Hot off the press: Yggdrasil review

Grannyring was just making a pretty valid point, geez. No need to jump on him like he stole something from you.

I do have a new Yggdrasil running in, actually. It's a nice unit but I think perhaps the R2R vs D-S DAC thing has become a bit of a fad, which the Yggy is riding a nice wave of, and it's good to have undiluted opinions to temper the growing expectations of prospective buyers.

The Yggy is indeed very detailed (which I have no problem with; the more detail the better as long as it's smooth, which it is here) but my one possible hangup on it thus far is I wish it had a little more bass impact -- I think that kind of echoes what Grannyring heard from his friends. And I've heard a lot of gear myself...I know what constitutes a nice balanced sound.

Mulveling, please share your impressions as Yggy's evolves during/after break in. I'm particularly interested in its air and sound staging.

Bcgator, you dont seem very active here, but certainly do not like a different view it seems. Three guys I hang with are seasoned solid aphiles like myself. You just like play here it seems.

I am actually trying to help the community. Very few will run the unit 24/7, especially folks like me that use it with a cd spinning transport.You can continue to crap on me, but I am just sharing experiences for the benifit of the community. Crap on!

I have a PSA PerfectWave Mk-II and tried the PSA DirectStream. The PerfectWave beat that hands down. Then I tried a Yggy. Even with no break-in time, it was better than the PSA units. I've had it now for a month and, finally, the bass is catching up with the rest mids & treble. Up to 3 weeks in, the bass sounds a bit shy, but is now well integrated.

I have to say, I've never heard the resolution of leading edge transients of all types as I can now with the Yggy. The quality of brushed cymbals, stringed instruments, piano, drums, and brass (glorious) are immediately obvious.

Just my two cents from a very happy camper.

The stock Yggy is perhaps the best sounding PCM only DAC in its price range.....very good value. However, a few simple inexpensive mods can take it to another level. These DIY mods can be done in a couple of hours. Please see my website for details: http://www.tweakaudio.com/EVS-2/Schiit_mod.html

With these simple mods the Yggy is more detailed, more air, better stereo separation, lower grain, more dynamic, more pure, etc. etc.

My friend, who did the mods shown on my website wants to send me his Yggy to put my zero feedback class A buffer/shunt regulator power supply on the output along with a much larger power transformer and better diodes. If this ever gets done then he might have a world class DAC.....there are, of course, even more mods that could be done....just the beginning.