Well said……for me i either do not like……very rare, like……quite often but do not buy, and then finally must buy…….rarely.
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How on earth could you fall for hype - or did you not listen before buying?
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But you said they sound broken? That suggests they sound very bad.
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Just to add to my post for clarification.
Nothing wrong with naim Amp’s, i could have easily lived with the 500dr in my system.
Also all modern dac’s do a great job these day’s, it just that the real top ones just do it better, and have it all rather than just part’s.
Also the best dac’s will work really well with just about everything as they aren’t over clinical or dark, or whatever if you get what i mean. Much easier to get a great system balance.
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Surely at least after the first one you would know it was not to your taste? If you like something more, fair enough, but wasting time listening to something you don’t like and then buying another withoit listening doesn’t seem sensible at best
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Good, as you will have seen from many including me is trust your own tastes and ears and not what you read on social media. All people are saying here for the most part are their personal views… there are no absolutes and price is no absolute bearer of preference, or in consumer hifi even performance.
So I repeat, trust your own demos and ears, not what you read from marketeers, magazines and personal views on social media … it sounds like you have learned this now… but not sure why you are still needing to justify your own purchase decisions by saying how much you dislike one of your poorer personal purchase decisions…. However please remember what you prefer is personal to you and possibly others but almost certainly won’t apply to everybody.
BTW I demoed I believe dCS Debussy a little while back with magnetic planars… yep it was good, but not my cup of tea… but I don’t go on about it…. But certainly respect the company and it along with others how they push the boundaries of consumer audio replay to give a choice of product to suit taste. High end DAC tends to have a degrees of subjectivity and different approaches suit different tastes. The digital to analogue process by its definition is lossy and an approximation so there is room in the market for huge variability, there are certainly no absolutes… unless sampling theory has been changed…. which would probably be worthy of a Nobel prize.
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Hi BF,
Good advice here. I think it would all need to be demoed at home. In general I like to buy hi-fi in the summer. All the dealers have plenty of time and if I get something wrong, I have plenty of time to get it sorted out.
I did hear DCS at the show but it did not work for me in the context of the system used. Both Naim 200 and 300 sounded musical to me and both are different to what I have at home but not necessarily better.
“Someone great” from LCD soundsystem showed incredible handling of Microdynamics on the cord electronics. I’ve never heard such resolution before.
Paul
Hi Paul,
Your NDS sets a high bar for any other streamer to beat. It reminds me of our then CDS3/555PSDR.
The ND555 would be an obvious option for you, as it was for us. It’s a good choice. However, given the cost to change, it may be worth trying Chord dac + M Scaler, DCS and MSB to confirm your preference.
Happy auditioning!
Best regards, BF
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We have the ND555 into the 500/552 downstairs and the Chord HugoTT2 into the Nait 50 upstairs. Both sound great. I am not that judgmental. We could live easily with either system.
The law of diminishing returns on DAC’s at the DAVE price point and even a fair bit above really kicks in hard I’d imagine.
Sure your personal preference is always there, but to find a substantially better DAC, at least sound quality wise, your budget has to increase - massively.
Speakers, amps are fairly easy to hear a difference at similar price points. I’m finding DAC’s, streamer/DAC’s not so much.
For example the Esoteric that I had on a head to head with the DAVE was a very, very good unit. It was ultimately the more upbeat sound of the DAVE that appealed more and I like the look of the DAVE better too. Not everyone likes the look of the DAVE or the cheap remote that comes with it etc.
These little differences matter to me, but they also may not have any bearing on others at all.
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Amidst all these discussions, I can’t resist the urge to set up my Chord TT2 again for a comparison with the dCS Rossini Apex. In my previous comparison, which involved using a Chord amplifier, I noted that the Chord DAC was distinct in tempo, whereas the dCS was more sophisticated and refined in sound. This time, I’ll be using Gryphon and Vitus for amplification. However, I’ll be employing a monocrystal silver power cord, along with digital and analog interconnects, which are several times more expensive than the TT2. The entire TT2 and its linear PSU will run off the grid using a battery, similar to the rest of the gear in my system. This setup is somewhat unconventional, so the TT2 may perform differently compared to more common setups. Let’s see how it fares this time.
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Hi,
Owning Dave + M Scaler for some years now, I played quite a lot with. I had previously a Naim amplification (552/300dr) on passive Scm40, I moved to active 40’s and left Naim.
I demoed the Esoteric N05-XD two weeks at home, expecting to find a very good one box solution, it was a deception compared to the Dave. The Esoteric had a strange tone that reminded me the Tambaqui, a coloured midrange, demonstrative bass… bye bye.
Here a the results of my own tests at home :
- powercord on Dave : I tried about 15 different models like a crazy bacon (Nordost, Audioquest, Isotek, Shunyata…), all were adding and removing something, despite many tries, a standard powerlead in 0.75mm2 sounds the best here (most open, no bass boost, most natural in tones…).
- M Scaler : it really brings so much, there is no discussion about it on my side. Without, you loose space, deepness, presentation is more forward, quite some steps back.
- streaming input on M Scaler : I started with USB, switching to SPDIF gave a better result. It’s important to choose a good sounding streaming as the Chord combo is sensible to it. Some streamers I tried could sound thin (Holo Red, Metrum Ambre), now using a Magna Mano Mk3 with Gentooplayer and Diretta.
- digital BNC cables : the standard provided RG59 are quite OK, a bit on the thin/bright side, I tried different certified 75 Ohm models (Belden, Canare, no name…) and ended up with the Canare L-5CFB crimp mounted by Audiophonics. They gave the most full and qualitative result.
- with or without preamp : I prefer with a good preamp between Dave and the actives, Dave directly connected to the speakers is OK, but not the best I could achieve here. Dave outputs XLR over transformers, I prefer using RCA out of Dave to the preamp.
I tried many preamps (Nac 552dr, Pass Labs xp20, W4S STP-SE, Benchmark LA4, Topping Pre90, Bel Canto Pre5, Singxer SA-1…), some brands do colour the sound a lot, so it depends if you want to hear the preamp or the source, I choosed to to hear the source and ended up with a preamp from SPL. - XLR cables to speakers : again a lot of tries and tuning possible here, bought 2 mounted versions from Adam Hall, mounted some myself with Mogami 2549 (thick sounding), Canare L4e6s (too midrange oriented), Van Damme XKE (silver plating sounds bad). I ended with a pair of SQM from Grimm.
I’m curious to listen to the Ultima 3 preamp too, I recently tried another preamp, which showed me again how good mine is, I wouldn’t blind buy the Ultima 3.
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I agree with many of your comments here - particularly the standard IEC power cord as opposed to certain other audiophile based ones - and I do wonder if that is a consequence of the high frequency power supply used in DAVE which is is pretty specific to some Chord products
Agree about digital input sensitivities - to get the best, but I have found the Naim digital streamers to really gel here with DAVE directly - else where the M-Scaler reclocker helped. Note this is Naim Streamers when they are not doing 32 to 24 bit word resizing in my opinion.
Also agree about preamp - for me that tends to allow DAVE to sound sweeter in a system context - possibly more about system synergies etc.
Fed with what source?
I don’t find the Tambaqui’s midrange to be colored. I’ve just set it up with the PhoenixUSB Reclocker and am preparing to invite some of my friends over this coming weekend for an AB session with Emm Labs and dCS.
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Magna Mano Mk3 with DAVE, that should be a nice combination!
Super feedback, very much appreciated.
We have connected our DAVE to the Ultima 2 pre-amp. Dave’s output was designed to be single ended, with adapters for balanced but the Pre-amp was designed to be balanced, with adapters for single ended, so we have never known whether to go single ended or balanced. In the end we went balanced but still don’t know which is truly better as even in balanced mode cable choice really makes a difference.
Re the impact of the M Scaler, your description resonates perfectly with our impressions.
The Tambaqui sounded wonderfully smooth and inoffensive to us but it was also veiled, lacked dynamic range on transients and left bass lines feeling a bit slow & ponderous in comparison with M Scaler/DAVE in a back to back comparison. The rest of the system was Innuos Statement server, D’Agostino pre-amp, Chord Ultima 5 power amp and Kudos Titan 808 speakers.
We recently attended a Chord Electronics event at the Audiobarn. They demonstrated the impact of inserting an Ultima 3 pre between M Scaler/DAVE and a Chord Ultima 6 power amp, followed by the impact of replacing the Ultima 6 with an Ultima 5. The speakers were ATC SCM100 passives in a beautifully lacquered walnut veneer, if memory serves.
Inserting the Ultima 3 pre was wholly beneficial to these cloth ears in connecting one emotionally to the music. Once heard, I don’t understand how anyone could go back, so long at it could be afforded.
Best regards, BF
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