[DaveRedRef-III]

Beolab
I am surprised you use the word 'musical' to describe the MSB tbh, though I respect the product. I am surprised because I have yet to read a review in which musicality (or even emotion) is the outstanding attribute of any DSD upsampling unit, be it from DCS, MSB, PS Audio or other. I believe this is why Esoteric simply refused to upsample with DSD and also why Naim wouldn't go near DSD. It seems to me to be the elephant in the room for every reviewer too. How do they give these units a 100% thumbs up? = They avoid talking about it. They rave about other aspects of the presentation.

I have to say DSD up sampling still sounds impressive to my ears and it is a seductive sound/presentation in general but it never moves me like real music. If I felt that in the past I probably would have bought DCS years ago because, like you, I like the presentation of DSD up sampling.

Chord has a more clinical sound I also agree but for me the emotion and musicality sounds/feels right. As a musician, fundamentally, that has to be the primary reason for listening to music.

Incidentally the only DSD up sampler that I have heard which goes some way down the road to addressing this perceived weakness is Meitner. Ironically the presentation of Meitner is nearer Chord than traditional DSD up samplers (Leaner presentation.) Maybe there is something to this.

 

[Beolab]

Beolab
I am surprised you use the word 'musical' to describe the MSB tbh, though I respect the product. I am surprised because I have yet to read a review in which musicality (or even emotion) is the outstanding attribute of any DSD upsampling unit, be it from DCS, MSB, PS Audio or other. I believe this is why Esoteric simply refused to upsample with DSD and also why Naim wouldn't go near DSD. It seems to me to be the elephant in the room for every reviewer too. How do they give these units a 100% thumbs up? = They avoid talking about it. They rave about other aspects of the presentation.

I have to say DSD up sampling still sounds impressive to my ears and it is a seductive sound/presentation in general but it never moves me like real music. If I felt that in the past I probably would have bought DCS years ago because, like you, I like the presentation of DSD up sampling.

Chord has a more clinical sound I also agree but for me the emotion and musicality sounds/feels right. As a musician, fundamentally, that has to be the primary reason for listening to music.

Incidentally the only DSD up sampler that I have heard which goes some way down the road to addressing this perceived weakness is Meitner. Ironically the presentation of Meitner is nearer Chord than traditional DSD up samplers (Leaner presentation.) Maybe there is something to this.

The Analog do not resample as the rest of the DAC DSD pack does, it only re-clock the signal no upsampling here. The MSB Diamond for example upsample the signal thats correct, but not the Analog.

I have it with the latest SW 1.7 and the MSB Renderer I2S witch drive eights around most of all dac's in its $12.000 price range.

Take a listen combined with Abyss / HE-1K if you have a reseller near you.

 

[DaveRedRef-III]

Thanks for the correction Beolab. Do MSB say why they changed their spec for the Analogue?

Not come across Abyss/HE-1K to date but thanks for the pointer

 

[Kakki]

Dear Rob,
 
I really like your DACs and really love your philosophy eliminating analogue components as much as possible to keep the maximum transparency. I'm planning to purchase your Dave but there is one thing I'm really sad about.
 
There seems to be no good power amplifier that can be the best partner with Dave.
 
If I see the market, there are many expensive monster power-amplifiers having multi-hundreds power outputs, with a lot of analogue components inside.
 
I guess to connect Dave to those monster power-amplifiers do not make a good sense when you are trying so hard to eliminate analogue components in the signal path in Dave.
 
I would really want to know if there is (or will be) any good power-amplifier to match with Dave... that has minimum analogue components for the maximum transparency and also has small / enough output (10w - 25w?) for the highest quality.
 
Would appreciate your kind advice...

 

[rkt31]

@kakki, check benchmark ahb2 amp. it is 100watt rms and the best part is that it has very low gain setting of around 9db and input sensitivity as high as 7.2v, which means it can as a low power amp too. it is touted to be one of the quietest amp wit extremely low distortion and very high s/n figures.

 

[Rob Watts]

Dave has 705/768 kHz DX digital outputs to go with my digital power amps. These are non-switching, but still retain the analogue simplicity of two resistors and 2 capacitors plus a single global feedback path. But power output will be from 20W to at least 200W. I just finished testing the DX outputs today.
 
The first DX power amp will be available next year and will initially be 20W RMS with a 70W mono-block option.
 
Rob 

 

[Beolab]

Thanks for the correction Beolab. Do MSB say why they changed their spec for the Analogue?

Not come across Abyss/HE-1K to date but thanks for the pointer

According to Jonathan Gullman at MSB he states that MSB Analog are their new generation DAC platform and utilise
Re-Clocking which is more advanced and utilise the fine femto 140 master clock in the more efficient and better way than the upsampling method as their older Diamond / IV DAC are using.

When they developed the new state of the art MSB Select DAC they did began with the Analog chassi / mainboard as a startingpoint.

 

[Kakki]

@kakki, check benchmark ahb2 amp. it is 100watt rms and the best part is that it has very low gain setting of around 9db and input sensitivity as high as 7.2v, which means it can as a low power amp too. it is touted to be one of the quietest amp wit extremely low distortion and very high s/n figures.

 
Thank you rkt31, for your information! This is an amplifier I did not know... very interesting reading rave reviews on this product. Have never seen it here in Japan.
 

 
Dave has 705/768 kHz DX digital outputs to go with my digital power amps. These are non-switching, but still retain the analogue simplicity of two resistors and 2 capacitors plus a single global feedback path. But power output will be from 20W to at least 200W. I just finished testing the DX outputs today.
 
The first DX power amp will be available next year and will initially be 20W RMS with a 70W mono-block option.
 
Rob 

 
Rob, thank you for your kind reply! So the first DX power amp works with Dave only I guess? as only Dave has such digital outputs?
Your new product information is always exciting and beyond my imagination... now I can hardly wait next year!!

 

[Sonic77]

So now only certain amps will work well the the Dave dac and others will not?

 

[Mython]

  So now only certain amps will work well the the Dave dac and others will not?

 
 
Oh come on..
 
That's an unreasonable leap of (il)logic
 
Just because Rob is developing an amp to work well with the DAVE DAC does not mean, in any way, shape, or form, that the DAC will not operate superbly with other amplifiers 

 

 

[Skampmeister]

Chinese whispers at work here in real time.

People are funny.

 

[Beolab]

Dave is in a different league to the QBD76. Its like comparing an iphone 6 to a phone from 10 years ago - that's how much things have moved on!

Rob

Hi Rob !

When do you think the DAVE will be ready for shipping, and can you predict any SW or HW upgrades for the first batch, like that was made to the Hugo ?

 

[Sonic77]

   
 
Oh come on..
 
That's an unreasonable leap of (il)logic
 
Just because Rob is developing an amp to work well with the DAVE DAC does not mean, in any way, shape, or form, that the DAC will not operate superbly with other amplifiers 

 

lol

 

[Rob Watts]

Hi Rob !

When do you think the DAVE will be ready for shipping, and can you predict any SW or HW upgrades for the first batch, like that was made to the Hugo ?

The delay from shipping Dave is down to me I am afraid. I have not sent Chord production code yet. I have more testing and a little more code to add, but it should be ready later this week. Then there will be a lot of final testing to do too.
 
We won't release product until its been extensively tested. This has been my most complex DAC design so an enormous effort has gone into testing and evaluation. As too hardware updates, Dave had 4 prototype batches (ten units per batch), so hardware changes are not expected. Also, on the hardware side, DAC technology for me has matured; over twenty five years of continuous DAC design means that I am now very happy about the hardware side.
 
Rob

 

[lovethatsound]

The delay from shipping Dave is down to me I am afraid. I have not sent Chord production code yet. I have more testing and a little more code to add, but it should be ready later this week. Then there will be a lot of final testing to do too.

We won't release product until its been extensively tested. This has been my most complex DAC design so an enormous effort has gone into testing and evaluation. As too hardware updates, Dave had 4 prototype batches (ten units per batch), so hardware changes are not expected. Also, on the hardware side, DAC technology for me has matured; over twenty five years of continuous DAC design means that I am now very happy about the hardware side.

Rob

well i don't think anyone should complain about chord taking their time to get dave absolutely right for the market.And on that note Rob i really think you and chord should really think about putting daul AES on dave and a balanced headphone output on dave,doing this would please alot more people than you could imagine,and most likely increase sales of dave as a 1 box solution for headphone users and blu transport users as well,don't just make dave great make it perfect . take your time rob (chord)get it right.