Well Friday was the day!!
My friend and his brother drove 2 hours to bring their dCS Rossini Apex so we could hear it in my system compared to my ARC6 Dave and Mscaler.
The main tracks we used are shown below. Although this is a screen shot from a Roon playlist, for the actual listening we used Squeeze and Squeezelite on the Antipodes Oladra streamer. All tracks were locally stored rips on the Oladra internal SSD. For both the Rossini and Mscaler/Dave we used the BNC output from the Oladra connected via a well known make of ferrited BNC cable to each of the DACs.
Both of the DACs have volume controls so we were able to connect both directly to my ATC SCM150 active speakers (using Iconoclast OCC 4x4 Gen 2 XLR cables).
I have heard some older generation dCS DACs but I have never before heard a Rossini but my interest was aroused by a few mentions on here and elsewhere. The format for the listening was that we played the whole of a track with one of the DACs then with the same track we swopped DACs and listened to the whole track again. Generally we then swopped back to the first DAC and then finished by playing the track again on the second DAC. ie playing each track 4 times.
Another friend popped in for a couple of hours in the middle of the session. He has an earlier generation dCS system which he outputs through ATC 40 active speakers.
I will do a plot spoiler now and say that none of us felt that we could categorically say that one DAC was wholeheartedly better than the other. In the final analysis it came down to personal preferences and a cost vs value judgement of each DAC.
This is very much a personal thing but I felt that the Rossini had a certain amount of ‘air’ around the upper frequencies which gave it an overall character which some might describe as being life-like but which I found could tend towards the ‘incessant’ end of the spectrum. This is a subtle effect but compared to the Dave’s refinement it was definitely something which I could hear. On some tracks such as the Chris Jones ‘
Thank You’, both the Rossini owner and I agreed we would be happier with the volume being turned down a notch or two (it wasn’t very high anyway) but with the ARC6 Dave by contrast I was itching to turn up the volume. I also felt that whilst the Rossini might initially give the impression of more detail compared to the Dave in reality I preferred the Dave’s calmer presentation which I think gives more space around notes and that the Dave actually had a better level of fine detail compared to the Rossini. I emphasise again that this was just my ears and what I heard on the day but I felt that the Dave combination avoided any tendency towards cloaking or a slight smearing of subtle detail.
There was a general agreement amongst all of us that the ARC6 Dave and Mscaler sound was a fuller presentation in the lower mids and bass. The Alison Krauss track revealed this quite easily (by the way, I had never heard this track before but I can highly recommend it. It left me itching to hear the rest of the album).
So, after quite a few hours of very pleasant listening and chatting the Rossini Apex and its owners went home. We never did reach a consensus and whilst each of of us could understand what the other saw in their own DAC I am pretty sure that neither of us intends to investigate buying a different DAC. I have wanted to hear the Rossini for quite some time and having now heard the Rossini Apex as far as I am concerned I have eliminated any lingering thought that it might be better than my ‘pimped’ Dave and Mscaler. Also I feel sure that with the impending Choral range Scaler, the ARC6 Dave is likely to take a further quantum leap in sound quality when that becomes available.
On Friday we did a rough back of envelope cost comparison. The Rossini Apex is the thick end of £27k with the ARC6 pimped Dave + Mscaler comes in at around £23k. If we had time it would have been interesting to compare a non pimped Dave/Mscaler to the Rossini Apex but there is only so much that one can do in a single day of listening.
There is one review from October 2020 by Sam Rosen at Positive Feedback where he felt that with suitable cables the Dave + Mscaler (unmodified, factory spec) was a similar level to the Rossini (that review was pre Apex) so it was interesting to now hear the Rossini Apex vs a pimped Dave.
In conclusion, it is clear that the Rossini Apex is a good DAC. It was just that I thought my Mscaler + Dave was better overall in several very clear ways and was the DAC which I would be happiest listening to long term.
System : Innuos PhoenixNET, Antipodes Oladra streamer with internal SSD and running Squeeze server and Squeezelite player apps, BNC ferrited cable to Mscaler or Rossini Apex DAC. Dave powered by Sean Jacobs ARC6 LPS and with internal Sean Jacobs Cap Board. Speakers : ATC SCM150 active.
