DAC to pair with VC and SW51+

[cinisi]

So for about 6 months now I run my VC through a heavily modded Darkvoice 336SE paired with a simple Soncoz DAC. The sound is nice and warm, pretty much how I like it (or what I got used to, lol).

I received my SW51+ from Ruslan today and immediately tried it out. The SW51+ seems a bit flatter sounding than my Darkvoice, so it may be that I need a different DAC to feed it.

Does anyone have experience with the VC and SW51+ amp, and tried more than one DAC to check out differences?

I'm looking to get a bit more more warmth and oomph out of the SW51+ than I'm getting right now. If that's not possible, then the SW51+ is probably just not for me. But I'm hoping I can get it to work because it's such a nicely built piece of equipment

 

[Monsterzero]

So, you went from a warm, romantic OTL tube amp to a more linear SET amp.

A couple ways to re-inject warmth into the equation would be to roll in some warmer tubes into the sw51. Im not familiar with the tube types that your amp uses, but a quick Google tells me some Mullards might work for you. There are quite a few threads on your amp over on the site that cant be named here.

The 2nd way to add more warmth would be to look into a r2r DAC

Finally, pad rolling on your VC will help as well.

 

[YtseJamer]

The guys from the other forum are all using the Bifrost 2 with the SW51+

 

[cinisi]

Thanks for the reply guys! @YtseJamer the bifrost 2 is indeed what many over at SBAF pair it with. Seems like a good one to check out. @Monsterzero , thanks for the R2R tip. After minimal research I found that the Bifrost 2 is an R2R DAC which is probably why it pairs so well with the SW51+

 

[kumar402]

So for about 6 months now I run my VC through a heavily modded Darkvoice 336SE paired with a simple Soncoz DAC. The sound is nice and warm, pretty much how I like it (or what I got used to, lol).

I received my SW51+ from Ruslan today and immediately tried it out. The SW51+ seems a bit flatter sounding than my Darkvoice, so it may be that I need a different DAC to feed it.

Does anyone have experience with the VC and SW51+ amp, and tried more than one DAC to check out differences?

I'm looking to get a bit more more warmth and oomph out of the SW51+ than I'm getting right now. If that's not possible, then the SW51+ is probably just not for me. But I'm hoping I can get it to work because it's such a nicely built piece of equipment

you are used to OTL sound and SW51 is SET and is more revealing of DAC and hence if you want t bring back warmth then go for R2R DAC. Best would be Metrum or Sonnet DACs which are R2R and NOS. If budget is below $1K then go for Denafrips Ares or Bifrost 2

 

[cinisi]

Hi guys, wanted to thank you all again for pointing me towards R2R DAC's. I received my Ares II, and I got the punch back in my setup!