[sajunky]

I have owned the soekris 0.02% resistor board paired with an amanero USB i2s module and powered by a basic linear power supply. The pegasus is substantially better in terms of fullness in the music, especially the bass.

This is expected, as it is Denafrips afterr all... The same firmware, same bugs. Soekris has (1) heavy DSP, as designer's preference is for good measurements, not a sound quality and (2) cost saving measures like using opamps in the signal path. It is why Soekris attracts mostly current Delta Sigma DAC owners as thanks to R2R ladder it still delivers a hint of a natural sound.

 

[Baten]

This is expected, as it is Denafrips afterr all... The same firmware, same bugs. Soekris has (1) heavy DSP, as designer's preference is for good measurements, not a sound quality and (2) cost saving measures like using opamps in the signal path. It is why Soekris attracts mostly current Delta Sigma DAC owners as thanks to R2R ladder it still delivers a hint of a natural sound.

I disagree with all you said really. After the 'heavy DSP', this is what the soekris 2541 outputs:

Really typical/expected R2R ladder distortion spectrum. If anything it looks a lot like Schiit's Bifrost 2, or like older multibit chips like TI PCM1704 or Sony TDA1541 (note the naming similarity to soekris!). Op-amps or no, it emulates the vintage R2R sound, and not 2020 delta sigma sound, at all.

That's not to say the Ares 2 / Pegasus don't sound very natural. Just don't like the comparison of soekris to D-S.

 

[sajunky]

I disagree with all you said really. After the 'heavy DSP', this is what the soekris 2541 outputs:

Really typical/expected R2R ladder distortion spectrum. If anything it looks a lot like Schiit's Bifrost 2, or like older multibit chips like TI PCM1704 or Sony TDA1541 (note the naming similarity to soekris!). Op-amps or no, it emulates the vintage R2R sound, and not 2020 delta sigma sound, at all.

That's not to say the Ares 2 / Pegasus don't sound very natural. Just don't like the comparison of soekris to D-S.

Good point. If only I could double my like. But others welcome.

You disagree with me, but I do actually fully agree with you! Maybe you didn't read carefully what I wrote, so I will not try to dispute. It is written on, maybe not clear enough, English is not my native language. I want to supplement your post with the following:

What really makes a vintage R2R DACs sound? R2R ladder chip or something else? I believe the later. A Philips TDA1540 came together with interface chips. One of a feature was 4x oversampling combined with noise shaping. It was intended to increase resolution little bit above 14-bits which was a maximum of the ladder. When a famous TDA1541 (16-bit) came out it was convenient to use the same technology to smooth the sound even further. There were already new SAAxxx chips, but none of them had offered non-processed and NOS like a modern DAC do. A number of vintage CD players came with this chip, I still have one. A short note of a history is here: https://www.dutchaudioclassics.nl/history_of_the_Philips_tda_d_a_converter/

Regarding Burr-Brown PCM1704 (and Texas Instruments licenced version) I can't say much, I owned CD player with PCM63, it was also oversampled with HDCD chip. So I think it is similar situation. If you want to compare NOS PCM1704 sound to the current discrete ladder DACs, there is a group buy from Audio GD for a new version of DAC19.20 with this chip. It will not use noise shaping it is a pure NOS like other A-GD DACs: https://www.head-fi.org/threads/new...hip-resistor-ladder-dacs.853902/post-16009443

With increased number of resistors in the ladder there is no reason for noise shaping. Unless... As Soekris use opamps, it is important to reduce transients of the ladder by deploying noise shaping. It is not clearly visible on your graph, as it ends on 20kHz, check a wide frequency FFT, it will show as increased high frequency noise.

 

[Baten]

Good point. If only I could double my like. But others welcome.

You disagree with me, but I do actually fully agree with you! Maybe you didn't read carefully what I wrote, so I will not try to dispute. It is written on, maybe not clear enough, English is not my native language. I want to supplement your post with the following:

What really makes a vintage R2R DACs sound? R2R ladder chip or something else? I believe the later. A Philips TDA1540 came together with interface chips. One of a feature was 4x oversampling combined with noise shaping. It was intended to increase resolution little bit above 14-bits which was a maximum of the ladder. When a famous TDA1541 (16-bit) came out it was convenient to use the same technology to smooth the sound even further. There were already new SAAxxx chips, but none of them had offered non-processed and NOS like a modern DAC do. A number of vintage CD players came with this chip, I still have one. A short note of a history is here: https://www.dutchaudioclassics.nl/history_of_the_Philips_tda_d_a_converter/

Regarding Burr-Brown PCM1704 (and Texas Instruments licenced version) I can't say much, I owned CD player with PCM63, it was also oversampled with HDCD chip. So I think it is similar situation. If you want to compare NOS PCM1704 sound to the current discrete ladder DACs, there is a group buy from Audio GD for a new version of DAC19.20 with this chip. It will not use noise shaping it is a pure NOS like other A-GD DACs: https://www.head-fi.org/threads/new...hip-resistor-ladder-dacs.853902/post-16009443

With increased number of resistors in the ladder there is no reason for noise shaping. Unless... As Soekris use opamps, it is important to reduce transients of the ladder by deploying noise shaping. It is not clearly visible on your graph, as it ends on 20kHz, check a wide frequency FFT, it will show as increased high frequency noise.

Thanks for the honest reply. Interesting stuff. That Audio-GD 19.20 looks nice indeed, but for $1k I'm not sure it's the one I would choose.

 

[]eep]

Nope, just trying to discuss the issue at hand here where both brands have some sort of driver issue.
Oh and if you're still looking for proof that the Ares II is better than the Pegasus... well there's already an owner of both that states the Pegasus is a step above.

Welcome to my ignore list troll.

Logically, sajunky is making a valid statement. Blunt but true.

You counter this with wilful denial and 1 opinion of unknown reliability (I trust him on his word but I can't evaluate his level of expertise so far. I've met to many audio owners with strong but flawed opinions).

I find that the level of objectivity is inversely related to the level of emotion surrounding the Pegasus. When the emotions are stirred, buyer beware (your logical reasoning will be impaired).

So far I see people trying to use reason against people that are using emotion. In real life I would suggest you stop talking and just put an arm over their shoulder and say 'there, there'. I'm just trying to make people take a step back, see what's happening and get some perspective on the strangeness surrounding the sudden emergence of the 'Musician' brand. Whatever you might feel, however bad you want to justify not seeing this (ignoring it), there simply are a lot of red flags when you use reason.

 

[legcramp]

Logically, sajunky is making a valid statement. Blunt but true.

You counter this with wilful denial and 1 opinion of unknown reliability (I trust him on his word but I can't evaluate his level of expertise so far. I've met to many audio owners with strong but flawed opinions).

I find that the level of objectivity is inversely related to the level of emotion surrounding the Pegasus. When the emotions are stirred, buyer beware.

I bet you're a salty Ares II owner too buddeh

 

[]eep]

I bet you're a salty Ares II owner too buddeh

now who is assuming? All bets are off. You could simply have read it here. I spotted the red flags before buying.

And I reseached, bought, studied, modified and sold many NOS R2R dac's with passive output stage for over 10 years already. I bought the Ares because it is exactly the same as my dac, only with better discrete dac, input and power. I know the sound intimately and I know what does what. Only I'm not a electronics engineer (but architectural).

 

[T 1000]

Not to lengthen much of the story, all devices on the market have the same or more flaws than pegasus, this is easily seen when you get into the thread about a device, for example -Ares II has far more red flags than pegasus but its faults do not stand out with such passion and loudness as when it comes to pegasus

 

[T 1000]

Pegasus errors, as far as I know, have a couple reported so far, one of which can be considered suspicious, are on individual devices and not that the reported error is present on all devices.
I don't care about raising someone's rating above the real situation, I just don't like when I attend to doing injustice ,especially when injustice is done to a device that has amazed me with its versatility
This is a passion driven by reason

 

[sajunky]

Not to lengthen much of the story, all devices on the market have the same or more flaws than pegasus, this is easily seen when you get into the thread about a device, for example -Ares II has far more red flags than pegasus but its faults do not stand out with such passion and loudness as when it comes to pegasus

More Ares users, more reports, it is statistically very small percentage comparing to others, there are no red flags. It is how reputation of Denafrips is built over years. Small number of Pegasus users, less reports. Each one can raise red flag, for a good or bad on the startup (depends how a matter is handled by a brand). Passion has nothing to do with.

 

[801evan]

This thread is getting hijacked by people who wants to derail the Pegasus thread.

I thought the Pegasus is amazing. Better than a Hugo tt2 + mscaler. It's not musical or warm, but rather, very linear and has amazing speed that's makes you forget the busy passages gets congested by many other DACs. Sadly, the i2s wasn't compatible with the Jay Audio CDT so I returned it since their marketing was quite off and led the consumer believe it is compatible. It's still a new company getting it's footing. Also, the chassis was squeaky when squeezed.

Also I realize, my Topping l30 is a impedance mismatch so I owe it another chance when I feel compelled to. A friend bought it as well and did a fuse upgrade and said the SQ scaled wonderfully on both ends. That made me more interested in trying it out again. His chassis doesn't squeak and scales well with HQplayer outputting 1.5mhz.

 

[tuyen]

its saturday and ive been listening to the system for over 6 hours. No intermittent distortion so far.

i disconnected the yamaha preamp and switched it over to my diy stereocoffee pre (ldr based design). Wow...

 

[sajunky]

Also I realize, my Topping l30 is a impedance mismatch so I owe it another chance when I feel compelled to.

I guess you could afford A90, it has the same problem, so you saved lot of money making better choice.

Frankly, to get the best from Pegasus passive I/V conversion, you need non-feedback class A amplification. You can get a decent one for a price difference between Pegasus and Ares II.

 

[801evan]

I have an upgraded o-core transformer for the l30 with all silver power cord and 2.3mm cable. Much better than the dual smps of the a90.

Zen Can is a good class A amp. I upgraded it to be powered by ipower x 9v to a dxpwr 3a. Easily beat a Vioelectric, Questyle, Phonitor 2. It's actually the best amp I've heard but I had to loan it out to a friend when I had the Pegasus.

 

[T 1000]

Here, comparisons are made non-stop between Ares II and Pegasus, although it has been determined that Pegasus is comparable to Venus ??
Is that story still going on after being compared (listened to) by multiple users who owned both !?