I personally love the sound of the Modi 3.
There is just something very enjoyable and relaxing about it’s presentation. I like the sound of the AKM 4490 DAC chip and this implementation just nailed it IMHO.
Interesting quote from a Hegel engineer regarding this same chip
In their H120 integrated -
“We have fitted an AKM AK4490 because we think this company makes the best sounding DAC chips – no more, no less. It’s true that they can be a bit more difficult to implement than ESS for example, but the ceiling of performance is so much higher…”
Of course YMMV.