Greetings, I live in NW Central London, UK, and am mostly an analogue person type but that may change a little.
Musical tastes: all bar heavy metal. Format tastes: pre-digital produced vinyl and FM radio broadcasts. CD if I have no choice. Er, but I just sold my nice sounding Ayon CD2. I am looking for a DAC to connect my apple laptop via USB to my equipment listed below. The DAC in the Ayon was connectable only via USB - SPDIF converters. $10 and $750 units each rendered music lacking dynamics and so I gave up on that route. I have borrowed a Chord Qutest to check I should even bother with a DAC. I hear a lot of information, yet a John Martyn LP track on vinyl has so much human reality with a weight of dynamics, force and air compared to the DAC which renders some kind of digital data picture by numbers, that is far off vinyl's representation of the moment of capture of recorded sound. So I suspect I need thermionic valves, or tubes, in a DAC. I found three machines at similar cost that I can justify: but the two large units, an MP D2 MKIII and a Doge audio 7 are quite a bit larger and heavier than the third, an MHDT Orchid. The are many references to each as offering vvg sound. I couldn't help notice grannyring's very helpful notes on the MHDT Orchid elsewhere on this forum. I hope to connect with him --I think I Be very well one and all. P
My main system is noted here: Cartridge; Decca SC4E with "Paratrace" stylus. Arm; Triplanar. Turntable; Verdier La Platine built in Germany by Auditorium 23. Motor: Teres DC Reference II Motor pod with Mylar 1/4" tape drive. Pre-amplifier: Croft one-off with 6336B valve regulation and dual mono off-board PSU. SET Power-amplifier: Yamamoto A 06-3s with EML mesh plate AD1 valves. Loudspeakers: Loth X "Troubadour" full range single driver front loaded 104db horns with same Stefan Stamm prepared driver as larger Polaris model. Interconnect and Loudspeaker cables - Auditorium 23. phew.
