Forgive me for dragging up an old thread but it seemed most relevant.
Early in this thread Dan mentions “the DAC, digital circuitry and analog stage are IDENTICAL in the Sonica to the UDP-205.”
The specs for the UDP-205 said “Dual ESS ES9038PRO Sabre Pro DACs”, whereas the Sonic only has a single ES9038PRO.
However, unlike some balanced DACs using one chip per channel (or “Dual mono” DACs), this second ES9038 is simply for the 7.1 channel analog output. Correct? Which can be configured as a second stereo output, But this board is left unmodified by Mr. Wright, correct? (It would then make for easy and interesting A/B testing though).
So then, the one feature that the Sonica has, which the UDP is lacking, is this analog stereo “AUX IN”.
- Assuming this goes unmolested past the DAC but still into the ModWright analog output stage?
The Sonica can then be used as a sort of Tube buffer, or gain stage, I suppose, with the volume control?
Passing through analog sources, or even a minimalistic preamp maybe. I guess that makes two additional features over the UDP.
Is this assumption about the analog input correct?
-xtype