[earnmyturns]

I had the Spring KTE as well as the Gen 5/Analog 2 Yggy in my house for about a month overlap. I think the AES input wins even with the Gen 5 USB input so I used AES but just a generic XLR cable. Without upsampling and listening through headphones I found the Yggy and KTE to be about level although each had its strong suits. Once you started upsampling, the KTE pulled out ahead through speakers though, the KTE couldn’t touch the Yggy at all.

Similar setup, except that my Yggy is Gen 3/Analog 1. Auralic Aries>AES>Yggy, Allo USBridge>USB>SU-1>I2S>Spring. Like you, I prefer Yggy for speakers, Spring for headphones. Yggy is in the queue for its Analog 2 upgrade, when it goes I'll move the Spring to my speaker system, then when the Yggy gets back I'll leave it burning in in the headphone system for a while, before swapping, it will be fun to compare when I do.

 

[kank]

After trying out the HOLO Spring L3, It is very impressive.
Recently coming from the Chord Hugo 2, I find the Spring L3 is head and shoulder above the Hugo 2. The sound stage has so much more depth, bass is stronger and more defined, lots of details, little bit warmer sounding than the Hugo2.
DSD rendition is superb, really happy with it so far. Quite a bargain if you are looking for a DAC only solution.
Now I need to setup the Singxer SU-1 module with it.

 

[WNBC]

Was that based on using the onboard amp or the Hugo2 as a DAC feeding into your amp? Just curious. I had preordered one back at the end of Summer 2017 as an all-in-one solution but with the delays I ended up cancelling my order. I ended up getting the iDSD BL and then ordered the Holo Audio Cyan. But, that ended up being delayed so I'm back full circle to another Spring. I am just feeding it FLAC 44.1, but eventually I need to splurge on an upgrade to Amarra 4 to some software that can upsample to DSD. Tried Roon and JRiver and then did upsampling to iDSD BL. Didn't necessarily sound better than Amarra 4. Now that I have Spring I'm out of free trials for Roon, JRiver . Can try Audivrana and HQPlayer to see the benefits of upsampling for Spring. For now, I won't be upgrading my computer so I just need some stable desktop player capable of DSD512 upscaling that won't drag down the whole system.

After trying out the HOLO Spring L3, It is very impressive.
Recently coming from the Chord Hugo 2, I find the Spring L3 is head and shoulder above the Hugo 2. The sound stage has so much more depth, bass is stronger and more defined, lots of details, little bit warmer sounding than the Hugo2.
DSD rendition is superb, really happy with it so far. Quite a bargain if you are looking for a DAC only solution.
Now I need to setup the Singxer SU-1 module with it.

 

[doraymon]

After trying out the HOLO Spring L3, It is very impressive.
Recently coming from the Chord Hugo 2, I find the Spring L3 is head and shoulder above the Hugo 2. The sound stage has so much more depth, bass is stronger and more defined, lots of details, little bit warmer sounding than the Hugo2.
DSD rendition is superb, really happy with it so far. Quite a bargain if you are looking for a DAC only solution.
Now I need to setup the Singxer SU-1 module with it.

I have both and agree completely on your comparison
If you are interested in a few months old SU-1 KTE DDR pm me.

 

[kank]

Was that based on using the onboard amp or the Hugo2 as a DAC feeding into your amp? Just curious. I had preordered one back at the end of Summer 2017 as an all-in-one solution but with the delays I ended up cancelling my order. I ended up getting the iDSD BL and then ordered the Holo Audio Cyan. But, that ended up being delayed so I'm back full circle to another Spring. I am just feeding it FLAC 44.1, but eventually I need to splurge on an upgrade to Amarra 4 to some software that can upsample to DSD. Tried Roon and JRiver and then did upsampling to iDSD BL. Didn't necessarily sound better than Amarra 4. Now that I have Spring I'm out of free trials for Roon, JRiver . Can try Audivrana and HQPlayer to see the benefits of upsampling for Spring. For now, I won't be upgrading my computer so I just need some stable desktop player capable of DSD512 upscaling that won't drag down the whole system.

I tried the Hugo 2 directly to my headphone and via amp. I prefer to have the amp in the chain as I find it adds a bit more body to the music. I am currently using JRiver upscaling to DSD512 too and quite like that (although you do need to turn the volume up a bit with DSD upscaling). I have no luck with the HQPlayer, it keep crashing on me when I start it so pretty much gave up on it.

 

[kank]

I have both and agree completely on your comparison
If you are interested in a few months old SU-1 KTE DDR pm me.

Thanks for the offer, but I have one coming already.

 

[WNBC]

I tried the Hugo 2 directly to my headphone and via amp. I prefer to have the amp in the chain as I find it adds a bit more body to the music. I am currently using JRiver upscaling to DSD512 too and quite like that (although you do need to turn the volume up a bit with DSD upscaling). I have no luck with the HQPlayer, it keep crashing on me when I start it so pretty much gave up on it.

Thanks. JRiver seemed pretty stable when I tried upsampling to iDSD BL and it is fairly inexpensive. Time to see what this Matrix X-SPDIF 2 and Spring can do. I always used SU-1 in the past, but wanted to try something different.

 

[llamaluv]

Time to see what this Matrix X-SPDIF 2 and Spring can do.

I'm in the process of doing this as well. I'm using the X-SPDIF 2 with my Spring KTE, which just arrived yesterday. No issues using I2S thus far, though I've only tried PCM 44.1K and 96K. Along with the obligatory burn-in, experimenting with PC-based upsampling (PCM 704K and DSD512 hopefully) is next up on the agenda.

 

[motberg]

Thanks guys... looking forward to the Matrix X-SPDIF 2 reviews... especially in comparison to the SU-1

 

[WNBC]

For fun I did try upsampling. With my Macbook I soon remembered, oh yeah native DSD is not supported. 4X DSD via DoP sounded pretty good. With limited testing I think I could hear a difference vs non-upsampled, but I do wonder if I would fail a blind test. Shows me how good the Spring is in NOS mode just playing 44.1 files.

I did have a PC to try for native DSD. I now see what you guys mean by needing a more powerful computer. Surface Pro 3 had popping noise issue at 8X DSD, but when I dropped it down to 4X upsampling there were no problems with native 4X DSD AISO playback. Again, sounded very good. I think there is something there and maybe I can just point to an overall clarity or cohesiveness, but it could be expectation bias. Not sure how critical I'll end up being with formal tests. Just not enough time for that right now.

Matrix SPDIF 2 performed well. All signals passed on to Spring were correctly reported. No hiccups. Can't say it sounds better or worse than SU-1 since it has been over 6 months since I've owned one.

The Surface Pro 3 is an old work computer that I'm just reassigning for music. Thoughts on native DSD vs DSD via DoP. Are there audible differences? My Macbook Pro is more powerful and a better laptop for doing 8X native DSD assuming Apple got it together and supported native DSD without MicroRendu. My knowledge here is limited so let me know if there is a way to do native DSD512 on a Macbook.

 

[doraymon]

For fun I did try upsampling. With my Macbook I soon remembered, oh yeah native DSD is not supported. 4X DSD via DoP sounded pretty good. With limited testing I think I could hear a difference vs non-upsampled, but I do wonder if I would fail a blind test. Shows me how good the Spring is in NOS mode just playing 44.1 files.

I did have a PC to try for native DSD. I now see what you guys mean by needing a more powerful computer. Surface Pro 3 had popping noise issue at 8X DSD, but when I dropped it down to 4X upsampling there were no problems with native 4X DSD AISO playback. Again, sounded very good. I think there is something there and maybe I can just point to an overall clarity or cohesiveness, but it could be expectation bias. Not sure how critical I'll end up being with formal tests. Just not enough time for that right now.

Matrix SPDIF 2 performed well. All signals passed on to Spring were correctly reported. No hiccups. Can't say it sounds better or worse than SU-1 since it has been over 6 months since I've owned one.

The Surface Pro 3 is an old work computer that I'm just reassigning for music. Thoughts on native DSD vs DSD via DoP. Are there audible differences? My Macbook Pro is more powerful and a better laptop for doing 8X native DSD assuming Apple got it together and supported native DSD without MicroRendu. My knowledge here is limited so let me know if there is a way to do native DSD512 on a Macbook.

I’m very interested in the comparison between Matrix SPDIF 2 and SU-1 but I understand you don’t ha e the latter anymore? Was it a KTE DDR or a standard one?
Thanks for your impressions.

 

[WNBC]

I had just the standard SU-1. I don't doubt there are improvements over stock SU-1 with the modded versions. Something to consider in the future I suppose.

I’m very interested in the comparison between Matrix SPDIF 2 and SU-1 but I understand you don’t ha e the latter anymore? Was it a KTE DDR or a standard one?
Thanks for your impressions.

 

[kank]

Bit of a revelation today, I've recently added the Singxer SU-1 to the HOLO Spring L3. I've been using a few HDMI cables with the unit. I have tried a few different HDMI and I can't believe how much difference the sound actually make from different cables. Ranging from 0.5m to 3m, it is quite fascinating as I am not really a big believer of HDMI cable.
Ended up getting the Nordost Blue Heaven 1m HDMI and it sounded a fair bit better than the $30-40 generic HDMI cables (of decent quality). So I encourage people to try out different HDMI if you are using the same setup as I am.

 

[T Bone]

Ended up getting the Nordost Blue Heaven 1m HDMI and it sounded a fair bit better than the $30-40 generic HDMI cables (of decent quality). So I encourage people to try out different HDMI if you are using the same setup as I am.

Thanks for sharing your findings! I tried a few different HDMI cables - mostly because of length; not resolution. Nordost makes some great gear.

 

[kingkikapu]

Anybody have any experience comparing su-1/spring/gsx mk2 + utopia vs Dave+utopia?