[vlach]

 
Quote:

How good is this combination with RP&T? I listen to just about every genre of music except techno (electronic).
 
I was listening to some Earth, Wind and Fire tonight and realized that my current system (HD650 + Little Dot Mk III) is very lacking in this one area.
 
Overall I'm very happy with the Senn's and hope most of this can be fixed with a new DAC/Amp. Would running the Senn's balanced help?
 
It sounds like the C2 can handle it but I have reservations about the 'smoothness' of the Audio GD dacs.
 
If you know of other DAC/Amp's that excel in this area please let me know.

Which DAC are you using now?

 

[slim.a]

Quote:

How good is this combination with RP&T? I listen to just about every genre of music except techno (electronic).
 
I was listening to some Earth, Wind and Fire tonight and realized that my current system (HD650 + Little Dot Mk III) is very lacking in this one area.
 
Overall I'm very happy with the Senn's and hope most of this can be fixed with a new DAC/Amp. Would running the Senn's balanced help?
 
It sounds like the C2 can handle it but I have reservations about the 'smoothness' of the Audio GD dacs.
 
If you know of other DAC/Amp's that excel in this area please let me know.

In my opinion, the Audio-gd DACs are more impressive than their amps. The "smoothness" comes from the lack of edginess and artificial distorition in the top end. They are closer to the original than many sigma delta based DACs.
 
If you spend a few weeks with a good DAC such as the dac19dsp, it is hard to listen to many other offerings as many of them sound wrong. The same cannot be said about the C2. The C2 is an excellent headphone amp for the price, but even when I listen to the LD MKIII, I don't feel the sound is wrong. It doesn't have the same resolution, separation of instruments, dynamics... yet it still sounds like music.

 

[kunalraiker]

Quote:

 The same cannot be said about the C2. The C2 is an excellent headphone amp for the price, but even when I listen to the LD MKIII, I don't feel the sound is wrong. It doesn't have the same resolution, separation of instruments, dynamics... yet it still sounds like music.

I would agree to some extent,but could you emphasise.

 

[Tom W]

Right now I'm using a mid priced Sony CD Player that is about 10 years old. Blue Jean Interconnects. APC (H15?) Power Conditioner.
 
I was listening to a re-mastered Atlantic sampler CD last night and parts of songs sound incredibly good and then...'it' happens. Vocals, keyboards seem fine. Horns sound digital but not too bad. To me the system always falls apart in the rhythm section. It sounds like there's a blanket over it or that they're all on top of each other. Maybe it's the pitch or timbre more than the PR&T but something is WAY off with the drums and bass.
 
I'll listen to some music with more percussion (but less bass and drum kit) and re-evaluate my situation.
 
I emailed Kingwa about using the Roc with the DAC19 and he didn't exactly recommend against it but thought it wouldn't be a good match. I told him I wanted to use the ACSS to connect the two. I was hoping the Roc would be a little tighter than the C2 and would give me the chance to run balanced in the future if I decided to go that route.
 
Slim.A I know what you're saying about going back...I find I listen to less than one album a day a work now on the ipod where I used to never take them off.

 

[.Sup]

Hey guys, does anyone know how to make an ACSS>RCA cable?

 

[haloxt]

Tom W, for a long time I listened to dac19mk3 rca to phoenix, alternating between SE and balanced headphone cable. I think if you use dac19dsp acss to roc with balanced headphones, you may notice roc making macrodetail performance more emphasized, whereas using single ended amp will give more equal macro and microdetail performance. SE dac to balanced headphones is like a crystal clear pluck of a string, with not as impressive bloom, fullness fading in and out. Staying SE in both dac and amp leads to a more proper balance and doesn't make you raise your eyebrow as ambience or bloom fades in and out.
 
.Sup, ipodpj has special ACSS to xlr cables. Don't know if anyone besides ipodpj has tried it though.

 

[IPodPJ]

Send a PM to Steve Eddy.  He can tell you how to do it.  It's pretty easy though.  You'll need a good size XLR barrel like a Switchcraft with enough room to house the resistors, a few resistors of your choice so you can customize the output voltage (you will need to know the current output of your DAC -- I measured the Reference 7 at approximately 2mA), some nice wire, and some ACSS connectors.
 
Not sure if you can do ACSS to RCA with a balanced DAC, I don't think so.

 

[.Sup]

Thanks PJ. Where can I get the connectors?

 

[IPodPJ]

Probably from Digikey or Mouser.  Send a PM to Steve.  I don't remember where he ordered mine from.  Minus the wire, I think the cable parts will run you about $80-$90 if you use some good Vishay resistors (not nude ones, they are much more expensive and won't fit inside the barrel anyway).  Whichever wire you choose will cost as much as you decide to spend on it.
 
The output voltage from the cable is around 2.5V (I'll need to test it again to confirm) because it was based off the incorrect measurements posted on Audio-gd's site and I didn't have a multimeter to test it at the time.  I had planned on it outputting 5V to be closer to the output of the XLRs on the DAC (which was also an incorrect measurement he posted, which he has revised to state the correct output of 5.33V).  Anyway, if you decide to do two sets of cables each with different values please let me know what you think.  I am curious to hear your impressions stating which one sounds better or if they both sound the same, or if the 5V sounds the same as using ACSS directly (and of course you'd have to make a plain ACSS cable with the same wire, for fair comparisons).

 

[SaiSai]

I ordered a DAC 19 DF yesterday. Can't wait..........
I also bought a new power cable (Audio Art Power 1) and a Oyaide pure silver coaxial cable for the DAC. I hope they can perform well.

 

[haloxt]

Hope you like it, DF filter can be pretty amazing sounding sometimes.
 
Is that oyaide FTVS-510? How much was it?

 

[SaiSai]

 
Quote:

Hope you like it, DF filter can be pretty amazing sounding sometimes.
 
Is that oyaide FTVS-510? How much was it?

the cable cost me $140 (USD). I did some tests last night. Hooked it to the CDP and the DR. DAC2 DX then output to the Burson HA160 through RCA. Sounds good to me.

 

 

[haloxt]

Who did you buy from? Oyaide stuff seems quite interesting, tempted to try their digital cable.
 
Err sorry for the derail . Do let us know how your new cables do with the dac19 though, it looks like it'll be good synergy.

 

[SaiSai]

 
Quote:

Who did you buy from? Oyaide stuff seems quite interesting, tempted to try their digital cable.
 
Err sorry for the derail . Do let us know how your new cables do with the dac19 though, it looks like it'll be good synergy.

I bought the Oyaide in a shop in Hong Kong.
I spent alot this week. Besides the Oyaide, I bought a pair of Audio Art IC-3,  3 Power 1 cables (one each for CDP, Head Amp and DAC), a Russ Andrews Mains Extension (The PowerLink). The purchase of DAC 19DF will be the last, at least for the time being......
 

 

[SaiSai]

I got it! It sounds amazing to me! The sound stage is so big! I love it!
My desktop head-fi setup has completed.