Your favorite DAC for your Vandersteens?

[olds1959special]

What do you enjoy the most? Do you feel you need to use a revealing or bright DAC to offset the darkness of Vandersteens? If you want to mention the pre-amp you use too, please do.

Edited May 25, 2023 by olds1959special

[Richard Vandersteen]

46 minutes ago, olds1959special said:

What do you enjoy the most? Do you feel you need to use a revealing or bright DAC to offset the darkness of Vandersteens? If you want to mention the pre-amp you use too, please do.

olds1959special, Vandersteen's are not dark.  Go back in time and look at the measurements John at Stereophile toke of many different models of Vandersteen's and note that except for the natural roll off caused by absorption and diffusion of the room they all measure reasonably flat.  In a world where most speakers especially mid-fi are up in the highs to capture people's attention and credit card they may sound down in the highs, but everything is there.  There are wires that are deliberately designed to work with bright speakers so this would be a bad choice for our speakers unless you have a very bright room.  One does want to choose components that are synergistic with the system and most importantly our TASTE!  If a system with Vandersteen's is dark and closed down several of the components in the system were poorly chosen as the speaker can only play what they are sent.  Not trying to say they are perfect even today but trying to present some perspective, YMMV.  RV

[Bruskie]

Auralic Altair. See my system profile

Bruce 

[Gsal]

I use a Denafrips Venus II and it sounds wonderful despite my predilection for analog. BTW I have owned countless speakers over my 55 + years of listening and having owned both the Treo and now the Quatro Wood CT I find it very strange when I hear people characterize the Vandersteen products as sounding "dark". That description makes no sense to me and my listening experience. I'd have to agree with RV. There's something wrong with your system upstream. My Vandersteens are simply very revealing and keep getting better and better as I upgrade my other equipment. Guess I'm just making the right choices.

[GdnrBob]

Ayre QB-9 for the office, Brinkmann Nyquist for the big system.

I owned the Ayre Codex previously, and it was a great match at a great price point.

Bob

[ctsooner]

I'm with Richard. I"ve never heard Vandersteen's sound dark at all and they are defiantly not piercing.  I listened to so many DAC's before settling on the Brinkmann Nyquist MK2.  I've owned some bespoke DAC's in the past that were special for sure, but I knew in time there wouldn't be anyone around who could fix them if they broke as hte designers were getting out of the business etc...  My preamp will eventually be the new Vandesteen preamp.  All with Quatro CT's.  

[Leo hi-fi]

I have a Denafrips Terminator as my DAC and my preamp is a Zesto Ultra (all tube). Everything sounds great and very close to analog sound. As Sal, I have a preference for analog. It may be that the R-2R ladder architecture of the Terminator is a good match for my Quattro CTs. 

My system does not sound dark at all. It's very transparent and detailed. It is not bright either. It's just natural. 

[GdnrBob]

I have heard of Vandy's sounding  'dark' before, but I attribute it to most speakers having their treble attenuated in order to sound 'alive'. That, and using a ribbon tweeter- which I never liked (after listening for more than 30 minutes).

15 hours ago, Leo hi-fi said:

It's just natural. 

Exactly.

Bob

[Holmz]

On 5/25/2023 at 11:06 AM, olds1959special said:

What do you enjoy the most? Do you feel you need to use a revealing or bright DAC to offset the darkness of Vandersteens? If you want to mention the pre-amp you use too, please do.

I am new to it, but picked up a used RME - it sounds pretty much the same as an ipad with a 1/8” plugged into a RCA input.
And it sounds the same as a TT.

I am p’rolly not a golden ear, but the toe taps the same.

[GdnrBob]

1 hour ago, Holmz said:

I am p’rolly not a golden ear, but the toe taps the same.

If you enjoy the sound, relax. Though that might sound like a paraphrase of Tex Antoine. -Google it. (it ain't pretty). A New York joke to say the most.

B

[TomicTime]

Dark like a superfine Pinot ?….. 

i enjoy an Aesthetix Pandora - Signature in the 7 system and a NAIM in the Treo CT system.

best to all in the search for MORE musical goosebumps !

[ctsooner]

Digital is ever evolving.  I know of two high end companies who are finally working on a top end DAC.  To me, it's much needed to have if you want to stay a top company with reference gear.  Exciting times ahead in digital.  I'm not a fan of many of the top digital companies out there as they can be too sterile.  Digital is just difficult to get right, but when you do, it can sound awfully good even if not up to comparable analog (vinyl or tape).

[Holmz]

3 hours ago, ctsooner said:

Digital is ever evolving.  I know of two high end companies who are finally working on a top end DAC.  To me, it's much needed to have if you want to stay a top company with reference gear.  Exciting times ahead in digital.  I'm not a fan of many of the top digital companies out there as they can be too sterile.  Digital is just difficult to get right, but when you do, it can sound awfully good even if not up to comparable analog (vinyl or tape).

It is either bit perfect as the claims from the 80s…
Or
it requires all sorts of cables, power conditioners, etc.

We got the hype back then, but it is has been constant upgrades and evolutions of perfection..

At least CDs and iPhones can play music in a car, or on a bicycle, or on a plane. 

 

The only constant in the system has been the TT, some AQ Emerald cables, and the speakers… and the various form of the media I bought.

[BKDad]

I dunno.

I’ve spent a lot of my working career optimizing signal integrity in mixed signal (analog and digital) environments.  Not, for audio, I’ll hasten to add, but the principles are the same.  (I had to say all that - rules of the internet.  You have to establish street cred so that all the combatants have something to poke you about.  Rules are rules.)

My own opinion on this is that a lot of the effort put into DAC design and the rest of the associated might be a bit misdirected.  Not actually, wrong, but not the main plot.  It’s kinda like the effort put into treating stomach ulcers for the better part of a century.  Well meaning, perhaps, but not really right either.

But, the subject sure inspires lots of debate and barroom type arguments.

[ctsooner]

Interesting post BK.  The one constant you bring is making us think a bit deeper and possibly in a different direction.  I just think there is so much that they are starting to understand about digital, that we may see LESS expensive options in the next few years or possibly MORE expensive ones. Will they do a better job for SQ?  I sure hope so.  I also think, that just like electronics and speakers, the better the quality we see for cone materials, boxes, magnets, caps, resistors etc... we may see that help with digital.  I know that there are some new clocks they have access to, that are even better than what we have affordable right now.

I think that they realize more and more that the electric feed is KEY and maybe more important than in analog gear.  I wish I knew as much as you guys do, but at least I usually understand what you are talking about once I read and look up definitions etc...  Thanks for sharing.  

[TomicTime]

noise… filters that impact… phase…. analog sections designed and executed by ones and zeroes experts a VERY distinct lack of Faraday cage implementation….. that is just my short list…… like a off tge shelf catalog engineer gave a shot at eclipsing the turntable SOTA….

i have heard a lot of aggressive forward detail dacs “ wow i’ve never heard that before “ that can’t get the violinist stable….. …

[olds1959special]

On 5/24/2023 at 7:48 PM, Richard Vandersteen said:

olds1959special, Vandersteen's are not dark.  Go back in time and look at the measurements John at Stereophile toke of many different models of Vandersteen's and note that except for the natural roll off caused by absorption and diffusion of the room they all measure reasonably flat.  In a world where most speakers especially mid-fi are up in the highs to capture people's attention and credit card they may sound down in the highs, but everything is there.  There are wires that are deliberately designed to work with bright speakers so this would be a bad choice for our speakers unless you have a very bright room.  One does want to choose components that are synergistic with the system and most importantly our TASTE!  If a system with Vandersteen's is dark and closed down several of the components in the system were poorly chosen as the speaker can only play what they are sent.  Not trying to say they are perfect even today but trying to present some perspective, YMMV.  RV

Maybe I thought they were dark when I was under powering them. Also, maybe they can seem dark compared to bookshelf speakers that have less bass. I boost the tweeter level by 0.5dB on my 2ci's to add a little more treble. I agree they don't sound dark now.

[olds1959special]

I use a MHDT Lab Havana DAC with a Raytheon 5670 tube but I changed the DAC chip to AD1865 from PCM56 to make it sound more bright/detailed. I love the idea of a tube DAC like this because it sounds holographic and there's no need for a tube pre-amp in the system.

[BKDad]

16 hours ago, TomicTime said:

noise… filters that impact… phase…. analog sections designed and executed by ones and zeroes experts a VERY distinct lack of Faraday cage implementation….. that is just my short list…… like a off tge shelf catalog engineer gave a shot at eclipsing the turntable SOTA….

i have heard a lot of aggressive forward detail dacs “ wow i’ve never heard that before “ that can’t get the violinist stable….. …

Well, here's a measurement!  Wavelength USB Spacelator   (Actual product)

Other similar measurements from me (starting) here:  USB Isolator Measurements  (These aren't of the Wavelength product, though.)

Now that I think about it, these kinds of problems are really another form of feedback!  How about that?

Yeah, the tones and noise are somewhat low in level, but how low in level are the cabinet moving vibrations from a pair of Quatros that are mitigated by using a granite block beneath them?  (With Vandersteen feet, of course)  Most people here on this forum hear a positive difference with the granite blocks.

My two cents:  People tend to try to compensate for noise and imperfections of various kinds that mask the information they really want.  That's true for TV sets where people turn up the brightness, contrast, and color controls, and in audio systems with various tweaks that brighten up or otherwise cover up the flaws in the sound.   But, nothing is as effective or lifelike as really cleaning the window itself.

[ctsooner]

So well put guys.  It's not rocket science (well maybe some of it really is, but you get my point).  I'm in a constant mode of trying to mitigate noise in my system.  I swear I even hear the difference using an LPS on my router that's in the room.  I'll be getting the gigafoil V4 with a good LPS to see if that cleans up my ethernet stream.  It should based on the optical isolation. Ayre spends a LOT of money on their ethernet boards that have an optical isolation deal built into it, but even they will tell you that using one before the signal hits their DAC is best.  

Again, it's to get rid of the noise and get the micro and macro detail that our speakers surely can.  That's part of where goosebumps occur.  so many digital tweaks around and some are outstanding, some are BS and some are good depending on the system they are in.  Again, it's all about auditions in your own system if yo0u are able to.

[Delkat]

I have a Mola Mola Tambaqui playing through the Kentos and it sounds damn good to me. 

[ctsooner]

My buddy reviewed that one and told me to put it in my final mix. It’s an amazing DAC. 

[GdnrBob]

On 5/29/2023 at 11:57 AM, TomicTime said:

Dark like a superfine Pinot ?….. 

I had a 3 Monkey's pinot a year or two ago. It was superfine, but I wouldn't say is was dark.

Bob

[Mike Goetz]

I really only use a DAC in conjunction with streaming to preview  vinyl that I am thinking about purchasing or occasionally when I am feeling too lazy to go the turntable route (which is not often). My streaming/digital chain is really not too sophisticated. I use iFi (Zen DAC Signature V2 and Zen Stream) which works well in my system. BTW, as a Vandersteen owner for over 30 years, right now 3A Signatures, I have never found them to be “dark”. 

[TomicTime]

I spent a few enjoyable hours listening to the Mola Mola in an excellent system a month or so ago - it’s a superb sounding DAC for sure