Yep Ric you are right exciting times we have coming. I left the T&A total stock, I was tempted to damp caps and chassis and add the magic pixie dust as I call it (Quantum chips) to the dac but left as is as it sounds really good. That transformer (stock) I am sure is enough but if one could find a bigger one that still fits inside that would be the ticket. Not many folks want big transformers outside their pretty box.
T+A 1- bit converters in the PDP-3000HV and DAC 8 DSD
- Thread starter EuroDriver
- Start date
Well I just returned from a weeks trip in MN setting up the T+A dac in my buddies SOTA system. This system I am sure retails well north of $300k with Berning 211/845 amps, Audio Research Ref 6 Preamp, SonoruS AT10 RTR tape deck along with a very nice collection of tapes made directly from the master tape, He also has a SME 30MK2 with Breuer Tonearm, dynavector XV1T cart feeding a Wadax preamp. All cabling is by Enklein and power conditioning by the new Nexus AC 8 outlet, Speakers are kaiser kawero. Racks and supports are all by still points.
I went there expecting the T+A to sound very good but not hang with the incredible analog he has in the system and as usual when I arrived the dac had been plugged in but no signal for a few days after my shipping it to him with about 200 hours play time on it. It sounded pretty bad right out of the box at DSD512 by the next day things were coming together and getting better. We also played around with where to plug the PC and finally settled on a location. I left his place for a few days to visit some other friends and when I cam back he was very happy with the sound as the dac had been playing 24 hours a day. I throughly enjoyed the sound but felt something was missing, the sound, tho excellent, lacked the life that I know 512 can have. He commented that it is getting close to the level he gets from his analog rigs. So Monday I mentioned why don't we try a balanced cable between the T+A and the ARC preamp. OMG!! I have never heard such a transformation in any component by changing one thing as this did. We listened for about 20 minutes then turned and looked at each other with our mouths agape. Commenting about the huge size of the sound stage. It was as if the balanced cable blew up the sound stage and everything just went further out. Yet the individual images remained rock solid and so well defined, bass was amazing I heard some harmonics off a acoustic bass that you just never hear. It was as if the sound became alive. I gasped, moaned, holly wah'd quite a few times as track after track never sounded so good. He commented to me that his system has never sounded this good and that he has never heard me gasp while listening to his system before, well I sure was now. We listened to almost the full Tidal stream of Little Feat, Waiting for Columbus. The size of the stage the clarity of EVERY performer the living breathing sound simply amazing. Forget what I said above about the T+A in my system what it was doing now in his system was absolute stunning. The best sound I ever heard in my life was in his system after the cable change and the T+A dac 8 DSD just sang and sang. Call me gobsmacked. Best dac for the $$$ any $$$$, at DSD512 simply stunning. His analog stuff will struggle to match that and I thought I would never say that about first rate analog.
I went there expecting the T+A to sound very good but not hang with the incredible analog he has in the system and as usual when I arrived the dac had been plugged in but no signal for a few days after my shipping it to him with about 200 hours play time on it. It sounded pretty bad right out of the box at DSD512 by the next day things were coming together and getting better. We also played around with where to plug the PC and finally settled on a location. I left his place for a few days to visit some other friends and when I cam back he was very happy with the sound as the dac had been playing 24 hours a day. I throughly enjoyed the sound but felt something was missing, the sound, tho excellent, lacked the life that I know 512 can have. He commented that it is getting close to the level he gets from his analog rigs. So Monday I mentioned why don't we try a balanced cable between the T+A and the ARC preamp. OMG!! I have never heard such a transformation in any component by changing one thing as this did. We listened for about 20 minutes then turned and looked at each other with our mouths agape. Commenting about the huge size of the sound stage. It was as if the balanced cable blew up the sound stage and everything just went further out. Yet the individual images remained rock solid and so well defined, bass was amazing I heard some harmonics off a acoustic bass that you just never hear. It was as if the sound became alive. I gasped, moaned, holly wah'd quite a few times as track after track never sounded so good. He commented to me that his system has never sounded this good and that he has never heard me gasp while listening to his system before, well I sure was now. We listened to almost the full Tidal stream of Little Feat, Waiting for Columbus. The size of the stage the clarity of EVERY performer the living breathing sound simply amazing. Forget what I said above about the T+A in my system what it was doing now in his system was absolute stunning. The best sound I ever heard in my life was in his system after the cable change and the T+A dac 8 DSD just sang and sang. Call me gobsmacked. Best dac for the $$$ any $$$$, at DSD512 simply stunning. His analog stuff will struggle to match that and I thought I would never say that about first rate analog.
Yes definitely a night and day difference when running balanced on the T&A.
I am enjoying mine immensely. Definitely a best buy given how "cheap" it is
Inspired by this thread, I tried running a balanced cable from my T+A dac into the Berning Quadratures. Was a BIG wow! It may be the case that the Bernings are optimised for balanced operation rather than running a conversion traffo typical of valve designs but WOW all the same.
Just my opinion, BUT, the T&A SHOULD be run balanced and upsampled to 512DSD, no ifs ands or buts. So far all the "reviews" of this wonderful piece have used native PCM and DSD rather using HQPlayer uspampling everything to 512DSD where this DAC truly shines. Also, I believe one of the reviews, which also gave it very good praise was running SE.
Like I said, this DAC should be reviewed and perceived by potential buyers in the manner it performs best; balanced and upsampled to DSD512, otherwise it is just a very good DAC, part of the pack of very good DACS, rather than one of a handful of truly exceptional DACs and for the money, even after all the computer costs are factored in, is still a best buy, IMHO.
I definitely need to change my cabling on the T&A. I purchased it for my headphone system and had it in my main system for awhile, comparing it to my MSB Diamond IV+ before I upgraded it to the Diamond V. When doing so I had very good cables. Now it is in my headphone system, the components of which have pretty much been settled on (T&A-->Cavalli Liquid Gold-->HD800S) EXCEPT cabling. Appreciate the advice about the Sablon. I have heard very good things about the Sablons. While I love my Lightharmonics Lightspeed USB with my MSB, the love was not as much with the T&A, so I am on a search for the "right" cable on that as well.
Sounds reasonable, the T+A only needs a data only USB cable, that should sound better than one with a power line built in, Sablon also has one of these on offer.
I just had the 5v line of my USB cable (as of yet not by Sablon) being removed, unfortunately now the T+A doesn't get recognized because of an Intona in line with it, without the Intona it works.
I already contacted Daniel of Intona about this, until I have an answer from him, I would advice against a data only cable if used with an Intona, otherwise it's preferable.
In the system I describe above we used a Wire World Silver Starlight 2m usb cable. I use a gigabyte motherboard with dac up usb output and in bios I turn off the 5V to the USB dac up port so only data goes down the line. The T+A does not need to see 5V in order to work so this set up was excellent. I have been very impressed with wire world USB cables and felt the WW starlight USB beat a AQ diamond in my system. The Silver starlight was a step above the starlight and I imagine the platinum starlight would be even better. I think the power cable we used to the T+A was a EnKlein, a new cable just introduced, second in their line. The Balanced cable was also EnKlein.
It is my impression and understanding that using an Intonia or UpTone region is not needed on the T+A as they have very good isolation of the USB input.
It is my impression and understanding that using an Intonia or UpTone region is not needed on the T+A as they have very good isolation of the USB input.
Another one for the to-do list - bypass the internal volume control and run line output into preamp / integrated. Ideally with some valve goodness ;-)
This is certainly the case if you use SOTA transports like a SGM2015, however with my CAPSv4 the Intona does clean up the sound and beat my former Regen/AQJB combo.
The T+A is less sensitive wrt it's USB input than the competition, but not immune.
I would add: check with your DAC manufacturer what long-term implications if any there are for the DAC (I feel like I posted this already but not sure if it's here or at CA) of removing the GND especially if you''re doing it through just a cable disconnection. Mine sounds great without, but iFi advised not to do it this way but instead go through a device which does the GN disconnection in 'a safe way' as otherwise the DAC is put in an unknown state and this could be detrimental to it in the long run. They suggested I use the iDefender 3.0 which does this, also allows a VBus disconnection and injecting clean power (like from a linear regulated one for instance).
I forgot to mention that is exactly how we did as well. Set the switch to line on back and run to the ARC ref 6 preamp balanced then to amps balanced.
I'd say still try the Regen as I doubt other manufacturers have duplicated the optimised PHY and MAC processing.
If you have a balanced pre and a balanced amp or just running straight into a balanced amp then balanced will most always sound better. However, there is another reason why balanced can sound better. Sometimes there is an "extra" stage to sum the balanced outs back to single ended. On some products the balanced outs are just plain more pure sounding because of this. The Yggy is one such animal. I told my friend who was modding it to take the plus from the xlr instead of the rca jack and he got much better sound this way. The Yggy has a summing circuit that is not in the path when you listen balanced or use the plus off the balanced output connector. I don't know how the output stage in the T+A is but if you are running a single ended pre or amp afterwords then you might want to try a xlr to rca cable that has an xlr on one end that has just pins one and two connected and leave pin three unconnected and an rca on the end going to the load. You can try an adapter first but all adapters mess up the sound a little. Reconfiguring an interconnect is better. My friend with the Yggy had already made his own interconnect so he just reterminated it.
The Gustard that Quadman has does not have a summing circuit so will not benefit from the above when running single ended.
The Gustard that Quadman has does not have a summing circuit so will not benefit from the above when running single ended.
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Marc...I would be most interested in your impressions having performed the bypass . I am giving serious consideration to this DAC running balanced line output into an ARC Ref10 pre.
I do not have balanced inputs on my amp. Will something like this be beneficial between T+A and My amp?
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Jensen-Tran...193326?hash=item54162b5c6e:g:K2oAAOSwKrhVXQnd
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Jensen-Tran...193326?hash=item54162b5c6e:g:K2oAAOSwKrhVXQnd
Hi Roger, there is a switch in the rear of the unit to disable the attenuator and run an external preamplifier. I don't however have a balanced unit here and am presently running directly into the Quadratures, with some great results. A friend usng a similar set up is due to lend me his Bespoke tvc and has promised some extraordinary improvements.
Hi Mark, Been a while...wow!...Congrats on the Bernings...i have heard they are incredibly sensational amps.
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