Last year I did an expensive experiment, and owned the Chord Dave, Bricasti M1, and Berkeley Ref Series 1 at the same time. With multiple outputs from my Aurender N10 and multiple inputs on my Luxman integrated amp, I was able to do various tests somewhat easily.
And very clearly to my ears, the Chord Dave offered more detail, more warmth, deeper soundstage and just plain more toe-tapping than either the Bricasti or the Berkeley.
I sold the latter two, still love the Chord Dave, and look forward to Chord's new gizmos that are supposed to improve the Dave's sound tremendously. But even with no extra gizmos...
Dave, who adds that while he didn't stick with the Chord Dave for its headphone amp capabilities that's also quite quite quite good
And very clearly to my ears, the Chord Dave offered more detail, more warmth, deeper soundstage and just plain more toe-tapping than either the Bricasti or the Berkeley.
I sold the latter two, still love the Chord Dave, and look forward to Chord's new gizmos that are supposed to improve the Dave's sound tremendously. But even with no extra gizmos...
Dave, who adds that while he didn't stick with the Chord Dave for its headphone amp capabilities that's also quite quite quite good