Less is more?

As I mentioned on a couple of threads recently I bought a little DAC on eBay:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=5727978853

I finally got my hands on it today after having to go down to the customs depot in person to fill out the customs clearance paperwork and pay the duty and VAT (it came from Hong Kong). Portugal is still knee deep in bureaucracy when it comes to these things

Here are a couple of pics:

The guts:


The rear 'panel":


It's a non oversampling, output filterless DAC. It doesn't even have a clock. It's just a CS8412 digital input receiver (the big chip) and the old Philips TDA1543 16bit DAC (the tiny chip). Even the output stage is passive as the TDA1543 output is a high enough level to not require a separate output stage. It's all housed in a nice acrylic (non-magnetic) case.

It cost me about £100. It probably cost about £20 to make. The principles and most of the parts are the same as in the £1500 47 Labs Shigaraki 4715 DAC . See here for Ryohei Kusunoki's explanation of why non-OS DACs should sound better.

So, I had a quick listen this evening and have to say I'm very, very impressed. Is it better than the DAC64? Well, yes, in many ways it is .

I have to do some more comparisons and more listening over the w/e and then I'll talk more about the sound and how it compares to the DAC64.

Michael.

 

Ah the old 'better than' chestnut, so basically you own a bit of plastic and two chips and it sounds better than something else.

Well yes it would, wouldn't it ha ha.

 

OK, OK, I'll give you £100 for your DAC64. I think it's very generous considering your new £100 DAC is better.

So, I'll PM you my address, when can you deliver?

 

give him a break , after all it could be an apple

 

Cute.

More like a lemon though...

 

Joking aside, I wouldn't be surprised if Michael (and/or anyone else) prefers the cheaper DAC. It's all a matter of personal preference after all.

 

It's more a matter of all DAC's sounding the same, notwithstanding the vivid imaginations of their owners who have been brainwashed by the mag's and customer testimonials (based on the mags).

Here, we go again

 

To the aurally (is that a word?) impaired?

 

It would be interesting to see the output waveforms and spectra of this DAC.

And since it's dependent on downstream electronics for reconstruction it may well sound different. And variable from equipment to equipment. The possibilities of confusion with Michael's switching power amp are legion, although perhaps the passive pre rolls every thing off?

Anyway I presume 'oedipus' hasn't read the linked article.

Paul

 

You're right, I hadn't. But now that I have, it seems like a bad piece of design for the reasons you stated.

I'd still wager that none of this is audible however - well unless the crap it's letting through takes out a tweeter

 

Haven't you got some main's cable's you should be listening to?

 

Having switched from a DAC64 to a 47 Labs DAC using a circuit that Michael's is cloned from, it's clear to me that: (a) for whatever reason, this DAC sounds different to other DACs and CD players (I've previously been in the "basically it all sounds the same" camp; and (b) it sounds much more like real live instruments than any other DAC or CD player I've owned, with none of the somewhat artificial smoothness most modern CD players seem to have, and none of the badger's arse roughness many older CD players seem to have.

I think it does things no other CD player I've owned ever has. It's very natural sounding, and very direct. Anyone who puts a premium on timbral accuracy should either build or buy one and see what they make of it. If you listen to acoustic music I'd be surprised if you didn't find it deeply impressive.

-- Ian

 

Make that closer to $800 out here in the real world.

 

Of course, one can do entirely without the DAC and have a PCM => PWM conversion for your switching amp...

 

Which then has to convert the signal into the analogue domain for it to go to the speakers. That sounds like a good idea.

 

Paul - I don't have the equipment to record/display the output waveforms or spectra of the DAC. I might know a man who does though so I'll see what I can do.

From what I know about my passive pre and the transformers it uses it doesn't have any rolloff in the audio band. In fact it's response is pretty flat well beyond the audio band:

http://www.stevens-billington.co.uk/page102.htm

(scroll down the page for freq. response graph).

I'm not quite sure why there should be "confusion" with my switching power amp. The waveform doesn't require re-construction, it is what it is. OK, it will have a lot of ultra-sonic components but we can't hear those anyway. The ear does the filtering (at least that's the idea).

I don't want to say too much more about the sound until I've listened to it some more but my initial impressions are along the lines that Ian described.

Michael.

 

The area that the Ultra-sonic hash may cause problems is with SS amps with bandwidth limiting. The extra hash can cause the amp to oscillate, you won't even hear there is a problem until the transistors blow. However this is very hit and miss and is usually dependant on the design of the amps. Valves won't suffer from this problem, but am interested why digital ones also appear to be OK (seen this else where as well as with Michael and Ian)

BTW I have a spare cd8412 if any one wants to try from scratch.

 

Preview of Michael's new avatar

Hmmm...not quite the same impact, wot?!

 

You've gotta say Joel, converting PCM to PWM to analogue does theoretically seem neater than converting PCM to analogue, analogue to PWM, then PWM to analogue. After all, less is more

How do these things sound with Dub & Dance music BTW? I've heard critisisms that they are a tad lightweight - any thoughts?

 

That's a very nice looking dac, like something you might pick up at a posh minimalist lifestyle store. The one nearest mes is called Utility.

No problems with weight with my 8412/1543 clone, Merlin. My system is in a small room with the speakers almost touching the sidewalls, but the sound is the same through headphones. An inappropriate powersupply (KISS seems the best philosophy here) or I/V resistor can cripple the sound though.

The crashing dynamics and very strong presence make dub sound particularly good.