Hello,
I was wondering some opinions whether going from my present Trends UD-10 to the USB off ramp Turbo-2 would be worth any sonic gains,if any?
I am using Foobar 9.44 with FLAC files,then to the ASIO driver I purchased from http://www.usb-audio.com .
This then feeds the Trends UD-10 and on to my Musical Fidelity DM25 tube upsampling dac.I should mention I am using the resampler in Foobar and it's set to 48khz out too.
The sound quality I am getting is VERY VERY GOOD!I have no issue's with pop's or clicks as I did with ASIO4all.
I am at a point where I am curious as to whether I would achieve any gains in sound quality,or is the next step selling my Musical Fidelity DM25 and going towards a I2S dac like the Northstar.
Thanks for your comments.
The UD-10 is a great product at the pricepoint, but it is not even close to the sound quality that you get with an Off-Ramp Turbo 2. The Superclock4 and optimized digital design deliver very low jitter. Much blacker background and detail rendering. Very musical. You dont need an S/PDIF cable either. Comes with a short captive cable.
I recommend using Foobar 0.8.3 with DirectSound2 and SRC upsampling to 24.96 with the Off-Ramp. All of these come with the product.
The Off-Ramp I2S is a bit better than the Off-Ramp Turbo 2, but you need a DAC that has I2S input.
Once you have made the move to I2S, then there are other options available, such as the Pace-Car reclocker that has both S/PDIF and I2S outputs available. This is the lowest jitter on the planet, even lower than the Off-Ramp, and you can mate it with USB, Squeezebox, Sonos, AirPort Express or Olive. They all have the same great sound quality once reclocked by the Pace-Car.
You can even use your UD-10 to drive the Pace-Car, but you must ship your laptop to me so I can tune the Pace-Car to the laptop. You see, the incoming jitter to the Pace-Car is unimportant.
As for DAC's, I dont mean to boast, but I have not found anything close to my modded DAC-1, Northstar or Spoiler except for the Bremen #1, which also needed some mods to fix the top end. If you read the feedback on these (posts on various forums - links under the mod info), you will find that I have multiple customers that have sold their EMM labs DAC's, Accoustic-Arts, and DCS DAC's after they received one of my DAC's. They are really wonderful sounding. As a matter of fact, a customer with one of my modded Dodson 218's just emailed me that he compared it to a Zanden Signature (supposedly the best DAC in the world). Here is his email:
"after a few hours of A/B testing both DACs over the same Dominus S/PDIF cable I have to say this (with some surprise): the Zanden DAC does NOT sound better than the half-priced modded Dodson. Zanden has sexy meaty midrange, good bass and is very dynamic. I think what I am hearing is the raw advantage of well-sorted non-upsampled 16/44 sound. But where the Zanden ’rings’, the Dodson ’flows’. The 24/192 upsampled Dodson casts a bigger soundstage, more air and handles especially high frequencies and sharp tones with much more ease than the Zanden. This goes against all the Zanden DAC reviews I have read, but I have to say that on my system the modded Dodson sounds more natural and less digital - not by a big margin, but clearly so."
Steve N.
