Owner`s manual

160 July/August 2013 the absolute sound
analog circuit outperformed the DAC by a wide margin, but in the
DAC2 the superior DAC and DSP allows the conversion stage to
approach the limits of the analog circuitry. Most of the negative
comments I’ve read about the DAC1 revolved around its lack of
dimensionality and dynamics, rendering its presentation overly
left-brained and emotionally uninvolving. The DAC2 is quite
different. The DAC2 sounded dynamically wide open with superb
dimensionality and tonal color. Over the course of my listening
sessions using the DAC2 HGC I was hard-pressed to come up
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sonic personality that I could identify as intrinsic to the DAC2’s
core sound that veered from the center path of neutrality.
The one sonic characteristic that I was constantly aware
of when listening through the DAC2 was the quality of the
recording itself. Whether it was a lowly 320bps MP3 or a 64x
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made and how well or poorly executed the original recording
session was. Excessive or inappropriately applied reverb was
immediately obvious, such as on the otherwise musically superb
duet album by Chris Thile and Mike Marshall Into the Cauldron.
Through the DAC2 the reverb sounds so obviously overdone
that it’s actually easier to listen around it because the DAC2’s lack
of grain and electronic texture separates the original signal from
the awful afterthought reverb.
Low-level resolution through the DAC2 was exemplary. On
my own live Boulder Philharmonic Orchestra DSD recordings
the little extra amusical noises from chairs and the more than
700 humans in the room during a concert were easier to discern
and separate out from the music. Depth cues were also slightly
more coherent on my DSD recordings played back through the
DAC2, especially when compared to my 44.1 conversions from
the same DSD masters.
I should mention that although the DAC2 plays back 2.8MHz
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of my live DSD recordings were made at 128x, so for playback
I must convert them to 64x. I’ve used two programs for the
conversion. Most of the time I use AudioGate, but Daniel Weiss
suggested I try his Saracon software, which is a dedicated stand-
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another. When I compared the PCM 192/24 conversions done
with both programs they did not sound identical. The Saracon
program’s overall output levels in default mode were different.
I needed to spend quite a bit of time tweaking the settings in
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levels, since AudioGate has no level adjustments. When levels
were as critically matched as possible, I found that the Saracon
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ever so slightly blacker, but the effect was very subtle and only
really noticeable on especially quiet passages.
I’m bringing up the issue of format conversion because
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to another had a far more profound sonic effect than any of
EQUIPMENT REPORT - Three New DSD-Capable DACs