Anyone got any opinions/ experience re Audio Note DACs ???
Jeff, the man to ask here is Data, he's had a few I believe, I've only ever heard the Dac 5, serious disappointment, mind you if you get one, your new ac mains transmission device will certainly kick it in the balls for sure
Hmm....my new AC mains transmission device......posted today apparently. Twill be interesting to see the effect. Although I'm hoping to divert a few shekels from my the sale of my flat (without wishing to tempt fate - my buyers are awkward so and so's), I do think a DAC 5 might be stretching it a bit Possibly something rather lower down the scale
I looked at buying a DAC3 blind a few months ago, but decided against it. I think the thing seems to be they have a very unique sound. Now, in relation to the parts they have inside them, they are a complete rip-off. However, if that sound is what floats your boat, you'll be happy to shell out whatever the price is for the sound you're getting. On the other hand, I'd really not want to buy stuff from Audio Note, I've heard a few too many stories about Peter Q and his attitude towards dealers and ultimately customers. Simon
Not had a few, just the one I have the dac 1.1, originally a kit, but like most of my stuff, I got it secondhand. Its actually a Canadian design by a guy called Michael Kerster. In stock form , it has an analog devices receiver and dac, good quality units, shottky diodes in the psu, and an ecc82 in the output with paper in oil caps. Couple that with the filter( is not a digital chip) is just like a speaker xover...just a 2 nd order choke and a cap, and you would expect it to be superb. Well it is only about as good as a regular cd player, I had an audio alchemy and that in some ways was better, the musical fidelity dacs are about the same, too. Quartrop in his propaganda claims great things( he is ok to talk to in person, VERY opinionated, always sound pissed off to me, I hear AN has been bankrupted a few times!!, owing suppliers, but that is 2nd hand info.), I think it is ever so slightly 'nicer' than some dacs, and the soundstage is quite 3-d, a feature I like, but tonal quality, prat, really is no better. In short, the thing is WAAAAY hyped, its not bad, just not the elixir of life, saviour and panacea of cd as its marketed, pisses you off a bit, esp. if you pay £10k + for the top of the range one. I would like to try the upgraded psu, with valves and chokes, but consensus on a valve forum is that it still has shortcomings which only a transformer coupled output stage improves. It is best IMO, with an ecc83 valve in, this cocks up the valves operating point totally, as I haven't changed the anode and cathode resistors for the 83, and introduces some distortion, which is audible as ever so slight string brightness, but it makes is so big and dynamic and powerful, rather like a chord dac64 effect. I am beginning to think all dacs are fairly similar in essence, rather like most valve amps have the same general tonal quality.
£10K? More like £30K for the top of the range DAC5. A total joke IMO. Qvortrupp's cynical price exploitation there is as bad as anything the overpriced cable merchants can do. The American's cream themselves over the AudioNote DACs though . Try criticising one on AudioAsylum and you'll be needing a nomex fire retardant suit in no time Michael.
There was an almost hilarious article in the British Airways Business Class magazine a while back, where some hack journalist virtually wet himself over the AN equipment, especially the DACs, with a quote something along the lines of 'With this DAC you may as well throw your vinyl in the bin, it throughly beats analogue'. Now, read something like that and tell me that journalist didn't get a kickback. Mind you, with the clientele they were aiming for it was obvious that they were selling it as a lifestyle accessory to impress your friends - I think AN kit was mentioned in the same breath as racing yachts Simon
I've liked all the AN gear I've heard. The Zero system is a funky little beast. Shame PQ keeps falling out with all his dealers, I like the fact he's so opinionated. They do make some expensive gear, for sure (Ongaku amp anyone?) but their cheaper stuff seems pretty good VFM to me compared to the opposition. The Emporium have a DAC Zero for about £200 ATM that I was considering before snaffling Lee's CAL instead. -- Ian
I think we're getting our wires crossed here, there's ANUK (Audio Note UK) which is run by Peter Q here in the UK, and ANJ (Audio Note Japan) which is, to the best of my knowledge, a different organisation, or at least not fully connected with ANUK. Simon
I think Simon is right allthough I too don't know what the connection between AN UK and AN Japan is or was. AFAIK AN UK had nothing to do with the original Ongaku and Gaku-on which cost something like £80K . However, that hasn't stopped AN UK "re releasing" the Ongaku....now at a bargain price of £25K . What the differences between this and the original are I have no idea: http://www.audionote.co.uk/news/an_news_jan04.htm Michael.
Uk split from JP I beleive cos' Kondo San was talking either about push-pull or saying some feedback is ok, not sure which. Prior, Kondo designed all UKs hi price stuff. Now Uk did it all at suprisingly cheaper prices, I think cos. PQ invested in the equipment here. However, I think Andy Grove, the WAD designer, and a clever man, is now doing the ANUK design work, and has redone the ongaku with less stages and an intestage transformer. interestingly, one of the most interesting valve amps there is, David Manleys 300b is swtichable between push-pull and single ended, I don't know of others that are this, AND switchable feedback from 0db to 10db, he did it to prove a point against PQs dogma!
Hi, In 1976 Hiroyasu Kondo formed Audionote in Japan. He was an ex CBS/ Sony engineer. His company started off with fancy silver wire & cable then developed speakers, cartridges, transformers & amps. All these featured his silver wires & cables. The stuff he mase wasn't cheap. The cables & cartridges were highly regarded by a number of people in this country in the early 80s. Audionote came into the UK before Peter Qvortrup got involved via other importers. When Peter set up Audio Innovations & Audio by Design, his systems used Audionote cable & cartridges. This lead to a tie in as the importer. This also lead to hearing the famed Onguku amp which he bought into the UK. By liking this amp so much, Peter then set up Audionote UK to import the Japan Audionote stuff & to bring out a range of cheaper Audionote products. The stuff from Japan was designed by Kondo & the UK stuff by various other designers. The partnership started to fall apart around 1996/97. There are two different versions to the story but the long & short of it was that Audionote Japan stopped supplying Audionote UK. This lead Audionote UK to develop all it's products. Peter aquired the use of the Audionote name for his products. Kondo san decided to name his Kondo to avoid any confusion. Kondo makes both push pull & single ended amps. SCIDB
SCIDB rides to the rescue I heard some Kondo monoblocks and a mother of a pre with an impedence matching trannie for the phono stage at the Bristol show (Living Voice room), and IMHO wasn't that impressed, but I'll put it down to the speakers, which I don't like. It wouldn't surprise me if Peter Q was his usual opinionated self and got right up Kondo's nose, which led to the split. I had a very interesting discussion at the Bristol show during which I was told that *heresay alert* Andy Grove is extremely reasonably priced as am amp designer, to the extent that I'm amazed he can afford a roof over his head. I wonder whether the new 'budget' Ongaku will provide the same magic the original had? Mind you, from a phsychological point of view a hefty chunk of that magic probably originated from the price tag? Simon
Jeff, question for you, as you've posted about Audio note dac, are you thinking of changing your current one then ? You've not long had it?, if so why if you don't mind me asking sir. T.
Ahh... errmmm... I'm glad you asked that one Tone !!! Firstly have for a fair while been looking at replacing my M.Mega Drive 2, its given great service and still sounds good but I feel that its time to move on. Also following my recent Von Schweikert VR-1 speaker audition I tried the followng combinations: Drive 2/ mc2 Balanced/ DAC64 -- OK AN CDT 1/mc2/dac64 -- didn't do it for me, maybe too relentless not natural enough - a bit "hard". Drive 2/Chord i/c/ DAC 2.1x Sig - Overly lush, lacked life AN CDT-1/Chord/DAC 2.1x Sig - Best of the lot !! (unfortunately didn't have my MC2 single ended so we had to use the new Chord i/c) Got my DAC64 for a good price, needed funds, sold DAC64 at profit, acquired CAL Alpha x-dem at very acceptable price, balance to fund new transport until I move and divert some funds to finance new DAC. The VR-1/ Music First Audio pre proved a much more revealing/transparent pairing than the PV-10/ Audio Physic Spark The CAL/DAC64 comparison (in my current system): DAC64 does good HIFI, great detail. Alpha, more musical, natural but doesn't have quite the detail or punch of the DAC 64. However the impending AC mains transmission device my help things there!
Jeff, I would experiment a bit, I've used that particular ac transmission device on the 64 on 3 seperate occations (once at the myth day here too Deans unit), didn't make as much of a difference as I'd hoped on that particular piece of kit, yes It did improve, but not by a RG amount Also tried on the Karic/Pauls LK 100? amp at Ju's days didn't like it all, also on an INFOCUS £6k projector, not much there either, although they all have one thing in common SMPS. Just a thought. They do take a while to run in Jeff, (ac device) and can be hard to start off with. Im going to make a suggestion, a Benchmark DAC 1, it's a studio stylee' thing, multivoltage (not smps either), has a built in preamp, you can use it with a pre-amp no probs, costs $800 and see's off the 64 in every dept, but is far more natural and neutral, but yet retains a very musical sound. Not great looking audio gems in the eye candy stakes, but its' pretty damn good, and landed to your door £8o0 inc taxes and bull. I have 2 units, a stock one and a Toneified version, that even gives the wadia 25 a good run for it's money (Seriously) T. http://www.benchmarkmedia.com/digital/dac1/default.asp Its one of the best kept secrets in the audio hemishpere
