Thoughts on a bunch of DACs (and why delta-sigma kinda sucks, just to get you to think about stuff)

[AudioBear]

Indeed Theta said that and the creator has always believed that.  The Angstrom manual did not say that to my recollection.  Hmmmm.  That could be because I am not sure there was a manual per se.  All I'm saying is it sounded great right out of the box.  It didn't take days or weeks to figure out the Angstrom was pretty special.
 
Update:  Just thinking out loud.  I need to point out I was using the Angstrom for DVDs as a theater processor and not listening to music.  There is a big difference.  Voices have a much narrower frequency and dynamic range than music and our brains probably process voices differently than music. So that the Angstrom didn't need to burn in for voices to sound good might not say much about how music sounded. 

 

[frenchbat]

Depends on brands I guess. Although you might have a failure test in house before shipping. Also a lot of manufacturers actually keep the gear on standby all the time, eventhough there's a switch. It's just a mute.

 

[purrin]

  thanks so much, this gonna save me fortune )
imo, even the master 7 is not thick and smooth enough, i prefer more intimate, thicker, mid centric and lush voice, which i think agd old products offer, eg ref7.1 or audiogd sa series.  
I sold the master 7 and I was waiting for yggy but it seem the sound does not really suit my taste T_T

 
You could always find an older AGD Ref 7, a Sonic Frontiers SFD/SFCD (from PCX with warranty) or TransDAC.

 

[purrin]

In any case, we are a few with the opinion that an effective dynamic range of 80dB (that's <14bits) is likely fine for most recordings (that often rely on some varied levels of compression), listening conditions (background noise vs. peak loudness) and let's not forget the linearity of the rest of chain starting with the transducers...

 
Obviously, the designer of the TotalDAC doesn't agree with you. Otherwise why would he offer the d1-dual or d1-twelve? Just so he can charge people more? Stacking the DACs will average out errors, leading to better accuracy, leading to more perceived resolution. 

 

[joeexp]

New Chord DAC to arrive soon. It is called "DAVE"
No technical details as yet -  but more taps for their FIR filter.

Supposed to be the World's best DAC ..
Another candidate for the title ...
 
At least at looks mean 

 

[PCWar]

At least it got the price for the worst looking DAC of the world. Repaced the Hugo

 

[DreamKing]

Yes, I hope this is fake because it looks like it. It looks like it does nothing.

 

[purrin]

 

 
Gandalf in space. Maybe a device from one of the First Ones in Babylon 5. Or perhaps a prop in the Liberator in a new Blake's 7 if they ever decided to make one.

 

[evillamer]

Give it a million taps , but still based off flawed sigma delta design. No thanks.

 

[lukeap69]

Wow! This will give the PS4 and Xbox One run for their money! This is the game console I've been dreaming of... 

 

[skeptic]

Chord really needs a new industrial designer. 

 

[AustinValentine]

This is not the droid you're looking for.

 

[wahsmoh]

Put it in an overpriced chassis that claims to be able to handle a tank driving over it

 

[drfindley]

  Question, when you guys say that the Yggy has a noticeably high noise floor. Do you mean that you're hearing more of the crap that gets picked up by mics during recording? Or do you mean a sort of fuzziness to the background, or hell even electrical noise?

With the Yggy, I'm actually hearing hiss and such that I have not heard before. Turns out, it's in the original recordings! I found that some tracks are hiss-free (The Flaming Lips) and others have lots of hiss (Miles Davis, The White Stripes). The Yggy has a low enough noise floor for me that I can plainly hear the differences and the silences.

 

[jacal01]

 
Looking at that thing makes me think 'nanobots'.   Maybe there's a horde of them acoming...