Mojo Audio Mystique EVO

Benjamin from Mojo Audio here.

I just wanted to let you all know that my current reference digital source is a modified Jay’s Audio CD transport.

The time, tune, and harmonic coherency is like nothing I’ve ever heard. And I’ve owned some pretty exotic CD transports.

Don’t ask me to explain why, but the best computer audio won’t hold a candle to a proper CD transport. Even those new JCAT XE OCXO clocked USB cards, which has the same type of OCXO clock as the Jay’s CD transport, is not even close.

When I played this for some local audiophiles all their jaws dropped. The sound was so much better than any digital music they ever heard no one ever asked to go back to computer audio for a comparison.

I now consider the best computer audio as background music. The timing and tune are totally messed up. Streaming is worse, but even music played from your music library on an internal SSD is off time and tune.

Seriously. Once you hear it you can’t unhear it. The sound those of you who are real music lovers have been waiting for.

I removed all computers from my main system. If I’m going to warm up my tube amp, I’m going to change CDs from now on.

Because a CD transport is my current reference digital source, the new Mystique X is getting some pretty serious S/PDIF upgrades. I’m even putting a power cut off switch for the USB input which will remove all clocking from inside the DAC chassis and lower the noise floor even further.

For those of you with one of our 2019-2021 EVOs you will be able to get this S/PDIF upgrade by the spring of 2022. We’re also going to offer a PCM63 DAC chip upgrade.

Interesting. I purchased the very good PS Audio PWT transport two weeks ago because I have been hearing folks say what Benjamin just posted. Ben shared this with me recently. So I have a very nice Hijiri Nogami power cord on the transport and the top of the line Hijiri Million Dollar digital cable. I have been comparing the sound to my Innuos Zenith 3 server. I had to find out for myself if CD spinning is still that far ahead.

The answer is not universal or easy. It depends and that is now clear to me. My Innuos Zenith is fed by a Network Acoustics ENO filter, two ENO ethernet cables, an English Electric Switch 8 powered by a top notch LPS and a modem/router powered my a top notch LPS. I have a Tchernov Reference USB cable between the Mojo Evo and Zenith.

I have been conducting listening tests carefully listening for differences and preferences. Here is my conclusion based on my system as outlined above.
- CD spinning sounds very, very similar to CDs ripped and played off the Zenith. Very close. I would give a slight edge in dimension to the CD spinner. Very slight.
- Streaming Qobuz from Roon did not sound as good as the CD spinner. It depended on the Qobuz file quality however. Non - HD Qobuz files sounded the worst. HD Qobuz sounded much better, but still about 85% as good as the CD spinner. It sounded flat compared to CD spinning.
- Using the new Innuos Sense instead of Roon makes things much closer to CD spinning. Roon does not sound as good as the new Sense software from Innuos. Frankly, Sense is much better sounding at the date of this posting. So streaming HD Qobuz files through Innuos Sense is damn close to the CD spinner. Within 5%.

Innuos Sense is coming out with an update next week that is said to sound some 10% better according to beta testers. This will put HD Qobuz files and CD rips on par with CD spinning in my rig. What’s important to remember here is everything matters when it comes to streaming and playing files off a server. Everything matters! The music playback software used is also critical. Roon is no match to Sense sonically as of today. However, Roon continues to improve their sound quality as does Sense. This space is moving fast folks with sound quality improvements coming monthly! Network Acoustics has some new ethernet filters and switches coming that will improve streaming sound quality even more.

No easy or general answer to the question of does CD spinning or streaming/server sound better. Cannot make any broad brush conclusions as it just depends. Too many options, products and variables are at play. In addition, the streaming/server improvements are coming at a very fast rate. Innuos Sense is just one example. Going from Roon to Sense has been a sonic revelation for many of us. Both continue to improve sound quality and that is great news for sure.

Depending on how your system’s digital front end is set up CD spinning may sound much better than a server or it may not. The only way to know is to compare for yourself in your own system. Just FAR too many variables at play for the one simple answer.

For those of you with one of our 2019-2021 EVOs you will be able to get this S/PDIF upgrade by the spring of 2022. We’re also going to offer a PCM63 DAC chip upgrade.

Hey Benjamin, if you want to hit it out of the park, make those upgrades user-installable!

Interesting that the subject of cd transports came up in this thread, as after 9 months of ownership of my EVO, I recently decided to experiment with listening to the EVO through my disc player as a transport. Last night was mesmerizing. I am using an Esoteric UX3-pi into the EVO spdif input. EVO/UX3-pi breathes life into the music, whereas the UX-3pi alone sounds flat and uninvolving in comparison. Might have to try a Jay’s or Pro-Ject transport one day.

The reason it took so long to try the spdif input is that the EVO simply sounds fantastic with my Laufer Teknik Memory Player streaming to the EVO. Matt Clott also used a Memory Player in his positive review of the EVO in the Absolute Sound. In my system, it is hard to say which is better, EVO/Memory Player or EVO/Esoteric. I will say that the EVO/Memory Player combo seems to have a knack of making compressed recordings sound more palatable to my ears, and recordings that already have good dynamic range are simply wonderful.

I use Roon, but @grannyring as usual is ahead of the curve and I will have to try some of the things that he has done that has improved the sound of his system. I appreciate that @grannyring is sharing his endeavors and results with the rest of us.

Benjamin’s description of the sound of the EVO is spot on, as it should be. I bought and tried 5-6 dac’s and chose Mojo Mystique v.3 (since upgraded to EVO) because of how it blends the musicians coherently together in a way that makes it seem that there is a live performance in front of me (in a “you are there” manner), instead of sounding like people are in a recording studio in separate sound booths. Benchmark DAC3 was like the latter. Border Patrol DAC SE came closest to sounding like the Mystique, in my system. I also had PS Audio DirectStream, which was around the same price as the Mystique, but the obviously smaller image size and flatter sound staging of the DirectStream (relative to the Mojo) made it an easy decision to go with Mojo.

Anyways, hope everyone is enjoying their EVO as much as I am.

Extremely problematic to make blanket statement about superiority of streaming vs. cd transports. Optimizing streaming is likely the most complex undertaking in audio, I doubt there are any two optimized streaming setups exactly the same. So many variables, and every single little thing matters.
In any case my original streaming setup was bettered by my PS Audio PWT, eventually with upgrades to streaming setup, streams and rips better than transport. Took many upgrades to turn the tables here. And I preferred my Mark Levinson No.37 transport (Phillips pro, much attention to mounting to chassis, less vibration) which unfortunately died some months prior. I'm quite sure I would have still preferred streaming vs the 37 ultimately, as I've since optimized streaming further from the point I preferred streaming vs PS transport. Almost forgot, I had modded my PS PWT, can't recall everything, remember using much better caps in critical areas. Anyway mods improved the transport, still not up to ML.

Also, keep in mind, dac inputs optimized differently. I have no doubt transports or streaming may be best, depending on situation. I also assume we'll see further developments in streaming, really in it's infancy. For me, streaming is the most exciting thing to come along in audio for ages. For content alone, even the largest cd or album collection can't beat it.

Still its good to continue to develop cd playback, my only concern is how much longer cd's will continue to be offered. Many releases are already streams only.
As for Mystique, Mojo dacs always been on my short list of dacs to upgrade if I ever felt the need. I like Benjamin's designs and implementation, he also understands the improvements boutique parts can make.