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Asus Essence One Headphone Amp/DAC (CeBIT 2011)
Nov 6, 2013 at 3:00 PM Post #2,701 of 3,573
gandah said:
  Going by the information on offer, the new Asus E3 dac does look promising, and if it lives up to the hype its receiving $1.699 will be a bargain. The E1 standard edition isn't a high-end dac at all and has many faults which you can easily find in this thread, however when adding muses, ONLY the sound quality is improved and nothing else, Muses Edition on the other hand has slight improvements other than the pro-loaded muses.
 
So if E1 standard = $500,  E1 muses = $1200, The new E3 dac if living up to it's promises is definitely worth the assumed asking price for sure
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But the muses differ on the new model, no? MUSES02 I think. Wonder what that difference that will make, if any.
 
Nov 6, 2013 at 7:55 PM Post #2,703 of 3,573
Originally Posted by dclaz /img/forum/go_quote.gif
 
It's all relative. Everything is going to be considered (or perhaps even is) overpriced compared to thinks like the ODAC/O2 etc if you don't need DSD or balanced output.
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The name of the ODAC/O2 seems to come really often and it appears to have the absolute best price/performance ratio. The portability of the ODAC is great and being outside a computer should means no interference. I have a few questions though about it.
1- Is the power circuitry and the opamp used inside are superior to those of the best PCI soundcards? 
2- Is it only better for music or it can be an improvement also for games and movies?
3- Is there a difference in quality from using an output of (RCA to RCA) instead of (3.5mm to RCA)?
4- I'd guess that it's only stereo so worthless for 5.1 gaming through speakers?
5- I'm wondering if I shouldn't just get the O2 headphone amp since the ODAC is prolly not worth it when you already have a very good soundcard. Let's say I do this, now to connect the soundcard to the O2's amp, should I use a 3.5mm cable from the headphone output of the front panel of my computer case or I should really use the rear Front L/R output which is of better quality and then use an Y splitter so I can still have my speaker connected? I wonder however if there's a disadvantage from having an Y cable for an output line-level cable.

 
gandah said:
  The E1 standard edition isn't a high-end dac at all and has many faults which you can easily find in this thread, however when adding muses, ONLY the sound quality is improved and nothing else,
 
So if E1 standard = $500,  E1 muses = $1200, The new E3 dac if living up to it's promises is definitely worth the assumed asking price for sure 
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The thing is that even if you'd want to buy the Muses Edition right now, it wouldn't be possible as it's been officially discontinued by Asus since quite a long time. Hell even just the regular E1 is hard enough to find, it's always on special order or very low stock but at least that one is still available. I don't understand why they would abandon the Muses Edition, offer something better and then have a huge gap between their 500$ E1 and the 1700$ E3. It makes no sense. Oh and the Muses was more like 900$ rather than 1200$ but gone forever anyway (-_-)

From the E1 I tested 25 days before returning for refund, I didn't notice the volume imbalance at all. The only problems I had is that sometime I would power it on and it wouldn't be recognized at all as if it would freeze instantly until I power it off for a while then put the power back later. It didn't happen too often at least but more than a few time. The other problem I had is firmware update done in service mode, even though I did everything correctly, the Asus program never recognized the unit so I never been able to upgrade its firmware. I found the sound improvement to be major over my AKG K702 headphones because of the amp inside that blow away any PCI soundcard but unfortunately on my high-end loudspeakers I couldn't really hear much difference from the DAC versus my high-end soundcard with upgraded opamps. I even had buzzing sound from the USB while moving my mouse around, which doesn't happen with my PCI card. I somehow expected much better for a 600$ DAC vs my 200$ soundcard, unless I was mostly paying (200$ DAC + 300$ Headphone Amp + 100$ XLR Output = 600$)? Ah and that so called 8x Symmetrical Upsampling... more like marketing bs, there was no difference with it on.
 
Nov 7, 2013 at 12:35 AM Post #2,704 of 3,573
My point was progression from standard, plus, muses, if is anything to go by, the E3 more then likely will be priced accordingly. which to me $1699 sounds about right.
 
Nov 7, 2013 at 7:30 AM Post #2,705 of 3,573
Today I got 9 pieces of 49720HA and put them on dip-8 socket. Almost took one hour to put them on socket, not an easy task.
 
Except XLR outputs, I swapped all the stock opamps with 49720HAs.
 
It is certainly an improvement from the stock as well as other opamp combinations (including 2132, 4562, 2107) tried previously by me. You get more more details besides clean and punchy bass. Treble is aggressive and not to my liking. 
 
I have never tried muses so can't compare with that combo but so far the best sound I have got from Texas Instrument's other op amps with me.  
 
One thing I have noticed after few minutes of swapping: the metal top of 49720HA becomes hot very quickly within 10 minutes of use. They return to normal temp within 2 minutes of switching off the E1. Is it normal?
 
Please advise.  
 
Nov 7, 2013 at 9:28 AM Post #2,706 of 3,573
shyamelge said:
  Today I got 9 pieces of 49720HA and put them on dip-8 socket. Almost took one hour to put them on socket, not an easy task.
 
Except XLR outputs, I swapped all the stock opamps with 49720HAs.
 
It is certainly an improvement from the stock as well as other opamp combinations (including 2132, 4562, 2107) tried previously by me. You get more more details besides clean and punchy bass. Treble is aggressive and not to my liking. 
 
I have never tried muses so can't compare with that combo but so far the best sound I have got from Texas Instrument's other op amps with me.  
 
One thing I have noticed after few minutes of swapping: the metal top of 49720HA becomes hot very quickly within 10 minutes of use. They return to normal temp within 2 minutes of switching off the E1. Is it normal?
 
Please advise.  
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They are hot by default.
Try to put 2132 into I/V, leave 49720HA at buffer and 4562 at factory default positions (also dip8 49720 for headphone buffer). It gives more balanced sound, clean but not aggressive.
 
Nov 7, 2013 at 9:36 AM Post #2,707 of 3,573
dmarasovic said:
  They are hot by default.
Try to put 2132 into I/V, leave 49720HA at buffer and 4562 at factory default positions (also dip8 49720 for headphone buffer). It gives more balanced sound, clean but not aggressive.
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Thanks for letting me know that they are hot by default. I was getting worried over it. 
 
Thanks also for suggesting a new combo. Yes, I will try it and inform you.
 
Right now, I am trying another combo: 5532 at I/V stage, 49720HA at buffer, HP and RCA outputs.  The aggressive treble is gone with it. The top-end is smooth now and some airyness of stock op amps is back. 
 
Nov 7, 2013 at 11:24 PM Post #2,714 of 3,573
In the official page, I noticed Essence III uses following op-amps:
 
Op-amps:
 
● I/V:2 x AD827SQ(ceramics)
● LPF:2 x AD827SQ(ceramics)
● Buffer(XLR):2 x AD827SQ(ceramics)
● DC servo(single-ended):2 x MUSES 02
● DC servo(balanced):4 x OPA2227P
 
Has anyone tried AD827SQ in Essence I or other equipment?
 
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