I recently had the chance to hear a Denafrips Pontus II (not 12th anniversary) and while pleasant, I felt it literally slowed the music down by like 10%. Very interesting. Not sure if it's my jam. BUT it did cause me to look at the Denafrips website, which got me thinking about their Iris DDC. Apparently it's not snake oil and is "inexpensive" enough at $550 to consider playing around with. Has anyone run one of these via AES to a Yggdrasil? Any thoughts or impressions vs. Unison USB?
Funny I recently purchased a Pontus 12 and picked up an Iris and was using a Allo signature bridge. The Pontus replaced a Schiit Bifrost 2/64 and it did sound better but I just replaced the Allo with a Denafrips Arse and things really cam alive with the Pontus. What surprised me more was I re-tasked the Allo and Iris to the Bifrost 2/64 using the AES on the Bifrost and it was significantly improved from using the USB port.
Bill
Out of all the cables, dacs, amps, the Denafrips ddc was the biggest cost efficent upgrade I have done. You get more then your money worth with the ddc. I actually purchased the iris non 12th first. The first listen I was in pure amazement how much it improved the sound. I loved it so much, I purchased a gaia from my audio dealer. Again the sound was upgraded even further. I loved how much the sound was improved, I ordered a iris 12th ddc, being it was only 550, and I had some reward points to knock the cost down further. That sounded better then the iris non 12th, but not better then the gaia non 12th.
That 500+ for the iris will be one of the best investment you will make in your audio journey. All of my dacs sound improved, only one it had no effect on, was the Sony TA-ZH1ES. Even connecting through AES, coaxial, optical, best sounding is i2s. The rest arent far behind. You can also hook up multiple dacs to the ddc.
Hooking up the gaia and also the iris to my yggy og through aes, further improved the sound, I don't have the unison, but I have the gen 5 usb. The ddc doesn't add or take away from the dac, it just further improved clarity and makes the background darker, which in turn makes the sound that much more enjoyable. I will never go back to not using a ddc.
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