Musical Fidelity V-DAC vs. Spitfire/Supplier Duo

According to a test in the current HIFICRITIC the V-DAC outperformed several others including the Cambridge Audio and the Benchmark DAC1 Pre (42 to 24 in their scoring system. I have found specs almost totally useless as the better companies are always conservative and the worse companies exaggerate shamelessly. Apparently the wall plug did not have a serious effect, they recommend the V-DAC highly and as they take no ads they have no motive not to be accurate.

Thanks Stanwal. I'll track down that review.

Stanwal, I could not read the review online, but assume it was the article relating to the 6 DACs. It seemed it was geared toward computer sound systems. Does it seem the V-DAC could still be promising for an external DAC w/ my Oppo BDP-83?

Yes. They say " even using a cheap CD player as an optical source over S/PDIF, jidder is still comparable to the best CD players we have ever tested. These are remarkably good results.----to say that I was surprised by the V-DACs performance is an understatement: I was actually quite shocked that this innocuous little box with its small plug type power supply could produce such a high quality sound----commonly associated with 1000+ pound cost devices.-----With great sound and exemplary measured performance , its easy to use and easy to buy. Its just excellent value for money and highly recommended." The 42 rating was with good associated equipment, it scored lower with typical computer equipment as did the others tested. They don't publish reviews on line as the sale of magazines is their sole source of revenue as they don't sell ads. I have found their reviews to be accurate in every case I could check myself. I would get it myself except I already have several I paid much more for which are as good.

Stanwal,
Thanks so much for posting some of the atricle's contents. I realy think I'm leaning towards getting one. It seems like it may be money well spent. I guess I'm just a little leary of this price point for external DACs, but I'm kinda stuck to the ~$350 price point. Hopefully it can offer some improvement over the Oppo's analog stereo out. As is, the Oppo is not terrible or anything, I'm just attempting to try and enter higher quality playback at a lower quality budget. I'm just not sure it can be done.

It should be MUCH better, they have tested a $10000 Dac which only scored 48 on their scale and several $2000 players which were in the 20s so this is a very good score, price does not ALWAYS equal performance.

I tried the VDac v.3 with an Oppo as a transport about a year ago. My VDac also had the upgraded power supply. During that time I also was auditioning the PS Audio Dlink III.
Right up front I'll say I did not care for the VDac. It had a hard, brittle sound in my system which is not what I care for at all. Also, the functionality of the dac was strange.
The PS Audio dac was the winner by a large margin. YMMV.

Timrhu,
Could you possibly have tried an "X" Dac? The V-Dac is just a small nondecript box that retaile for $299 US and as far as I know it does not have an upgraded power supply. That being said I have read that the V-DAC does make use of some design features that the discontinued X-DAC v8(I think) used.

Powerwindow, you are correct, I owned the XDac. Sorry for the confusion.

The MF VDAC goes for 299. why not save up and spent a few extra and buy a used MF A324 DAC. It sounds much better than the VDAC and is only 100 to 150 more on the used market.

I think that it is V-DAC that uses a better DAC chip and has lowered jitter figures ... I wouldn't be surprised if it beat the MF A324.

After checking, it was the VDAC v.3 I owned. Of the 6 or 8 dacs I have owned it was my least favorite.

After rechecking, it was the X-DAC v.3.
PLEASE DISREGARD ANY OTHER COMMENTS i MAKE IN THIS THREAD AS I CLEARLY DON'T KNOW WTF I'M TALKING ABOUT.