Wadia 321 DAC, anyone have any experience with it?

For future reference. I picked one up for $1500 from my local dealer and I am pretty happy with it. I upgraded from a peachtree iDAC (which was a decent implementation of a Sabre). I got it primarily because of the price and the reviews about the "warm characteristics" as I am running class D amplification. Like the reviews say, it has a nice analog presentation. Tank like construction. I think one review stated the USB was not as good as the other inputs. I only use Coax for CD and a W4S moded Sonos player. It makes my cheapo Sony DVD/CD player sound great. I normally run a Rogue pre but its down until I get knew tubes. So it was nice to be able just to bypass the pre and go balance strait to my amp. I like the sound of the pre in the mix but the Wadia still sounds really good without it. I think the price on these came down cause Wadi came out with DSD support on the new model (321i). So if you don’t need DSD it’s a good deal. And if your just streaming or playing files and want to get rid of a component (preamp) I think it’s an excellent deal especially if your amp has balanced inputs. The one knock is the footprint. I like the auto sleep mode as well.  My neighbor came over and listened to it a promptly went a purchased one,lol.

I just bought one new off Agon for $1,000, a great deal. I compared it to the Bel Canto Dac 3 and NAD M51. It bested the Bel Canto in total output, finesse, and certainly bass. The NAD was really close but I preferred the warmer sound of the Wadia on my higher efficiency speakers.

The case is huge for a DAC and almost too big for normal shelves depth-wise.

On the flip side, most dacs are crammed into very small chassis, so it's really a personal preference. The DAC delivers as good or better performances than almost anything out there.

It is very rich and analog sounding. However, I also have an Audio-Gd 7 DAC, which is more hifi sounding and may appeal to some types of audiophiles.

As mentioned previously, i also have an NADm51 and have owned numerous other Class A Dacs. FWIW, the only ones I personally would upgrade to would be DCS, Empirical Audio, MSB and ARC Ref. It's not a steal, but very economical way to get reference level performance.

I have to say the casework on that DAC is spectacular for the price it sells. The inside looks pretty sparse....

There's a review here:

http://www.absolutesounds.com/pdf/main/press/HFN_Wadia32_June2015.pdf

IMO the lack of many reviews probably supports the conclusion drawn by the reviewer which I interpret as Ok, but nothing too special.

Thanks. I ended up going with the Exogal Comet as it is hard to find any reviews about the 321; just comments about its appearance which is quite impressive. Exogal is a newer manufacturer started by original Wadia engineers who left Fine Sounds just before the 321. Couldn't be happier with the Comet but would love to hear the 321.

I have one and it's about as good a dac as I've heard, especially for the price.

It's in the same league as all the reference dacs selling for 2-10 times as much. It's also a clear step up from the log jam at the $2k price tag.

The NAD M51 can get fairly close to it's performance for less money, but not much else I've heard.