recently bought a used OG A1 with USB gen 5. I'm not happy w/ it. It sounds objectively worse than my shanling H7 with the latest AKM 4499EX DAC when connecting to a Mjolnir 3 over RCA.
The H7 w/ its AKM DAC has noticeably tighter and ethereal sound, and more importantly, noticeably more detail especially in the treble region. The OG A1 sounds veiled & muddy in comparison, and the details that effortlessly pop out on the H7 I almost have to strain to notice with the yggy. I notice nothing "special" about the yggy, aside from a more analog, organic sound compared to the H7, which is to be expected given the differences between R2R/multibit vs DS sound signature.
My question is, will adding a LIM to it help bring out more detail? I have read that the OG A2 is actually described as "aggressive" and "fatiguing" with lots of detail & energy, compared to the LIM which supposedly has a more neutral smoother sound.
But what about the A1 compared to the LIM? Sonically is the A1 considered to be darker and less detailed than the A2? And do people here that own LIM yggys think that I will notice an improvement in the treble and detail retrieval region over the A1?
Also worth mentioning I already upgraded to the unison USB from the gen 5. I do think the unison did minorly improve layering and texture of the sound vs the gen 5, but I still find the H7 hands down sounds better, despite being a portable headphone dac/amp that's 1/10 the size and weight of the yggy and less than half the cost.
FWIW, my headphones are the goldplanar GL850. Not popular I know, but consider it very similar to a heddphone, as its the same tech. And it sounds absolutely sublime w/ the H7 + mj3.
ps, also seeing all these A2 deals pop up only a week after I bought my used A1 for $1300 is also making my stomach turn a bit. Felt like I was getting a deal but when upgrading to unison + LIM I'm $2k deep into this hunk of metal now :\.