Sorry, I need to update my system description, it's been a while.
I previously used the B2 in voltage mode with only transformer output. It made ~1V output, enough for most amps, and it had a nice mid/high tone. Before selling my old B32, I had a listen to make sure it stil worked, and I was impressed by the excellent bass compared to my B2, although mid/highs not as open, typical of 4562 family of opamps in unity gain. In trying to figure out why, I learned that the 9018 is designed to run in current mode with an I/V output stage, and I was reminded that active output usually beats passive.
So I added Legato, substituting my existing Jensen line-out trannies (JT-11-EMCF) for the old Legato's big electro output caps. The bass was even better than B32, and mids/highs were better than the passive tranny-only output. A friend liked it and had me update his tranny-only B2 with the new Legato which sounds even better than the old Legato and doesn't require output caps, but he liked it with tranny output anyway.
Then my friend upgraded to the low jitter async USB input which made another big jump. I added his old Hiface to mine but it's still not as good as his. So now I'll probably do the Cronus/I2S to kill all the jitter once and for all. I think that should be pretty nice.
What's your Buffalo like?
