LTA Aero vs Merason Reuss vs Mojo Audio Mystique Y?
Hi everyone, I just recently made an account after reading through @mitch2 ’s incredible Six Dac Comparison thread. I’m considering DAC upgrades from my Merason Frerot with Pow1 power supply, and the three finalists so far are the LTA Aero (I’d probably use the Ray Reserve tubes), Merason Reuss, and Mojo Audio Mystique Y (with either AM or NC chokes). Has anyone compared any of these three? I’m looking to retain the natural, "analog" liquidity of the Merason while improving upon microdynamics, depth, and imaging specificity.
Mitch had both the Aero and Mystique Y in-house, albeit not at the same time, so that gives me some sense of how they might compare using Aero’s stock tubes. Ideally I’d prefer to stay away from tubes but the Aero is pretty compelling. The only downside with the Mojo is that it’s optimized for its single-ended outputs and I’d want to use the balanced outputs for the best sonic performance from my amp. The Reuss would be a natural upgrade from my Frerot, but I’m not sure exactly how it compares to the more widely reviewed DAC1 MkII, and I also feel the AD1865 chip used in the LTA and Mojo is more well-regarded than the Burr Brown in the Merasons.
I’d appreciate any thoughts about how these three might compare for what I’m after. I’m very drawn to modern implementations of older DAC chips (specifically the AD1865, AD1862, Burr Brown PCM63, and other very well-regarded chips), so please let me know if there are any other DACs around the same price that I should be considering. This is for my desktop headphone system, so form factor is also important and the three DACs in the title are about as large as I’d like to go.
I have a friend that is taking delivery of an Aero dac in a few weeks. He has a number of tubes to try including Ray Reserve. I have a LTA MicroZOTL preamp and the tubes that shipped with it were not very good. It sounds totally different with different tubes. I suspect that the same is true of the Aero dac. |
@davebull I can’t offer comparisons but I have a LTA Aero, have had it for almost 2 months. I had a PS Audio Direct Stream MKii that I sold but had to compare for the first month. I also have a Krell Illusions ii with a built in DAC that I can switch between. I think the LTA Aero is fantastic, it’s the best DAC I’ve had in my system. It is alarmingly quiet which is really saying something based on being a Tube DAC. It adds a tube flavor without the negatives and you can hear noticeable differences when rolling tubes. I’ve got the Ray Reserves, stock, Tung Sol NOS both 6v and 12v, Amperex 6 v (1950’s from Holland). The Tung Sol are my favorite overall, the Amperex are unbelievable but have more energy and mid emphasis, the Rays do everything extremely well but are a little more clinical, surgical, don’t have as much tube flavor. In my experience with it, if someone has only listened with Stock tubes, it really doesn’t give you the full picture of what the DAC is capable of. I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend the LTA, it’s the most organic, vinyl sounding DAC but with non of the draw backs you’d typically here about when taking about a tubes, vinyl, R2R designs. Again, how it compares to the others on your list, I can’t comment, I don’t have any experience with the other DAC’s. |
