Mercury V3 Streamer/DAC Impressions

Discussion in 'Digital: DACs, USB converters, decrapifiers' started by artur9, Dec 24, 2024.

  1. artur9

    artur9 Almost "Made"

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    As part of a loaner, I got to hear the Mercury V3 and will post my impressions here.
     
  2. artur9

    artur9 Almost "Made"

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    My impressions of the Mercury V3 streamer/DAC.

    My listening chain
    • HP Mini Desktop running Debian and RoonServer
    • Ayre AX7e integrated amplifier
    • Philharmonic Audio BMR Monitors v2
    • cabling: some Chinese cabling and whatever I had around to make the necessary connections.

    I used the Ayre’s volume control to account for volume differences greater than 1dB. I measured the volume using DecibelX on my iPhone, trying to get the average as close as possible.

    Across all these comparisons, the Mercury is at a disadvantage - the input the Mercury was on isn’t fully burned in - each Ayre input is fully independent and I haven’t used the one the Mercury is on before.

    I listen mostly to acoustic music (classical, jazz) and early 80s rock. I used the following playlist. Each song, other than White Christmas (it’s seasonal!) illustrates some aspect of music I find important.
    • White Christmas - The Drifters
    • The Firebird: Infernal Dance of all Kastchei's Subjects - Seattle Symphony
    • Concerto for 2 Violins, Strings and Basso continuo in D minor BWV 1043: 1. Vivace - Anne-Sophie Mutter (Violin) / Nancy Zhou (Violin) / Mahan Esfahani (Harpsichord)
    • Almost Like Being In Love - Joe Stilgoe
    Mercury was hooked up via RCA and used as a Roon endpoint throughout, since that is how I listen to music 90% of the time. The RCA cables used were the best I had to hand, if their appearance matched their quality. I did not use the Mercury as a streamer-only into another DAC.

    I just plugged ethernet into the Mercury, turned it on and added it as a Roon zone. For the Benchmark and Soekris comparisons, I could group the 2 together and toggle back and forth almost instantly on the Ayre. As the Linn uses a different protocol it could not be grouped with the Mercury so a little more work was required: give them both the same playlist, stop both, start song on both, toggle back and forth on Ayre.

    First up!
    Roon -> USB -> Schiit Eitr -> Benchmark DAC1 -> balanced out (XLR) -> Ayre

    Benchmark DAC1 is Benchmark's original DAC, without USB. This one is pretty old and has been through the mill.

    Using a USB port right off the Roon server, which is not a best practice. I use this set up mostly for background listening while I work.

    tl;dr - Mercury destroyed this chain.

    Eitr/Benchmark DAC1
    • much flatter soundstage.
    • Relatively unpleasant to listen to.
    • Dull sounding
    • tone seems off
    • imaging more difficult to discern
    • both violins sound the same
    • background sounds (plankton?) almost impossible to hear
    Mercury v3
    • louder than Eitr/Benchmark by 4dB
    • seems brighter
    • more dynamic range, percussion impacts more forceful
    • sometimes a bit screechy on violins
    • more lingering of trails of notes
    • soundstage is three dimensional.
    Next: roon -> USB -> Soekris 1221 -> RCA -> Ayre

    This is Soekris' newest, least expensive model.

    The Soekris’ settings are all default except for fixed volume so that I can use it as just a DAC and not a DAC/headamp. Normally, I use the Soekris with a Magni Piety for desktop listening. I moved it over to “the big rig” for this comparison.

    I think the differences here are more about the differences between Soekris’ R2R tech and Mercury’s ESS ES9033Q. I have a pronounced preference for R2R DACs over ESS. Generally, R2R seems to keep an acoustic instrument’s sound more true, at least to me. Only Linn’s Katalyst sounds better to me than R2R.

    Soekris 1221
    • dynamics slightly better
    • imaging more precise
    • violins sound woodier
    • more space around vocals and instruments
    • envelope (beginning/end) of notes more sharply defined
    • soundstage comparable
    Mercury
    • louder by 4dB
    • a bit of fuzz on vocals, not as clear as Soekris
    • less front to back soundstage
    • screechy violins
    • image slightly larger
    • soundstage comparable
    Lastly: roon -> Linn Klimax DS/1 -> XLR -> Ayre

    This is the second version of Linn’s top-of-the-line streamer/DAC. Linn’s current TOTL DAC is Organik, previous was Katalyst, before that was AKM velvet based and before that (DS/0) unspecified. This, being the second version (DS/1 after DS/0) means it’s using AKM DAC chips. Linn Klimax pricing when new is anywhere from 10-20X that of the Mercury (or more).

    In the past I’ve found that I’ve preferred both AKM and Wolfson DACs to ESS, so that plays a role here.

    To be honest, by the time I got to this comparison I was getting fatigued; three days of hardcore listening is tough!

    The Linn has three additional advantages in this comparison:
    • AFAICT, the Linn streaming protocol is better than Roon’s
    • Ayre sounds better through its balanced (XLR) inputs; it’s stated so in the manual.
    • The Klimax is plugged into a Hydra power conditioner while the Mercury was plugged into a bog standard UPS (dunno how much of a difference this makes but full disclosure, right?)
    With all of the above, I preferred the sound of the Linn to that of the Mercury. There was a kind of static around the notes played by the Mercury that I don’t understand/cannot account for. Honestly, something probably noticeable only in a back-to-back comparison.

    Linn Klimax DS/1
    • notes linger
    • piano more natural
    • row F
    Mercury
    • quieter than Linn by about 1-2dB
    • piano a bit unnaturally jangly, static-y
    • notes stop a bit quicker
    • row H (my preferred row, it turns out)
    Other considerations:

    Aesthetics: I’m one of those who likes the look of equipment to be not so utilitarian/industrial. In particular, I would prefer my streamers not look like Intel NUC boxes. I really don’t like my streamers to have outputs other than the digital ones (AES/coax/TOSLink/USB) as I feel that I’m getting a computer, not an audio component. In those regards, the Mercury falls short of my aesthetic benchmark.

    Ease of use: I connected the wires, turned it on, and could play music within 5m. Couldn’t be easier. I did find the behavior of the ACT light a bit confusing so I ended up waiting for the Mercury to be on the network a little longer than necessary.

    Conclusion:

    I could easily recommend the Mercury to anyone needing a streamer/DAC. I didn’t try it into any of my DACs because i prefer fewer wires. I would think someone not using the Mercury’s DAC is doing so for personal reasons as the Mercury’s DAC sounds very good.

    Great little device.
     
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  3. Michael Kelly

    Michael Kelly MOT: Pi 2 Design

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    I am surprised you didn't connect any of your DAC to Mercury. The core function of mercury is digital output to your DAC. I'm glad you like the internal DAC, but it would've been interesting if you had tested all of the functionality that you could. Maybe the next guy!
     
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  4. HotRatSalad

    HotRatSalad Friend

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    So you only tested with USB and the mercury 3 DAC if I'm understanding correctly ?
     
  5. artur9

    artur9 Almost "Made"

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    Yes and yes.
     
  6. artur9

    artur9 Almost "Made"

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    Yeah, i was acutely aware of time pressure. Having only a few hours a day meant I could only do USB.

    With a lot more time, doing the Mercury into the Benchmark and my AVM70 and the Soekris would have been interesting. This Linn has no inputs other than Ethernet.
     
  7. Michael Kelly

    Michael Kelly MOT: Pi 2 Design

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    so maybe we need two loaners on the tour to make sure people have time. I still have your address, how about I send you a mercury, you take your time and then when you're ready to post your new impressions, we can put it into the pool to go onto the next user. Since you've already shipped and covered the cost of the first loaner, I'll take care of When you ship offthis new unit. Send me an email and let me know
     
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  8. Huhnkopf

    Huhnkopf Friend

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    Can we do a Europe loaner too? Would love to compare vs my PI2AES with the big DiY LPS.
    @Empyah definitely as well
     
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  9. artur9

    artur9 Almost "Made"

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    I think, maybe, I'd prefer to be put at the EOL again to do more listening?
     
  10. Michael Kelly

    Michael Kelly MOT: Pi 2 Design

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    I would be fine with this. But we would need someone to coordinate it.
     
  11. Huhnkopf

    Huhnkopf Friend

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    I can do it. A minimum of 2 are also in Germany which should make the first stops pretty smooth, then probably NL, France, PL out of my head. 10-12 max?
     
  12. Michael Kelly

    Michael Kelly MOT: Pi 2 Design

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    that would be great. Go ahead and get the list together for yourself and then send me the name and address of where to send the unit. Don't forget to include phone number so that I can ship it internationally. I usually use UPS and they insist on a phone number. I will mark it as a demo unit with $99 value. I'll cover the shipping, but there might be a small customs fee which I can rebate once we know what it is.

    either send the info as a p.m. or you can send it to [email protected]
     
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    Last edited: Dec 30, 2024
  13. ChaChaRealSmooth

    ChaChaRealSmooth SBAF's Mr. Bean

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    @Huhnkopf go ahead and make a new thread for the EU loaner in the loaner programs
     
  14. Huhnkopf

    Huhnkopf Friend

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  15. decompositions

    decompositions Facebook Friend

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    I've had a pi2aes for quite a while and picked up a Mercury v3 because I just needed something for a second setup (mine isn't the loaner unit) - I never actually tried to sit down and do a comparison when I got the pi2aes because I got it for more functional reasons than sound ones, so I tried to do a listening comparison with the Mercury while I had some time to kill over the holidays.

    I tried to test this with a few different variations, I compared mercury to usb and then went back and compared to pi2aes - I mostly used my headphone setup, but also tried putting it into my speaker chain. My yggdrasil is an oga2 with unison usb, and I used the SE outputs on both of my dacs (I could go back and test the balanced outs with a transformer, but I think the conclusions would be the same). For reference, I have a JDS synapse in my desktop's usb setup because I had some hum/noise issues in the past on my previous desktop where you could hear a buzz when the GPU went under load. I used roon to feed all of this and was running the latest version ropieee on both the pi2aes and the mercury using wifi. I'm using the stock power supply for the mercury and some jameco psu on the pi2aes, nothing special.

    Setups tested
    Headphones (Starlett -> ZMF Auteur Classic)
    • JDS Synapse -> yggdrasil
    • Mercury (aes) -> yggdrasil
    • pi2aes (spdif) -> yggdrasil
    • Mercury (spdif) -> yggdrasil
    • pi2aes (aes) -> yggdrasil
    • JDS Synapse -> soekris 2541
    • Mercury (aes) -> soekris 2541
    Speakers (Benchmark LA4 -> DIY First Watt F6 -> Monitor Audio Silver 500 7g)
    • Soekris 2541 (USB)
    • Mercury (aes) -> Soekris 2541

    Impressions

    Never tried to do a writeup on something like this before, but this is my impression of the mercury v3 in general vs both usb and pi2aes. I'll try and compare mercury and pi2aes more directly afterwards, but the biggest differences to me is there's this just slightly increased sense of focus, like going to a new glasses prescription or getting a slightly sharper camera lens. It's not necessarily that there's anything new there, just that the things you were already hearing feels a bit better defined. There's more sense of separation and layering, and where sounds start and stop feels a bit more clearly delineated which feels most noticeable to me with percussion and vocals. I would say this makes it feel a touch brighter, but not in the sense that there's increased treble as much as treble elements perceptually stand out more when they aren't as blended into a background, like seeing a spotlight on an oled tv panel vs led. I've never cared much about head stage, but I didn't really notice any changes there.

    On speakers I felt pretty much the same thing in regards to a cleaner separation and sense of sound layering, I don't think there's much unique to speakers to comment on here. I didn't feel like soundstage size (as in distance from the stage) or placement changed, but I would say that on speakers the stage felt a bit more open, not in that things felt further out but more that it felt like things were on a stage with a wall behind them on usb and on mercury it felt like they are on a stage that's cavernous in the rear. This was a pretty subtle difference and isn't something I cared much about for most of the music that I listen to, but thought it was worth mentioning.

    As far as the Mercury vs pi2aes vs usb direct differences, I think the Mercury and pi2aes vs usb are basically the same sort of differences just in different degrees, i.e. my comments for mercury vs pi2aes would be the same as mercury vs usb, just to a lesser extent - I did feel like there was a pretty clear ranking/progression of Mercury > pi2aes > usb on the yggdrasil, and while I only tested mercury vs usb on the soekris it was the same case there. I do think that differences were more noticeable on the yggdrasil than the soekris, but I would guess this is more that the yggdrasil has more to show than the soekris does rather than anything to do with unison vs xmos. I also thought that the difference between the Mercury and the pi2aes was greater than the difference between the pi2aes and unison, that is to say Mercury >> pi2aes > unison. I thought that the Mercury (aes) -> yggdrasil setup was the best out of the ones listed.

    Conclusion
    I would recommend the Mercury over the pi2aes if you were going to be buying one of these as a new thing, I do think it's worth the extra money. Aside from sound, I appreciate the nicer looking casing that you don't have to assemble yourself and the fact that you only have one power supply to worry about - related, the noise nuke is another nice addition and some incentive to not get nervosa over spending a bunch of additional money on a power supply. If you already have a pi2aes, I'm not sure I would bother upgrading unless the money isn't a big deal for you - the pi2aes is still very good. I'd also like to say that USB on the yggdrasil and the soekris are also both still pretty good, and I'm still going to continue using USB most of the time for convenience - I don't think you're missing out on a ton, but it's the kind of thing where I'll use streamers if I'm going to bother turning on the gear that has a warm up time. I would recommend buying some rubber feet to use if you plan on stacking it on something though, because the mercury doesn't come with any (unless I lost them which admittedly could have happened). The LEDs on the front panel are also a bit confusing, the PWR light only worked the first time I powered it on and stopped turning on after saving wifi settings in ropieee - this doesn't seem to matter, but I could see it being confusing for someone less technically inclined (this is probably just some software quirk and not a real problem w the Mercury).

    Pics or it didn't happen. (excuse the mess I'm in the middle of selling gear and swapping things around)
     
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  16. Michael Kelly

    Michael Kelly MOT: Pi 2 Design

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    we have noticed this with Ropieee. It turns out that when you turn on the Wi-Fi, it overwrites the config.text file. And unfortunately, because of the way they have set up the latest versions, you can't SSH into it to fix that.

    I will try to determine if turning on Wi-Fi to our system as guest will allow you to change that to your Wi-Fi later and not overwrite any file.
     
  17. Guidostrunk

    Guidostrunk Acquaintance

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    Has anyone with the mercury v3 running volumio, used any eq plug-ins? If so what would you recommend? I'm running the V3 into a Gungnir 2 > MJ3 > hd800s. I plan on getting some powered speakers in the near future and will be using the mj3 as a preamp.
    The crazy thing is , is I do still have packed away from my DJ'ing days(early to late 2000's)a dbx driverack and a DEQ2496(backup). I just don't know if I want the extra box to clutter up my space. Unless it's the better option than a plugin. Both units I do believe have AES in and out so that's a huge bonus for me using the V3.
    Any insight would be much appreciated.
     
  18. Aklegal

    Aklegal Friend

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    I want to congratulate @Michael Kelly on another winner. I received the Mercury v3 today and I honestly was not expecting the difference I heard, I just wanted to continue to support the dude.

    I've had a Pi2Aes since 2020. I tried the first Mercury with the pi module. I found it it and the Pi2Aes to sound identical but I ended up selling the Mercury because I wanted more usb ports. I added Atomic Bob's noise nuke more than a year ago and it while it improved the sq across the board, the main thing it did was bring the usb output up to the level of the pi2aes' digital outputs - they sounded damn near identical.

    Well the Mercury v3 digital outputs sound very different from usb. The treble extends more and is clearer. Using jriver I can switch between the two extremely quickly and the difference isn't subtle. At this level I won't call the digital outputs superior but they are more to my preference in my setup - usb out is still very good (dac dependent of course).

    I briefly listened to the on board dac and I will just say that I didn't find it offensive. That might be the highest praise I can give a Sabre dac. I have owned quite a few (LKS, Audio GD, Wyred for Sound, Matrix Sabre Pro) I eventually grew to hate them all. The Mercury as of right now does not cause me to make sad faces. It's a great add on. Maybe the next iteration could adopt the AK4499 but it would likely take up too much space.

    So I expect to own this thing until Michael says he has made something better.
     
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  19. Michael Kelly

    Michael Kelly MOT: Pi 2 Design

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    Support update 1/7/25 - Mercury V3 DAC units shipped prior to 1/7/25 had an incorrect resistor populated. This created a low voltage on the SPDIF output that might prevent a reliable connection with some DAC's.. For units shipped prior to this date the best solution is to use a BNC to RCA adapter (see here) on the AES (BNC) output instead. Contact us for more detail.
     
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  20. Metro

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