsonhawk - consider the audio mirror non-os dac as well ($ ... Clio09
03-18-06
Clio, are they still selling for ($500)? the website implies ... Sbank
03-18-06
Spencer, the website price has always been $999 for as long ... Clio09
03-18-06
Fwiw, i've communicated with an owner of the bel canto 2.0. ... Gmood1
03-23-06
Thanks everyone for your advice. i decided to take the plun ... Hudsonhawk
03-23-06
Good choice! these dac-ah's are about the best bang for the ... Flye
03-23-06
Hudsonhawk, killer dac, the huge difference i found with any ... Undertow
03-23-06
Thanks for the tip! well timed in fact, as i was just mulli ... Hudsonhawk
03-23-06
Well, i was also looking for an inexpensive but good soundin ... Bombaywalla
03-23-06
Bombaywalla , you should hear a dac like this with a better ... Gmood1
03-23-06
Toroid is better than a wall wart no doubt about it there br ... Flye
03-23-06
Which is why my latest digital purchase is battery powered. ... Clio09
03-23-06
I agree battery power has its strengths. i also feel a well ... Gmood1
03-23-06
Bombaywalla, please tell us more about your trial and inclu ... Sbank
03-23-06
There seems to be quite a few battery powered designs out th ... Fishwater
03-23-06
As a matter of fact on the power cord, we had 2 of the dac-a ... Undertow
03-24-06
Undertow, i noticed the same thing when i changed from the b ... Gmood1
03-24-06
Gmood1, this particular dac is the dac+ version implying tha ... Bombaywalla
03-24-06
I have to ask? where are you guys finding the dac + or whate ... Undertow
03-24-06
Hmm, i found their upgraded dac-ah here , which i found thr ... Hudsonhawk
03-24-06
Okay, the always quick-to-reply pacific sent me a clarificat ... Hudsonhawk
03-24-06
Which is to say, it's a new product that just recently becam ... Hudsonhawk
03-24-06
Great bombaywalla !.. sounds like you got a terrific deal on ... Gmood1
03-24-06
Undertow, just to clarify - the non-oversampling dac that i ... Bombaywalla
03-24-06
I'd like to throw out the possibility of the older museatex ... Mre2007
03-27-06
I've just ordered a non-modded dac ah from pacific valve. f ... Holderlin
03-27-06
Correction. the mod with the select opa627bp op amp is the ... Holderlin
03-27-06
Looks like they just updated their website. they've also li ... Hudsonhawk
03-28-06
I currently run a ps audio superlink gen. ii 18 bit dac. i r ... Chadburr
03-29-06
Spencer, gmood1 & anyone who might be interested: i finally ... Bombaywalla
03-29-06
I would compare the wadia hooked up via analog like it is an ... Undertow
03-29-06
Undertow, thanks for making the suggestion. i did think of w ... Bombaywalla
03-29-06
Bombaywalla, thanks for the little review...good stuff! nic ... Gmood1
04-02-06
So, for those curious, i received my modded dac-ah and broke ... Hudsonhawk
04-02-06
I’ve got to chime in here. i’ve owned an audio mirror for a ... Islandflyfisher
04-02-06
04-02-06: hudsonhawk it's funny, i made a similar note whe ... Bombaywalla
04-02-06
Good for you hudsonhawk! glad to see the non os dac working ... Gmood1
04-02-06
Bombaywalla, i also did some thinking about your comparison ... Gmood1
04-03-06
04-02-06: gmood1 bombaywalla, .......i'm thinking that so ... Bombaywalla
04-03-06
Yes bombaywalla the 10x factor works ok. i'm not sure this i ... Gmood1
04-03-06
Howdy mates...i also have a non os dac- the scott nixon tube ... Knollbrent
04-04-06
Gmood1, yes, 10k input imp of the next stage vs. the driving ... Bombaywalla
04-04-06
Bombaywalla, all your theories and hypothesis are great.but ... Gmood1
04-04-06: Bombaywalla
Gmood1,
>> You must ask yourself. Why use a preamp between your
>> Wadia and amplifier?
the answer is very simple: Wadia's digital gain control is the absolute pitts! Sonically, it stinks! I know I'm an owner but I will not prop up this unit just 'cuz I spent money on it. What I do is put the volume control to 100 thereby bypassing it. Now I have totally lost control over adjusting the volume. That is where my preamp comes in. Inside the Wadia they provide a set of DIP switches to adjust the buffer outputs from 4.25V all the way down to 0.25V for each channel separately. I believe that the user adjusts this output depending on the amount of voltage gain in his/her preamp.
Wadia claims to have a patented I-->V conversion technique & I wonder if these buffers are doing double duty of I-->V + buffering? I don't know enough about the Wadia design (& the DAC control PCB is multi-layered thereby making wire tracing nearly impossible) to make a useful comment.
>> There's a reason why APL,RAM and other modders
>> concentrate so much on the output stage of their
>> players. Which includes doing away with the negative
>> feedback opamps.
well, even if I try the BVAudio SR10 external buffer, there's no getting rid of the negative feedback opamps inside the SN DAC.
OK, I can understand negative feedback in the opamp-based output stage is less sonically than those outputs stages not having any.
>> Also the impedance does matter when driving long
>> interconnects or passives.
agree! How long is long tho? Not 1m interconnect! I think long would be in excess of 5m.
I would agree that output impedance is very imp when driving passives. A CDP having an output imp of 3K (as written in your orig post) would likely be an issue when driving a passive preamp. I agree!
>> I can imagine handling interconnect interactions is a
>> walk in the park for such players.
I believe that this would also be a true statement for a DAC using a Burr-Brown OPA627.
When I plug this SN DAC into my preamp, I have so much gain from this DAC that I have to crank down the volume knob atleast 3 clicks from where I listen to the Wadia. In the CAT that's quite a gain reduction.
>> I wish you were closer ..I could quickly prove your
>> hypothesis wrong.
well, my hypothesis is, for the SN Saru DAC+ which uses a strong enough output buffer than can drive my 1m interconnect + my preamp input capacitance, that badly recorded CDs sound terrible thru it 'cuz the dominant effect is poor jitter performance in the recovered clock from the input data stream. The poor jitter performance xlates to poor DAC performance as the DAC uses this jittery clock to perform a D-->A.
(Were I to additionally remove the negative feedback in the output buffer would I get even better sound? probably!
I think that in my DAC the jitter performance dominates over the negative feedback in the output buffer).
Bombaywalla (System | Reviews | Threads | Answers | This Thread)
04-04-06
Fair enough my friend..at least we agree on something.lol i ... Gmood1
04-04-06
Gmood1, i think that we have been agreeing on almost everyth ... Bombaywalla
04-05-06
Bombaywalla, what exactly is done to just modify the digital ... Undertow
04-05-06
Undertow, as i understand it, when mods are done that exclud ... Bombaywalla
04-05-06
Interesting... i got a little lost on the re-attaching the x ... Undertow
04-05-06
04-05-06: undertow i got a little lost on the re-attaching ... Bombaywalla
04-06-06
Hudsonhawk, i've owned the bel canto 1.1, ack dack 2.0, kora ... Gunbei
05-16-06
Long-dead thread, but since there was some question as to th ... Hudsonhawk
|
|
