Hey Now,
I bought a used Aune from a fellow Head-fier who did the following mods >
1. Changed the single Burr Brown 2604 opamp from the amp stage to 2 mono AD797 opamps on Brown Dog adapter. This makes a significant difference in the sound specially since we are using two dual mono opamps. The AUNE has a Blue ALPS potentiometer which is totally quiet and has Nichicon and WIMA caps in the signal chain. This is a very high quality system for the price.

2. Changed the DAC's opamp from the Burr Brown 2134 to the high regarded LM4562. Audiophile products uses this opamp in their Spitfire DAC which was rated as the best DAC below $300 by What Hifi.
3. The AUNE has the following options:
a. USB and SPDIF input for the DAC
b. Analog input for a cd player
You can switch between all three inputs i.e. you can have 3 devices connected to the AUNE using the 3 inputs and switch between them using the front panel switches
c. It has a preout which will bypass the amp stage and directly outputs the DAC stage. This is a fixed preout and here the AUNE works as a stand alone DAC.
4. I am including two power supplies. The original 15V 1A AUNE power supply which is fantastic but am also including an Elpac 18V 1.3A switched power supply. This power supply adds control and lowers the noise floor significantly. (My comment - the oem Aune power supply did not work, kept getting dropoffs, the Elpac worked great).
5. I am also including the original opamps i.e. BB2134, BB2604 and 2 dual mono LM6171 opamps (used in Meiers flagship amp). The AUNE will come with the AD797 dual monos and LM4562 installed.
6. This is a fantastic little headphone amp. It is VERY comfortable driving everything up to 300ohms without a sweat but can also drive my 600ohm T1's.
I traded the Aune to upgrade to a Maverick D1. The Aune was a very good sounding unit with the above mods. Don't know how an oem one sounds. The mods are not too difficult, I did similar upgrades to my Maverick D1 and Creek OBH-11 (I actually replaced the opamp to LM4562 with a DIP socket and the 7 oem capacitors with Elna/Nichicon ones).
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Finest kind,
Chris
Edited by ccklone - 11/9/10 at 1:41pm