Transparent dac

[Mivera]

Hi Keith,

I noticed you carry Genelec active speakers on your website. You know some of their models have built in Ravenna. What this means is you will be able to connect them to the same network as the Superstream and choose them as an endpoint in the Roon app soon. The Superstream and a pair of those speakers could be a complete system.

 

[Purité Audio]

Genelec aren't bad ,their strength is that they all sound the same ,just louder and with more bass as they get bigger, downside is they are sold by everyone and someone like Thomann sells them for less than I can buy them for!
I might have another look though.
BW Keith.

 

[Mivera]

Genelec aren't bad ,their strength is that they all sound the same ,just louder and with more bass as they get bigger, downside is they are sold by everyone and someone like Thomann sells them for less than I can buy them for!
I might have another look though.
BW Keith.

I have never heard them before but I love that they have built in Ravenna.

 

[Mivera]

want some suggestions on a transparent dac that my objectivists brothers would approve of. No audiophile delusion, just perfect operational performance.

I believe such a device is obtainable at relatively low cost...

Run a J test on the Iphone analog outs. That may be all you need! After all a $200 IFI is just as good as over $10K in Harman gear according to the J test.

 

[Vincent Kars]

http://en-us.sennheiser.com/headphone-audio-amplification-hdvd-800-acoustic
It has a glass top so very transparent

 

[Thomas savage]

Don't want any Ifi schiit

 

[ceedee]

Subjectively transparent is another matter

What do you mean by this term?

"Transparent" is a pretty straightforward concept (at least I thought it was). A device can be said to be either audibly transparent or not, right? Of course, a listener may still prefer the sound of a non-transparent (audibly colored) device, but that's down to aesthetic preference.

Personally, I'd rather the DAC do its job with as little audible coloration as possible, and I can always tweak recordings with EQ/other DSP later.

 

[TBone]

I believe such a device is obtainable at relatively low cost...

as i ... any possibility of home auditioning dac(s) in your price range?

 

[Thomas savage]

as i ... any possibility of home auditioning dac(s) in your price range?

So far there is only one suggestion my plan is to look at the recommendations and then buy one. If I don't like it I will send it back.

 

[Blumlein 88]

Feel free to list others based solely on your technical appreciation of them..

Have you any experience with other products from emotive? I will need amps or active speakers too.

I have used previous Emotiva DACs which also were good. A friend has their XMC1. This is a multi-channel DAC/Pre which includes Dirac room correction as part of the package. Even in bypass as a DAC/pre it is very good. Same fellow has one of their less costly multi-channel pre's and one of their 5 channel amps. All of their gear I have heard/used performs at a high level despite the modest cost.

As for active speakers, the JBL LSR305's are quite something. Depending on your particular use scenario you might want a sub with them. Still doable in your stated budget even with sub. Focals studio monitors are good too though I think the good ones from them are over your budget. With active speakers you have a bit of a gap in low priced and high priced speakers where there isn't an outstanding candidate (at least to my knowledge/experience).

Here is a link to the Teac I wouldn't be afraid to try.
http://www.teac.com/product/ud-301/

Below $500 and does DSD too if you like. You can also find the UD501 on closeout for not much over $500. If you could go a bit more the various NT503 DACs have some nifty network streaming options. Though it will cost you near a $1000 for those.

http://www.teac.com/product/nt-503/

 

[Purité Audio]

Don't want any Ifi schiit

I see what you did there!
Keith

 

[TBone]

So far there is only one suggestion my plan is to look at the recommendations and then buy one. If I don't like it I will send it back.

Been looking at reasonably priced dacs in my immediate area for quite a while, obviously I'm in no rush. Since I've little interest in rolling dacs to try match my transparency worthiness level, rather my next purchase be long term. The vast majority of my music inventory is 16/44 and it's growing quickly, considering how cheap & easily accessible used CDs are gotten around town. I've ~dozen SACD, maybe twice that in 24 bit music data; my hi-rez'r inventory has, and will remain mostly static.

Have been eye-balling the Sim Moon #300D (2 different versions) for some time; given my local bias. The Rotel 1580 also looks interesting.

 

[Fitzcaraldo215]

What do you mean by this term?

"Transparent" is a pretty straightforward concept (at least I thought it was). A device can be said to be either audibly transparent or not, right? Of course, a listener may still prefer the sound of a non-transparent (audibly colored) device, but that's down to aesthetic preference.

Personally, I'd rather the DAC do its job with as little audible coloration as possible, and I can always tweak recordings with EQ/other DSP later.

Transparent is yet another audio-ized metaphor derived from our sense of sight, but what it describes exactly is still "in the ear and mind of the beholder". I also do not think it is black/white. (Sorry, another visual metaphor.) I think it is subjective and there are degrees of relative transparency, even among digital stuff. You might think something quite "transparent" sounding until you hear something else that is even more so. So, one listener's "transparent", might be another's yeah, but I heard something else that was even more "transparent".

I will go off the deep end, here, (mixing more metaphors while at it), and cite the old cliche about "veils being lifted". I actually like that, because I think it happens in audio and it is fairly descriptive of an increased sense of "transparency" and/or a greater sense of detail, lower noise and artifacts, fewer colorations, etc. In DACs, part of that effect might be due to the analog output stage, as well as the digital processing.

 

[RayDunzl]

want some suggestions on a transparent dac that my objectivists brothers would approve of.

Benchmark DAC2 HGC here. Not low-low cost, but not uber extravagant, either.

The User Manual contains plenty of measurements, pages 41-56.

The Ad-copy:

All Benchmark converters are designed to be sonically neutral. This sonic transparency is absolutely essential in the studio monitoring chain. For this reason, Benchmark DAC2 converters are central components in the monitoring systems in many of the world's finest studios.

When Benchmark's professional converters are used in hi-fi applications, studio-quality sound can be enjoyed in a home environment. Enjoy pure music without any coloration from the electronics. Hear the music exactly the way it was heard in the studio, and exactly the way the artists intended.

Transparent sound can go beyond replicating the studio experience. Recordings that have been produced with a natural and unprocessed sound can transport you to the performance space. However, this can only happen when the entire playback chain is selected for maximum transparency.

 

[Blumlein 88]

Transparent is yet another audio-ized metaphor derived from our sense of sight, but what it describes exactly is still "in the ear and mind of the beholder". I also do not think it is black/white. (Sorry, another visual metaphor.) I think it is subjective and there are degrees of relative transparency, even among digital stuff. You might think something quite "transparent" sounding until you hear something else that is even more so. So, one listener's "transparent", might be another's yeah, but I heard something else that was even more "transparent".

I will go off the deep end, here, (mixing more metaphors while at it), and cite the old cliche about "veils being lifted". I actually like that, because I think it happens in audio and it is fairly descriptive of an increased sense of "transparency" and/or a greater sense of detail, lower noise and artifacts, fewer colorations, etc. In DACs, part of that effect might be due to the analog output stage, as well as the digital processing.

Well we could go with straight wire as the comparison. You do need a reference to determine transparency. In the past I loaded amplifier outputs, fed them a signal and tapped the output in way the result was unity gain. Fed that to my regular power amp. Could I hear the amp as different than the interconnect? Back then only one amp managed to be transparent out of several I tried. The others all had a sound. Some were very obvious, some more subtle. That is what I mean by transparent. No sound of its own.

 

[NorthSky]

Transparent DAC for Thomas?

Here's one:

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• Bonus: http://www.theaudiophileman.com/#!henry-audio-dac/cdcr

 

[Keith_W]

You may be interested to read Bruno Putzeys' thoughts on DAC's:

"I very often have to invent new measurements on the fly when I suspect there might be something going on that doesn’t show up clearly on standard measurements. To give one example, you could take a DAC and do something very classical, like sweep the level of a sinusoidal signal from full scale to nothing, and then look to see how distortion changes with signal level. You might find some minuscule squiggles at lower levels and shrug them off as measurement errors, like, “OK, that is just the machine not correctly measuring noise.” But I got suspicious at some point and said, “Hang on, let me try to find explicitly whether something happens in the noise floor with the signal modulation, but then I have to do so without a signal present. How do you do that?” Well, you sweep a DC input to a DAC. You feed it a constant code, some small value, and measure the noise. Increase that code and repeat. Suddenly you’ll find that some of these D-to-A converters will do these frightening things, like the noise floor suddenly shooting up or an audible whistle actually just walking through the audioband as you sweep, going from supersonic down to zero and then back up. You have to be creative when you measure, not just do the standardized battery."

http://www.soundstageultra.com/inde...s-of-mola-mola-hypex-and-grimm-audio-part-one

Unfortunately, his Mola-Mola DAC is a bit over your budget.

 

[Blumlein 88]

I suppose that test is useful for when I start modulating DC to my DAC or wouldn't that make it very low frequency AC?

 

[RayDunzl]

DAC Frequency Response:

Basically, mine is +/- 0.05dB across the band from 10Hz to whatever, as best as I can conveniently measure it. I'll assume that most of the badness seen here is due to the 25 foot RCA cable, and the on-board PC ADC, RF grunge from whereever, and whatever other measurement problems/deficiencies I have using a PC and REW and taking the measurement from the preamp and not the DAC output. That low in the bass at 3Hz is only half a dB off...

This is way zoomed in - the entire vertical scale is 0.7dB range.

But, then you throw a little room correction into the mix, and run the same sweep again, and Oh no! My precious flat frequency response is trashed!

Vertical scale range is 20dB now:

Colorations, anyone?

Subjectively, it's better. No more boom/mud down low.

 

[NorthSky]

• http://mola-mola.nl/index.php/dak

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♦ Price ($6,600 but in reality it costs $18,340) → http://www.superbestaudiofriends.or...-other-stuff-dac-techno-discussion.279/page-2

"Mola Mola dac is priced at $6,600, but it is just the price as the optional module for the Makua Linestage ($11,740), which means to own this dac, you have to pay $18,340."

• http://www.stereophile.com/content/mola-mola-makua-linestage-dac#KgXQEpF1uXF43YrM.97
• http://www.stereophile.com/content/mola-mola-vivid#PTtQr6F1BV6eUSwC.97 → That would be a good match with Thomas's speaker's brand.