The long and winding road of being cheap . . .

albee · « **on:** 26 Aug 2005, 03:11 pm »

I recently quested for a good redbook/DVD player recently. Tried an inexpensive Pannie, Yamaha, and finally a Onkyo 502 (rebadged Pioneer 588!). Well, I regrouped and decided to try a dac from Hong Kong's DIYClub.com. It will probably take two weeks to get here but I'm fired up. At $135 (plus shipping) I can't take too big a hit if it blows. The unit is a NOS and accepts both coax and optical with a selector switch. I plan to use the optical with my existing dvd player and the coax with redbook device. There wasn't a lot written about it but just enough to make me want to try. This is considerably cheaper than a Nixon and it uses eight NOS dacs in parallel. We'll see.

http://eshop.diyclub.biz/product_info.php?products_id=270

albee · « **Reply #1 on:** 10 Sep 2005, 06:58 am »

I am certainly impressed with my NOS dac from HK. It has about 20 hours on it and I'm bowled over at its performance/cost ratio. This box has EIGHT NOS dacs in series! It gives a smooth, controlled sound that is free from sibilance, harshness, and digititis. In fact, I want to use the descriptors "tubey" and "analog" but don't want to get myself into trouble--let's say it removes most of the nasties associated with redbook without sounding soft or rolled off. AAMOF, in my system, it has a one-foot forward presentation (which I prefer) without being in your face. It throws a well-seperated image and brings vocalists slightly forward while adding depth to the overall soundscape. Besides using eight dacs, it also has a very healthy output section as I had to turn down the volume on my preamp when I switched over. This dac is either engineered to be fearless of impedance loads or just puts out a bit more juice than 2V. It does run extremely warm so it must be running Class A and will need some breathing room above it. The AH, unlike its over/up sampling cousins, is not the ultimate in detail retrieval but it's no slouch either. This is the perfect cheapskate dac for the "music lover" not the hardcore, system tweeking neurotic. I plan to give more impressions of the DAC-AH after a good run in for about a month.

The dac cost $135 (which is a bargain) while the Air Parcel from HK cost $39. It took exactly seven days from when I was notified it had shipped until it arrived. Even at almost $200 I'm impressed. If I get upgrade-itis in the next year I will definitely check out DIY Club offerings. This particular dac is the bottom of the line so everything else must be really fine.

gongos · « **Reply #2 on:** 10 Sep 2005, 07:30 am »

The only problem w/ the Chinese stuff is if you want to get rid of it, you'll take a big loss. At least when you buy used on Agon, you can get your money back.

mcgsxr · « **Reply #3 on:** 10 Sep 2005, 03:56 pm »

You are probably right about the losing $$ on buying lesser known, foreign built gear, but like anything else, it is simply a niche market, and needs to be worked as such.

Knowing where you found all the info, that is the place to look to move a used version... I know that many over on Head-Fi have posted about that config, so if it were me, and I tried it and it was not the ticket for me, that is where I would seek to move it.

Same for tripath stuff right - most folks think that we are nuts for spending dough to have cheap amps/receivers modded, but there is a market for it, so you simply need to identify that, if you are looking to move out of that gear.

All that aside, glad to hear that the stacked NOS DAC is sounding good - I would like to hear one of those at some point myself!

albee · « **Reply #4 on:** 10 Sep 2005, 03:59 pm »

Sure, if you buy kilobuck equipment you'll take a hit. $179 is NOT a hit even if it blows up in a year's time. BTW, I will report that if it ever happens.

One should never look at audio equipment as an investment. It's a passing fancy and it's best to keep it that way.

Gordy · « **Reply #5 on:** 10 Sep 2005, 04:53 pm »

Albee,

Check out the Audio Mirror dac at 5x the price... http://www.audiomirror.com/ Granted the chassis and some caps/parts are upgraded, but the circuit reads like they're identical???

albee · « **Reply #6 on:** 10 Sep 2005, 07:33 pm »

Holy smokes, Gordy, shades of Levinson's Red Rose integrateds that are Caiyin! Looks like a rip to me. A fellow at the headphone forum ordered the dac and an extra case, transformer, and power regulator to move the p/s outside the case. If I soldered and knew what I was doing--I'd do the same.

Gordy · « **Reply #7 on:** 10 Sep 2005, 10:43 pm »

Probably more akin to any of the gain clones vs. Lab 47 as I think the Audio Mirror is the one being copied...

albee · « **Reply #8 on:** 11 Sep 2005, 05:08 pm »

Gordy: I remember seeing the "Red Rose" integrated on a Canadian dealer's site long before it was stamped by Levinson.

I would tend to think Ti Le might be OEM'ing that piece for AM.

Gentlemen, we now have the question of PHASE. My intial impressions were given on the assumption that the DAC-AH did not invert phase. This morning I switched the polarity around at the speakers to see what would happen. Well, the vocals stepped back, more lower bass appeared, and the top-end took on more delicacy and sweetness from what sounds like more added decay. The soundstage is flatter but the overall effect seems to be more (here we go) "analog" sounding. Anotherwords, (here we go, again) more "musical".

NOW, would I presume this is the correct phase (seems so) or does it come down to a question of "which do you like the best"? (BTW, I wrote Johnny an email with several different product questions and he did not answer this particular one--he may not know.)

maxwalrath · « **Reply #9 on:** 11 Sep 2005, 05:19 pm »

Quote from: albee

Gentlemen, we now have the question of PHASE....

Is there any reason manufacturers can't be held to a standard where they have to put it on the back of their gear that a component is phase inverting? It would save a lot of bandwidth here at AC....the question comes up about random gear every week.

albee · « **Reply #10 on:** 20 Sep 2005, 10:47 pm »

Mystery solved. No more phaze craze. I found my Stereophile cd that just happened to have a phasing track and the Lite IS phase inverting. I have a sneaky feeling most of these inexpensive wunder boxes are inverting. Good to know where I stand. Life resumes.