Audio-gd discrete op-amps reviewed: OPA-Earth, OPA-Moon, OPA-Sun v.2 - Page 3

Try Elna Silmic II at all analog supplies of the DAC chip. I had the Sanyo WG previously in those places but ATM they remain at digital supplies only. BTW my DAC is based on the CS4397 chip and if you look at the Evaluation Board datasheet, there is the LT1028 proposed as the unbalancing filter op-amp. They knew what they suggested.

What headphones are you using? The OPA211 has got somewhat corrupted "instrument drawing structure". For me the LME49710 is too blurry. It is great in my friend's headphone amp preamp section to compensate for somewhat edgy sound from the TI's NE5532 used in the first stage. I left the Sanyo WG in my CDP near the DAC together with the Panasonic PX's but I'm using it as the digital source only nowadays. Sometimes as a comparison when there is a doubt I did something wrong to the DIY DAC.

syllabus, I understand your preference but don't agree that looking for exact playback is audiophile related. I'd rather say audiophiles are looking for sepcial effect and that's why they dissect what they hear to evaluate if certain effect is sufficiently present. It might turn out that in another circuit I will prefer LME49710 or another op-amp. As I realised yesterday, the AD797BRZ and the OPA211ID, the grounded OPA Sun v.2 are still serious contenders for the ultimate op-amp.

@syllabus, it looks like TI stopped sending free samples to Poland, at least they refused to send them the last time explaining I already had ordered those parts which wasn't true. I see no source of these op-amps to buy them. The OPA827 is not yet available at European vendors, either. I went back to the OPA211ID pair in the meanwhile, due to capacitors changes mainly. As a general rule I would say that any low distortion op-amp might be your favorite dependng on the surroundings from the power supply to the electroacoustic transducers, so I defer from telling anybody the LME49720, the OPA211, the Sun v.2 or the LT1028 is the best.

These won't work for my DAC - too low voltage supplies. Including the topic of this thread - we're drifting aside. These THS40.. probably won't work, either. They have pretty high input currents. When I tried the AD8022 or a pair of the AD8021's, I heard noise only. They were high input current op-amps, too. The Audio-gd discrete op-amps have the advantage of JFET inputs which is very low input current.

AD826 worked well besides it's nothing special, AD8022 was noisy, and yes, I have decoupling capacitors on all op-amp inputs. Might be these were oscillations because the AD8019 produced no noise, neither did the AD8397.

Our experiences differ a lot. I never liked the LT1364 and for me it's roughly the AD826 class, the AD8022 is one of the best for output buffers. I installed them there in my CDP, many guys did it in their Audiotrak Prodigy HD2 soundcards and confirmed that it was better than any other popular op-amp besides maybe AD8599 which is slightly different, much easier to use and very likeable.

I evaluated the AD8022 once as sounding pretty similar to the AD797ANZ, maybe a bit more tubey.