Wadax Reference Dac and Server arrive

[spiritofmusic]

Hi Jonyung, it's a while since anyone's complimented me on my choice in components, you've made me feel like a young man again Lol.
The Eera Tentation is a fantastic CDP, and in a small way emulates the Wadax Ref in being hugely forgiving of poor masterings without giving up on their resolution. I have a whole bunch of career retrospective CD boxsets incl demos etc sourced from lo fi origins, live tracks sourced from cassette tapes, and the Eera makes them all as immersive and musical as possible without covering up their poor provenance.
The Mullard, and Mazda 6DJ8s, are the first tubes in my Nat Utopia pre that haven't gone noisy and so outperform the Voskhod and Reflektor 6N23P ones that I had relied on before, and my GE211s are still going strong, into their 75th year of life.
The Zus? Me and you rate them, everyone else, not so much Lol.
Now, back to our normal programme, and the Wadax Ref...

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Ah Mike, I was unaware he owned the dac. Of course, YT, MP3s thru many other DACs really aren't artifact free, hence my comment.

yes, figured you did not know.

 

[spiritofmusic]

Mike, I perversely enjoy lo fi stuff reproduced w maximum musicality. Robert Fripp and Steve Wilson have done wonders mastering cassette tape live recordings from over a half century ago onto the King Crimson retrospective boxsets, they can be a pain to listen to via analytical CDPs, but a treat via more musical ones. I can imagine the latter via the Wadax Ref rig.

 

[microstrip]

(...) My only reservation with CJ gear would be that it only has RCA SE inputs. Either way that's an awesome problem to have, looking forward to the impressions once the decision is made.

Unless you have a complex system or long cables SE is not an issue. In fact, SE susceptibility to hum can be a positive factor - we must optimize grounding and connections to get an hum free SE system. Such system will have intrinsically lower broadband noise, a good thing in terms of sound quality. People relying mainly on the intrinsic hum rejection of balanced systems very often do not try any grounding or cable positioning optimization as it apparently it is not needed.

 

[Audiocrack]

with the Wadax Ref dac and server i've been sampling large orchestral streaming recordings, since i've not yet loaded my long term reference files. this can be 'big' music. very complex. i find i can really push it as there are zero digital artifacts. until you hear it absent those things, who knew that's what it was? must have been in the recording? nope.

there is no glassy sheen on strings, no jagged edges on transients, no timbral nasties, nothing but smooth natural music. liquid and continuous. i'm sitting here listening to a nice Beethoven's 9th (Gaffigan/Luzerner Sinfonieorchester--Quboz 96/24) and slowly upping the volume setting. past the previous "excess cringe" safety point. nothing is telling me this is reproduced music. there is 'air' around instruments, vocals are direct and set in space. i'm feeling the pulse of the music. you get a sense of whole persons singing. absent distractions the musical flow and immersion is complete.

no thoughts of digital or analog or anything but music. i'm not judging this performance, just commenting on the experience. and this makes me want to listen to more large orchestral. this opens up so much music to me to more than sample.

In my experience reproducing massed strings of large orchestral pieces (eg the symphonies of Bruckner, Mahler, Shostakovich, etc) in a convincing way - that is without this (awful) unnatural digital shrillness/harshness - is one of the most difficult things to achieve via the digital medium. Apparently Wadax succeeded in this regard and that is high praise indeed.

 

[morricab]

with the Wadax Ref dac and server i've been sampling large orchestral streaming recordings, since i've not yet loaded my long term reference files. this can be 'big' music. very complex. i find i can really push it as there are zero digital artifacts. until you hear it absent those things, who knew that's what it was? must have been in the recording? nope.

there is no glassy sheen on strings, no jagged edges on transients, no timbral nasties, nothing but smooth natural music. liquid and continuous. i'm sitting here listening to a nice Beethoven's 9th (Gaffigan/Luzerner Sinfonieorchester--Quboz 96/24) and slowly upping the volume setting. past the previous "excess cringe" safety point. nothing is telling me this is reproduced music. there is 'air' around instruments, vocals are direct and set in space. i'm feeling the pulse of the music. you get a sense of whole persons singing. absent distractions the musical flow and immersion is complete.

no thoughts of digital or analog or anything but music. i'm not judging this performance, just commenting on the experience. and this makes me want to listen to more large orchestral. this opens up so much music to me to more than sample.

Honestly Mike, would you expect ANY of the artifacts you described on a top DAC? I don’t get those and my DAC is less than 1/10th the price of the WADAX.

 

[morricab]

In my experience reproducing massed strings of large orchestral pieces (eg the symphonies of Bruckner, Mahler, Shostakovich, etc) in a convincing way - that is without this (awful) unnatural digital shrillness/harshness - is one of the most difficult things to achieve via the digital medium. Apparently Wadax succeeded in this regard and that is high praise indeed.

Not sure what DACs you have been playing with but I haven’t had and issue with what you describe in a LONG time and with relatively affordable DACs.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Honestly Mike, would you expect ANY of the artifacts you described on a top DAC?

no, i don't expect them. yes, i do hear them. and cannot un-hear them. bad for me.

I don’t get those and my DAC is less than 1/10th the price of the WADAX.

Brad, these last 2 weeks lots of hard lessons about digital music reproduction have been learned. some listeners even get frustrated. i suggest that you don't directly compare Wadax. agree that there are many great sounding dacs at all price points. i'm sure yours is one of them.

 

[Audiocrack]

Not sure what DACs you have been playing with but I haven’t had and issue with what you describe in a LONG time and with relatively affordable DACs.

Playing with the Tidal La Assoluta loudspeakers in combination with inter alia Tripoint top notch ‘grounding’ units and grounding cables let you hear an awful lot of the ‘goodies’ as well as the ‘bad’ aspects of (digital) recordings. Most of the digital recordings with massed strings are tolerable but come nowhere near to what I experience in the concert hall (in particular ‘het concertgebouw’ in Amsterdam) as regards air, smoothness, seneriry, dynamics, etc. (And I listened to quite lot of dacs, including very expensive ones).

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Mike, have you formed an opinion yet on the Wadax server vs the Extreme?

my Extreme is going to a new happy owner. i'm buying the Wadax Reference Server.

on Friday night my friend Victor, who owns is an MSB Select 2 and is an Extreme owner, came over to assist with the compare. Victor also brought a Gigaswitch and LPS to optimize the copper Ethernet that both the Wadax and Extreme would use. both the Extreme and Wadax server were sitting on Dazia's. we used TAS for the Extreme, and Roon obviously for the Wadax. Emile had optimized the USB driver for the Wadax Reference dac.

we did the compare, first three tracks with the Wadax Server, then those same three with the Extreme. i'm not going to speak on behalf of Victor. but it was a clear choice. we move on. synergy? Akasa Optical link? hard to know cause and effect exactly.

the Extreme/Wadax Ref dac is awesome in every way. the Wadax combo is better.

below is how my system looks today.

 

[spiritofmusic]

Mike, congrats. Twins lol! And this late in life, forget medical science, that's audio miracles for you.
I note your fairly unequivocal language, "clear choice".
Straight KO, technical KO, or win on points?

 

[morricab]

no, i don't expect them. yes, i do hear them. and cannot un-hear them. bad for me.


Brad, these last 2 weeks lots of hard lessons about digital music reproduction have been learned. some listeners even get frustrated. i suggest that you don't directly compare Wadax. agree that there are many great sounding dacs at all price points. i'm sure yours is one of them.

Well, given that I never heard what you heard from the MSB Select II, it is perhaps for the best. I am sure I will hear the WADAX at some point though...

 

[microstrip]

Maybe I should learn to explain with examples. Perhaps I was too vague in my description. (...)

Thanks for your clarification. Can you tell us something about your system and preferences?

 

[morricab]

Playing with the Tidal La Assoluta loudspeakers in combination with inter alia Tripoint top notch ‘grounding’ units and grounding cables let you hear an awful lot of the ‘goodies’ as well as the ‘bad’ aspects of (digital) recordings. Most of the digital recordings with massed strings are tolerable but come nowhere near to what I experience in the concert hall (in particular ‘het concertgebouw’ in Amsterdam) as regards air, smoothness, seneriry, dynamics, etc. (And I listened to quite lot of dacs, including very expensive ones).

Given that I don’t care at all for the sound of Tidal speakers the several times I have heard them at shows, I am not sure what to make of your comments. A forensic dissection of a recording is usually not a very enjoy experience and usually indicative of something not right...

 

[microstrip]

my Extreme is going to a new happy owner. i'm buying the Wadax Reference Server.

Congratulations on buying the full system.

Just one detail - do you know of any published measurements on the Wadax Reference DAC? If I ever had an Wadax Reference DAC close to the MSB Select II I would surely make a null test on them after listening!

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Well, given that I never heard what you heard from the MSB Select II, it is perhaps for the best. I am sure I will hear the WADAX at some point though...

hearing sources at shows is a crap shoot. reading the feedback from Capital Audio Fest about the Wadax, and now living with it for 10 days, it's hard to reconcile the feedback until you realize that....you can't. too many variables. and then trying to imagine a direct compare to your gear? very hard unless you hear it multiple times in multiple contexts.

and the MSB Select 2 is awesome, the best i've ever heard digital until i heard the Wadax. but again; so many ways to hear it, takes work to get it's full measure.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Congratulations on buying the full system.

thank you!!!

Just one detail - do you know of any published measurements on the Wadax Reference DAC? If I ever had an Wadax Reference DAC close to the MSB Select II I would surely make a null test on them after listening!

god, i sure hope not!

just kidding Francisco, not seen any published measurements. maybe Stereophile will do a review and Atkinson will get his hands on it.

 

[Audiocrack]

Given that I don’t care at all for the sound of Tidal speakers the several times I have heard them at shows, I am not sure what to make of your comments. A forensic dissection of a recording is usually not a very enjoy experience and usually indicative of something not right...

Apparently our (audio) preferences and or taste differ and that is completely fine of course.

 

[microstrip]

thank you!!!

god, i sure hope not!

just kidding Francisco, not seen any published measurements. maybe Stereophile will do a review and Atkinson will get his hands on it.

I think that for many of us measurements are an important aspect in this hobby. Although they do not tell us on how something sounds they can explain a lot. Both MSB and dCS claimed technical excellence and we have access to independent measurements on it.

Until now I have only read reports on the Wadax Reference used with solid state gear - I would like to read opinions when used with tubes.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

I think that for many of us measurements are an important aspect in this hobby. Although they do not tell us on how something sounds they can explain a lot. Both MSB and dCS claimed technical excellence and we have access to independent measurements on it.

Until now I have only read reports on the Wadax Reference used with solid state gear - I would like to read opinions when used with tubes.

you don't see MSB Select in many tubed systems either. Lampi or Nagra more common.

in Asia dealers are selling big tube amps, and maybe you will see more Wadax sold into those type systems.