[hasanyuceer]

Anyone knows which is better via USB?

Thinking about getting one but i am really confused...

 

[fenixdown110]

The Musiland 02. 24bit/192kHz via usb cannot be beat at that price.

 

[hasanyuceer]

Some saying about uDac and its Sabre chip is best bang for the buck at these prices..

 

[fenixdown110]

Compare the specs for yourself and decide. Don't rely on what others say blindly.

 

[MikeW]

the sabre dac is cheaper, and supported by an american company, and does not use propritary drivers. It also uses a Sabre dac as already noted. Do compare the specs, but they don't mean that much. People get so wrapped up about 24/192. That's only a small portion of the puzzle. And there's hardly any content anyways. Im sure the udac is comparable on SNR and THD. Although those numbers don't say that much, there are dac's that have relatively poor specs that sound more musical then better measuring gear.

They are probably both good pieces, the sabre chip is much newer then the burr brown dac in the Musiland, it's also got it's own output stage, there are no op-amps or capacitors in the signal path, other then the one built into the sabre. The sabre will also undeniably have superior jitter reduction, while the musiland will have the superior transport itself. That's a toss up.

 

[swmtnbiker]

Absolutely. If specs were the be-all and end-all of the evaluation process then there wouldn't be much to talk about here. Ideally an A/B comparison will show up at some point.

 

[MikeW]

i'd also like to note the specs qouted on the ebay auctions for this dac are ********. They say 140DB signal to noise, the dac chip they use itself is only rated to 113 db, as found here

http://focus.ti.com/lit/ds/symlink/pcm1793.pdf

you never know what your gonna get from china.

 

[hasanyuceer]

Thanks for answers, still dont know not to do but wont think about it and will get one..

 

[qusp]

LOL@ 140db what a joke

 

[wang228]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MikeW /img/forum/go_quote.gif i'd also like to note the specs qouted on the ebay auctions for this dac are ********. They say 140DB signal to noise, the dac chip they use itself is only rated to 113 db, as found here http://focus.ti.com/lit/ds/symlink/pcm1793.pdf you never know what your gonna get from china.

Just out of curiosity, i checked their ebay ads, and it actually said

Digital S/N: 140dB (A-weighted)
Digital dynamic range: 140dB (A-weighted).

I think the important word here is 'Digital.' I take this as referring to usb-to-spdif conversion. 140db is within the limit of 24 bit (144 db).

 

[Uri Cohen]

I own this and it is worth the money. I was thinking about upgrading it to something better but everytime I listen to it I just keep saying it is already good enough.

 

[miyinan]

I heard the Musiland had a lot of driver problems. Anybody comment on that? I trying to decide between these two as well actually.

 

[weibby]

realistically speaking how many of us here needs 24/192 dacs?

 

[spookygonk]

Quote:

Originally Posted by miyinan /img/forum/go_quote.gif I heard the Musiland had a lot of driver problems. Anybody comment on that? I trying to decide between these two as well actually.

I have the Musiland (bought of these forums) and initially was using 1.0.7.0 which sounded very good and am now using 1.0.8.4 (out 4th MArch) and it works perfectly. Have a selection of music in 16/44 up to 24/192 and they all play (using foobar2000) and sound great. Only thing is I'm not very good at noticing / differentiating / describing the nuances of different drivers or cables (as with the so called 'golden ears'), so I'm just going to listen to and enjoy my music.

Acer One > Musiland Monitor 02 US > Darkvoice 332 > Sennheiser HD580 (& AKG K701 when my birthday arrives).

 

[timoteo]

I bought the $99 NuForce uDac for work and I'm sending it back. I'm using Grado SR-325i headphones and although I hear some little tonal differences, on my computer at work the NuForce does not give me any more detail or soundstage or give any more "life" to the music than I can get through the headphone output directly rather than through the DAC. My computer has some basic Dell soundcard - nothing fancy. "No difference" is not worth $99 to me.

Never ever ever rely just on specs. They are meaningless. Get whatever gear you want on home loan and listen to it and decide for yourself.