Home Source Components

About a month back I picked up the Kora Hermes DAC after reading about it on Agon and AA. It was a reference for a bit for a few reviewers so O thought I'd give it a go. I am using it slightly unconventionally in a computer as source rig with a hagusb/aes converter to take the usb signal out of my apple mac mini to the aes input of the Kora dac. I have been on a search for the holy grail for a while now looking for a dac that would plit the difference between the thicker analog sounding wadia/opus21 sound and the faster but brittle sound of some of the newer top gun dacs. Having gone through the wavelength cosecant, transporter, transporter APL modded and apogee mini dac …

I tried to take every detail. I still have some photos if someone need more details. Overall sound is good. This dac runs warm. Quiet curious about the buffer design. comments plz @kevin gilmore

See Olive just released a lower priced model today. If the O3HD is like the OH4D (no O3HD page up yet) it will have a digital input too. $1K and DAC duty makes this a bit more interesting. Still seems a bit cumbersome to have another library for other devices (iPod, etc.), but curious if any here have experience with their previous models?

I've been looking for internal photos of the Reimyo CDP-777 since the thought first entered my mind that I might own one. Over the past 11 months when the occasion presented itself, I have done numerous in depth searches for such images, but to no avail. so as far as I know, these are the first internal pictures posted on the net. enjoy the gut pics of my CDP777...

*Gets straight to the point* https://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=226826 Its not a replacement for foobar (only plays one file at time, doesn't support anything besides flac and wav), but I think it actually sounds better. It gobbles up 1gb of my RAM with AWE on though and the file I'm playing is only 300mb~ The main improvement I think I'm hearing is in the soundstage, there seems to be a lot more depth now, and the sounds are nicely spaced out when it sometimes gets a bit cluttered with foobar. This is where I heard about it: http://www.odysseyaudiohk.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?num=1215105279

http://www.slimdevices.com/ It's like a squeezebox on steroids! (credit to akwok on irc for finding it)

I am thinking about upgrading one of my E5's. I like the sacdmods zap filter/ LC audio clock combination but I was curious about RAM. First, has anyone had any experience with this company in general; good or bad. Secondly, they do a transformer type modification to the output stage of the E5. Since they claim they remove all the transistors, op amps etc.. what drives the trasformers? Are they driven directly from the dac chip itself? Has anyone eve heard a RAM player with this output transformer type output stage? I am definitely intrigued by this clearly different approach. www.referanceaudiomods.com ..... just click the E5 link and you can read all about the $75…

DAC1 PRE - Benchmark Media Systems, Inc. I have never heard a DAC1, and I get the impression that they are generally frowned upon here at Head-Case, while the rest of the audio world seems to be impressed. The review of the new Benchmark DAC1 PRE in the most recent Hi-Fi news was nothing short of glowing. Ken Kessler couldn't seem to find enough good things to say about this unit, including that it made one recording "...sound as lush and room-filling as a mint original vinyl pressing." So anyone heard one of these? Its level of functionality truly is enticing at its price tag of $1575.

Hi Everyone. I just heard the Cary 306 professional and I loved how it sounded. It had a bunch of detail and the highs sounded bright to me, but it didn't sound harsh or shrill. Also, every instrument and the vocals had it's own space. Overall it was just amazing. What is a good price for a used one? Also, does anyone know of a comparable source that may be a little cheaper? Thanks for any help or sugguestions.

Just in case people are interested in having a sample rate converter for Foobar2000 I just found this: A new resampler DSP for foobar2000 - Hydrogenaudio Forums I don't think the SRC is going to make my audio sound any different but I have also learned that they can do a lot of damage too. If you don't believe me look at the comparisons here: SRC Comparisons The one above is based on the SoX resampler which looks excellent in the test results above and has lots of options about phasing of the impluse response if you buy what Ayre says in that other thread. I went looking for something that had been measured to settle any misgivings I had about the PPHS res…

Just got this in yesterday and cold right out of the box, put a big smile on my face. This thing has gobs of PRAT and I now have BASS like I never had before. BIG SOUND out of this black box. Hate to use this cliche but I am hearing things (minute details) that I never heard before. Could be a keeper.

So ever since I've gotten into headphones couple of years back, I've been intrigued by vinyl. Everytime I think about pursuing vinyl, I tell myself it's too much of a pain and I stop thinking about it. It helps in that I know very little about vinyl. Of late, I've been pondering if I should just sell one of my rigs (most likely the Stax rig) and get a vinyl setup. What do you all think of that, and vinyl in general?

Yet Another Thread To Talk About Digital Cables. discuss.

Yes another USB converter.... I have an easy one for you: do these USB converters are that truly different from each other? I mean are they realy on different levels if you compare the ones you can find used like the affordable RedWine Audio to the crazy expensive Empirical stuff? I like the Canto presentation but at $500 (US) this need to be good. Thanks in advance. Amicalement

I have searched but seems hard to find any professional review, however didnt find anything bad as well, but still not that much. Came acros used one and willing to hear more impressions, if possible please, especially in my system. Produkte - CD-Spieler 1 THX.

Just wanted to throw out there that I may possibly want to move away from the Meridian sound that I have been listening to for the past year or so, and try out something else. Budget is around $1500 +/-, the more below that the better. Used is just fine, in fact I would prefer used because that means it is probably a $2000+ unit and we all know that the more expensive something costs the better it sounds What I have liked and enjoyed about the Meridian sound: Great soundstage - to hear actual soundstage depth that is cohesive and captures all of the spatial information on a recording, probably the best Meridian trait. All of my headphones and amps that I have run t…

So, my dad's ponying up like 10 grand for a McIntosh integrated tube amp and a pair of B&W speakers and needs a source to go with them (as well as interconnects). I'm not well informed about high end sources so can some of you guys help me find something that's up to par with the amp and the speakers? Looking for DACs or CD/SACD players Lets say $5000 limit

Has anybody heard this player? Their website is a bit messy and old-school, but it sounds like an interesting Redbook source, for the low, low price of $10,950 http://www.novaphysicsgroup.com I found out about it from doing a bit of research on Melos Audio - these are the same guys, I think...

Has anyone had a chance to hear the new McIntosh SACD/CD beast yet. I'm pretty sure this uses the new ESS ES9018 chip. It also has SPDIF in so this is certainly a contender for the 2-channel system. Well except for the fact it has a $6500 MSRP and at that price point it better be pretty special.

Ok - its time for me to spend a little $'s on my hobby. I'm trying to decide what I want next. I bought the Sony c555es with the intention to have it modded - but it hasn't happened yet. Instead I ended up with a squeezebox & a DA100 DAC. Now I'm wondering if the modded 555es will best the DA100. I don't have lots of experience with sources so hopefully someone will have some good suggestions for me. My amp is a SP PPX3 slam & my cans are RS1, Darth Beyer V3 & AT 900 ltd.

I swear to God I won't buy anything else if I can afford this http://www.bladelius.com/products/bladelius/media-players/embla.html Never heard of this brand. Anyone has?

Hello The player turns it off itself during playing ..after10 minutes or a few hours. The green light on left turns to red. Goes back to green by pressing on load, play or forward. Sometimes it is able to load the cd and play music. Many times, it's locked in. No control with remote. Impossible to reach Alex who did mods on it.

Anyone here own an Aurender or Lumin or something similar as a music server vs a PC or Mac. I use a mac mini and lately my mind has been infected with the thoughts of the Aurender N100 anyone else go that route or hear comparisons?

Having a handfull of Squeezeboxes in the house I was hoping to try my hand at DRC for my speaker setup. After working throurgh to creation of a filter with DRC and Inguz, it would seem Inguz doesn't work with the latest version of LMC. I could always try and run an earlier version, but I figures I would see what others have had sucess with? BruteFIR seems like another option but I am LINUX retarded and it looks to be a bit configuration intensive.

A black one. I got the Apollo home and plugged it in. I did not wait for any warm-up what-so-ever. Holy cow! What great sounds. Way better than the E5 and I still have to break it in. I coulden't even think of how much greater a sound the upcomming Saturn might be. How could it be any better??? The sound is like analogue or being like Single Power's finest amp and most all other source units sounding like an OK solid state amp in comparison. I heard the G08 at the last meet for a limited time and was not bowled over. However it was only a brief few selections and A/B'd it with the E5 and found it only slightly better. The Apollo beats the G08 by a wide margine, at least. …