AMR / EMM / PLAYBACK Designs

I changed my mind a bit about EMM. The other day, I spent several hours listening to XDS1 in my friend's system with top of the line T&A active speaker, McIntosh preamp (can't remember which one). The first couple of hours, using Kubala Sosna Elation power cord, I still was not impressed. The sound on many tracks was thin, piano was very clear but too light weight for my taste. However, when it Elation cord was replaced with Elrod Gold Statment, it sounded much much better. I don't think that Elation was a bad cable but may be it just did not match well with EMM. Perhaps the same could be say of Synergistic Research Tesla T3 cord that I used with EMM. Unfortunately EMM is already a stretched for my budget, throw Elrod on top of that, it is not healthy for my bank account so I think I'll stick with Playback for now.

Bar81, I did not mean to imply that EMM only works well with incredibly expensive power cord.
It kind of surprise me though. Usually, even with stock cables, I expect a unit to work ok and give a reasonable performance. Better matched cable certainly should elevate the performance. However in EMM case, it seems like wrong cable can significantly deteriorate the sound quite a bit.
I never listened to it with stocked Kimber cable however.
My friend is now reporting also good result with Stealth Dream and he will compare Stealth to Elrod again before he make his decision on power cord.

Bar81, thanks for the information, I will let my friend knows since I was at his place a couple of weeks ago, he still did not know about any fix on switching input problem between high rez and SACD. Also, do you know if the new firmware will make XDS1 accept 24/176 and 24/192 input?

I am looking to replace my Berkeley DAC with something that will also handle SACD. So far I had a well broken in XDS1 in my system for a little over a week and I was a bit disappointed. Hopefully in the next week or two, I should have PD MPS-5 to try. XDS1 looks much better than the pictures in most magazine. However, I find it to be an unfinished product as it still has some bugs that has not been taken care of yet, although I understand that EMM knows about the problem and still tries to fix it.
I forgot exactly what it was now but I remembered getting some distortion sound coming out of the unit either when sampling rate was changed from 44.1 to 88 or when switched source from digital input (from my music server) to SACD player or something like that. The only way to get rid of the distortion was to turn off and on again. For product this price, I expected everything to be functioning perfectly. Also AES/EBU digital input supporting on 24/96 is a bit lame and EMM is delaying its upgrade to support 24/192 for awhile now. Anyhow, beside that sonically, it was a mixed bag for me. In my system, Berkeley has fuller, richer and warmer midrange. EMM has greater extension at both ends, better speed but for my taste, sounded too lean. I use all Synergistic cables (Tesla Apex) in my system with T3 power cords for Berkeley and EMM. I also tried Nordost Valhalla IC for a littel while with EMM.
I think XDS1 did many things better than Berkeley but in the end, I find Berkeley easier to listen to for extended period, more musical although may be less neutral or accurate than EMM but happen to be the way I prefer to listen to music. Let see if PD MPS-5 will suit me better.
It was strange listening to SACD on EMM though. I found the difference between SACD and CD layer was less than when I heard the same disk with Esoteric D-05 that I used to have.

I now have PD in my system and it is not even well broken in yet but so far I am very impressed.
It sounds like Berkeley DAC on steroid. I found its sound closer to Berkeley than EMM XDS1, surprisingly. Whatever Berkeley does well, it improves it while at the same time, it corrects many of Berkeley weaknesses, much better controlled bass, excellent pacing and rhythmic control. With XDS1, I felt like it did many things better but at the same time, Berkeley did certain thing that was crucial to me better.
To me, EMM is more hifi-ish where as PD is definitely more analog and more musical. However, some friends who heard EMM in my system also heard EMM XDS1 sounded better in other system so some of these is most likely system dependent as well.

I think the comment regarding EMM sounds more similar (or accurate) in comparison to Lyra Titan/Rockport is interesting. I have not heard Lyra often enough and never heard A90 but I do think that Lyra house sound certainly seems to be in the same family or closely related to EMM.
Tonally, in my system, PD has more in common with my Dynavector XV-1s (running through Ortofon T100 SUT) than EMM although I think Dyna has even fuller body and more weight as a whole and a bit more of the thick (in a good way), smooth extended top. EMM is probably more similar to my old Ortofon Jubilee but not quite as punchy but similar leaner sound than Dyna. I do not find PD excessive in the bottom end nor unnatural sounding. However, personally, I am more interested in stereo system that makes everything sound more listenable. There is no reason to sacrifice great performance that happens to be poorly recorded. Just my own preference....