RME ADI-2 DAC

Yeah, everything set flat / to default, although setup balanced with a dual 1/4" to 4-pin XLR adapter.

 

IPAs caught on in Oregon in the late 90s, by the time I moved to San Diego in 2002 they were already in full force here and local San Diego brewers had their own style. The style was developed by the brewers extreme love of hops and has little to do with the historical British style. Main inspirations for modern IPAs were beers like Anchor Liberty, Sierra Nevada Pale and Siera Nevada Bigfoot Barleywine.

It's an aquired taste, I didn't get it at all in 2002 but by 2008 it bacame most of what I drink.

 

Hallo, Herren,

I bet, none of you, or very few, has ever listened to the real sound of a solid state headamp, not to say a seriously designed one, while here in Europe, and in Germany in particular, such sophisticated electronics are present in every home, and we know very well their sound, more, many of us also build them. You simply are not able to judge the quality of a distortion-free circuit in reproducing faithful and correct timbre and decay of real instruments, and this is maybe the aspect in which RME headamp excels more, but it is excellent in many others parameters.

 

Was that satire? That was strangely reminiscent of the dude that said every household in Europe has violins, or some shit.

 

Sirs... I tried my darndest. Also, I live in eastern EU, so there's balalaikas n shit in every house.

 

Well the last few pages have taken a turn for the weird, or maybe the generational differences are confusing me; not hard to do these days. Posting while listening to the RME ADI-2 Pro DAC into a BH Crack (no speedball) with HD650. Guess the joke's on me. Or my personal preferences diverge considerably, which is likely.

 

I'll try to compare the built-in headamp of the ADI-2 DAC to a Schiit Magni 3 today. I sort of get where Marv is coming from, but I wouldn't call the headamp output as garbage. I have compared it to that Questyle Golden Stack amp (w/ LCD-4) and the Questyle was better, but not by a country mile. Maybe I've caught the tin ear, because nothing seems to wow me, it's either bad or "well, sounds like headphones!".

 

This came to mind...

 

Here's the skinny - Magni seemed to deliver a more dynamic sound, yet the RME was more resolving and presented a wider stage. Neither were garbo, yet as I said - lately it has been hard to impress me with sound. Maybe it's time for me to finally mature up and build a tube amp, it's just that there are no closed back cans worth getting which play well with tubes.

Overall I'm super impressed with the Magni 3. @schiit have done a terrific job with the design both sound and economics wise. Shit like this is why DIY is dead.

 

In retrospect, I probably shouldn't have referenced the Chewbacca image, nor the accompanying post, as in re-reading it it does not say quite what I thought it did. A good reason for me to contemplate longer before I hit "post".

In that vein, apologies for the additional nonsense created.

 

We're veering off topic here, and I expect this to be cleaned up, but GFDI people's opinions are their own opinions. I've decided not to trash talk pieces of gear I know some people like because a.) That would make the forum less fun for some people, b.) There are those with better ears who'll likely do the same without my butting in, and c.) I haven't heard as much gear as half the people on here, and that's me being optimistic.

One of the things I believe people have to get when reading any audio review or impressions set is that everyone has different preferences. I know whose tastes align closely to my own, and that only took a few months of lurking to suss out, figure how I agree with them relative to gear I have heard and areas where I know my hearing to be different. Another thing, and this is something more specific to SBAF I think, is that there are people who are less inclined to censor themselves, and would happily call out something that they personally hate without regard for convention or social niceties to people they can confide in, keeping less flattering opinions from the general public.

This forum is getting bigger, and while that's a good thing in some ways (keeps the place from stagnating), it does lead to situations like this where people who've gotten used to just being themselves have to keep a muzzle on for fear of raining on someone's parade and having to deal with the backlash. That sucks, because then the candor that added so much value to the forum ends up being watered down.

I'm a bit of a dumbass when it comes to communicating via text, as some people I chat with on here might know. That's why I end up publishing overly long posts like this, because I'm trying to be clear, if at the expense of brevity. Being forced to read between the lines for impressions because people are afraid of treading on other people's toes sucks, so I take personal exception to forced niceties.

That's no excuse to be an asshat, mind. Basic social courtesies are still important, even if some of the more prominent members tend to do the same at times (hah).

Anyway, there are people who like this thing as an AIO, there are people who think it's less-than-stellar, to put a bow on the Dumpster. To each their own, if some of the senior members l̶e̶t̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶f̶a̶c̶t̶ ̶t̶h̶a̶t̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶i̶r̶ ̶m̶e̶n̶t̶a̶l̶ ̶f̶a̶c̶u̶l̶t̶i̶e̶s̶ ̶a̶r̶e̶ ̶b̶e̶g̶i̶n̶n̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶d̶e̶t̶e̶r̶i̶o̶r̶a̶t̶e̶ ̶s̶l̶i̶p̶ express a personal dislike for a product, that doesn't necessarily mean that their opinion should sway you any if you've heard the thing they're talking about and enjoy it.

 

This is something I've learned. It's easy to think that you have to put everything in one post to ward off questions. However instead you get a huge wall of text that no one likes reading and discourages engagement. Better to spread out that information over the course of a conversation.

 

More remembering college where I had to sit there for 1.5 hours while the professor talked the whole time. This is quite literally the worst way to learn anything. The class where I learned the most was the one where I was somehow the only student that signed up. It wasn't cancelled for some strange reason and I just went to his office and asked a ton of questions. You do far more when engaged as opposed expected to absorb everything like a sponge.

People that did well in lectures did good despite being lectured to, not because of it.

 

That's why I'm glad my largest class is like 30 people, and that's freshman year. Though I still get those lectures. Terrible.


Also why the name change back to purr1n?