[highfilter]

I am interested to hear upcoming user reviews on the W4S DAC-1/DAC-2, as I am interested in a DAC with good circuit design and implementation that sounds fantastic to the majority of people right out of the box, without modifications.
 
A discrete, non-modifiable (without surgery) output stage is refreshing, as it can get tiresome hearing about the never ending search for the perfect combination of tubes and opamps.
 
Swapping 20 tubes in and out until it is decided that the Northern Himalayan black mesh plate D-getter is the right tube might be a fun "hobby" for some, but not really what I'm looking for.
 
Steve

Couldn't have said it better myself. Looking forward to hearing some reviews on this DAC, as the endless tube swapping and mods on top of mods isn't my cup of tea.

[mchuckp]

Sorry everyone for the delay on my DAC-1 impressions.  Been sick all week and busy this weekend.  I'll try and get some good impressions up this evening after things settle down.

[ted_b]

It's really too bad that Wyred doesn't offer an in-home eval program....15% restocking fee seems to not understand that they have NO brick and mortar dealers, and this coming from someone who has sung the praise of EJ's work on his STP SE pre from the highest mountain.

[srb]

Although there are some Internet manufacturers that don't charge a restocking fee, it's hard to understand how it can be totally avoided, as the item can't be sold as new.
 
However, dB Audio Labs did rethink their restocking fee on the Tranquility DAC, and have reduced it to $75, which is now only 5% of the $1495 cost.
 
15% will cost you $150 to try and return the DAC-1, and $225 on the DAC-2.  Maybe if it's as good as everyone hopes, Wyred4Sound may be able to reduce their restocking fee as well if the projected returns are minimal.
 
Steve

[ted_b]

If they intend to release new products with no brick and mortar (or even more than one domestic online dealer) then they need to price this with those costs-of-sale in mind.  If they expect 10% of their product to be returned (high number) then bump up the price of the product by a few $$ to cover such product launch costs.  Or create a stash of demo machines that can "tour" the marketplace, eventually selling as seconds.  My $.02

Anyway, back on topic.  I wonder if they are using Gordon's asynch code for their 24/192 USB implementation (and Gordon hasn't released the 24/192 himself) or have they discovered a new solution.

[srb]

I wonder if they are using Gordon's asynch code for their 24/192 USB implementation (and Gordon hasn't released the 24/192 himself) or have they discovered a new solution.

According to the previously linked 6Moons preview article:
 
"The 24/192 USB interface does require a dedicated device driver to properly enable the device.  We use our proprietary microchip-based driver which is also Microsoft signed 'verified' to pose no issue with 64-bit platforms."
 
And from the DAC-2 page on their website:
 
"Proprietary drivers for 32/64 bit Windows XP, Vista, 7 and Mac OS 10.4, 10.5, 10.6"
 
Steve

[Jon L]

According to the previously linked 6Moons preview article:
 
"The 24/192 USB interface does require a dedicated device driver to properly enable the device.  We use our proprietary microchip-based driver which is also Microsoft signed 'verified' to pose no issue with 64-bit platforms."
 
And from the DAC-2 page on their website:
 
"Proprietary drivers for 32/64 bit Windows XP, Vista, 7 and Mac OS 10.4, 10.5, 10.6"
 
Steve

W4S is probably using the Cypress EZ-USB chip, as opposed to Wavelength's TAS1020 solution.  As to which sounds better, obviously it will depend on who you ask, but at least the Cypress solution supports up to 192 kHz USB..

[mchuckp]

1ST IMPRESSIONS

Alright, here are some impressions that I promised.  Sorry for the delay.  Been sick and busy.  You'll notice my references to my ears being messed up.  I was at AK Fest and got sick while there and came home with a sinus and ear infection and the plane REALLY messed me up. 

My source is an Oppo BD983 Special Edition and a Squuezebox Touch.  Speakers are Salk Songtowers (ribbon tweeter version).  Preamp is a Van Alstine Transcendence 8 (tube) and my amp is a Van Alstine Ultravalve (tube).  Room is moderately treated with GIK acoustic treatments.

If you want to know more about my set up.  Here you go:
SET UP: http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?action=systems;area=browse;system=1367
Gallery: http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?action=gallery;area=browse;album=3359


When I first got the Touch I did comparisons using the analog outs and found the Touch to be much better than the Duet (used to have) but not on the same level as the Oppo.  BTW, my gear is a Van Alstine T8 tube preamp, Van Alstine Ultravalve tube amp, feeding Salk Songtowers with Ribbon Tweeter upgrade.  Let me know if you have any questions.

I need to preface again that my ears aren't perfect yet from a ear/sinus infection I had last week.  That being said, I at least wanted to throw out what "I think" I hear. 

Day One: Upon first turning it on and throughout the whole listening session the low end seemed VERY pronounced and the highs were harsh.  Even though my hearing wasn't good this day I was concerned that this DAC was tuned very weird to some weirdo personal taste.  Shortly after starting the session, I opened the manual and noticed these things being listed as what will sound better as it breaks in.  Interesting.  In hind sight, I don't know if this is honestly what I heard or if my hearing was so messed up that I actually had the volume very loud because my ears were clogged up but my ear wasn't picking up much in the midrange and only the lows and highs were getting through to my ear.

Day Two:  Hearing isn't perfect but much better.  What I did was burn a copy of a Playlist from iTunes to make comparisons to the SB Touch quicker for comparing sources (from Apple Lossless).  I went back and forth listening to the CD via the Oppo, then the CD through the DAC, then the same track on the SB through the DAC.  I felt no need to compare the analog outs from the SB to the DAC as I had already compared the SB analogs to the Oppo when I first got it and felt right away that the Oppo was better.

In short, it is very apparent that there is tighter low end in the DAC.  The low end also DOES come through with much more ease.  When playing through the Oppo SE, it sounds great but the low end gets a bit lost in the mix in comparison to the W4S.  Switching over to the DAC, the low end stands out more but not in a way that feels it is "pushing" the low end.  It sounds very nice giving me a punchier sound overall but still has the organic and natural feel that I’m used to with the Oppo.  Going back and forth, the Oppo now feels bass shy.  The combo of this more pronounced and clean low end along with my room treatments really lend well together.  I'd guess if my room was left untreated, this low end might get muddied up with the bad loading that I get in my left front corner.

Another thing I noticed was smoother transients.  No matter the instrument, the attacks and dissolves had a nice smoothness to them.  The last thing that stood out to me was the subtleties it picked out in the recordings.  Vocals had more air around them.  A few tracks in particular that point this out is Eva's 'What a Wonderful World' and Jack Johnson's 'All At Once'.  Eva's track has some analog hiss in the background of the track that is very apparent towards the beginning.  This was even more noticeable using the W4S.  On the JJ track, he has some feedback going on in his guitar at the beginning in the background when it is just his vocals.  Again, this stood out even more using the DAC and I could hear more of the nuances within the actual feedback itself vs just being feedback if that makes sense.  On vocals with a bit of echo or reverb, it was more apparent through the DAC.  The decay of the reverb hung around a bit longer than I'm used to.  In the end, I think this DAC is REALLY pulling out every ounce of detail that is there, be it good or bad.  Just like any other piece of high quality gear, better recordings sound that much better and weaker recordings sound that much weaker. 

As for the comparisons I did, I don't think I could pick out the Oppo vs the SB running through the DAC in a blind test.  There was a few times that I felt the Oppo as a source through the DAC sounded ever so slightly better than the SB but I wouldn't put money on it.  In the end, this is a good thing as it shows that getting the bits to the DAC be it from a disc or a music server it will get great sound.  As I pointed out above, I can say that I AM liking the DAC better than my Oppo SE.  I think taking such a pristine presentation out of the DAC and running through the tubes in my preamp and amp make a great combo.  I'd love to do a direct comparison of this DAC to the Eastern Electric DAC that uses the same Sabre chip but has the tube stage.  Hopefully someday, I'll find someone in the area that gets one and we can do this comparison.  Just not convinced that 3 levels of tubes is the sound that will be to my liking.

As of now, I'm happy with my purchase.  It is doing what I wanted it to do.  Make my SB Touch sound just as good or better than my Oppo SE and so far it seems to be achieving that by out performing it.  I'm obviously not going to recommend someone spend $900 on an Oppo SE and a $1K on this DAC for a pairing.  But since I already have the Oppo SE, I plan on keeping it. 

I got one and have been using it this week. Short answer is that I do really like it. My source has been an Oppo BDP983 Special Edition which I have LOVED. I feel the W4S dac has a nearly identical presentation but excels a little bit in low end definition and punch and more detail.  I notice more details in the recording and things like echo or reverb sustain more clearly.

I previously owned a PS Audio DL3 which I thought was very good. I stopped using it after getting the Oppo SE upgrade because I liked the Oppo SE better (more natural sounding).  So without doing a direct comparison, I could feel pretty confident that it is since the Oppo itself outperformed it IMO. With some of the upgrades I have made in my system with gear and room treatments, my set up is pretty revealing.

On a functionality basis, I have only used the coax inputs via Oppo and SB Touch. Using the DAC, I can't tell the difference between CD vs lossless files.  But swithcing over to a CD through the Oppo, I could tell it isn't quite as good. I've been able to play 24/96 stuff through the SB Touch and even higher resolution via bluray from the Oppo. When I tried an SACD it didn't work though.  Not sure if it doesn't support that multiple or if I have a setting wrong in the Oppo. I need to research this.

Hope this helps. For ME, I think it IS worth the $1K price of admission. My goal as been to match or exceed my Oppo performance for my SB Touch and I've accomplished that. Is it for everybody?  Not sure.  I really like the sound of the Sabre in the Oppo SE, so for me it was perfect.  Love to do some shootouts with other DACs if I meet some folks in the Pacific NW that has others.

[mchuckp]

And a few pix....

W4S DAC-1 w/ Squeezebox Touch


And one with the lights off so you can see the display:

[ted_b]

Thanks for the nice review.

Oppo won't output SACD (PCM or DSD) via coax/toslink digital outs (only HDMI and analog).

[johsti]

Thanks for the review.  I have been looking at the W4S dacs and I found your review interesting because we have the same sources (BDP83SE and SB Touch).

I currently have a PS Audio DLIII and a touch and have been comparing the analog out of the Touch and coax into the PS Audio.  I still haven't decided which one I like more.  The PS Audio is louder out of the balanced outs so it's difficult to compare the two without matching the volume of both sources.  The PS audio sounds more detailed and the bass has a little more definition, but the Touch isn't far behind and may even sound a little more natural to me.  I would be interested in hearing your assessment of the analog out on the touch compared to the Wyred dac.

[mchuckp]

Thanks for the review.  I have been looking at the W4S dacs and I found your review interesting because we have the same sources (BDP83SE and SB Touch).

I currently have a PS Audio DLIII and a touch and have been comparing the analog out of the Touch and coax into the PS Audio.  I still haven't decided which one I like more.  The PS Audio is louder out of the balanced outs so it's difficult to compare the two without matching the volume of both sources.  The PS audio sounds more detailed and the bass has a little more definition, but the Touch isn't far behind and may even sound a little more natural to me.  I would be interested in hearing your assessment of the analog out on the touch compared to the Wyred dac.

I have not compared the Touch to the W4S directly but did compare it to the Oppo SE. I felt the Touch via analog outs is WAY better than analog outs of a Duet. However, to my ear the Touch seemed to push low end a bit but yet wasn't clean. Even though my room is treated, the Touch sounded like it was untreated because the low end was a bit flabby and bloated. I felt it did a very respectable job in the mids and highs for a $300 device. I didn't think it had quite the natural and organic feel that pulls me in like the Oppo SE. It also didn't have quite the separation in staging.

Going to the W4S, the low end got bolder than the Oppo but was much tighter and I really liked it. People hear differently and like different things. To my ear, unless bass is very tight and mixed properly, it is distracting to everything else that is going on. Someone else my feel different.

[golfugh]

Thanks for the review.  Looking forward to the 6Moons review next month.

[Jon L]

Thanks for the review.  Looking forward to the 6Moons review next month.

*Shrug*  Why? I can already predict with confidence they will bestow it with some sort of "Blue Moon Award," perhaps "The Most Amazing DAC Under $5999.99 With Asynchronous USB That Won't Clash With My Decor."

[roscoeiii]

But a review is more than the bestowing or not bestowing an award. It's a chance to have the DAC compared to other DACs that one might consider buying. In this case, the Yamamoto and Weiss DACs ought to be compared to the W4S, and maybe the recently reviewed Stello units as well. That's the review's payoff for me, since I won't likely be able to audition all of those.

[face]

Here's a write up I did on another board.

Two nights ago, I initially heard the W4S DAC-1 at a friend's place. His gear initially consisted of an Ayon Crossfire integrated amp, Ayon CD-2, and a pair of Sonist Concerto 2's. Later on we added a pair of Acoustic Zen Crescendos bi-amped with a Wyred  4 Sound ST-500 on the bottom. At that time, the unit had only about 20 hours of play time on it. I was told that it was a little bright out of the box, but it went away within the first few hours or so.

As for what we listened to, I couldn't tell you for the most part other than it was Ayon's reference CD, something we've been using as reference material for the last few months. It contains various jazz and blues tracks, a few instrumentals and a couple of tracks from Clapton.

With hardly any break in time on the DAC-1, I was impressed. Very extended on both ends, little to no coloration, excellent attack and decay, with huge dynamics. What impressed me the most was the amount of slam! Bass was powerful and tight, never sloppy. Instruments had the right amount of air around them. And the soundstage was huge, very tall with plenty of width and depth.

Compared to the Ayon CD-2, the biggest difference was in the midrange. The Ayon had more tube bloom, as it should for being a tubed CDP. Some male vocals were slightly larger too. But I found the DAC-1 had better attack and decay, more slam, and a slightly taller soundstage.

My friend graciously let me borrow the DAC-1 as long as I promised to keep breaking it in. From the moment I arrived home, it's been receiving a constant feed from either my Marantz SA-15S2 or Squeezebox Duet.

I did some quick listening that evening, but it wasn't until late last night that I was able to do any serious listening. At that point the unit had about 48 hours on it. My rig, consisting of the DAC-1, Marantz SA-15S2, Wyred 4 Sound ST-500, Mapletree Line 2A(modified with Sonic Cap platinum and Jensen caps, Goldpoint stepped attenuator, and other misc. tweaks) custom 3 way speakers, and misc. bass traps and diffusors. It may be quite humble compared to my friend's, but is still a force to be reckoned with.

Using the same reference CD that was used an evening earlier, I compared the DAC-1 to my Marantz SA-15S2. Fortunately, the Marantz and DAC-1 output voltages were very similar, so level matching wasn't an issue...or so I thought. Immediately I noticed the DAC-1 was more extended on the top end, which is no surprise since the SA-15S2 is known for it's rolled off, or warm top end. The DAC-1 also had much better dynamics, which caused me to get up and lower the volume on a few occasions due to the fear of waking up my neighbors 100' away! Attack and decay were also better with the DAC-1, and so was overall detail, without even a hint of harshness. As for differences in imaging and soundstage, in my room they were subtle at best, with the DAC-1 having the edge.

To wrap things up, the Wyred 4 Sound DAC-1 appears to be all I could ask for from a DAC. Excellent extension, attack and decay, huge dynamics, little to no coloration, and without a hint of harshness. As my friend Raife would say, "Such Good Sound".

FYI, I have a DAC-2 on order.  They should be shipping hopefully by the end of next week. 

[satfrat]

Have you had the chance to demo the EE tube/SS Dac in your system yet? Being that they both use the same Saber chip, it would be nice to hear any comparisons between these 2 Dacs as your descriptions of the Wyred Dac closely resemble that of what I've heard from the EE tube/SS Dac. Thanks.
 
Cheers,
Robin

[Jon L]

FYI, I have a DAC-2 on order.  They should be shipping hopefully by the end of next week.

When you get it, do let us know how's its asynch USB input compares to its spdif inputs.

Another main aspect I'm curious about was the density and solidity of midrange.  So often, DAC's with tons of upsampling (Sabre does internally upsample) and solid-state output stage tend to have great extension and speed, but end up having sort of water-color, see-through midrange without much density and solidity to the vocals.  Do let us know how this aspect is with DAC-1/2..  No, I hate over-tubey, larger-than-life, midrange also.

[ted_b]

Jonl,
Where do you read that Sabre does upsampling internally?  Maybe oversampling, but any Sabre DAC chip I've used (Oppo, etc) does native sample rates as output.  Maybe we're having semantics differences (i.e oversampling vs upsampling to 864khz).

[face]

Have you had the chance to demo the EE tube/SS Dac in your system yet? Being that they both use the same Saber chip, it would be nice to hear any comparisons between these 2 Dacs as your descriptions of the Wyred Dac closely resemble that of what I've heard from the EE tube/SS Dac. Thanks.

I haven't heard the EE DAC, it sounds like it would make an interesting comparison though.