[Progisus]

I recently got a Ha1 a few days ago and have been loving it so far. Unfortunately i'm in quite a conundrum as it's making me want to sell my Gungnir Multibit which is by all regards a more expensive dac. I have been doing A/B comparisons for the last 2 days now between the Gumby dac and the Oppo Ha1 dac and for the life of me i cannot notice a discernible difference of say more then 1%. The Gumby sounds maybe a touch warmer and when i say a touch it's really not even noticeable it's to such a tiny degree, that in fact it may not even be there. Also just to mention that i used the Oppo amp for both dacs and listened at exactly the same volume with same cables for all tests. Only took me about 2 seconds to change between dacs as well.

Anyway, That's how alike the sound sounds coming from both the Gumby and Ha1 dac sounded. Now just to make sure i was hearing what i was hearing. I compared the sound impressions from a HD800S, LCD 2, and a Shure 846. I could clearly hear HUGE! sonic differences between the headphones but not between the two dacs. I'm honestly becoming a believer that 99% of the sonic difference is coming from the headphone and not from the dac. If i had to advise someone buying new gear that wanted to hear the best sound, i would honestly tell them the headphone is by far and away the most important part.

So where does this leave me, i'm not really sure to be honest and would love some of your guys input....
I'm tempted to just sell my Gumby soon which i have loved so much. I will continue to spend hours doing more tests as i enjoy it, but i'm not really sure what to think about spending money on dac's after a certain price point anymore.

I totally understand your feelings. I feel I could easily have stayed with my HA-1. It also handles EVERY signal thrown at it and has the fantastic display as well. Also helps heat the room in winter. Lol. I think it is going to reclaim its desk space.

 

[craftyhack]

I totally understand your feelings. I feel I could easily have stayed with my HA-1. It also handles EVERY signal thrown at it and has the fantastic display as well. Also helps heat the room in winter. Lol. I think it is going to reclaim its desk space.

I have been using my HA-1 for hours everyday since I got it in the beginning of Aug in 2014. It is my desktop DAC/AMP for all of my main PCs(shared with a USB switcher, basically a KVM). I use at least one of my PCs every day for minimum say 2-3 hrs. When working and then gaming after than could be 20 hrs or more straight. I have had zero issues with it and it does everything I need wonderfully. Now that I realized that it is 4 years old with maybe tens of thousands of hours on it I am a bit nervous . Perhaps I should buy another as a spare while that is still sort of possible.

 

[Audiofiend1]

Thanks for the replies guys, i'm really happy to hear that it's not just me who feels this way about the HA1 dac compared to other dacs. It's amazing to see how many people love their Ha1 dac

 

[craftyhack]

Thanks for the replies guys, i'm really happy to hear that it's not just me who feels this way about the HA1 dac compared to other dacs. It's amazing to see how many people love their Ha1 dac

Yeah man, and thank you for posting, you probably saved me at least $650 . I already have a gen 1 gungnir and I have been thinking real hard about sending it in to upgrade it to Gen 5 USB and multibit. I use it (with a Gen1 Mjolner) in my living area listening chair (vs. my HA-1 on my computer desk) and I can't really tell the difference between my HA-1 and my Gungnir/Mjolner right now (example cans used are unmodded HD800, LCD3, LCD-XC, Focal Elear all balanced on both DAC/AMPs). I figured after upgrading it would be much better than the Gen 1 version as well as the HA-1. It sounds like upgrading it would be a waste of $ as I prolly don't have a golden(or even copper) ear.

That said, if I can find another HA-1, I would totally swap it out for my Gungnir/Mjolner as I do like the functionality of my HA-1 much more (remote, a nice display, more I/O, monitor outs, etc.) and it would be cool to have a spare, if my desktop HA-1 breaks I am gonna be hurtin, I am not aware of anything out there with this foot print and this functionality and quality to drive both monitors and headphones .

I had also been considering picking up a Sonica to stack on my HA-1... but from what I read a lot of people couldn't tell the difference between the DAC in the Sonica and the DAC in the HA-1 either.

 

[Partyslammer]

Has anyone done a recent comparison between the HA-1 and the Marantz HD-DAC1?

I've been using the Marantz with either Denon 7200's or Audeze LCD-XCs as far as digital sources and have been totally satisfied with the sound but I've never been happy with the Marantz' kinda cheap single stereo analog connection for analog sources from my receiver such as the turntable. I guess I'm wondering if I should consider finding a good used Oppo HA-1 and trading/selling my Marantz or using the likely additional $500+ I would need to spend to get an Oppo and just go for a simpler analog (maybe tube) headphone amp *in addition* to keeping the Marantz?

 

[LarryMagoo]

As mentioned previously, I use a Yggdrasil DAC with my HA-1 as I find most Delta Sigma DAC's tend to sound harsh/strident compared to an R2R style DAC. I really love all that the HA-1 can do...it's a shame that Oppo got out of the Music component business...in light of that development I think that HA-1 will turn into a real collectors item...if it hasn't already...

 

[WildStyle-R11]

Well i just swapped to my Marantz SA8005 built in DAC, to see what it does. I can't unhear it. The HA-1 has some kind of brightness somewhere. It sounds to me that the Marantz cleans up the sound in comparison.

 

[makan]

Well i just swapped to my Marantz SA8005 built in DAC, to see what it does. I can't unhear it. The HA-1 has some kind of brightness somewhere. It sounds to me that the Marantz cleans up the sound in comparison.

Yes. Some people have heard that brightness in the HA-1 DAC. Others like me haven’t. Enjoy!

 

[Progisus]

Yes. Some people have heard that brightness in the HA-1 DAC. Others like me haven’t. Enjoy!

HA-1 has earned space on my desk so... put the Chord TT in line out mode and fed into HA-1 analog. Lots of power to feed the Utopias and sounds great. Sometimes I wonder if the amp section of DAC/Headphone Amplifiers isn’t actually what gives the sound “signature”.

 

[Svatopluk]

Well i just swapped to my Marantz SA8005 built in DAC, to see what it does. I can't unhear it. The HA-1 has some kind of brightness somewhere. It sounds to me that the Marantz cleans up the sound in comparison.

The brightness comes from the HA-1's ESS Sabre32 DAC, the amp is very natural and not coloured in any way. OPPO's implementation of the Sabre32 seems to bring the treble forward in the mix somewhat resulting in the perception (real or not) of added brightness. Some folks find it annoying, some do not.
I still have my BDP-105 but I rarely use it's DAC (same as HA-1) nowadays. It's mainly used as a transport in conjunction with Yggdrasil functioning as DAC.

 

[WildStyle-R11]

Yeah, I'm still using my Oppo HA-1 as my AMP. The DAC is good and the brightness isn't too bad, but it is quite noticeable if you are sensitive to that. Took me years to figure out I'm sensitive to treble.
Well good news is I was gonna put new link in the chain anyway, so it doesn't matter at this point.

Also I can see people using the HA-1 Just because of the display, Just pass the signal trough. ^^

 

[hbmorrison]

FYI I am selling my Oppo HA-1 over in the classifieds.

 

[fnsnyc]

After trying the HA-1, I stuck with the Woo WA7.
The DAC in the HA-1 is better, but it is too 'clean' sounding. I miss the warmth of a more natural tone.

 

[MRC001]

Nothing like the tubulicious sound of a SET amp to tame the brutally clean output of a SABRE DAC

 

[Megalith]

Does plugging the HA-1 into a surge protector or UPS impact its sound/dynamics if you are only using its pre-outs? Or would that only affect the headphone amp section?