Chord DAVE, Aune S16 etc. - more comparative listening (rambling & tedious)

[bonzo75]

Hi the DSD is better for sure, but is your assessment based on listening to the GG at Christoph’s – if so listening through Tidal through a PC significantly reduced quality, as compared to listening off a proper HD through, say Aurender or so. And he upsamples everything on his computer

 

[wisnon]

Must admit the Mola Mola is a product I don't know at all, and which I'm not sure is available in this country. Having said that, our engineer friend who was in the market for a new DAC when we started doing comparisons (still doing some, curious about the T&A for a secondary system) bought a dCS Rossini in the meantime (no Swiss importer either) and is very happy with it. He got rid of his other DACs (Berkeley etc.) but kept the Weiss for his holiday chalet. I've since heard several Lampi DACs which he would not take into consideration as they use tubes. Of those I have a soft spot for the Golden Gate and the Golden Atlantic, but only the passively filtered chipless DSD board, not nearly as convinced by either of the PCM boards. The DSD512 equipped Golden Atlantic is probably one of the best deals in terms of QPR right now, make sure to include it in your comparisons if you're price-conscious (I'm "both", so to speak - I get to listen to a lot of stuff I can't afford, it's fun).

Greetings from Switzerland, David.

On my GG, I adore the PCM at all rates. Just a matter of choosing the right tubes for the music genre.

I feed spinner CD and stock Mac Mini digital, as well as an Audiophile Optimized PC i74790K server via USB. Unfortunately I screwed up the PC with a recent upgrade and will have to fix it from the ground up!

 

[acousticsguru]

Hi the DSD is better for sure, but is your assessment based on listening to the GG at Christoph’s – if so listening through Tidal through a PC significantly reduced quality, as compared to listening off a proper HD through, say Aurender or so. And he upsamples everything on his computer

He doesn't upsample "everything", but he does upsample RBCD (which, needless to say, is all he uses Tidal for) to DSD512 (worth it, IMHO, if perhaps not on the level of using a solid state upsampler like dCS). Some upsampling, e.g. DSD64 to DSD512, degrades the sound quality (logically, as it's not "upsampling", but a conversion with re-modulation), so he won't use that. Upsampling high-resolution PCM on a computer or server has been a qualitative toss-up of pros and cons to me thus far (again, unlike using a solid state upsampler).

To my mind, the GG and Atlantic sound very musically involving using the chipless DSD engine. The PCM boards sound very "HiFi" to me, not bad (the R2R represents a noticeable step up), but with significantly lesser resolution and "you are there" feel than e.g. the dCS units I know (old and new, the in-between era ones sound too analytical for my taste). And since the RBCD to DSD512 upsampling works just fine, if I were to order a Lampi, it would be chipless DSD only (having said that, the extra cost of having both the chipless DSD board and the R2R with the then necessary second super clock for 48k family rates isn't a deal breaker).

Greetings from Switzerland, David.

 

[bonzo75]

Yes he also uses tidal and not an optimized server. Those things make a big difference. Unless you have compared the GG PCM and other PCM in that same setting

 

[acousticsguru]

Yes he also uses tidal and not an optimized server. Those things make a big difference. Unless you have compared the GG PCM and other PCM in that same setting

From a source other than a computer? Same impression. Of course servers make a difference, but that's not the point I was trying to make. The PCM boards have their own specific sound. The chipless DSD is different, more like an analogue source, in the best sense of the term. I won't say the low-level resolution of the chipless is up there with the best PCM DACs I've heard either, but it's reminiscent to listening to vinyl playback in the sense that one cares much less about what one doesn't hear.

To be perfectly blunt, I can't see anyone buying a Lampi to find out what exactly is on their records, but to enjoy the music and not care. I could imagine adding one to my system for the purpose, so it's not as if I were making fun of the concept. It seems perfectly valid to me.

Greetings from Switzerland, David.

 

[bonzo75]

The resolution actually changes a lot with the valve, as does the color from coloured to neutral

 

[bonzo75]

But again, did you compare the GG PCM with another PCM at Christoph's?

 

[acousticsguru]

The resolution actually changes a lot with the valve, as does the color from coloured to neutral

You're referring to what's left after the signal passes through the valve - I was referring to the digital resolution an R2R DAC board is able to provide, no matter what the output stage manages to preserve. Admittedly, no analogue output stage is able to preserve the full resolution and dynamics of 24-bit PCM. DSD corresponds to roughly 20-bit at 100-120kS/s PCM in terms of resolution - there, the resulting resolution and dynamics would seem manageable for a SOTA output stage.

But to reiterate: I wasn't referring to how limiting an output stage is or isn't to the total system resolution (which in realistic terms, is nowhere as high as some audiophiles - ironically ones who believe in numbers - think), merely to the fact that this is a case where one can hear the limitation of an R2R board - no doubt thanks to the high-quality output stage!

Tube rolling is fun, and I'm not debating that finding the matching combination will do a lot to one's appreciation of what a DAC is able to make of the source file, but it cannot, strictly speaking, "improve" the resolution or dynamics.

Greetings from Switzerland, David.

 

[bonzo75]

Well I would disagree with theory alone but then maybe that is why he makes a non R2R dac as well, which he prefers to his tastes, I clearly prefer the R2R PCM

 

[acousticsguru]

But again, did you compare the GG PCM with another PCM at Christoph's?

Yes. I can see using Tidal in his setup is convenient but nowhere near ideal/a limiting factor, but it's work in progress, and you're reminding me I've made promises to him in this respect I still need to keep (let's hope he isn't lurking).

Greetings from Switzerland, David.

 

[acousticsguru]

Well I would disagree with theory alone but then maybe that is why he makes a non R2R dac as well, which he prefers to his tastes, I clearly prefer the R2R PCM

I much prefer his R2R to his chip set PCM - I'm sorry if I didn't make this sufficiently clear? But now that you're saying this, his reasons may well be the same as mine (his chip set PCM DAC board provides greater resolution, audibly so - but then, resolution alone is not music).

Greetings from Switzerland, David.

 

[bonzo75]

Oh ok

 

[bonzo75]

While I don't disagree his implementation gives the more coloured Lampi sound, I think all so called neutral like spectral and dCS have their own color. This neutrality recording philosophy, I have never seen it work except at Mike Lavigne's. Mostly it is the color of sterility and lack of decay. The most see through recording retaining realism I have heard is Lampi with 242, and at two of my friends, who both have the analog domain amp, which is very much like the spectral. In fact, it sounds more neutral than the esoteric k01 with clock that one of them owns. And as soon as we shift to the Px25, that neutrality goes away

 

[acousticsguru]

While I don't disagree his implementation gives the more coloured Lampi sound, I think all so called neutral like spectral and dCS have their own color. This neutrality recording philosophy, I have never seen it work except at Mike Lavigne's. Mostly it is the color of sterility and lack of decay. The most see through recording retaining realism I have heard is Lampi with 242, and at two of my friends, who both have the analog domain amp, which is very much like the spectral. In fact, it sounds more neutral than the esoteric k01 with clock that one of them owns. And as soon as we shift to the Px25, that neutrality goes away

Neutrality to me, in terms of connotation, isn't necessarily a positive term, but I know what you mean. Transparency to the source is what I was thinking of. No wonder brands with studio background like dCS and Spectral put an emphasis on it. At home, all that counts is enjoyment. As a tool to work with professionally, not so much.

One of the most impressive listening sessions I ever attended included all professional dCS gear from the early days (the ugly slim black units), where a professional open reel deck played music from master tape through a daisy chain of ADC, downsampling DDC, upsampling DDC and finally DAC again, and they switched back and forth between tape source direct to amp and tape deck through four dCS units, converting to high-resolution digital (24/192 PCM if memory serves), downsampling to 16/44, upsampling to 24/192 again, and converting back to analogue. All that was asked of people was to identify which was which.

(The irony, of course, is that everyone I'm relating this story to believes they would have been able to tell a difference…)

To my mind, these ideals should meet in a SOTA system just as they do, or rather should, in concert. Live music is and remains the benchmark. What use is a system that can't make me experience (and re-experience) what took place in front of the microphones?

As an aside, Christoph and I heard a Spectral/MIT/Shunyata system in Munich in which high-resolution digital was played back by an Aurender server and EMM Labs DAC, speakers were Magico. The sound was rather depressing, needless to say, Christoph blamed it on the Magicos (let's refrain from discussing those, suffice to say I'm not a fan either). That was until the gatekeeper switched inputs on the preamp and put a standard redbook CD into a Spectral SDR-4000SV player. From congested "HiFi" to a sense of "you are there" realism, transparency, air and three-dimensional spaciousness that reminded me of what the whole point of "transparent to the source" is: the source.

Greetings from Switzerland, David.

 

[bonzo75]

I.don't like the spectral CD player at all, disagree it is transparent, it has its sound and does not sound real to me. Extremely digital as opposed to real analog sound.

 

[acousticsguru]

I.don't like the spectral CD player at all, disagree it is transparent, it has its sound and does not sound real to me. Extremely digital as opposed to real analog sound.

Interesting you'd say that. So you've heard the new SDR-4000SV? It was rather revelatory. Maybe not in the sense that one must inevitably like what's on the record. But in the sense that one comes significantly closer to what's on the record than with most gear. Needless to say there is no such thing as perfectly "neutral", but all the qualities one suddenly heard, as if the sun had just risen and there were light after dark, were clearly gleaned from the record and not an "effect", and as such "revelatory" in the truest sense of the term.

I must emphasize that my use of the term "analogue" is not "sounds like an analogue recording" (be that open reel deck or vinyl LP). That, to me, is no objective. Sounds like real life is an objective. Makes me think there's actually someone there with me in the room, playing music, is an objective.

In contrast, the term "digital" to me is entirely negative. It's pretty much what I mean when I say something sounds like "HiFi" (= electronics/canned music) versus the real thing (= nature/live music). It means one hears something one shouldn't (be able to) hear: a direct effect of the digital to analogue conversion process. That is something I can relate to as I suffer from migraines, and sadly, most digital playback to me sounds as if I were staring into fluorescent light. Its a mere matter of seconds listening to inferior digital playback and my muscles start tensing up, resulting in nothing less than an escape reflex. I heard one such (very expensive, too) converter in Munich (upon requiring, it turned out they're using an ancient off-the-shelf chip set, and are proud of it, too). That's not at all what I heard with the Spectral, on the contrary. The fact alone that a converter is more resolving doesn't make it sound more "digital" to me, rather less.

Greetings from Switzerland, David.

 

[acousticsguru]

To put it another way, the SDR-4000SV gleaned more information from a CD than most high-resolution DACs, and the result was engagingly life-like, toe-tappingly dynamic, open, airy, three-dimensional, focused, lively sound that to me, sounded neither "analogue" nor "digital", but transparent to the source, good or bad, and that, extrapolating the potential, made me wish the brand offered a computer-audio capable high-resolution DAC.

Greetings from Switzerland, David.

 

[bonzo75]

Yes at Munich in 2016, they had it playing next to the Feickert Firebird with an Etna (same system). It was a no contest. Spectral was plastic in comparison. Then I once heard it on its own in a spectral system with XLF, where I compared the VTL s400 (or 450, don't remember the exact name) to Spectral 400s. When I say analog, I mean sounds like real life. I agree with you on your digital hifi definition.

 

[acousticsguru]

Yes at Munich in 2016, they had it playing next to the Feickert Firebird with an Etna (same system). It was a no contest. Spectral was plastic in comparison. Then I once heard it on its own in a spectral system with XLF, where I compared the VTL s400 (or 450, don't remember the exact name) to Spectral 400s. When I say analog, I mean sounds like real life. I agree with you on your digital hifi definition.

Bummer, I missed that room - there was simply too much to see… What I related above is the only time I heard the latest incarnation of the Spectral player, given it has only been available earlier this year, so I can't really say more than it was most impressive then and there, and that luckily, they didn't play back some silly audiophile demo disc.

Greetings from Switzerland, David.

 

[marty]

To put it another way, the SDR-4000SV gleaned more information from a CD than most high-resolution DACs, and the result was engagingly life-like, toe-tappingly dynamic, open, airy, three-dimensional, focused, lively sound that to me, sounded neither "analogue" nor "digital", but transparent to the source, good or bad, and that, extrapolating the potential, made me wish the brand offered a computer-audio capable high-resolution DAC.

Greetings from Switzerland, David.

The problems with the SDR-400SV are two-fold. First, it is often heard in an all Spectral system. This has never impressed me. (Mobiusman was so disappointed with the musicality of that combo to the point of returning the SRD-400SV). Secondly, it is a lot of money to ask for a one box player that does not afford the courtesy of allowing one to play anything else through what might be an exceptional DAC. No USB input. No AES input. No optical input. Zero. Nada. And for 20K? Ridiculous. This purist approach is self-defeating and certainly not in the best interest of affordable musical enjoyment. I suspect its sales are quite limited due to this liability alone.