The THIRD
BATTLE
OF GIANTS - last one and BIGGEST TO DATE.
The old
champions and new challengers will be represented by:
1. TDA1541
inside one of the best CD of all times - the Sony CDP227ESD with a full
tweaking job, NOS and a lampizator built in.
2. The new
contender will be ROCKNA DAC
utilizing AD1865 chip (Audio-Note DAC4 and
5 !) with identical lampizator like in DAC4 and Sowter transformers
(Tubes will be Amperex Ecc182)
3. The barely
legal youngest stallion - ESS DAC from Twisted
Pear - the BUFFALO SABRE
- with Lampizator
4. The current
residing champion - my personal favourite - with all the belts -
DENON
DCD2560 with one of the best DACS ever - 4 pieces of AD1862 with
Broskje Lampizator variant.
5. one of the
best CD I ever had -Kenwood
8010 with Burr Brown DAC PCM58 and KSS190A
mechanism - with lampizator and full tuning/clock job.
6. Lampucera
with the best Cirrus DAC CS4397
7. Behringer
Upsampler with a AKN DAC AK4393
8. ARCAM CD73
with lampizator (Wolfson DAC)
9. Sony
Playstation 1 with lampizator
After this
comparative test I will close the CD chapter and rest my case. There
will be not much more I can learn from these experiments. I will leave
it to others to work further and find better caps, better tubes,
silver cables, better operating points - PERFECTIONISM is what I leave
to the followers.
A year later
(dec 2009)
Ok, Ok, I admit
- making a valuable comparison of 9 devices, all so good that almost
perfect - is practically impossible and possibly impractical.
Anyone claiming such verdict would have to have his head examined.
But I have lived with all of them for a year, listening and tweaking,
and I can say what I generally think.
The TDA1541A continues to surprise me. When I thought that I know its
limits, I discovered website where there was a ready recipe for
non-oversampling mod in a Sony chipset environment and this mod pushed
the TDA quality to another level. My favourite solution is double
paralleled TDA and SRPP lampizator based on Siemens e88cc tubes. I have
a preference for Sony demodulator versus the Philips one. So the choice
comes down to two players: sony CDP-227ESD and 337. Despite the 337
being MUCH heavier built - the 227 actually sounds more attractive to
me.
Broadly generalizing, the good old TDA is unbeatable. It can only be
just about equalled by the other DACS which sound "different". The TDA
in the car kingdom would be the BMW B28 M5 from 1992.
2. While the original Rockna sucked, the AD1865 NOS concept as
for example in Audio Note DAC4 and DAC5 and some 3's and kits too - is
a hell of a dac. It is infinitely easier to implement than TDA1541A and
its sound is very attractive. Direct comparison to the TDA makes AD a
slight winner in every area but the AD never gets me emotional as much
as the TDA does. I could really live with any of them, or rather - with
both.
3. The ESS dac is a mixed bag. While I really love its sound - I am
angry about poor availability of the product.
I mean - offering a DAC only through a one man company from USA is not
the way to be admired, applauded or recommended. Such sales channel
limitation leads to monopolistic practices, market degeneration and
unrealistic pricing. Lack of competition will kill ANYTHING in the
world.
And there we are: the DAC itself, as a chip, is in my opinion the best
DAC in the world today. It is a class of its own.
Especially with Behringer upsampler before it.
But I will not recommend you to buy BUFFALO dac which when we tied it
in stock form with many too many op-amps - sounded uninspiring and
flat. And I can not expect anybody to desolder 80 % of that PCB
and rebuild it for Lampizator output. That's unrealistic.
So we can now wait for someone to offer ESS Sabre Reference DAC in a
more user friendly package. Chances are - I will be that someone.
4. Denon 2560 is a player of limitless possibilities.
The DAC AD1862 is magical, arguably even better than the AD1865. I have
managed to: a) lampize that DAC from current outputs (biig improvement)
and I also managed to B) convert the balanced PCB into paralleled mode.
I gave omitted the digital flip of absolute signal phase and I floated
all 4 DAC inputs and I fed them with the same signal and I gained the
idling DACs from negative phase - being now positive again. The
paralleled signal in analog domain makes the already explosive sound -
even better.
If I could only do C) NOS for this DAC - it would probably be even much
better. Seems impossible but true - AD1862 is one of those DACS to die
for.
5. one of
the
best CD I ever had -Kenwood
8010 with Burr Brown DAC PCM58 and huge magnetic mechanism, a
class higher quality than similar Sony KSS190A
mechanism - with lampizator and full tuning/clock job. Do you think I
am crazy, or on glue? Kenwood??? - those people who make kitchen
toasters ? YES. They used to be in top three of Japan makers, alongside
Sony and Teac. In my opinion, Kenwoods DP8010, 8020 and x9010
represent the highest level of technical excellence ever achieved in
the history of audio engineering. I am talking about the mass products,
not Forsell Air Reference.
Anyhow - I digress. The 8010 which I happened to use for the past weeks
- is very good but not GREAT ENOUGH. It does everything well,
mechanically, visually and sound wise, but the PCM58 is holding it
back. This is a great DAC chip but not as great as the above described
kings.
The lampized Kenwood would beat EVERY player out there from the stock
crowd, but not the lampized champions.
6. Lampucera
with the best Cirrus DAC CS4397 - I did not use Lampucera for the
past couple of months so it gets excluded from this set of divagation.
I will return to it in the next 2-3 months.
7. Behringer
Upsampler with a AKM DAC
AK4393 - This is the black horse of this contest. Initially
I treated it like a joke, like a fun project to test my skills, and
eventually it impressed everybody to a serious degree. It is very close
or equal or even above the TDA1541 and AD1865. It does not beat the ESS
Sabre32 but it is damn close, definitely in the same league. What
attracts me to the AKM dac is that it is both cheaper and easy to
purchase inside the Behringer Upsampler or Ultracurve. That easily
off-sets the minuscule difference in sound to the advantage of still
best ESS Sabre32.
I haven't tried the AKM's AK4395 or 6, Some people say the higher
models are better, other people claim that the 93 is the best shot, the
one with pure magic spell. I cant say.
8. ARCAM CD73
with lampizator (Wolfson WM8742 DAC)
This is great DAC and great player - but not as good as the ESS SAbre
or AKM DAC. Today, Wolfson is the most popular choice of many
manufacturers and it can be had for little money, implemented in
hundreds of players, DVDs, squeezeboxes and DACs. I really recommend it
even if the Sabre ESS I recommend even more.
The other DACs I like are: TDA1543 in 8x parallel application and
also the Philips' TDA1549.
I also like the B-B PCM1794 and B-B PCM-63. They can be - with good
application and tube stage - as good as any of the chips mentioned
above.
If you download and read my WORD
TUTORIAL DOC ver 3.0 - I will put there the ready recipes for the
best Lampizator circuits for all these chips.