Wyred DACS

The USB works well on the Bryston, however only with CD quality digital files. It has a 16 bit/48kHz limit on the USB. I have been using the BNC/coax input and it will do 24/192. If all you have is USB, then a device like the HiFace is probably the way to go.

Bottom line... the sound quality especially the HD files is stunning!

Paul

Hi Paul,

Thanks for the response. I am primarily a vinyl guy, however there are times when I am putzing around the house that I like to have music on in the background. That is when I toss on a CD or more often then not, Pandora Internet radio from my laptop. I realize it is not the best fidelity, but I find it a great source to discover new recordings that I may not be aware of.

So, in an attempt to try to kick up the fidelity of the Pandora, I'd like to find a good sounding USB Dac. All of my gear is vacuum tubed (tuner, pre, amps, etc) and I listen to vocals, jazz, classical, and acoustic types of music.

I've been trying to find out more about the sound of the Wyred Dacs, Havanas, Tranquility, and now Bryston to determine which might be the best way to go.

I appreciate your comments as well as the others on the forum.

Best regards,
No Regrets

I have had some feedback from EJ that he is getting a bit of flack about some of my posts and they do not reflect what I have said to him.

To set the record straight my concern about the DAC had to do with not being able to get the USB working. This has now been resolved and is working flawlessly using kernel steaming. I have since become aware that problems with Windows 7 had to do with an update to windows. Having worked in the IT industry as a programmer for many years my experience is these types of problems are virtually impossible to avoid. Knowing this I now believe when I said products should not be released with these types of driver problems it was not a correct assessment of the true situation. From what I can gather extensive testing was done.

My position on the sonic's is it is close to the best out there at any price. It has the best detail of any DAC I have ever heard. It totally outclassed an Havana is every area. It was close to Mike's reference DAC but in the areas of sibilance control, fluidity, liquidity, musicality and sound-staging that DAC was better. Not hugely better - it was close - but it was better. That DAC however is a lot more expensive, heavily tweaked, and in many ways an unfair comparison. The reason I mention it the original scuttlebutt is it was scary close to the best out there at any price. However I found it was 'just' close. I put just in quotes here because I don't want people to get the wrong idea - this is a tremendous accomplishment. I also want to add I have had a chance to listen using up-sampled 192/24 material and material recorded at at 192/24. This raised the bar even further and I want to do a direct comparison to Mikes DAC and the Tranquility DAC specifically checking this out. Although I can't preempt the outcome of that new comparison because audible memory is a poor thing, my feeling is using that it may be scary close or even equal. Without reservation I recommend this DAC. The only DAC I am aware of in its price range that may be its equal is the Tranquility and I will be doing a specific comparison to check it out. This is expected to occur sometime later this month.

With regard to the balance issue please be aware this is of zero concern to me. I worked in the IT industry for many years and any new product goes through similar teething issues. That is only to be expected. Both EJ and the distributor I got it through here in Australia - Deep Hz Audio - are doing everything in their power to correct this quickly. Their after sales service is absolutely impeccable and a real credit to both organizations. Having problems does not concern me as much as how well they are corrected. This problem so far has been corrected in a flawless and timely manner to my complete satisfaction.

Thanks
Bill

Bill,
Clearly you have done quite a bit of experimenting with USB and the higher bit/sampling rate options on DACS.

I received my DAC 2 yesterday, and have been doing a bit of experimenting. (options options..)

My library consists entirely of ripped CDs to FLAC and 24bit/96Khz from HD tracks.

I was experimenting with USB and USB bit rate settings.
I did initially set the PC output to USB 192khz, all worked fine of course.

In my case though since the maximum sampling rate of any of my library is 96khz, setting the USB comms to 192khz seems to be of no value. Why not just let the Sabre chip take the 96khz raw sampling rate and do it's thing.

At this point I'm back to running USB from PC at 96khz, only because it "seems" the best way to go.

I hope this makes sense, and I'd love to hear any comments you may have regarding this.

Hi Rayooo

I didn't check anything at 96k since 192k was available. I did notice a bit more detail with 192k up-sampling and native 192k was better again. Did'nt have 96k to check out but I would imagine up-sampling 96k to 192k would not be much if any better. However I would still do it. The reason I do up-sampling in J River rather than let the ESS DAC do it is the up-sampling algorithms in J River are state of the art right now while the up-sampling used in the ESS are not that recent and the DAC chip probably doesn't have the processing power of your PC which limits how good the up-sampling can be.

Thanks
Bill