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Old 05-15-2009, 08:28 PM
Vinnie R.'s Avatar
Vinnie R. Vinnie R. is offline
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Red Wine Audio
 
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Meriden, CT
Posts: 465
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All,

Thanks for the posts so far!

Quote:
Ability to drive balanced headphone via 2 x 3 pin XLR would be very nice to me.
There will be no balanced outputs. The entire design (dac, headphone amp) is all single-ended.

Quote:
I do hope this DAC/headphone amp can take analogue inputs as well (and hope more than one) so that it can be used as a standard alone headphone amp.
The Isabellina dac has 3 digital inputs (USB, coax, and optical). Adding analog inputs will add complexity and cost because I'll need to pass the output of the dac (as well as analog inputs) to an input select switch. Doing all of this gives us a preamp. If you want a dac + preamp with headphone output, I already have this: Red Wine Audio Isabella (add dac + HP options). I know, I know - it is not cheap at $6k. But with the "Isabellina HP" (Isabellina with headphone output), I am hoping to keep the price less than half of that.

So in order to keep the cost down, I was hoping that most people would be fine with the 3 digital inputs, 1 set of volume controlled RCA outputs, and
one 1/4" headphone output. I would appreciate more feedback on this...

Quote:
My only suggestion is for at least one pair of fixed SE outputs for the DAC. It would be nice for us electrostatic owners

So maybe a fixed and a variable out as a compromise
I can make the RCA outputs either fixed or volume-controlled... the customer can decide based on their needs.

Hopefully the features above will make most people happy, and this will keep it from getting too expensive. I know price is a concern.

Looking forward to more feedback...

Thanks again,

Vinnie
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