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I've had the Maverick Audio TubeMagic D2 DAC for a while and I've been going back and forth between using LM4562 Opamps and the OPA627 Opamps that came pre-upgraded with this unit (each two single OPA627 OpAmps on an adapter board to create a dual opamp). Each had it's pros and cons but neither really seemed to be giving me everything I wanted. The OPA627 seemed more smooth, but almost too smooth, to the point of lacking texture in some cases. The LM4562 had more of the texture that I preferred, but can also be just a bit harsh, especially for long listening sessions. The tube output, using a Sylvania 5670W tube, did help, but only so much. http://gotnorice.com/B…

I'd like to get a dac to pair with my recently acquired O2/KGSS rig. I'm currently using my APL modded Philips SACD1000 but there's a pretty big portion of music that I only have on hard drives. I'd like to keep this as inexpensive as possible but if I can't find anything to my liking I'm willing to wait it out awhile. I'll mostly likely be using the DAC with a Squeezebox as the transport.

Last Tuesday DHL came to my door with heavy package, so, after two weeks waiting glad I was... I had day off from work, but was to busy with my son to set it up directly, however open up anyway to make first check. It was very interesting for my boy as well, cos he loves all that buttons. First impression wasnt shocking, cos I have seen this mashine in real life before, but getting one myself still exciting after all. Build quality is good, nothing fancy, just simply good. Metal case, massive metal front panel and some useful stuff on it, like display and buttons...:)Display light is not irritating at all, mild green color with quite huge indication of what happenin…

Hi, does anyone know what this is worth and how's its performance? I'm looking for a DAC, and this popped out. But a quick search turned up the newer models, I think this one is a very old model (I'm assuming the first). It has balanced outputs which is nice, but I was wondering about its performance... Thanks for your help HC!

Interesting. Focused on pure playback, it seems. You apparently give up A/D, equalization and 24/192 support (caps at 24/96) for your $1100 savings -- though that's all second hand scuttlebutt.

I bought and returned a Yamaha S1800 universal player (that apparently does pure DSD) because it was a joke. The regular CD layers sent from my Mac over optical to my Monarchy 18B beat it in every way--I guess I shouldn't be surprised. Is there any SA-CD player under $1000 (used or new) that can do things with SA-CD (greater detail, more realism, bigger soundstage) that the aging Monarchy 18B can't do with CD? I'd really appreciate your recommendations. I'm quite pleased with the front end of my system--Gilmore Lite and the 650s.

Right direct from Oppo themselves on their Twitter page: https://twitter.com/OPPODIGITAL Best bets: Dual core at least, 4k, latest Marvell QDEO video processing, wouldn't be surprised to see a higher end variant come out in 2013 to succeed the 95. Overall, I expect to see further improvements and streamlining/addition of features for the Internet, streaming, supported files, etc. etc. That's been their cycle to a tee and it's a safe bet it's going to happen again here if that's anything to go by. Stay tuned.

I'm not too good at home theater stuff, so I need some help. I need some suggestions on the absolute cheapest way to get 5.1 surround sound out of my tv, using it's optical out, and then going to Logitech Z-5300e speakers. The connectors for the speakers are 1/8's, so obviously this poses a slight challenge. I'm stressing cheapest, cause medical school is killing my wallet. Thanks, Dave

I'm not in the rarified source world that a lot of you are, but I've been looking for a decent sub $500 universal player. I'd been leaning towards the oppo, but found that Cambridge makes a universal that is pretty well regarded that has an audio-only setting. Anyone know anything about it? The few reviews I've' found make it seem decent.

Finally got it

Squeezebox Touch unboxed and in the wild Looks interesting

The first review for the Sony box thing is out: http://www.whathifi.com/sony/uhp-h1/review $349 USD seems like a reasonable price if it competes with the Oppo BDP players. I'd love to see a head-to-head comparison of their video and audio performance.

Thinking of going with a new dac, as an upgrade from my apogee minidac. I've been using USB and have primarily flac files (ape, ogg as well). Mainly i'm debating going with a benchmark dac1/is2(usb conversion) , or maybe a transporter to avoid USB all together. It seems the onbard usb options on most dacs are considered inferior transports to an alternative like this. No complaints with my mindac, but I know I can do a bit better with these fancier transport options available. I don't have any oversampling either and I know that i'm not utilizing the full potential of this DAC. Anyway i've read a bit about the empiricle audio is2 dac1 mods, and also been trying …

Pardon the mess; I'm moving next week so I don't have a nice table to put everything on. I knew I had to buy it as soon as I heard Voltron's set up at CanJam. I got it about three hours ago and it's terrific like I remembered it. So far, I'm using the AES input on my Primare DVD30 to compare the DACs between the two devices. It's my very first piece of individual equipment that costs this much so I'm experiencing a whole new level of sound. For example, I always discounted one recording as flawed because of strange background noises but the higher resolution of this DAC makes it very clear that it's just sound from the audience. Apparently, I'll get even more mileag…

So I'm gonna have around $400 soon (yay for selling my supermacro ) and I'm looking to upgrade from my Entech Number Cruncher to be used with a CK2III and Grado 225s (woodied hopefully in the near future) The DACs that I'm thinking of are the MSB Link III w/o upgrades, Headroom MicroDAC (new and old) and OPUS dac. If you have any suggestions, tell me!

I'm in the market for a proper (i.e. non-iPod) source, and I was hoping you guys could help me out. My current home rig consists of a Dynahi, Millett, and RS-1s (with said iPod as source). The Channel Islands Audio VDA-1 has been suggested by a couple of people as being good value on the used market, and I'm currently in touch with someone selling one with the VAC-1 and "Revelation Audio Labs" cable for around $400. I have been doing some DAC research on head-fi, but it is hard to get impressions of the VDA-1 vs. other DACs, as it's discontinued. The price is a little steep, but a bit better than you might think, as the seller is also Canadian (I avoid 14% tax and $25…

Oz, at Let There Be Sound Just got in a few of these new USB DACs from Cayin. It has a USB in on the front of the unit as well as a mini headphone jack. It also has controls on the front of the unit, including volume control. It also comes with a remote. There are two DAC chips. Analog out 1 uses a TDA1543 and Analog out 2 uses a PCM2706 which is also volume controlled. The iDAC can be used as a preamp through the second analog out. I finally got into my music room to try it out. I am using it as a pre at the moment through a Berendsen STA 150 power amp and my System-Audio Ranger speakers. The only headphones I have at the moment are ER-6is. I haven't tried them yet. As y…

Universal Audio | 2192

OPPO BDP-95 Blu-ray Disc Player

Vinnie has released his new modular amp/dac/phono stage/headphone amp device he calls LIO. I like Vinnie at shows but have never owned any Red Wine Audio gear. How does this thing look to the HC tech folks and critics? Discuss. http://vinnierossi.com/

Hey, guess what I just got? Rega Apollo...sounds pretty nice straight out of the box...burn-in to follow... Oh, and: black.

Finally have a little cash to become active around here again. Looking for a USB DAC to match up with the Lambda normal bias + SRM-T1 I just bought from Birgir. I've narrowed it down to these 2. Any have any personal experience with either? Anything else you'd recommend? Looking to keep the price under $500.

just as my title, can anyone give me some ideas about detecting the lifetime's of tube inside the audio aero DAC. From what i know, the lifetime of the tube is around 10000 However, the original owner used it for 1 year and 2 months. So i think I can only use it for 10 more months.Is it right? do you know any ways to prolong the lifetube? when i read the instruction, they advise me to let the DAC on all the time . If i turn it off, I need to wait 1 or 2 days to make the DAC do its best when the tube died, where can i contact to have the replacement? thanks

Yesterday, while I was browsing el Craigslist and a****gon I stumbled upon an EAD DSP-7000 mk.II DAC and was intrigued. So, I deciding to go doping panda, PI. From what little information I could gather, EAD had three lines of DACs: the DSP-1000, the DSP-7000, and the DSP-9000. The DSP-7000 was the original product while the DSP-1000 was an economy version of the 7k and the DSP-9000 seemed to be a more different than the other two. Each line has had several revisions with the DSP-1000 and the DSP-7000 both having three revisions while 9000 has an unknown number of revisions(to me at least). The first series had a CS8412-CP EP, 2x AD1862N-J, NPC SM5813APT, and some propri…

Anyone looking for an SB3 should jump on this fast, assuming of course that it's the wireless version.