MHDT or Border Patrol

I've been reading more about the MHDT DACs in forums all over and one theme keeps popping up.  Time and time again, I see owners saying the reliability has not been great from boards going bad, to tubes dying quickly, to inputs not functioning anymore.  The reviews of the sound are encouraging, but it seems like they don't last too long past their warranty end of 1 year before some failure or another.  Can any long-term MHDT owners confirm that?

I've been reading more about the MHDT DACs in forums all over and one theme keeps popping up. Time and time again, I see owners saying the reliability has not been great from boards going bad, to tubes dying quickly, to inputs not functioning anymore. The reviews of the sound are encouraging, but it seems like they don't last too long past their warranty end of 1 year before some failure or another. Can any long-term MHDT owners confirm that?

I haven't had mine for a long time, but here's a story about my MHDT Orchid.  I bought mine second hand here a little over 2 months ago.  Initially I was using it between my Blue Sound Node 2 and my preamp, connecting via coax. 

I decided to give it a try in my computer system and when I tried to use the USB input, I couldn't get it to work.  At first I thought it was a driver problem, so I contacted Jian at MHDT.  He was very helpful, but the driver didn't fix the problem.  He said " mail me your shipping address, I'll send a new board to you."  Mind you, I told him that I had purchased it from someone else.  Within a few days, the new board arrived and it did take care of the problem. 

Other than some frustration and a few minutes to swap out the board, it didn't cost me anything.  I'm guessing that there may have been some problems and they are aware of them, but it also seems that they stand solidly behind their products.  Whether there's been a fix moving forward or not, I don't know. 

My suggestion would be to contact MHDT and ask.  Jiun was very responsive and I was frankly very surprised that he would provide a replacement board for free to someone who wasn't the original owner.

Thanks. That does bode well if they are that responsive and helpful to issues.  Perhaps some of the other owners were not as willing to reach out to the manufacturer.  Hard to know.

A bit late and maybe of no interest. I faced same challenges finding digital sound flat and lacing life, almost sat on in comparison to records. My cd front end was a canary ct-600 transport via chord qutest, vinyl front end a vpi prime signature, Ortofon quinex black, ear834p, all played through ear 834 amp and ml esl9 speakers. I am currently trying out a Copland DAC 215 and it sounds superb. May be worth comparing...

Tubes matter when it comes to (my) MHDT Labs Pagoda dac.

It pays off to do something investigating into the tube(s) that matches what you're looking for. I've tried numerous tubes in my Pagoda, but the best by a large margin are the Reflektor '75 6N23P SWGP Silver Shields. 

They're much clearer and natural sounding to my ears and in my system, than any other tube I've tried. They sound distinctly different and better. 

I really recommend trying different tubes if you go the MHDT Labs route.