Since a question and a review of Bifrost 2 came up recently, let me just add my 2 cents.
I was at first put off by the increase in price from $600 to $700, but this is just a knock-out DAC! Spacious, good timbre...I have a standard set of classical music tracks I listen to for 'test purposes’. I expected improvement, but I’m just blown away by this. Or to put it differently, as the test tracks were playing, I just sat down and listened to the music for an hour. That’s unusual for a ‘test scenario’.
Currawong had a nice review, I won’t try and duplicate that, only to say it is consistent with my impressions.
I have not yet tried to compare it to Yggdrasil. It is inconvenient for me to install the Bifrost in that system, and that is not where I will use it in any case.
Compared to the original Bifrost (not gen 3 usb) it just lifts a veil, gives a richer, more natural timbre to the music. Bifrost multibit OG is good, that is where I started with Schiit, shocked at how much better it was than my previous $900 sigma-delta DAC. And that was not just something ‘new’. Every time I put that old DAC in a system, compare it even to modi multibit , the old DAC goes back in the drawer. Well, now I have a Bifrost OG that I need to give to a friend.
Since Ableza has noted that ‘xx%’ better is foolishness, I will just say that for me it is ‘x%’ better. YMMV
addendum: Asgard 3 is also a good product...but for me it is not a 'blow-away' like the Bifrost 2. It has more top end sparkle than vali 2, but for me less detail, less spacious. But these are small differences and trade-offs. If you don't want to mess with tubes and a larger form is not a problem, Asgard 3 is excellent choice at the ..'budget level'
Maybe with the addendum it's my 3 cents...
NF