Trinity DAC

AudioExplorations

New Member
Apr 5, 2012
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Just read about this DAC on wizard's blog: http://cybwiz.blogspot.be/2013/03/trinity-dac.html

A very promising review:

Review by Jeff

I have them side by side in my mansion (dCS borrowed from a friend of Gordon). I am in a position to give you frank opinion. dCS is great, no doubt about it. But Trinity is simply another class of its own. I can tell you the characteristics of the two:

1. dCS is about mid-range warmth. The old Scalatti was too warm and too slow. The Vivaldi system improves but it is still on the warm side of the tonal spectrum. Yet it is not about tonal coloration. Anyway, Brits know the tricks and hence it sells in Asia.

2. But what dCS lacks clearly is "perspectives" of musical note. The structure of the soundstage is not as continuous as Trinity because the resolution of dCS is two notched down below. The Trinity is able to distinguish different type of harmonic structure of different type of instrument (string, brass, and wood) simultaneously in a truly palpable many. The superimposition of harmonic stemming from winds onto harmonics decay of the strings is so clearly delineated to form a real perspective into the musical venue of the recording with real communications between the musicans. There are simply so much more perspectives (depending on your mind target to focus on which attribute) into the recording. This completely KO the dCS, 9 out of 10 super audiophiles in my Taipei mansion unilaterally agrees. The 10 was hesitated for a while and reached the same conclusion after 10 minutes. The dCS sounds basically flat after experiencing the Trinity.

3. Transient resolution also blows up the dCS away. An easy example, the dCS may have 10 steps of dynamic contrast from the smallest note of piano to the loudest note in 5 seconds. The trinity probably has 30 steps within the same 5 seconds. This assume your system has the resolution to reveal these contrasts.

4. For true high resolution file via the USB port, we can forget everything else because the LIANOTEC of Trinity dac allows BIT PERFECT conversion without any digital filter. This is a proprietary design of the Trinity dac.

This is the real end game in modern DAC. All other dacs are the same after you experienced the Trinity. David Chesky in New York would agree, I am sure, To tell you my experience, all 16/44 CD decoded by Trinity sounds much better than the same recording in DSD play thru the TAD 600 reference. You should focus on the quality of recording rather than recording format.

I want to let you know that I sold the 4 box dCS Vivaldi system to get Trinity with pride. It saves me tremendous cost on cables and it clearly to my ears that it is simply another level. My friend who bought my dCS system did not understand why I went for a single chassis. In the last two evenings, consecutive listening of Trinity DAC in my mansion probably changed his mind.

http://www.trinity-ed.de/typo/index.php?id=12&L=1

Does anyone have any first hand experience with this dac?
 

Shaffer

New Member
Nov 2, 2012
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I do with the dCS Vivald, Scaratti iand I wonder who jeff is.

Gauging by a quick search, Jeff seems to live in HK, or somewhere about, and his comments are being distributed via Wizard's blog. He refers to his home as a mansion. That's all I need to know. :)
 

FrantzM

Member Sponsor & WBF Founding Member
Apr 20, 2010
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Hi

From the review ....

But what dCS lacks clearly is "perspectives" of musical note. The structure of the soundstage is not as continuous as Trinity because the resolution of dCS is two notched down below.
or

The superimposition of harmonic stemming from winds onto harmonics decay of the strings is so clearly delineated to form a real perspective into the musical venue of the recording with real communications between the musicans.

What can anyone make of these? What is a "harmonic stemming" or "harmonics decay" ... Really ?!?

SO that is a review, and one is supposed to be informed about this DAC sound reproduction characteristics from this assembly of words? I would not dare call these sentences ...
 

FrantzM

Member Sponsor & WBF Founding Member
Apr 20, 2010
6,455
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Hi

From the review ....


Hi Franz that is not a Review, it is the comment of Jeff who sold his 4 pieces dCS Viladi sytsem to buy a TRINITY DAC. The blog can be find in the Forum at www.audioexotics.hk

Kind Regards

dB

TRINITY

Welcome to the WBF, we expect to hear much more from you. The title called the piece a "review" thus my comments. Still, these comments do not tell me much. I would be willing to believe that your DAC is great if it compares with the DCS and the likes.

Care to tell us a little bit more about you DAC, design philosophy and we are not asking too much, yourself? We may be tough at times but we pride ourselves for being balanced. Again Welcome and good life and success to your present and future products.
 

asiufy

Industry Expert/VIP Donor
Jul 8, 2011
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almaaudio.com
Yes, more information would be great.
From what I gather, it uses off-the-shelf DAC chips (which?) and switched mode power supplies... Somehow I can't see that being better than the dCS, even though your clock is claimed to be 1000 times more accurate than dCS'....
And no DSD, I suppose?


alexandre
 

zermatt

Well-Known Member
Oct 5, 2010
90
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913
wash dc
Welcome TRINITY, its great to here from you.

I do know the DCS pieces well, but I am not an owner. Let me say that I would love to get my hands on a Vivaldi DAC and rip out the analog stage and replace it with tubes. Oh-well that will never happen. So my general impression of the Vivaldi stack is that it is a major upgrade from the Scarlatti, but it does have significant short comings. I do expect the DCS crew to update and revise its software to address it week points. Therefore it performance will alays be a moving target. I do love audio industry because the more innovative designers will have a chance against the industries heavy hitters.

So I am wondering, What is in your DAC has been able gain such a praise!
 

TRINITY

New Member
Sep 12, 2013
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www.trinity-ed.de
Lianotec

Yes, more information would be great.
From what I gather, it uses off-the-shelf DAC chips (which?) and switched mode power supplies... Somehow I can't see that being better than the dCS, even though your clock is claimed to be 1000 times more accurate than dCS'....
And no DSD, I suppose?


alexandre

I am Dietmar the designer of the TRINITY devices. My task is it to design electronic, which are better than the available measurement instruments. That means Ultra linear. That is what I did over 20 years in the research department of Thomson Multimedia, where I designed all the electronic for the standardisation of all digital recording standards from DVC to blu ray. By the way I had developed the first blu-ray laser driver with rise time of 350ps, which was essential for the blu-ray standardisation. During my 30 years as design engineer I have developed almost any kind of electronic from PLLs, frequency synthesizer, clock recoveries, channel codes, C-MOS ICs, GaAS ICs and so on. So actually I am not a dedicated audio designer. I personally think that is an advantage, since I solver problems in a different way.
Another point of my philosophy is, what you see is what you get, that is the reason why I deliver every product with complete measurement protocols. I do not like to publish typical value like almost all other companies. The measurement protocols can be seen on our webpage. So it is very easy to compare my results with the one published in “Stereophile”.
Back to the DAC, the PCM 1704 is in my eyes the best DAC architecture on the market. They are expansive, but they are worth every cent. I have developed and patented an architecture, which I call LIANOTEC, which stand for Linear Analog Oversampling TECnique. This circuit creates additional sampling point without using a digital filter in the analog domain. If you download the manual you can get a rough overview about this unique design. With this architecture you can built a ultra linear real multi-bit DAC.
Yes all my products use special SMPS units even the Phono and as you can see on the measurement results published on the web, the noise level is extreme low at 0.5nV/Hz1/2. Conclusion if it works for such low level signals it will work for all others also as well.
Of course I will try to answer all your questions, but before you ask RTFM.
The USB Interface supports DSD64.
Dietmar
 
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AudioExplorations

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Apr 5, 2012
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Dietmar, welcome to WBF, thanks for joining the discussion, I look forward to hearing more about your DAC.

Hopefully some of the WBF members will get a chance to hear this DAC and provide some of their listening impressions.
 

LL21

Well-Known Member
Dec 26, 2010
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Hi Dietmar,

Was just speaking with someone who is considering your Trinity DAC yesterday...have heard nothing but great things about your digital. Look forward to hearing more about it. I am a committed digital-only audiophile...trying to concentrate resources into one great source, rather than spread across multiple formats really. Nothing against other formats whatsoever. Looking forward to reading more about your experiences that lead you to your current design with 1704.

I have listened seriously to: Metronome Kalista Ref/C2A, Emm CDSA, DCS Vivaldi and Scarlatti (full stacks), Stahl-Tek Vekian, ARC CD8, Audio Aero La Source, Esoteric X-01SE, Meridian 808.2i and of course my favourite, the Zanden 4-box (with some very critical 'mods' to mechanically isolating each box, all NOS tubes and upgraded PCs).

Would love to hear the Trinity.
 

TRINITY

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Sep 12, 2013
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www.trinity-ed.de
TRINITY at AudioArts

Dietmar, welcome to WBF, thanks for joining the discussion, I look forward to hearing more about your DAC.

Hopefully some of the WBF members will get a chance to hear this DAC and provide some of their listening impressions.

At the Moment only a few people can speak about the sound of the TRINITY DAC, since I have delivered these DACs only to audioexotics. Nevertheless the next available will go to Gideon form www.AudioArts.co . Unfortunately exclusive produced products like the TRINITY Line have a long lead time of roughly 8 weeks.
The TRINITY DAC has no own sound like all of our products, since the products neither add some things like harmonics or remove some things, caused by a band limited system. What you will hear is master tape sound.
Just one word about valves, peoples who have listen a full-fledged TRINITY system, told me it sounds neither like valve and nor like semi-conductor. That was exactly my target.
I want to say sorry, that I have used the "RTFM" abbreviation, somebody told me I should answer here as the CEO of my Company and not as the design engineer as I am. That happens if you work your whole life as engineer and never wanted to work as CEO, even if I am a CEO of my own Company since almost 20 years. Nevertheless for all the other, who like the engineering slang I learned in the US here a link, http://www.satiche.org.uk/satiche/sat-0765.htm
 

RBFC

WBF Founding Member
Apr 20, 2010
5,158
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www.fightingconcepts.com
Dietmar,

Thanks for joining and providing information about your work! Many of us here are digital-only audiophiles and read about new DACs, etc. with great interest. Will you please go to "Settings" on the upper right of your screen, then choose "Edit Signature" from the menu on the left. Here, you can list your position as CEO/engineer for Trinity and be clearly identified for all our members.

Thanks,

Lee
 

jfrech

VIP/Donor
Sep 3, 2012
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Dietmar, another welcome from me. I've heard your phono stage and pre at Gideons, and can relate to your comment that it is not quite tubes or semi conductors. If you check under the forum turntables/phonostages there is a thead on your phonostage...appreciate if you can add to that conversation also...
 

Audiocrack

Well-Known Member
Aug 10, 2012
2,175
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1,158
I talked to Dietmar extensively the last couple of days. Apart from the fact that he is a true gentleman he impressed me more than enough to make the jump: I ordered a Trinity dac. Will post my experiences with the Trinity dac on WBF but patience is needed as it will take approximately two month before the Trinity dac will be delivered to me. For those who are interested in specs, please take a look at Dietmar's website. The Trinity dac specs look very impressive to me although I must confess that I am not a technician. And as I wrote before in my post regarding the Tripoint Audio Troy signature in the end only one thing matters to me: how does a unit sound (in my system). Although the proof of the pudding is in the eating I have high hopes that Dietmar created something very special with his Trinity dac.
 

Julf

New Member
Nov 27, 2011
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Amsterdam, The Netherlands
What can anyone make of these? What is a "harmonic stemming" or "harmonics decay" ... Really ?!?

SO that is a review, and one is supposed to be informed about this DAC sound reproduction characteristics from this assembly of words? I would not dare call these sentences ...

And how is that different from the reviews published in most audiophile magazines? :)
 

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