Newk Yuler
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- Sep 21, 2008
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Please allow me to bump a long dead thread few will care to remember...
I dug my old Valab NOS DAC out of the closet a couple of days ago because I realized my USB to S/PDIF hardware had greatly improved over the years and I hadn't tried it on the Valab. Amazingly it looks like an amateur half-insane Dr Frankenstein had been whacking away and adding to it. Honestly nearly what happened as recorded in this thread.
Over at ASR a clever gentleman mentioned Empirical Audio Off Ramp 5 owners had testified it worked very well with NOS DACs that had no reclocking or other razzmatazz messing with the incoming digital. Being I have both of those I realized it might be prudent to try them together. When I put it together and turned it on it sounded farty, distorted and the image disorganized, so I let it run for 24 hours and it sounds much better. Warm and organic, but not very well imaging and somewhat poorly focused. I imagine if it was put on a scope it would measure very dirty, especially by today's standards for DAC quality (2019).
I Frankensteined a pulse transformer on the S/PDIF input that shouldn't be there and could come out with little effort. Other than that I have a big issue with the TCXO that Teradak or whoever designed this thing decided needed to be on the input circuit. I have little doubt that part of the input circuit is doing more damage than good to the pristine S/PDIF I'm giving it. I'd like to bridge it but I have no idea how to do that so it's probably just going to stay as it is.
It's been an interesting little experiment, listening to this relic in a decent modern sound system. I'll probably let it run a little while longer, maybe pull out the pulse transformer and run it a little while longer, then back in the closet with it.
I dug my old Valab NOS DAC out of the closet a couple of days ago because I realized my USB to S/PDIF hardware had greatly improved over the years and I hadn't tried it on the Valab. Amazingly it looks like an amateur half-insane Dr Frankenstein had been whacking away and adding to it. Honestly nearly what happened as recorded in this thread.
Over at ASR a clever gentleman mentioned Empirical Audio Off Ramp 5 owners had testified it worked very well with NOS DACs that had no reclocking or other razzmatazz messing with the incoming digital. Being I have both of those I realized it might be prudent to try them together. When I put it together and turned it on it sounded farty, distorted and the image disorganized, so I let it run for 24 hours and it sounds much better. Warm and organic, but not very well imaging and somewhat poorly focused. I imagine if it was put on a scope it would measure very dirty, especially by today's standards for DAC quality (2019).
I Frankensteined a pulse transformer on the S/PDIF input that shouldn't be there and could come out with little effort. Other than that I have a big issue with the TCXO that Teradak or whoever designed this thing decided needed to be on the input circuit. I have little doubt that part of the input circuit is doing more damage than good to the pristine S/PDIF I'm giving it. I'd like to bridge it but I have no idea how to do that so it's probably just going to stay as it is.
It's been an interesting little experiment, listening to this relic in a decent modern sound system. I'll probably let it run a little while longer, maybe pull out the pulse transformer and run it a little while longer, then back in the closet with it.
