[LarryMagoo]

So you are saying there's no difference at all between "well engineered" DAC's? I wonder why there are so many to choose from if they all sound the same. All I know is that changing DAC's on my system was DRAMATICALLY different!!! And all I did was change from one DAC to another with zero other changes....others can repeat that story....especially when listening to a R2R or/and Multi-Bit DAC over a Delta Sigma DAC!

 

[ngyu]

Hahaha, I love how the first two replies are polar opposites for each other. Glad to know I'm not alone in this struggle!

I'm an engineer by trade, so I definitely hear what you're (LarryMagoo) saying about Multi-Bit R2R DAC should be better than DS DACs. Everything in theory pointed to me that the Gumby should be better, that's why I forked out the money to buy it.

However, as I'm doing the same DAC only change, my ears are my ears and what I hear.... well... I couldn't hear the difference. I don't have that 'digital glare'. I'm trying to hear for that improved sonic detail... the smoothness without losing clarity...., but when I switch back to the Oppo....the detail is there too! This is also with the 'warm up' time I keep hearing the Gumby needs... it's been on for almost a week (same with the Oppo).

So that's why I'm thinking it's just my ears can't hear the difference.

 

[MRC001]

Your honesty and open mindedness goes a long way to minimizing expectation bias & placebo effect that plagues listening comparisons.

 

[LarryMagoo]

NGYU,

EE or ME? Those are the only professions that I call on for custom components my Partners make in their ISO 9001 & 13485 shops!!!!

Robert Harley, Absolute Sound, just finished reviewing the Schiit Yggdrasil. After one week, it still sounded bad to him. The Yggy and Gumby's are famous for needing break-in time! Robert says this about break-in....


Although Moffatt warned me that the Yggy wouldn’t sound

good right out of the box, I gave it a quick listen anyway after

an hour of warm-up. He was right; the Yggy was hard, bright,

forward, and flat. I checked in with it a couple of times over

the next week and heard it improving somewhat, but it was still

disappointing. I decided to let it sit in my rack, powered up, for

a full month before revisiting it.




Your Gumby will need the same break-in to sound it's best....More Sweetness to come after the 300 hours mark! Schiit co-founder, Jason Stoddard, actually prefers the Gumby to the Yggy.....I'm telling you that there simply is ZERO comparison between the Oppo's ESS Sabre 9018 (their new DAC, the 9038, two steps above our 9018's, yet still reviewed to expose that Sabre glare though much less than the 9018) and your Gumby. Let us know next month your listening impressions!

Cheers,
Larry

 

[ngyu]

ME working in an EE environment. Got experience in both worlds.

Yeah, I've read a bunch of the reviews + actually heard the Gungnir Multibit before making the decision to buy it. It's possible that my Gungnir isn't warmed up cause I don't have the Mjolnir sitting on top of it like my friend's. I'll give it a bit more time, but my 15 day Schiit return window will come up soon, I'll make a decision before then.

Regardless of reviews, at the end of the day, I gotta hear it to make it worth it. If someone else hears it, but I don't, then why would I spend my money on it? I don't doubt it's superiority in concept and design and implementation, cause on paper, it does look better. I just doubt the capabilities of my own ear. Is there an upgrade for my ear's ADC? (kidding)

 

[ray-dude]

As part of our huge headphone shootout, we did extensive A/B testing between the Oppo HA-1 and various DACs (Jotunheim, Mimby, Gumby, etc). Oppo is a damn fine unit (esp. on the headphone side). Except for the Jotunheim delta sigma DAC (eh), we heard VERY little to distinguish the DACs going through the common Oppo amp. There were a handful of tracks where particular passages were "tells", but you really had to key off of them in an A/B test. The Yggy had a bit more obvious separation, so even then, it was very subtle.

In general I find DACs to all have their own character, but I need to live with them for an extended amount of time to build up an intuition of what the DAC is. It is almost like they are training my head to hear in a particular way. When I have extended audition stretches (vs A/B), the difference is much more palpable for me.

An exception for me is the Chord DAVE. When I dropped it in vs the Oppo HA-1, it was revelatory. I had never heard music reproduced that way through headphones. Absolutely stunning. The more I listen to the DAVE, the more I discover in its music reproduction. 10x premium over the Oppo, but for me at least, it is worth it (as long as I'm in denial about that extra 0 I paid for it It is the first and only DAC I've heard that was enough of a jump for me to move off my Oppo HA-1

 

[alphanumerix1]

I briefly got to try the hd800s through the ha-1 se output and was not impressed. Whats the general consensus with the hd800/s with ha-1 do they pair well?

Would the lcd2/X/3 be a better match?

 

[Hooster]

I briefly got to try the hd800s through the ha-1 se output and was not impressed. Whats the general consensus with the hd800/s with ha-1 do they pair well?

I believe that the consensus is that they do not pair well. Having 2 components that err on the side of harshness together is normally not a great idea.

 

[zilch0md]

(snip) But well engineered DACs do sound so similar as to be nearly identical, and any differences that one detects would be splitting hairs. (snip)

The truth of this statement varies greatly with the experience of the listener and the other gear that's present in his or her chain (i.e. from true to not true to everything in between).

There are legions of people who listen to music every day, who most certainly cannot tell the difference between any two "well engineered" DACs, primarily because they've never spent much time listening to "well engineered" DACs with "well engineered" sources, amps and transducers. Depending on the headphone their using, nearly all novices will express some measure of appreciation at first going from their laptop's sound card to something like an Audioquest Dragonfly, but if, on the very next day, they are allowed to hear even a $10,000 DAC with the same headphones, it's highly unlikely they are going to discern any difference. Two things are missing from that scenario - experience and a chain that's worthy of the comparison.

You don't have to possess mythical "golden ears" to hear subtle differences in well engineered DACs. All you need is a few years worth of adaptive hedonism spoiling your appreciation for lesser gear - the process in which you repeatedly get bored with that which was at first pleasurable and repeatedly seek a better experience. -AND- This won't happen unless you've persistently eliminated weak links in the component chain, as you raise the bar with one component, then with another. A single weak link can obscure the differences between well-engineered DACs.

I think we can all agree there is absolutely no point in comparing "well engineered" DACs while using a $100 pair of headphones. Sadly, even a $1000 pair of headphones or a $1000 amp can obscure such a comparison. My LCD-2 Rev. 1 are not known for neutrality or resolution and they have shelved highs. They sound just fine with the most "glaring" of ESS DACs, yet no better with NOS DACs - at least not in my experience. Try that with the HD800. In my opinion and that of many others, it is all but incompatible with ESS DACs, though most appreciative of NOS DACs (and a few OS DACs other than those by ESS). So, in addition to having well-jaded ears, if you're going to evaluate well-engineered DACs, all the downstream components have to be up to the task.

The HD800 is a "microscrope" into everything that's happening upstream, including the quality of the tracks you're choosing to play. It's very sensitive to amps that use a lot of negative feedback. It much prefers zero-feedback or, at least, low-feedback amps. When I want to compare DACs, I plug my HD800 into the zero-feedback Metrum Acoustics Aurix, set to 0 dB gain, to bypass its gain transformers (serving as a passive pre.)

 

[zilch0md]

I briefly got to try the hd800s through the ha-1 se output and was not impressed. Whats the general consensus with the hd800/s with ha-1 do they pair well? Would the lcd2/X/3 be a better match?

The HD800 and, to a lesser extent, the HD800S (which just has more bass energy and less of a treble spike), are not happy on the HA-1, in my opinion. Just about any planar magenetic, including those by Audeze or Oppo's PM-1, PM-2, and PM-3 absolutely love the HA-1. If you are willing to spend HD800S or LCD-3 money - just get the PM-1. You'll save some money and find a very nice synergy with the HA-1 - and I'm not saying that because they're both made by Oppo, but rather, because they just sound great together, with many different genres, and with no fatigue across long hours of listening. I wear the PM-1 when I just want to enjoy listening to music.

 

[ngyu]

I personally own the HD800 and Oppo HA-1, running in balanced mode. I have been known to not be as sensitive to sibilence, but I personally really enjoy my HD800 on the HA-1, and don't find it harsh at all.

 

[zilch0md]

I personally own the HD800 and Oppo HA-1, running in balanced mode. I have been known to not be as sensitive to sibilence, but I personally really enjoy my HD800 on the HA-1, and don't find it harsh at all.

Thanks for your perfectly valid counterpoint, ngyu. In the end, with this hobby, we have to decide for ourselves. I actually envy your "compatibility" with the HA-1 + HD800 combo. I can enjoy it in short doses and it's truly remarkable.

 

[makan]

I personally own the HD800 and Oppo HA-1, running in balanced mode. I have been known to not be as sensitive to sibilence, but I personally really enjoy my HD800 on the HA-1, and don't find it harsh at all.

I have the same setup and I too
don't find it harsh

 

[LarryMagoo]

I have a the 800S and I use it with incredible results with my HA-1!!! However I am not using the ESS Sabre DAC inside the HA-1. I am only using the Oppo's Class A amp but with the Schitt Yggdrasil DAC. The infamous Sabre glare is gone and lets the amp's sweetness shine through!! I am running XLR's balanced in from the DAC and run XLR's balanced output with a custom made 20 ft cable from DH-Labs.

 

[zilch0md]

^ I hear you. The HA-1 amp section is loved by many, as it works well with many different types of headphones and many tastes.