Audio Note Dac with Noh?

bambadoo · « **on:** 3 May 2004, 09:36 am »

I have an Audio Note Dac 1.1x (latest) some modifications have been done. However some people tell me that combining this dac with a NOH pre, isn't the beste combination.

JoshK · « **Reply #1 on:** 3 May 2004, 01:36 pm »

I think you will also need to know the input impedance of your amp and the gain. The AN DAC has a very high output impedance if I remember correctly. I had the AN CD3.1x but I never tried it with a passive.

zybar · « **Reply #2 on:** 3 May 2004, 01:37 pm »

I also had the 3.1x and it worked fine with a passive.

GW

John Chapman · « **Reply #3 on:** 3 May 2004, 02:11 pm »

Hello!

I am not certain of the 1.1x but I have a Dac4 here and it works very well. I have several other customers with AN dac's and they seem to be working out well.

As mentioned above your amp input impedance comes into it as well. If you have a very low amp input imp (ie. 10K or less) then the highish output imp of the dacs may have trouble driving it well through a passive of any kind. Lots of times it seems that users of AN dac's tend to like tubes anyway (I know I do!) and tube amps tend to have high input impedances which makes a better match. Typical solid state input impedances like 30K to 50K should work out fine as well.

Many Thansk!

John

John Chapman · « **Reply #4 on:** 3 May 2004, 02:12 pm »

Hello!

I am not certain of the 1.1x but I have a Dac4 here and it works very well. I have several other customers with AN dac's and they seem to be working out well.

As mentioned above your amp input impedance comes into it as well. If you have a very low amp input imp (ie. 10K or less) then the highish output imp of the dacs may have trouble driving it well through a passive of any kind. Lots of times it seems that users of AN dac's tend to like tubes anyway (I know I do!) and tube amps tend to have high input impedances which makes a better match. Typical solid state input impedances like 30K to 50K should work out fine as well.

Many Thansk!

John

bambadoo · « **Reply #5 on:** 3 May 2004, 10:11 pm »

Well my amp is a version of lcaudios zappulse 2.1 and it has 2.3 k impedanse. This will soon be replaced with version 2.2se and an impedanse about 15k.
But I am changing my gear all the time. I wont go for tube poweramp, but my next pre will either be a decent tube pre, or a tvc based, i.e the Noh, which seems really nice.

John Chapman · « **Reply #6 on:** 3 May 2004, 10:48 pm »

Hello!

2.3K - wow...... I think that is the lowest I have seen for input impedance and that's a bit low for any passive device in my mind. It is asking a lot of the source to drive that low an imp and the highish output of the AN dac would not be an ideal match.

15K is much more in the ball park and as long as you have a good amount of gain in your system (ie. you'll have the level knob down from the top few positions for most listenning) then that would likely work out great for you.

Keep us posted how you make out!

Many Thansk!

John

bambadoo · « **Reply #7 on:** 4 May 2004, 09:37 am »

Yes that is low. However many, many people got upset about this, and lcaudio redesignet the zappulse modules from 2.1 to 2.2. Now it has 15 k impedance.
I can see that diycable is in a process of implementing the zappulse modules in their design. http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=10063

If interested you can read about the modules her:
http://www.lcaudio.dk/com/zp2.htm?

And they perform very well. Mine has elna cerafine caps in the psu. The best I have tried for this purpose, and diodebridges (byv79e) - and a 2*42v - 800 VA trannie. It plays really good.

Best Regards from Norway. More and more people here are trying out some tvc preamps now.