Introducing the VMV D2R High-Resolution Desktop DAC - Now Available on Apos Audio

[sendler2112]

Playing the VMV D2R DAC into the VMV P2 and the amp section of the Burson Conductor Reference SE for comparison, The VMV amp sounds better. It is slightly wider and slightly warmer in the range just above vocals. But even with this slightly more fleshed and easier midrange it can still hold an edge in retrieving the last bit of resolution of reverberant tails farther down and out. And bass extension and weight is improved. Some of this seems to be due to running the headphone cable from the 4 pin XLR balanced of the P2, whereas the Burson is only single ended and I'm using a short adapter on the end of my headphone cable to take the 4 pin to 6.35 TRS.

Playing the P2 out the SE jack is around 6db lower in gain and probably only half the power and starts to sound more like what I am hearing from the Burson but still not as bright around the HiFiMan 8k resonance peak. And using the RCA input to the P2 lops off another 6db. Which definitely forces you to bump up to the mid gain level. Which is fortunately only a very slight degradation to the sound compared to low gain. The difference in sound quality between high and low gain of the Burson or the Aune S17 is quite a loss when selecting high.


Since the P2 can accept XLR and the Burson SE only takes RCA input I could connect them both to the D2R at the same time, match levels, and just quickly switch the headphone cable back and forth. It was interesting to find, but not a surprise that with the output of the D2R set to "all", the sound was thicker and less detailed due to the extra impedance of the double load. It is nice to have option to turn on only one or the other.

The HifiMan HE1000SE are an amazing reviewers tool. So transparent and revealing.

 

[sendler2112]

The last thing I wanted to play with on the VMV D2R was to see if there was any difference in the sound between the variable and fixed output selections. When I tried this on my Burson Conductor 3XP, the difference was fairly substantial with the fixed setting sounding immediately more detailed and open. The D2R is much more subtle but the fixed does sound slightly more detailed and transparent than when switching to the variable setting, even before dialing in any level cut and matching the volume with the amp. Just going from -0.0 fixed, to -0.0 variable makes a slight change in the resolution.

That being said the variable still sounds good even with -6.0 matched so anyone using the VMV D2R as a volume control can use it for that much fine control and be happy with it.

Switching my amp to "mid" gain and taking the variable down toward a listening level matched -18.0, you can hear the quality starting to go away already. Even with 24/192 files. So analog volume control of the amp will still be better if you are using more reduction than this.

 

[sendler2112]

My comparison of the D2R to my Gustard A26:

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/gus...pressions-thread.966041/page-63#post-18084774

 

[saxeav]

Ciao. Ho comprato il dac smsl vmv D2R.Il dac e collegato al CD player con cavo coassiale rca. Il Dal e collegato all amplificatore con cavi xlr . Ascoltando la musica l'audio si interrompe e poi riprende, in alcuni momenti l'audio si interrompe per circa 5/6 secondi e poi riprende. Ho fatto il reso! Ne ho acquistato un secondo, stesso modello. Stessi problemi Mandato indietro anche questo! Possibile sia sfortunato?? Ho fatto molte prove, cambiando cavi, CD player,cavi di alimentazione. Ma il problema è rimasto. Cosa può essere successo? Grazie

 

[sendler2112]

I always used my VMV D2R via a USB from my computer and it never gave any problems.

 

[saxeav]

Sono capitato con dac difettosi. Pazienza

 

[sendler2112]

I would say that is not the case that the DACs are faulty and there must be some issue with your setup.

 

[saxeav]

Direi che non è vero che i DAC sono difettosi e che ci deve essere qualche problema con la tua configurazione.

Ho provato in tutti i modi. Nulla da fare. Ormai ho fatto il reso. Prima avevo il su 9, poi il su 10. Nessun problema con loro. Al Su 10 ,dopo circa due anni si e bruciato uno dei due trasformatori.

 

[sendler2112]

Ho provato in tutti i modi. Nulla da fare. Ormai ho fatto il reso. Prima avevo il su 9, poi il su 10. Nessun problema con loro. Al Su 10 ,dopo circa due anni si e bruciato uno dei due trasformatori.

The Gustard X26III is really good.

 

[saxeav]

Il Gustard X26III è davvero buono.

Si. In rete ne parlano molto bene.

 

[Musikfan]

Hi everyone,

Does anyone know if SMSL released a firmware revision for the dr2 dac? If so, can you please provide the revision # for most recent update,, and a weblink to the update? Are there instructions on how to install the revision?

On a related topic, how does one find the firmware version number on the dac?

Many thanks in advance.

 

[tesox]

Hi everyone,

Does anyone know if SMSL released a firmware revision for the dr2 dac? If so, can you please provide the revision # for most recent update,, and a weblink to the update? Are there instructions on how to install the revision?

On a related topic, how does one find the firmware version number on the dac?

Many thanks in advance.

https://www.smsl-audio.com/upload/portal/undefined/VMVD2RMCUFW250117.zip

 

[Musikfan]

https://www.smsl-audio.com/upload/portal/undefined/VMVD2RMCUFW250117.zip

Hi, thanks for sharing the link. There are 2 subfolders: support hiby and nonsupport hiby. Which one are we supposed to use? Are you supposed to connect the dac to a laptop/pc using USB? Also, if I understand step #3, you hold down the knob on the dac and power it up. Is that after you've connected the dac to the laptop/pc? Cheers!

 

[tesox]

Hi, thanks for sharing the link. There are 2 subfolders: support hiby and nonsupport hiby. Which one are we supposed to use? Are you supposed to connect the dac to a laptop/pc using USB? Also, if I understand step #3, you hold down the knob on the dac and power it up. Is that after you've connected the dac to the laptop/pc? Cheers!

Hi, sorry but I can‘t provide you any support for that. I never updated my D2R before I sold it. It did it with several other SMSL Dacs and it was always an adventure…

 

[saxeav]

Smsl sta cadendo in basso,