Yggdrasil Refined - New Schiit Yggdrasil Analog 2 (Yggdrasil A2) Sound Impressions

/shrug

It really is impossible to please all of the people all of the time. Best that can be done is choose between the better of two 'evils'. I do think @Dino is correct that the shipping cost (and probably hassle/downtime) are the main annoyance factors in this particular case, but still no product timing is going to make everyone happy (and that includes Schitt in the equation, as sitting on new product for 6 months to align with the next is a lose for them), so no point in even considering making everyone happy a goal.

In my case I bought the Eitr the day it was offered, and waited for another upgrade significant enough that I felt it was worth shipping (at which point I planned on upgrading the USB board at the same time). That day has come, so all good. Though again as Dino noted, yep, someone else who chose that is going to whine about buying an Eitr they no longer have an immediate use for. /shrug again.

p.s. That written, Schitt's queue system is great and it does everything right as far as I am concerned, though I bet someone out there is whining that it doesn't provide an estimated date (don't do it, because then they will whine if the estimated date is missed - the no way to please everyone truth of the matter).

 

Apparently I have been around people who do not always have a reasoned internal debate before feeling anger. Why is Schiit getting pushbacks?

 

I have seen far too many businesses fail having the best intentions, the best technologies, and the best engineering, and yet fail to account for fickle irrational customers.

I think I can say that many customers here are of the "extremely intelligent, extremely well informed" variety. If schiit lost all their other customers and only had these types left, I suspect they wouldn't be in business.

Running a business is a pragmatic exercise in straddling the line between offering great products, and understanding and navigating the fundamental fickle irrationality of a general customer base. It's marketing, and at times, it is even more important than engineering.

Sometimes the question is, should Schiit pretend they live in an ideal world and offer upgrades as fast as possible while alienating customers, or should Schiit recognise they live in the real world and they have to provide the best customer experience possible for an average customer that might slightly inconvenience the most well-informed/well-educated customers, who are going to buy their products anyway because they are the best?

Part of this question has implications for whether schiit remains in business at all.

 

Amen.

Engineering is a huge factor in an engineering oriented business, but without customers (aka 'humans'), there is no $'s, and no $'s equals no pay for the engineers, and well you can see how the schiit rolls down hill from here.

Besides, a good portion of good engineering is about accounting for human preferences, foibles, and what is cool in the current social moment. The business side must account for the same.

p.s. but companies that are purely selling marketing bs, where engineering is second deserve to die ASAP too. The holy trinity of quality engineering, good business practice, and timely/relevant marketing still works today.

 

I thought most people who complaining are international customers. From Asia for example the shipping could easily cost more than 300-400 usd. But that is not Schiit’s fault.
Within the US I think it is reasonable to upgrade in a more frequent basis.

 

Dude, really, the sky isn't falling....jeez.

 

@Dotard

If anything, @schiit says no to customers where it counts... else we'd have gaudy blue/pulsing rgb leds and more of them, useless vu meters, bluetooth, underlit green led vacuum tubes, a power switch on the front collecting finger grease around the aluminum, running 120VAC across the board, digital volume control chips making it easier to put an led indicator of volume position, bla, bla, bla

...need I go on

I think they ARE listening where it counts, sound quality, quality workmanship/materials, engineering, price, efficiency, etc.

we're all having fun, us and them

 

Yep, saying 'no' is just as important (when 'no' makes sense) as saying 'yes'. Can't make everyone happy all the time.

 

Like standing up to the wife eh

 

Yggdrasil and especially the USB5 and A2 upgrades are probably a tiny fraction of Schiit's business. I bet you things like Magni 3 and Fulla are what keeps the company afloat. From their A2 upgrade queue, there are about 150 people waiting for upgrades, so that's like $82500 in revenue, which is a drop in the bucket for them, based on other numbers Jason's mentioned in the past.

I think sometimes we project our own drama onto the company, and forget that we (the Yggdrasil users), and then the fraction of those owners that are unhappy about the upgrades, are a tiny part of the company's revenues and our feelings don't reflect the general operation or health of the company. There're way more (100x?) Magni, Modi, Fulla, etc. customers out there perfectly happy with their stuff.

 

Such problems ;D roughing it while Yggdrasil in the shop... the baby multibit is nice, usually on my computer/headphones!

(bit of a crosspost since we can't link on headfi, sorry -- ref: https://www.head-fi.org/threads/what-a-long-strange-trip-its-been-robert-hunter.784471/page-464#post-14040947)

Anyone else excited for a2? Been doing a lot of listening to dacs and really understanding differences, the elacs really help. But, damn, the moby is 3D... howwwever, not the Yggdrasil.

 

Raising the price of the Yggdrasil to reflect the upgrade & quietly lowered the price in steady increments over the months to be back to what it normally is & no one would have complained.

 

Please tell me you don't honestly believe one of the goldfish over at HF wouldn't notice the pricing changes you suggested and then launch a conspiracy campaign of mammoth proportions.

 

That is a terrible idea. It would generate more complaints.

 

Of course Schiit might have had to re-brand the naming. Maybe add a 2 to the end of the Yggdrasil.

I bet this would have caused a lot less complaining. When people see a new name & assume its a new product, they are more susceptible to the price increase. I Think DCS did this with their Debussy & Scarlatti models, which had the exact same board & layouts inside, minus a extra transformer, but the pricing was of course different.

 

Wow. How many times do you have to get it wrong before you just stop? Hint: Now is that time!

 

Almost nobody complained about the price increase, what people complained about was the upgrade itself. If they made a Yggdrasil 2 they would have had 1000x more backlash from normal people who aren't completely self-absorbed, now upset that their Yggdrasil 1 wasn't getting an upgrade at all, not to mention it would fly in the face of everything they have said about the Yggdrasil.

 

Really still a noob when it comes to DACs, so with new Yggdrasil I can abandon my eitr yes? Will be running out of usb. After answering feel free to crap all over me for not searching this thread. I can handle it

 

I would personally no longer use the Eitr if my Schiit DAC had Gen 5 USB like the new Yggdrasil. From what I have read it brings to level of Eitr or better. I have not personally compared though. I use coax input primarily out of a dedicated optical transport.

 

That is correct, Ray. The EITR is effectively the Gen 5 USB in another chassis. Yggdrasil now comes standard with this.