I would take his comment to the U16 alone. And a general positive impression vs. U16 as likely. But equalising U16 with DI-20HE was overflowing a bucket a bit and destroyed trust.
Thanks for clarifying on this issue. I am also not native English speaking.
Thanks
@Jake2 . Yes, I was trying to explain exactly this: on the U16 and on the DI-20HE I feel an evident improvement using the OCK-2.
Differently, I haven't noticed an improvement using the square output of my OCK-2 clock to the uDDC. (as also reported, let me "burn in" all the devices and try the sine output, which was better, to me, with Gustard devices, and worst, i.e. with the famous DI-20HE).
The "equalization" that you "noticed" wasn't mine. The AudioGD sounds differently from the Gustard u16 (which was upgraded with silver wires and a better "ground", I'm a friend of technician, so we can try some tests. I can assure, with the upgrades, it sounds much better than the stock one).
The AudioGD doesn't sound bad, you will never read differently on any of my messages, I'm just saying that, to me, the uDDC sounds better than
both the Gustard u16 (with upgrade) and
also the AudioGD.
It seems to me that you have a very "high consideration" of the AudioGD devices.
I also appreciate them, you can trust me on this as, when the uDDC was arrived (as a surprise, as it wasn't planned as the other LAiV devices), I was evaluating to upgrade my AudioGD to the DI-25HE...but, since I have the Harmony DAC and HP2A, with pleasure, I preferred to take the uDDC.
Anyway, my AudioGD was nice but, i.e., it was a little bit "mellow": a lot of "dynamic power" was lost using it (USB input from my SOtM devices).
The uDDC doesn't have this, to me, limitation.
I have not reread all my (few) posts, but it seems to me that I wrote that I have (also) TWO Gustard x26 Pro (one original and one heavily modified), and as per your knowledge, the AudioGD does not handle the PIN to recognize DSD on Gustards (the LAiV does, for example).
For completeness, I did not describe everything I have because I thought this was a forum, not the tax office.
For (your) general knowledge, I can tell that I also own an Emotiva Pro DC-1 dac, two Emotiva xpa-1L power amps, a Naim NAP100 power amp, integrated AudioAnalyse PA60, another power amp (Ferson, an italian vintage brand), an m2tech DAC and DDC(young mk4, latest one + EVO 3) two pairs of passive speakers, online UPS upstream in the chain, followed by a galvanic isolator and other filters. I have also two PCs, one for the roon server and the other for the HQPlayer core, or I have a "vintage" Marantz power amp, tons of different cables (previosuly I mentioned the AQ, but, i.e. I use also a couple of Tellurium Ultra Black II XLR... and a lot of other nice things (a car box full of stuff).
For a moment I was tempted to attach some photos, but your phrase “if you have, I promise” made me to desist: this seems (to me) a forum.
I spend more than 10K a year on hi-fi, this is my standard since several years, and you can buy a lot of things with this money (of course it's always way limited: I would like to buy PMC high end speakers, or a nice Playback Designs DAC, but they're out of my budget
).
I don't know (and honestly I don't care) on your current chain or devices but, if you have the chance to try the uDDC vs the AudioGD, I would suggest, to try it (if possible, as you're comparing the HE versions, in order to have a "fair" comparison, the uDDC + a decent linear power supply).
Or course, feel free NOT to trust me, my perceptions are based only on my current chain and the purely subjective aspect of this passion, combined with the synergy of components, which is very important, prevents, without a doubt, the possibility of everyone having the same idea about something...and I think it is also a pleasant aspect of our common passion
Kind regards,
Andrea (given name
)
the tax man quote was hilarious 
