REVIEW: PS Audio Digital Link III DAC - Page 2

This is probably a better subject for its own thread, but.........

The advantages are the same as for DVD-A versus regular CD's--higher sample rates and bit depths increase dynamic range, detail, and allow for overall improved reproduction.

The amount of source material is limited now, but I have to believe that downloadable files are where the market is headed.

Linn Records makes a number of classical and jazz recordings available in 24/88.2 and 24/96 formats as FLAC or WMA files (more or less DVD-A quality).......for instance:

http://www.linnrecords.com/recording...hot--sacd.aspx

There's no problem playing these FLAC's via Foobar with the native E-MU ASIO driver for the 0404 USB over its USB connection.

I just wish there was some clear statement about how the industry will support hi-rez audio. One or the other of competing formats always seems to lose out early enough in the game for the other to succeed on its own, regardless of which one was technically the preferable option (VHS vs. Beta). Continued competition sometimes causes both to fail.

But you are certainly correct in asserting that DRM would be a more significant issue for the big labels than satisfying the audiophile market!

Maybe we will just have to put up with no hi-rez at all and my point becomes moot, perhaps?

Does any of you actually have a collection of 24-bit/96khz music files? I've been looking into this, and they are just hard to find! Linn offers mostly classical or British Jazz, neither of which is my cup of tea. Music Giant seems to have what's called SuperHD, but it's not cheap, and it doesn't really say what kind of sample rate.

Jon L, when you say that spdif sounds better than usb on the ps audio digital link iii, do you mean the spdif directly from the pc's built-in spdif-out port, the modded lynx spdif port, or the spdif from the empirical audio usb-spdif converter at 24/96 (and have the pc connected to the converter by usb)? It's hard to make an unbiased comparison on the different input ports of the PS audio based on your system since it seems like every piece of equipment you own is a more expensive modded version. For example, how does your PC's built-in spdif out sound compared to the usb instead of going through the modded lynx spdif? How is the modded lynx spidf compared to the empricial audio usb to spdif converter at 16/44.1 and at 24/96? Is the better detail you are hearing through the spdif due to the use of the modded lynx spdif or the empirical audio usb-spdif converter, or is it really due the difference between the usb and spdif in on the DLIII? even though theroretically it's better to have the digital signal converted to spdif in the DAC than in the PC due to the noise of the PC power supply, many people would argue that not all USB are created equal on different PCs. In this case, is it possible that your high-end modded Lynx spdif is simply better than the usb ports on your computer?

I had a very limited experience comparing usb-in with toslink-in on the Musiland MD10 I used to have. Although I felt that the toslink input coming from my PC's built-in toslink output was noisier, what I heard was not that dissimilar from what you described in your review. The toslink's treble sounded with more sparkle and more air than USB. It really gave a false sense of increased detail. The usb sounded more analog, overall a fuller sound. I have compared toslink with the usb on my DLIII a few times; however, this time I connected a Yamaha CD changer through toslink in and a laptop through the usb. I think again, the toslink did have a little more sparkle on the treble, but I can't be sure if it's due to the CD transport or the input. Have you tried comparing usb out directly from pc to DLIII and usb out from pc to Empirical Audio usb-spdif converter than to spdif in of DLIII?

Now onto the issue of 24-bit/96khz playback, has anyone actually tried out all these other DACs that acutally support 24-bit/96khz through USB using a high-definition 24-bit/96khz file? The official MAX sample rate supported by the USB protocol is only 48khz. Everyone else who's claimed that their usb input supports up the 24/96 (like the Benchmark DAC1 USB) is doing it through "unofficial" customization and mods. Sure there's theoretical advantage, but does this theoretical advantage actually translate into real-life advantage? It's hard to say. Like what many have already found out, it's hard to find real 24-bit/96khz music files, and the playback of those files are pretty much the only advantage an USB input that supports 24/96 has. Since with most DACS, the spdif inputs will support 24/96 or 24/192. Where else would you be able to take advantage of an USB input that supports 24/96 other than playback of real 24/96 files from your PC? And even if you do own real 24/96 music files and a DAC that supports 24/96 through USB such as a Benchmark DAC1 usb, how would you ever be able to prove that the 24/96 usb input is really better than if the usb input were only 16/44.1? I suspect that a higher-quality file in 24/96 would still sound better even when down-sampled to 24/48 or 16/48 and played through an usb input that only supports 16/48 or 24/48.

Finally, on a side note, there is a way to feed your DLIII some 16/96 material. If you own an Oppo dvd player that plays SACD, it will convert the DSD stream to 16/96 LPCM based on a review by Stereophile. You can then feed the 16/96 LPCM stream to the DLIII or any other DAC that supports 96khz via spdif. Based on the Stereophile review, the result supposedly rivaled that of an expensive SACD player. This is what got people raving about using the cheap Oppo player as a transport. I don't have any SACD, but I will probably go get one just to try this out myself. Obviously it will only work with 2-channel SACD. With multi-channel material, you still need to go through the multi-channel analog out or HDMI out from the DVD player.

Sure, I have purchased some Linn FLAC's. If I play a 44.1kHz file, my 0404 USB sync indication is at 44.1 kHz, and when I click on a 24/96 file, the sync indication on the 0404 control panel changes to 96 kHz.

You're under a bit of a misconception there. The standard Windows USB Audio driver only supports up to and including 48 kHz......so how, then, can recording devices, such as the 0404 USB, the M-Audio Fast Track, TASCAM US-144, DigiDesign Mbox2 and others all record and playback 24/96 files? By simply not using the standard Windows USB Audio driver! These devices are generally not automatically recognized by the system--you do indeed have to install specific drivers or they don't work (and I am not referring to only the ASIO drivers, but also to the device-specific WDM drivers.)

All the USB connection must do is stream data, and USB 2.0 bandwidth is tremendously greater than that required for 16/44.1. It's simply that the device must be built with the capability to properly buffer and reclock the data to the DAC, and a driver written to run that hardware. It's hardly "unofficial".......it's not less "official" than the manufacturer's video card driver for the particular one installed in your machine that provides you with more than VGA resolution on your monitor, right? Or maybe even more to the point, no different than a driver for a sound card attached to the PCI bus inside the PC. Just because a sound device is connected via USB doesn't mean it has to conform to some outdated standard.

And as to the advantage......do stereo DVD-A's sound better to you than CD's? It's basically the same question, right?

Why would downsampling on a PC necessarily sound better than the downsampling that was already done to generate the redbook master? As I mentioned previously, no one tracks at 16/44.1 any more--the original recordings are done at higher resolution.

There are various dithering algorithms that can be applied before the bit reduction, and asynchronous resampling from 96 kHz to 44.1 is not a no-brainer. If the original source file is 88.2 kHz, it is easier--just take every other sample, and you're basically good to go. Not so simple when the source and output rates are not integer multiples. So comparing a 24/96 version to a 16/44.1 version isn't so direct--there is data manipulation involved.

But as you mention, if you listened to a 24/48 downsample of a 24/96 file, all the downsampling needs to do is drop half the samples and reclock to the new rate--no "new data" is generated/interpolated/estimated. But going to 16 bits involves dithering......or just truncating the 8 LSB's, which is known to be problematic.

Other than those Linn FLACs, did you find anything else, the selection and the genre of music is quite limited. Also can you try down-sample those 24/96 files to 24/48 or 24/44.1 and give us a detailed report on how real-life sound compares at those 3 sample rates via USB output? I understand that a lot of redbook CDs are already down-sampled versions of higher bitrate recorded studio version. My real question is whether these customized USB drivers do deliver an audible benefit when playing 24/96 files. Apparently based on what I've gathered, it's not that straighforward to implement 24/96 through USB (as claimed by Benchmark), otherwise every USB dac on the market would be supporting it already.



No, I'm not under any mis-conception, you basically just repeated my point. Customized, special drivers or firmwares are needed to support higher bitrate through USB. You gotta remember that every single device you named above (0404 USB, the M-Audio Fast Track, TASCAM US-144, DigiDesign Mbox2) is designed for a completely different market than DACs such as PS Audio DLIII, Benchmark DAC1, etc... Sure, special drivers for these professional recording devices and computer video cards are common place, but when was the last time you had to install a special driver so your high-end SACD player would work right? As PS Audio's CEO Paul had mentioned before, the DLIII was designed as a standalone DAC to be used in a traditional sense. He expected most people would connect it to a transport via spdif. The USB connection was offered as a convenience as more and more people are listening to computer-based music. Therefore the DAC was designed to be driver-less, plug-and-play. I'm sure Benchmark had similar idea in mind, that's why they worked so hard to support 24/96 usb at the firmware level instead of the driver level. Chances are most people who spend thousands of dollars on hi-fi equipments are not necessarily music recording professionals or computer geeks who like to mess around with drivers. Chances are those professional recording devices, despite having the most specialized drivers to support USB connection at 24/192, won't necessarily sound as good as a hi-fi DAC such as a PS Audio, Benchmark, Bel Canto (just to randomly name a few) when you use those recording devices as a DAC in a traditional hi-fi audio sense becuase that's not what they were designed for.


Again, please see above. You missed my point. I'm not questioning the fact that a real 24/96 file would sound better than a 16/44.1 file. I'm questioning whether having a customized usb driver that supports 24/96 would really add much to real-world value. I don't know, maybe it does, but at this point, the only value it adds is to allow me to play those Linn files, which I will probably never buy. Maybe this will change in the future, I don't know.

Maybe not so straightforward to implement it in a strictly plug-and-play mode, you are correct--Benchmark did spend a lot of time on developing that firmware to make it work. But with device specific drivers, no big deal.

Benchmark is a long standing pro audio company who targeted the DAC1 at recording and mastering engineers before it ever hit the "consumer" market. Their bread and butter is the pro market, and consumer audio just happened to present an opportunity for them. The S/PDIF input on the newest versions of the DAC1 is still a BNC connector....not exactly common in the consumer market, at least at this price level, right?

According to a mastering engineer I know, about 80% of recordings are mastered on Apogee DAC's, with the Benchmark likely the next most popular one these days.

Well, I guess we will differ on a few points there. First, installing drivers for various devices is commonplace, and generally has few issues. My device works seamlessly with no pops/clicks, and all I did was followed the instructions that came with the product. Painless, straightforward--it's computer audio, so by its nature, it is not like buying an SACD or multiformat player and plugging it in. But even so.......it was easier to get the 0404 USB up and running than it has been to get IE7 to operate the way I want it to (consistently rejecting pop-ups and malware, for instance.) I'm nearly 50 and my last programming class was in FORTRAN; I never have recorded anything other than LP's to cassettes over 25 years ago--so I hardly qualify as a computer geek or recording engineer!

And what is necessarily wrong with "pro audio DAC's", especially considering that the Benchmark is at heart a "pro audio DAC"? What are pro audio devices designed to do that "hi-fi DAC's" not designed to do, or vice-versa?

That, again, is a topic for another thread, but c'mon guys.......recording engineers listen to live performances day in, day out, and they also know what real music sounds like--as much or more than most audiophile hobbyists.

You're right, I misinterpreted that point. I am just so convinced that hard drive-based audio is superior (in audible quality and in convenience) to running an optical disc in a transport that I don't want to go back down that road.....so any future gear I buy must be compatible with PC use at better than 16/44.1.

Yes, Benchmark happened to be a pro-audio first company, then hit the jack pot on the consumer market with DAC1. Well, this goes to tell you that consumer market is in a much larger scale than the pro-audio market...

There's nothing wrong in using a pro-audio device as a DAC. The dilemma lies in that everyone is making compromises in making a product. We are always hoping that a consumer product would have all the features of a pro-audio device, and vice versa. In fact, this is why Benchmark DAC 1 is such a successful product because it's a good compromise between the two. The problem is, often designers for one side don't necessarily have the expertise for the other market. A consumer high-end DAC for example might not have all the specs of a professional DAC, yet it can still cost more and sound much better because the digital-to-analog processing is only a small part of the whole picture. The power supply, clock, cabling, connector jacks, etc... all can play a very important role in the final sound. The professional dacs are mainly designed for recording professionals and may have more input/output features and upsampling/downsampling options, but they might make sacrifice on the power supply (such as the 0404 USB you are using), connectors, opamp, etc... because a recording professional will not care about those things. They will care about the integrity of their digital signal when using those devices. In fact, many of them would then take the recorded material and turn around listening to them using consumer grade hi-fi equipments. You can find examples frequently in those hi-fi magazines which often showcased systems used by recording professionals for music playbacks at home, and surprise surprise, very often those systems are completely made up by consumer grade high-end equipments, nothing that you will find in a studio.

Sure, I also wish that my PS Audio DLIII would support 24/192 through USB and converts USB to I2S directly, and I wish Apple would make the entire Itune store at least 24/96. Why should I pay for a whole CD worth of crappy compressed files when I go out and get the real CD at the same cost and at least get uncompressed 16/44.1 files?

Anyway, that's why we can always hope, and that's why we hang out at these forums constantly looking to upgrade to something better...

Happybob, a propos of your last statement, the constant search for something better, I would like to mention again what I said in a posting here last week (that it seems went unnoticed).

Jon L said that he didn't quite agree with the rave flavor of the TAS review, but that the PS Audio DLIII certainly deserves some more attention from audiophiles.
I noted in my posting that Barry Willis's rave-flavor review was with the proviso that the DLIII is used together with the Margules Audio Magenta ADE-24 harmonic sweetener. I believe he clearly says so in the review's (the following paragraph after the one quoted by Jon L). He states there that such combination made standard CDs "essentially equivalent to their SACD counterpars, even when SACDs are played back through the $5000 linn Unidisk SC [his reference]". Unfortunately for those who wish to learn about the sonic virtues of the DLIII alone or who take issue with the rave flavor of the review, Barry Willis's review did not deal at all with the DLIII disconnected from the ADE24 (as far as one can tell within the full context of the review, as published). Happybob, are you familiar with the ADE-24?

I'm not really familiar with the Margules ADE-24, I do remember seeing that mentioned in the TAS review. I kind of just thought it's something that Barry used on with all his DACs. I think he had used the Margules ADE-24 with both PS Audio Digital Link III and Stello DA100 during his comparison. If you do a quick Audiogon search, you can find one for sale for $90. It looks like a buffer stage that you insert between the preamp and the DAC, kind of similar to the Musical Fidelity X10 buffer stage or even the tube buffer used in my Mhdt Lab Paradisea+. It makes the sound overall sweeter, more tube-like, and I guess more analog and simliar to SACD. It's something that may or may not help your setup depending on the particular DAC and amp you have. Personally I'm having my PS Audio Digital Link III modded by Rick Cullum, so I don't think I'll be trying out the Margules.

Here's a review on the Margules I found on google:

http://www.positive-feedback.com/Issue6/ade24.htm

Apparently its effect is not appreciated by everyone who's tried it, and it can add a veiling to the sound sometimes.

happybob, many thanks for your prompt rsponse. I don't own a DLIII yet but I am seriously considering buying one. Last detail being considered is whether to buy the DAE-24 as well, to replicate Barry Willis's basic set up. I am told that it works phenomenally with lesser digital converters and cd/DVD players, in particular the OPPOs (I own one of those). According to Margules this is usually the case: the ADE-24 benefits are more obvious with lesser digital gear as their less sophisticate digital filtering tends to eliminate more of the harmonic richness of the music--which is precisly what the design of ADE-24 tries to correct (it is more than just a buffer, it actually has active analog circuitry that deals with the harmonic restoration). Actually he is [gladly] surprised that Barry Willis found out that its benefits are still of significance in such a latest generation DAC as the DLIII. I understand the current porduccion run of the ADE-24 has much better parts than the original of 3 years ago (audiophile quality resistors and capacitors, as well as gold plated RCA jacks), but same model reference, same box, and lower price ($190 now versus $250 originally)... In any event, if the ADE-24 does not make a positive difference with the DLIII in my main music system, it would for sure have a place in my secondary music/HT set up, next to the OPPO. Many thanks again for your response.

I have a PS Audio DLIII and got the level 4 mods offered by Rick Cullen and I believe got not only a super sounding DAC but a really good value for the money.  I have been following PS Audio since they came back into the market place in 1997 after Paul McGowen bought back the rights to the company he founded.  This is a company with a vision led by a truly extraordinary human.  At some point I will replace my DLIII and when I do it will be with PS Audio's recent DAC offering.

 

They have just released a network card that plugs into the back of their DAC and are close to releasing a NAS that will do extra duty as a ripper.  The network card they call the bridge puts your DAC on your internal network and the Internet.  So now the DAC is also an internet radio device.  They have an iPhone app you can use to control it also.

 

So the vision thing is what I am so very interested in.  With the release of their NAS high resolution music will be easily available at home.  Every time I try to get into hi rez music it becomes a dog's breakfast of hardware, software drivers, crappy connections and I wind up with a rube goldberg system that is not sustainable.  

 

So I guess my point is that while I love my DLIII, I really like that there is a vendor with a vision and the ability to deliver.  Hope y'all don't mind the slight off topic comment.

The network card sounds like an interesting idea, but that's an insane price to charge for an "upgrade". I can essentially do the same with my squeezebox which eliminates the need for a network connection on the DAC and still have all files stored on a NAS.  Internet radio still has a long way. The term HD Radio is misleading as none of it is ever streamed in "HD".