Hello (Chord) Dave, You're My Wife Now!

rabski

Everything in moderation
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Hmmn, interesting in the copious number of input options. Everything is catered for as long as one likes AES or USB. Bet it sounds amazing though!
I had assumed the two central RCAs are also inputs, so AES, USB and co-ax. I may be wrong though.
 

DomT

Food and coffee and rock n roll
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I compared dcs Bartok, Mola Mola Tambaqui, MSB Discrete + the top MSB model and Rockna Wavedream to each other and my own built DACs. The only one I could live with was the MSB Discrete. The dcs Bartok IMO represents good value at its secondhand price of circa £7.5k but is no way worth £16k. The MSB Discrete with the inputs I need cost around £16k too, but sound better IMO. None of these DACs outperform my own DAC with tube output stage retailing at just over £3k so that's what I'm sticking with
And where can we listen to and buy your DAC?
 

eddie-baby

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Tonality and system matching aside (as we all are susceptible to that, and we all have a preference). Is the DAVE regardless of cost the best DAC that money can buy still in 2022?
 
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Psilonaught

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Tonality and system matching aside (as we all are susceptible to that, and we all have a preference). Is the DAVE regardless of cost the best DAC that money can buy still in 2022?
I think that is the $64m question. I'm keen to hear one.

I'd be pretty gutted if I'd hit the end of the road of what I can upgrade to.
 

JANDL100

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I'd be pretty gutted if I'd hit the end of the road of what I can upgrade to.
Exactly. Where's the fun in that?

Also, my tastes, preferences, knowledge, insight, experience and hearing change with time.

And new components (to me) are always appearing, making last year's hit become this year's latest ad in the classifieds.

What's best now might not seem so golden in a little whiles time.

Anyway, different can be just as much fun as better.
 

TheFlash

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Exactly. Where's the fun in that?

Also, my tastes, preferences, knowledge, insight, experience and hearing change with time.
This is true. Tastes can change, often as a result of hearing other possibilities, and we know hearing changes as we age (hopefully gradually over many years rather than rapidly).
And new components (to me) are always appearing, making last year's hit become this year's latest ad in the classifieds.

What's best now might not seem so golden in a little whiles time.

Anyway, different can be just as much fun as better.
Your last paragraph is worrying. Different can be exciting of course, but if it isn’t also a difference which is better then you’ll be swapping kit faster than makes financial (or audiophile) sense. The skill in this hobby is, I think, in not only recognising better but in distinguishing short term better from long term better.
 

eddie-baby

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One skill is trying to distinguish is there actually a difference, that is legitimate, worth the cost and that we are not being hoodwinked by our emotions as well :D

Over engineered gear is as nice to own as cars that can do 200mph when we can only drive 70 maximum by law. But you do have to ask yourself constantly is it really better past a certain standard of engineering. There'll always be the badge snobs tho.

There's some amazingly good hifi out there without spending a fortune that really is as good as anything, that is subjectively speaking and that other thing people look at :)
 

Juancho

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Hi Dom,
I'm in Wimbledon, South West London. Owners who are probably amenable to a listen are in Geneva, Brussells, Milan and Edinburgh. Here's what one owner said:

Hi David,

The DCDAC with its upgrades has now fully burned in.
I was thinking of writing a review you could post, but was not sure what to write, until this afternoon I walked into an audio shop to buy a cable and caught myself falling over myself to share my experience….I could only talk in superlatives! So here it goes, the souped up DAC- now increased to 4 boards- , the revised valve output stage and the 6 new regulator stages, sound absolutely phenomenal! The only way in which I can describe it, is that now the last veils holding back the music have been removed…the music is finally there in all its depth, beauty and transparency, despite my revealing system, there is literally nothing left that stands between me and the music, listening is totally addictive and there is finally nowhere left to go to improve, it is just music…and it is beautiful!

No more need to delve into words describing the deeper, open, more layered sound stage, the strength of the dynamic range, the total absence of harshness or edges that were left in some difficult recordings, the air and palpable space and instruments, the ease of performance and the purity of sound simply make you forget all those and instead just let you loose yourself in the music…

Safe to say I am very pleased and recommend the DAC to other current and future owners to push that extra mile, it’s so worth it!

https://adaudio.wordpress.com/
 
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JANDL100

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Your last paragraph is worrying. Different can be exciting of course, but if it isn’t also a difference which is better then you’ll be swapping kit faster than makes financial (or audiophile) sense. The skill in this hobby is, I think, in not only recognising better but in distinguishing short term better from long term better.
Oh dear.
I didn't mean to worry you.
I did say that different can be just as much fun as better.

Actually, I think we just have somewhat different hifi hobbies.
My hifi hobby isn't generally about the pursuit of an ever closer approach to perfection. It's about gaining different perspectives on the music by investigating different audio presentations. More often than not a change is an obvious backward step, but not always. And sometimes a presentation isn't clearly better, whatever better might mean to you or me, but it is enjoyable for a while. Then I try something different.
 
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TheFlash

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Oh dear.
I didn't mean to worry you.
I did say that different can be just as much fun as better.

Actually, I think we just have somewhat different hifi hobbies.
My hifi hobby isn't generally about the pursuit of an ever closer approach to perfection. It's about gaining different perspectives on the music by investigating different audio presentations. More often than not a change is an obvious backward step, but not always. And sometimes a presentation isn't clearly better, whatever better might mean to you or me, but it is enjoyable for a while. Then I try something different.
Yes, I think our approaches are different in their focus though not entirely. I’ve done lots of “different” in my second rig, as much to experiment and learn as anything: valves and solid state, passive and active pre’s, various speaker types, classes A, A/B and D in the power amp department. But in my main rig, it’s definitely about improvements.
 

Camverton

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Oh dear.
I didn't mean to worry you.
I did say that different can be just as much fun as better.

Actually, I think we just have somewhat different hifi hobbies.
My hifi hobby isn't generally about the pursuit of an ever closer approach to perfection. It's about gaining different perspectives on the music by investigating different audio presentations. More often than not a change is an obvious backward step, but not always. And sometimes a presentation isn't clearly better, whatever better might mean to you or me, but it is enjoyable for a while. Then I try something different.
Yes, a change is as good as a rest sometimes. In much the same way as it was good to hear music in different concert halls and whilst we may have our favourite versions of the great composers, sometimes hearing a different approach enhances our enjoyment of what we have come to accept as best for us.
 

tuga

. . .
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I think that it depends on one's goal. For some it's getting to a certain place and for others the journey that which matters most.
But as @JANDL100 said sometimes that place is a moving target...
 

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