[Zyca]

Hello there everyone, I would like to introduce a rater well designed and well built USB DAC that had been on the market in Taiwan for the last few years.  While there were plans to introduce it to the world market, it never quite materialized until now.

May I present KECES USB DAC.



BASIC specs:
*World Voltage Compatible, switchable between 100~120V and 200~240V
*Power supply independent of your computer, shield the DAC from noises of your computer's power supply.
*Audiophile Grade Burr Brown PCM2702 DAC IC and two BurrBrown OPA604 as output filter OP
*Highly regulated and independent power supply for each section of the DAC and OP, fully shield each section of USB DAC from interfering each other.
*Audiophile/Military Grade Resistors and Capacitors, all in the name of higher quality sound.
*Presentation Grade fit and finish, inside and out.  To let everyone see how good it really is on the inside, we made the top cover from engraved clear acrylic.
*High Quality gold plated RCA connector with Teflon insulated Silver plated copper wire.

Currently listed on eBay for an introductory price of $180 plus shipping:
However, since it is not suitable to post eBay link here, anyone here interested can purchase directly for $175USD plus shipping, currently only paypal payments are accepted. (I'm open to suggestions on online payment services.)

Shipping/Handling Charge (Via International EMS express shipping.):
US/Europe/Russia:30 USD
Asia/Oceania Regions (exclude Russia): 20USD
Africa Regions: 40USD

Combined shipping discount:
Buy 3 units and only pay the shipping for two (ie: $90 charge is now only $60)
Buy 5 units and only pay the shipping for three (ie: $150 charge is now only $90)



For all the tech buffs, below is a more detailed description of how this DAC is like.


AC Power Section
From the picture you can see the general layout of the USB DAC, and let's start from the left.

As you can see on the top left of the picture, power enters the unit via an IEC power inlet that had a built-in fuse box.  We have selected a slow blow fuse that provide a good C/P ratio, but you can use any exotic fuse that you so fancy.

Next is the power terminal strip, where you can easily select the input voltage by choosing which part of the winding on the transformer that will be powered.

Then the high efficiency toroidal transformer, with separate winding for DAC and OP amp power.


DAC Board Configuration


DAC Power
Now onto the USB DAC board itself, the lower section of the board house the regulator circuit. The power is first rectified by a set of high speed diode, and filtered by high quality NCC capacitors.  The DAC IC requires a 3.3V (digital) and a 5V (analog supply), this is provided by LM1086CT 3.3 & LM1086CT 5.0.  Which provides really good regulation for both the cost and the board space it occupies.

With the power regulated, it is passed onto Elna's Silmic capacitor for output bypassing before it is passed onto PCM2702 DAC IC.  There are also quite a few bypass capacitor right next to the DAC chip to make sure the DAC itself is properly looked after.


Analog Power
OP amp also have a similar treatment, but it uses TL431 + bipolar transistor regulation configuration for even lower noise and higher performance, same ELNA Silmic capacitor is also used there, and OP itself is fully bypassed with Silmic capacitors as well.


Audio Signal Coupling
The coupling between DAC and OP is done with Bennic's top grade XPP capacitor, which is quite a good performer, delivers clean and detailed sound without sounding harsh.


Other Quality Components
1% precision and military grade resistors is also used throughout the board, to ensure that effort spent with the other components is not wasted by lousy resistors.


As for the final fit and finish, or some would call it quality of construction.  Well, the pictures above and below speaks for themselves.  All photos are taken from a production unit, KECES pride itself in making every unit looking good inside and out, thus the acrylic cover and careful internal layouts.  We don't have units specifically made for photo shoots, because we don't need to.


More pics:





Currently listed on eBay for an introductory price of $180 USD plus shipping:
However, since it is not suitable to post eBay link here, anyone here interested can purchase directly for $175USD plus shipping, currently only paypal payments are accepted. (I'm open to suggestions on online payment services.)

Shipping/Handling Charge (Via International EMS express shipping.):
US/Europe/Russia:30 USD
Asia/Oceania Regions (exclude Russia): 20USD
Africa Regions: 40USD

Combined shipping discount:
Buy 3 units and only pay the shipping for two (ie: $90 charge is now only $60)
Buy 5 units and only pay the shipping for three (ie: $150 charge is now only $90)


Please feel free to ask any question that you may have.

[lonewolfny42]

Your photo's didn't show....here's one from the eBay listing....

[Zyca]

Your photo's didn't show....here's one from the eBay listing....

Hummm... Weird, I guess I'll upload the photo to imageshack and have it host it there instead.


Thanks for the note

[Zyca]

image link updated, please let me know if it still won't show.


Thanks.

[lonewolfny42]

Its working now - I see photo's...looks good. What are the dimensions of the dac ?
Thanks....

[Zyca]

Its working now - I see photo's...looks good. What are the dimensions of the dac ?
Thanks....

Width= 210mm
Height= 65mm
Depth= 180mm

Ships with region specific power cable (if we can't find a proper cable, we will include a proper adapter for your country) with voltage preset for the region.  A good quality USB cable is also included as well.

Shipping weight is close to 2KG with a shipping carton and packing.

[kyrill]

nice another very affordable usb dac

However how does it sound compared to the many non oversampling usb dacs?

[Zyca]

nice another very affordable usb dac

However how does it sound compared to the many non oversampling usb dacs?

I personally have not heard many NOS DACs, the last I heard is based on 8 parallel TDA1543... That was something that I couldn't quite stand, no highs, no lows, only very thick and muddy mid range.  I'm not sure if it is the one I heard was incorrectly designed or something, but it doesn't really sound good at all to me.  I have not tried TDA1541 and other NOS DAC that is supposingly having a rep, since I really don't have any friends close by that owns one.

But I would recommend that equipments be judged on their musical performances, rather than the technology it is based on.  For that how it is actually applied would matter the most aa


For all AudioCircle buyer, I would like to sweeten the offer by this:

All AudioCircle buyer in addition to a 1 year warranty, will now enjoy a 14 day no question asked (tho we would love to know why it doesn't fit your need or your taste) return policy.  Ship the unit back to us (please make sure all accessories and the unit itself is in the same condition as it arrives, and INFORM US IN ADVANCE.) within 14 days of the receipt of the unit, and we will refund the unit's purchase price less shipping, to your paypal account.  We know it would be even better if the shipping could be covered, but that cannot be done unless the price of the unit is dramatically increase to cover the cost.



Sorry for sounding all weird in the above statement, but it would be best if the fine prints can be known to everyone before anything in the fine print were ever going to be invoked.


For all modholics, we supply full schematics to PCM2702 DAC, there is no secrets that we really plan to hide, everything is in plain sight.  If you couldn't download the spec from www.keces.com.tw, then I can mail it to you upon reqest.   Please do note that modding does VOID your warranty, but we will still support you via e-mail if something goes wrong in the process of modding, helping you find out where it went wrong and how could it be fixed.

schematic at:  http://www.keces.com.tw/4_download/download/DAC2702_sch.pdf


Thanks.

[Zyca]

Hello everyone, here's the RMAA report we got, we used EMU's 1212M to test KECES USB DAC and that's the result we got.

Equiptment we used is nothing special, and none are modded from original spec in any way.  Cable used is just cheap shielded cable for RCA, and standard power and USB cable that we ship with our product.  We set it to 24 bit, but Windows will automatically reduce it to 16bit upon output, so that should not matter too much.

The formatting is changed a little bit from the original report, because it is not easy translating something from pure HTML to forum compatible format, so please bear with me there.  None of the data are changed in any way or form, only been either turned into a picture or reformatted to fit the forum better.

Enjoy.


If you are interested in aquiring one, please let me know and I'll arrange for a paypal invoice to be sent to you. (Yes, without using Ebay, you can get it for $175 plus shipping, if you use Ebay, it will be $180 plus shipping)

KECES USB DAC

RightMark Audio Analyzer test


Testing chain: External loopback (line-out - line-in)
Sampling mode: 24-bit, 48 kHz




Summary




General performance: Excellent




Frequency response










Noise level










Dynamic range










THD + Noise (at -3 dB FS)










Intermodulation distortion










Stereo crosstalk










IMD (swept tones)








This report was generated by RightMark Audio Analyzer 5.4

[mcullinan]

It does look really cool...
gllg.. Being a design person, Im a sucker for the see thru top. Nice Touch.
Mike

[Zyca]

It does look really cool...
gllg.. Being a design person, Im a sucker for the see thru top. Nice Touch.
Mike

Thanks for the kind comments, I should be able to have something even more interesting to show everyone in a couple of weeks or less.   aa

[Zyca]

Current batch of KECES USB DAC is running low on stock, if anyone's looking into such devices at the moment, go for it before it is sold out!