SBAF DAC Talk II

The Emotiva amp and preamp I have are really good value for new gear, and the amp especially sounds great, but I'm eventually going to step up to a Bifrost 2, Vidar and Saga or equivalent. I wanted a 2-box solution that worked with my Logitech harmony but that idea has been blown up now with this M2U sounding so good.

 

I don't care about Emotiva one way or the other, but as I understand it Emotiva began out of a Taiwanese/Chinese OEM/ODM company called Jade Design. I think they were OEM/ODM for Sherwood Newcastle or Sherbourne and tailored to installed audio brands (think, rich guy dedicated HT). So it's kind of the other way around - rather than Emotiva following the design specs given to them as the manufacturer for whatever brand they're working for under contract, they're designing and manufacturing all in-house. I could be wrong though. It's been years since I paid any attention to Emotiva.

 

Thanks. That makes sense. Their main approach seems to be budget home theater but the product line seems haphazardly chosen

 

After some time spent with the AK4396 M2U I've switched back to the PT-100 built in AD1955 and I won't be switching back. The difference in resolution is negligible and the Modi sounds hollow in comparison. The mid-range suckout on the Modi makes my favorite genres (progressive metal, prog rock, classic rock) sound lifeless and boring.

 

Hopefully this doesn't start a religious war by asking this but what's with the fascination audiophiles have regarding linear power supplies over switch mode supplies when it comes to DAC designs? What importance does a power supply have to a DAC's performance?

Was reading the Dangerous Source thread and saw some posts about how the SMPS was "holding back" the DAC. But in what way? What gains are made with a LPS? What about a choke input?

Only thing I've seen suggested is the better the power supply the better quality bass. What else?

Some engineers swear by LPS in their designs. Not sure if that is some adherence to a dogma or some real performance benefit.

Asking as someone who is mildly curious on how DACs work and what goes in their design. I find them very interesting and I'm no engineer nor audiophile.

 

The Dangerous Convert 2 was great, but it had the highest noise floor of any DAC I tested, So I would imagine the noise would be lower with a good LPS or maybe even with a higher quality SMPS?

 

There are likely far more knowledgeable folks on here that know more than me, but here’s my basic understanding.

SMPS vs LPS - neither approach is a guarantee of a good power supply. There are good ones and bad ones of each type. As in almost all things, it’s the design and implementation that matters.

That said, SMPSs in general generate a lot of noise due to the switching on/off, and are susceptible to external RFI/EMI, requiring a lot of filtering to keep this from bleeding into the device - my understanding is it’s generally the filtering where a lot of the skill and money is spent in designing a quality SMPS. Linear supplies are generally/inherently less noisy but are far less efficient (run hotter) and require larger and more expensive parts (e.g. transformers) and are typically more expensive to produce. Hence why cheap devices tend to use crappy, bare bones SMPSs.

Also with respect to DACs, sometimes supplies are actually separated between the digital stage and the analog output stage to optimize each one (and avoid noise bleeding between the stages I believe). Yggdrasil does this (and uses LPSs for both). Each stage’s supply will have different impacts on the sound.

Google is your friend here is you want to find out more I think.

Here’s one link that explains the differences between LPS and SMPS fairly well overall:

https://audiobacon.net/2018/06/29/linear-power-supplies-for-audiophiles-getting-closer-to-live/amp/

 

Fascination in the sense that it is almost automatic to assume that good, usually means "expensive" , external LPS will do wonders to improve DAC performance. It may be the case but more often than that it will be just a waste of money.
Most high quality DACs are engineered to work with less than optimal external power sources.
Quoting form the RME ADI-2 DAC manual :
"An internal switching regulator of the latest technology with high efficiency (> 90%) prevents internal hum noise by operating above audible frequencies. Internally the switching regulator is followed by standard linear regulators, followed by super low-noise linear regulators. Therefore the ADI-2 DAC achieves its technical specs even with less optimal power supplies. Or in other words: the choice of power supply is not critical."

 

Audiophile and pro gear tinkerers love tinkering with gear. A lot of gear both. pro and hifi, skimps on power supplies leaving the unit starved but the regulated switchers used by Dangerous and RME are not cheap at all.

 

I’ve read some reviews of the Berkeley Alpha DAC in @purr1n’s old DAC post and elsewhere, but I’d be curious to know how the Berkeley stacks up to good newer DS DACs like the Matrix, Solaris, and Dangerous. Is it still worth seeking out, or has it been surpassed by more recent DS DACs?

 

purr1n, if you have the time/desire, would you mind comparing the Pi2AES to Schiit's Unison USB?

 

RME usb beats the crap out of most other brands over “better” protocols and certainly has less tomfoolery going on than the regens. The Lynx card to the Lynx boxes are the only better sounding all in one system I’ve heard than RME. Everyone else needs to get their act together for normal people who want rock solid good sound th at always works. My MOTU shit is only halfway there driver wise but still shits on the XMOS junk for stability.

For all the Rednet hype, the actual Focusrite Rednet converters sound pretty good and smooth. I don’t even see why you’d need a separate DAC if your Rednet has analog out unless you wanting something with shit tons of mojo like Dangerous or Lavry. Yes this is total overkill because the rednets are for live sound, broadcast, and hooking up consoles.

All the thunderbolt hype and Mac only shit is lol in 2020. More people who actually do shit with computers are getting burned by Apple and abandoning them everyday ime. When your AppleCare runs out, you are truly fucked. Apple OS updates have fucked over a ton of people reliant on specific hardware and software which was the only reason for them sticking around in the first place. Meanwhile many Windows laptops can be repaired yourself pretty easily. The people buying Macs are mostly getting more basic and do nothing more than basic office tasks that any computer from 2000 onwards could do. The new Mac pro seems to be targeted at inflated Hollywood fx budgets only. The days of buying a Mac mini for a cheap DAW box or music listening rig for more stability than windows are over.

 

damn seems like Hollywood computer fx is becoming more like the current music industry gear wise now. The smarter guys build systems based off of Anand tech dpc ratings and just have tons of ram and just enough cpu power to not let the fans or Cooling get too noisy. The best used pickings in studio gear are from idiots who got their dad to buy them a home studio to record their Wyld Stallyns rock band or white boy rap album. Chicago, NYC, and Pacific NW are killer markets for this.

I don’t know any metal music guys irl with non mobile Macs newer than the og cheese grater. Tons of older macs that are slowly switching to reaper due to avid and when those die it will be windows and reaper. The guys with new rackmount UAD Apollo rigs hooked up to iMacs are mostly braindead Mac users in 2020 ime who want something overpriced and made in china to go with their Mac. The apogee symphony and ensemble mac stuff is bitched about way more than the older Rosettas, 16s, and Minis I used and still see in use and the elements lack flexibility.

Reaper is more intuitive than Pro Tools anyway for anyone who has just used a portastudio and a computer before. Guitarists can record themselves just as easily as garage band without being told they’re idiots by Apple.

 

Apple killing pcie fucked them in the ass. Thunderbolt stuff can be solid now but wasn’t then. The guys running tons of plugins with virtual instruments eating up ram are mostly composers.

Yep! After a few years they sell off all the nice toys they don’t use and can’t maintain. The mics, pres, and more maintainable items all get bought on the cheap. A lot of the console stuff that’s hard to use or has overheating issues just gets gutted for pres and parts and junked. My friend in LA got a used once in box SSL Nucleus for 1k that way when he was looking at the new Softtube Console things. The guy he bought it from had no idea how to use it. Just having bought that crap new proved the og buyer was a wannabe.

 

Confirmed, bought my last studio monitors from these guys.

 

I snagged the new Babyface Pro FS during holiday sales but it hasn't shipped in Canada yet (or anywhere? I'm not sure).

I'm still on the fence with the Focusrite Clarett I got a few months back and wonder about the Rednet stuff. I'm curious if there's much difference between the cheaper X2P or AM2 vs the bigger 4Pre.

 

Warning. The Babyface Pro is a brick and reliable but great sounding it is not. The treble sucks and there’s no warmth. The newer MOTU stuff sounds better. The Clarett sounds bigger. The Babyface Pro actually working as a bus powered interface is a miracle though.

If RME fixed the sound, then their price wouldn’t raise eyebrows. I see 900 bucks for a mediocre sounding interface and my mind tells me “try everything else!” I can predict when my MOTU gear will crash. Do not believe all the guys on gearslutz hyping it up as the end all be all. There are other guys there who can hear the sound.

The Focusrite Rednet and Red interfaces are much better sounding than RME and the Clarett. They’re smoother. You just need the 1000 dollar Dante card to use them at lower latencies.