Hello and best wishes for the New Year.
I've just sold my Denafrips Ares II DAC, which, for its price, doesn't disappoint. But I've been itching to improve this part of my audio system for a few months now. Of course, I thought of the brand's big brother, the Pontus II, and then the Gustard R26, but in the end I chose this DAC, so singular and almost confidential in France.
In fact, since the end of 2023, Garry has been offering a DAC that has been thoroughly revised in many respects. You can see the profound difference between the old and the new just by looking inside. We can't reduce all these changes to the disappearance of the rectifier tubes.
In fact, recent tubes have both advantages and disadvantages. On the plus side, they're often smoother. But their disappearance often results in a quieter, more dynamic and transparent device.
This choice was also confirmed by the manufacturer of my SET 300b audio amplifier, FEZZ audio Mira Ceti 300b, which I like very much. For the same reason, FEZZ didn't want to use them on their amplifier. This is also Elekit's choice for its two SET amplifiers (I owned the TU8200DX, SET by 6L6WGC, which I really liked).For this new DAC. I trust Garry to have spent a long time honing his device so that its musicality is judged to be good and an improvement on the old version. I contacted him for some information and he confirmed that this new model is, to his ears, musically better than the old one.
I can well understand that if you have the old model, there's probably little point in changing it for the new one, unless your musical quest is for greater transparency and dynamics. For my part, after a Denafrips Ares II and a great deal of thought, my choice fell on this new Musical Paradise DAC. It's a Musical Paradise, and the quest for smooth, analog reproduction has always been Garry's goal, in every device he designs.
I also asked Garry about AKM chipsets. His answer is that the version delivered after the factory fire are lightened (currently AKM4499EX, prior to the AKM4499 fire) is less powerful than the old ones. So, for the time being, he's keeping them on the back burner, while waiting for more advanced, high-performance versions. For my part, I would have preferred AKM, even if in my opinion, the most important elements in a DAC are a strong, separate power supply for digital and analog, tube output stages and the quality of the output capacitors.
For financial reasons, I have to wait until early March to place my order. In the meantime, I had ordered some Jupiter Cooper capacitors, but they're out of stock. I then modified my order and chose Miflex 2.2 uF KPCU 600 V capacitors, as well as two Duelund by pass 0.01 uF 600 Vdc JDM-Sn/Cu series capacitors, paper oil in tinned copper foil. In fact, I'm delighted with this change, as probably the Miflexes are a better choice for me, as I like a bit of warmth on the vocals.
I hope that a lucky owner of this DAC will write a review of his musical experience with his new DAC.
Finally, I'm interested in the clock battery option, but only on condition that the clock is active on the SPDIF input, as I won't be using the USB input (Gustard U18). Do you know if this is the case ? Thanks for helping me make this choice of whether or not to buy the battery-powered clock for the SPDIF input.
Have a nice Sunday !
Jean-Louis.
