[MtnHam]

With Stereophile featuring the dCS Vivaldi System ($108,000) on their January 20014 cover, and a glowing review, it would seem this is the new reference standard for high end digital. I also appears that MSB  offers competition at about $48,000. Is this kind of crazy expenditure really necessary? What does one need to spend to get, say, 98% of SOTA? How does MSB compare other top end gear?

[worldcat]

Trinity dac!

[wisnon]

TrinityDac $52K is the new buzz. Light Harmonic Davinci is $30K, CH Precision Dac/Preamp for $37K and then the "cheap" guys are Phasure Nos1 Dac with tweaked PC for about $8K and Lampizator Level 7 with 2A3 Directly Heated triodes for about $10K.

[MtnHam]

What happened to Wavelength with their Crimson? Is it no longer a contender (at the low end, only $10,000)?

[Folsom]

I have as hard of a time believing that the money is worth, as some AC improvements wouldn't improve any of those DAC's...

[jtwrace]

What happened to Wavelength with their Crimson? Is it no longer a contender (at the low end, only $10,000)?

I owned one.  The problem is that they're out dated IMO.  Not that the above is really worth it though.

[wisnon]

I have as hard of a time believing that the money is worth, as some AC improvements wouldn't improve any of those DAC's...

Never heard any of them, but the people who have, claim that they are all that. I have heard the EMM Labs Dac 2x, and that is superb on DSD, but not necessairly better than my Lampi DSD only Dac. I have also heard the PBD MPD-5 and again, its lovely. Same for Total Dac (withTotal Dac Server and Voxativ tubes and Due speaker).

Would love to hear a Phasure, DaVinci, CH Precision, Illusonic and a Trinity. Not really psyched to hear a dCS nor AudioNote.

[geowak]

I have a dealer in the Cleveland Oh area who sells the DCS stack. A couple of years ago he did a comparison with his top vinyl rig, to the DCS. He stated that the analog rig sounded better at 1/4 the price of the two big buck systems. That's money that could be spent on better speakers...But for me, sadly, I still have the digital system. But I do luv it, it's all within what I am willing to spend and mobile...

[Quiet Earth]

Not rally psyched to hear a dCS nor AudioNote.

Hi Wisnon,

I think you should be very interested in hearing an Audio Note transport and DAC, since your favorite DAC maker bases his entire business model on the Audio Note Performance Level System. If I recall, the first Lampizator DAC began with Lukasz's fascination with his own Audio Note DAC 4.1x that he purchased about 10 years ago. It also looks obvious (to me at least) that the Lampizator business model is a direct descendant of the Audio Note performance Level System building philosophy. So with that in mind, why would you not want to hear the basis of where Lukas gets some of his ideas? At least you will know how close he has come, and if he has succeeded in making his own products better.

I think it is cool that another company wants to build their product line in this fashion, and the more the merrier. Competition is usually healthy for everyone concerned, especially the customer. Audion also builds their products this way. I look forward to hearing the Lamizator products myself. Especially the DACs. They are on my radar because of Audio Note.

Audio Note should be on your radar because of Lampizator. It's a win win, don't you think? 


Hi MtnHam,

It is interesting that you posted this thread in the discless circle. I still think that the very best sounding digital products require spinning a disc in real time. I know that some day it will all change, but I am still waiting.

[MtnHam]

Hi Wisnon,

I think you should be very interested in hearing an Audio Note transport and DAC, since your favorite DAC maker bases his entire business model on the Audio Note Performance Level System. If I recall, the first Lampizator DAC began with Lukasz's fascination with his own Audio Note DAC 4.1x that he purchased about 10 years ago. It also looks obvious (to me at least) that the Lampizator business model is a direct descendant of the Audio Note performance Level System building philosophy. So with that in mind, why would you not want to hear the basis of where Lukas gets some of his ideas? At least you will know how close he has come, and if he has succeeded in making his own products better.

I think it is cool that another company wants to build their product line in this fashion, and the more the merrier. Competition is usually healthy for everyone concerned, especially the customer. Audion also builds their products this way. I look forward to hearing the Lamizator products myself. Especially the DACs. They are on my radar because of Audio Note.

Audio Note should be on your radar because of Lampizator. It's a win win, don't you think? 


Hi MtnHam,

It is interesting that you posted this thread in the discless circle. I still think that the very best sounding digital products require spinning a disc in real time. I know that some day it will all change, but I am still waiting.

Thanks to everyone who has responded. I did question where to post, as I too like being able to spin the disc, although I also want the best in 'discless' playback. I will be at CES next week and will try to spend serious listening time with all the products suggested.

[mcgsxr]

While I am entertained by any front end that costs 100K, and I did read this month's rags, I won't ever be approaching that level of investment in audio (barring a lottery win of tremendous value).

I have not spun a disc (for main audio listening) since 2005, nor am I looking to anytime soon.  Since discovering the joy of PC front end, and played along in the shallow end of the spending pool, I have been very happy.  I specifically enjoy the ability to centrally store the music, and distribute it out to different systems in the home.

I am presently just using my AVR as the DAC and Pre for my system, but am reviewing cheap DAC's to play around with.

I respect that there are tons of excellent transport and DAC setups out there in the world, but I won't be playing around with those anymore.

[wisnon]

Hi Wisnon,

I think you should be very interested in hearing an Audio Note transport and DAC, since your favorite DAC maker bases his entire business model on the Audio Note Performance Level System. If I recall, the first Lampizator DAC began with Lukasz's fascination with his own Audio Note DAC 4.1x that he purchased about 10 years ago. It also looks obvious (to me at least) that the Lampizator business model is a direct descendant of the Audio Note performance Level System building philosophy. So with that in mind, why would you not want to hear the basis of where Lukas gets some of his ideas? At least you will know how close he has come, and if he has succeeded in making his own products better.

I think it is cool that another company wants to build their product line in this fashion, and the more the merrier. Competition is usually healthy for everyone concerned, especially the customer. Audion also builds their products this way. I look forward to hearing the Lamizator products myself. Especially the DACs. They are on my radar because of Audio Note.

Audio Note should be on your radar because of Lampizator. It's a win win, don't you think? 


Hi MtnHam,

It is interesting that you posted this thread in the discless circle. I still think that the very best sounding digital products require spinning a disc in real time. I know that some day it will all change, but I am still waiting.

I would think its too similar and a bit more on the conservative side. I dont mean its bad at all, just not potentially different enough to be psyched about a demo. I wouldnt refuse one.

[Diamond Dog]

Thinking about Meitner/EMM Labs and Esoteric as considerations here as well. The most recent Esoteric gear sounds really good - the days where they were considered to be overly analytical-sounding appear to be behind them.

D.D.

[MtnHam]

While I am entertained by any front end that costs 100K, and I did read this month's rags, I won't ever be approaching that level of investment in audio (barring a lottery win of tremendous value).

  Since discovering the joy of PC front end, and played along in the shallow end of the spending pool, I have been very happy.  I specifically enjoy the ability to centrally store the music, and distribute it out to different systems in the home.

... am reviewing cheap DAC's to play around with.

While I think it is crazy to spend anything close to $100K for a digital front end, I will listen carefully to learn what that kind of foolish expenditure achieves. I suspect we will soon be able to buy 98% of that performance for a small fraction of the cost. I too love my huge HD library, and am reasonably happy with my Wavelength Crimson DAC ($7k new, 5 years ago, my 3rd DAC) which evidently falls far short of today's high expectations.

[Diamond Dog]

Looks like Esoteric just upped the ante:

http://www.esoteric.jp/products/esoteric/p1d1/indexe.html

D.D.

[rollo]

With Stereophile featuring the dCS Vivaldi System ($108,000) on their January 20014 cover, and a glowing review, it would seem this is the new reference standard for high end digital. I also appears that MSB  offers competition at about $48,000. Is this kind of crazy expenditure really necessary? What does one need to spend to get, say, 98% of SOTA? How does MSB compare other top end gear?

  From my experience the DCS is wonderfull. However not much better than others. The difference is small. Important to some but not all. Unless a direct comparison to another digital system is done it would be hard to tell the difference from other A+ rated DACs.
   Saying that the Briscati and Berkley Pro come to mind. Especially the Biscati IMO. Using a $1000 musical Fidelity transport the Briscati is superb. Using a computer as source better yet. Maybe. Using a CEC 01 transport and Briscati oh my !
    BTW there is no best anything just different. Ya want to go mid price with A+ sound ?? DB audio tranquility DAC and MacMini. Not a dealer of any recommended.





charles