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TDA1541A


The SECOND BATTLE OF GIANTS
JULY 2008


After almost half year since the first top player contest many players tried to beat my top four: the Lampucera, the Grundig 9009, the Azur and the Shanling. Or should I say the game was between the DACs really: The CS4397, The Wolfson WM8470, the Burr-Brown 1794 and the old Philips TDA1541AS1.

I decided that it is time to call a second game. The Revenge. The champions went back to their pits, regrouped, improved, tuned, took doping and generally got prepared for the new bloodbath.
We have four new contenders which all surpassed the old champions. So let the battle begin !!!


1. As good as the stock unmodified Cambridge 640C lampized externally with 6H1P tube was - it was seriously beaten by the Arcam CD73, with same wolfson but better power regulation and better part tuning, and also better lampizator - internal 6H6P SRPP of second generation (meaning that the resistors of 620 Ohms were changed now to 39 Ohms)

2. As good as the tweaked Big Boss Grundig 9009 was, it was beaten by the slim kid - The NAIM CD3 with non oversampling mode, no tuning, and one triode Siemens ECC801S as internal lampizator.

3. The lampucera is now the super tweaked version with good power supplies, with the caps upgraded to a mix of os-cons and tantalums, and the output is via a 6H6P in triode mode cathode follower. It uses Obbligato oil caps unlike the old test having no name MKP's.

4. Finally - the burr brown dac chip PCM1794 of the shanling - I don't have it now, so the fourth corner will be for lampized SATCH DAC - the theoretically best TDA1541A dac box ever made.

Additional runners up are: Nakamichi CDP-2e and fabulous Philips CD753. And as a surprize - the old DENON 2560 with Analog Devices DAC AD1862 returned with new energy.
The winner of this contest will go to another house and it will challenge good old Audionote DAC4 SE. Things will be interesting this summer!



My amp is hot, my speakers are toed in, my chair is comfy, lets listen !

lampizator test


Ouuuggh this is gonna be tough. The bar is rised so high, that it is very exhausting to listen for such small nuances and find minuscule differences, if all players here are TOP CLASS and selected from thousand mediocre boxes. In every case I just want to jump shouting YES this is it ! I love this sound.

Anyway - I can share with you what I heard.

1. NAIM CD3 - this slim'n'ugly thing looks like a joke but after lampization and removing 5 opamps per channel it opened up, exploded with details, and attacked me with totally unveiled image of live musicians. This player redefined what is possible to do with TDA1541A S1. If you think that TDA1541A is just good midrange  and woolly bass and shy trebles - think again.
The NAIM sound is like a dream of TDA1541A afficionado come true.  The NAIM people know something about the TDA1541A which I don't know yet. I tried same caps, better regulators, all kinds of tricks and never arrived on such good sound.
Partly thanks to the ultra pricey supertube - very explosive dynamics surprised me. Siemens ECC801S is a super expensive silly tube which extracts the last detail and last drop of juice from the TDA1541A. When I added the NOS (non-over-sampling)  mod (very very easy in this player) it responded with magic causing goose bumps like never before.

This is the first player in series of champions, so it is too early to draw conclusions or to call a winner  but before trying the other 5 - so far - compared to all my previous experience - the baby "pancake" Naim CD3 becomes for a while the KING OF CD PLAYERS. I can not imagine one single smallest area where I can hear any weakness. Also the ergonomics, the good taste design, the ultra large and legible display, the understatement look, the super high reliability of manual drawer  - puts it on top of the list for people interested in the ultimate, cost no object  CD playback. Unfortunately it is hard to find and quite pricey. I guess 500 Pounds is a minimum ticket plus lampization.




2. The Lampucera with full tuning.

I can not stop admiring my Chinese princess. There is no debate - the CS4397 rightly belongs to the elite of DACs.   On such simple PCB as the Lampucera and with all SMD caps bypassed by 10 uF tantalums and all electrolytes replaced by  330 uF oscons ( by 6,3 V) - with DAC-DIRECT output to Lampizator - the 6H6P configured in anode follower triode - and with Obbligato oil capacitors (Or should I say canisters). this board DAC produces sound which I expect from 5 000 Euro  top of the line CD player.
Overall this sound has no weaknesses, it delivers everything it does in the best form. If I was hard pressed to "find something on this sound" I would say that sometimes, and only in direct comparison to  the best players - it sounds a little bit "plastic" . Kind of synthetic. Next minute - I don't hear it at all, but sometimes the warmth of voices in the Naim or the Arcam captures my attention. Maybe after better cap selection - this plastic feeling would disappear. If I remember well, os-con sounds just like that - a little plasticky - compared to the better Blackgates.
Don't get me wrong. This remark is only VERY VERY subjective and small. Like a complaint about the uncomfortable cigarette lighter in a Porsche.

Overall, if I didn't hear the NAIM I would say that Lampucera rules, but unfortunately there is only one position for the king so Lampucera can be a Queen. Considering the board price - some 20 Pounds before shipping - it is a DREAM. You can have 25 Lampuceras for one NAIM.

3.SATCH dac fith full mods

SATCH dac has been described in its section in details. With NOS mode, some tantalum bypass, and with SRPP lampizator with 6N2P tubes - it created a new reference immediately. The typical hifi descriptive terms which we used for other players in this contest were replaced in our vocabulary with the likes as Holy Shit, Oh My God, and the like.
The satch does everything that the NAIM does plus it is more refined, it sounds deeper, more magical, more awsome in the hallucinations departments. It is the dream come true. For a week I just listened. I have probably pulled 100 CDs and I loved every minute of listening.  Satch  is not really a product - it is basically a DAC chip naked, with lampizator attached.
It shows that the potential of the good old TDA1541A is extremely strongly related to the surrounding circuitry. TDA is like a musical instrument - it plays what the artist can play, without sound of its own.
As far as DAC boxes go - I haven't yet heard a better one.

4.ZERO DAC with AD1852 dac chip

This silly looking cheap  DAC after lampization with Triode cathode follower totally surprized me.  I did not expect it to sound this good.  There is something very right about the warm timble of music. Bass is very good, details are rich and natural , I just loved it. I rank it as real high end, in this particular contest it comes last but just a hair behind Lampucera. I believe some people would pick ZERO as a better choice.

5. DENON DCD2560 revisited

it was the fourth time the DENON returned to my lab for upgrade.
I changed the tubes to 6N2P and the Analog Devices AD1862 DACS were in current output mode. I used a pair of mono DACs without using the second mirror pair.
I added tantalum caps directly on chip's pins for three power supplies per DAC. It sounded great but shy in the bass. I replaced tantalums with OS-CONS - 330 uF by 10 V and the bass returned. The additional caps were necessary because the power supply regulators are very far from DAC chips.

What can I say - the DENON really came to life with the best tubes known to me today. The bass, mids and trebles were as good or better than from any of my other contenders, but there is one aspect where the Denon DCD2560 wins - the size of soundscape. The DENON DCD2560 has the widest, highest and deepest soundstage I ever heard. It has energy, power, slam, drive, details - I always dreamed about. I can  not find one smallest flaw in the DENON.
It also looks great and the ergonomics are great.
In this contest - the ranking is the following:
Denon 100, SATCH 95, NAIM 90, Lampucera 85,  Zero dac 80  points.

The Nakamichi CDp-2e did not sound good enough to make it to this listing but it was nevertheless VERY good. Equal to the best Sonys like 227ESD or 337ESD.


I had to return the Denon to the owner, so it was the Satch which went to the friend's house to play against the Audio Note DAC4 upgraded to DAC5 status with blackgates which could form a nice will of a rich man.

6. Audio Note DAC 4 (4,5) against the Tube Satch

  The SATCH in the context of a 70 000 Euro system - top of the line Verdier 845 monos, Verdier 4 box preamp, and Audiomeca Mephisto 1 transport  with Top Lowther horn 2 way speakers and all top Kondo cabling - was really at home. It sounded heavenly good. I mean the DAC played as expected in this system - natural, powerful, energetic and totally analog. Smooth and magical.
However after switching to DAC 4 based on the AD1865 DAC (one stereo piece) and the same receiver as in SATCH - CS8414, and the tube equivalent of 6N6P - the superb ECC182s - it beats the SATCH. It is a small difference, very small, but the A-N has more detail and more power energy. It sounds as the SATCH on steroids.
Totally fabulous DAC, and rightly so for the price tag of 19 000 Euro (or so I was told).  If I havent heard the DAC4 I would say the system is in perfect synergy with the SATCH.

There we have it - the 500 dollar SATCH comes 94 % close to the AN which is my world reference player. Can I say more ?

So I am going back to my lab to chase the dragon and eventually beat the A-N. If memory serves me, The Denon DCD2560 was 99 % of the AN. 

A fully hotrodded and lampized Revox B225 with two TDA1540 DACs may be the one to beat AN DAC4, who knows. Kind of a black horse of the race.




  A YEAR LATER
The lampized Behringer DAC was the closest one to beat the Audionote. It was so close that the difference did not matter anymore. Well - facts are - they were equal. And the Behringer 9624 costs only 300 Eu.


.......................................to be continued ........................



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