Schiit Modius DAC announced

Discussion in 'Digital: DACs, USB converters, decrapifiers' started by JohnCarter17, Jun 2, 2020.

  1. Pogo

    Pogo Friend

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    What I would expect is an outboard walwart, discrete circuitry, SE and balanced in/outs with preamp function and in silver or black. And a $199 pricepoint.
    Already have the Asgard3, I don't like it's sound,too in your face for my tastes.
    Currently running balanced out of my vintage preamp into the drop CarbonX,meh.
    Hoping the Magnius will split the differences between those 2 amps.
    Only 1 way to find out.
     
  2. Poleepkwa

    Poleepkwa Friend

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    Schiity Nostradamus predicts you might be right. It will be opamp based, since they already have the Asgard 3. Like a Heresy in bigger case with balanced inputs and MOAR power. Probably called Magni HTX 6969...
     
    Last edited: Jun 4, 2020
  3. jnak00

    jnak00 Friend

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    I would guess that a Jot 2/Magnius would be ways out. If it was close to being ready, I imagine they would have held off on Modius to launch both at the same time (like Asgard3/Bifrost 2 last year) so people can buy them at the same time.
     
  4. shotgunshane

    shotgunshane Floridian Falcon

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    Keynesian or Supply Side?
     
  5. Clemmaster

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    Hard to believe Schiit could release a balanced Asgard 3 in that price bracket. They weren't even sure they could sustain the $200 price tag of the current A3 and they released it that cheap as a favor to the community.
    Scaling up a magni is probably more realistic.

    Unless, of course, we're talking $400 and not $200.
     
  6. haywood

    haywood Friend

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    The usb bus on the pi3 was used for everything, the pi4 has a separate usb 3 bus with nothing else on it, and some things like Ethernet are no longer on a usb bus at all. I haven’t seen any comparison between the usb implementation of the two models and it could still be noisy on the pi4 but there are enough differences I wouldn’t just assume it’s bad.

    Anyway back to modius.
     
  7. Psalmanazar

    Psalmanazar Most improved member; A+

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    The chips mostly sound sound fine dating back to the first multibit delta sigma chips made by AK in the late 90s. Metric Halo still uses these and sounds cleaner than any Schiit and Dangerous converter. Apogee and MOTU have good Sabres. The AK4490 is the lamest one. The newer chips get more resolution that the designs can’t fully realize. And they all sound different because of how they are voiced. Different generations of chips sound different. You can’t swap them out despite what the Ayatollah and SMSL Topping tell you.

    Schiit doesn’t have the product release lifecycle to spend years perfectly tuning one circuit like pro audio companies do. You see Schiit dacs for a few years. They don’t keep making the same converter for decade like Dangerous or 20 years like Lavry and Prism and Metric Halo. They don’t have the time for r&d and the price doesn’t have the same bom as Dangerous. Dangerous can use a more special power supply, clock, custom tuned filter , and THAT buffers among other things to get the AWESOME sound. Bricasti can use even cooler parts at their 9000 dollar price point but with all the revisions and filters, it was made by a f'ing tweaker. Too many options at too high a price point vs Dangerous products that sound AWESOME in all caps for 2000 dollars.

    And then Prism has some CS4398 DAC that came out in 2008 and is still in their current products and laughs at all this shit for treble cleanliness even if it has a sound of its own.

    And topping has a new dac every 3 months where the chip is at least 50% of the bom...
     
  8. SineDave

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  9. Armaegis

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    I tried replacing my Prism Lyra with an RME... and now the RME serves as an optical bridge feeding the Lyra :confused:
     
  10. Raimei Templar

    Raimei Templar Friend

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    Think it would have to be OP amp based with a switching power supply to do it, but it would be doable I think. The Geshelli Erish is basically that, but its based on OPA 1656 op amps, if Schiit were to put out a super Heresy featuring balanced inputs and ideally using better op amps like the LME49724 it would certainly have a place in the market.

    Even at 250-300 it would be a pretty big deal, as there would be zero reason for anyone who purchased based on measurements to buy anything else. Might even sound better than the THX stuff does depending on what op amps they go with.
     
  11. Vtory

    Vtory Audiophile™

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    Heresy experiment turned out it was a big NO way. At least no sbaf regular active members were happy with it over 3+. Recall modius might be too good for thx. THX and heresy were more or less in the same category.
     
  12. Raimei Templar

    Raimei Templar Friend

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    Well that is why you would want the super Heresy to be better than the THX :). Heresy was based on OPAs just like the THX was, a amp based on a more exotic op amp will likely be an improvement or at the very least different. There are loads of options out there for op amps, just the current trend is to slap OPAs in everything because they measure well and are cheap. I am sure Jason has loads of ideas for some interesting op amp based stuff.

    Heresy kind of gets handwaved as just being a simple op amp design but thats actually not true, its a REALLY good op amp design, one of the best out there for OPAs I would say. Absolutely the best at its price point. Jason's choice to use ten freaking op amps to ensure it deliver high amounts of current was brilliant. It doesn't get mentioned much but as I understand it the JDS Atom for example has issues with low impedeance, low sensitivity headphones such as the DCA Aeons or the Verum 1 due to its op amps not being able to provide current well at low impedance loads. Some people have reported it not being able to get a proper amount of volume to those headphones as a result. Heresy has no such issues. Might not be to everyones taste but its a impressive amp in its own right on a technical level.

    I would love to hear what Jason could do with a op amp based amp that had a bigger budget, might surprise everyone!
     
  13. insidious meme

    insidious meme Ambivalent Kumquat

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    I don't think with the other technologies he's using with other amps that another opamp based one will be coming around anytime soon.
     
  14. Ash1412

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    I have reservations about having to parallel a bunch of opamps together to get high power, and I think Heresy already seems like pushing the limit for that. But maybe the design might use LME49724 to do differential input and discrete devices on the output for power if trying to hit $200. I'm still hoping for fully discrete at $300 though, even with a switching supply, cause all the Cavalli amps are such designs (with tubes for that matter) and they're decently liked around here.
     
  15. Vtory

    Vtory Audiophile™

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    @Raimei Templar If you want to compare, compare it with 3+. That's the essense of the experiement. I kinda think it impressive, too. Just never want it *over 3+* for myself any day. Jason proved op amp loses even in such a low price bracket.

    Heresy could be more forgivable especially for its price, only if there was no magni 3+.

    If you're a measurement-first person, please disregard me.
     
  16. Raimei Templar

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    Thats fair, but I wouldnt take the first attempt to be the limit of what Jason's Op amp based designs are capable of especially when the Heresy/Magni 3+ release seemed to be designed for thunderdome which meant the designs needed to be as similar as possible. Without that constraint (and with a bigger budget) results may be different. Though I would understand if Schiit didnt want to go down the road of different op amp sounds as that is somewhat of a nightmare and could very easily lead to some poor guy trying to test them all in a padded room somewhere.

    Based on what T.M Noble is posting on a certain other site, it seems Schiit is planning to make products for both the "objective" and the "subjective" groups so logically a super Heresy would make sense. My own baseless speculation is that Schiit will release a Super Heresy and a discrete Jot 2 both to be paired with the Modius. Would make for a great Thunderdome part DEUX episode to see a super heresy (with some fancy cool op amps) battle the THX amps.
     
  17. EagleWings

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    This is very re-assuring, thank you. I’ve been trying to use the Shanling M6 (AKM4495) as a DAC and it is such a wreck. I am guessing I should be seeing similar results.
     
  18. Cspirou

    Cspirou They call me Sparky

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    I think the one comparison missing is Modius vs Gungnir DS. Gungnir should still be superior due to several features, but wondering how much the gap has been closed.
     
  19. Scott Kramer

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    Need to talk @SoupRKnowva into upgrading his to Unison. Then it's a fair fight! ...Thinking about it, wow that might be a cool Dac.
     
  20. SoupRKnowva

    SoupRKnowva Official SBAF South Korean Ambassador

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    No talking me into it required. I was just in Korea when Unison came out, and I haven't found the time to put the order in yet.
    Saw someone else mention that this might be a baby C2 and my first thought was, nah, that's Gungnir DS. Which is also why I don't think I'm super interested in Modius. Marv said it doesn't have the slam, which any dac I replace the Gungnir DS with will need.
     

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