A DAC that ought to be better known: RME

rtotchia, I suggest you try a different PS as you really have no claim to disqualify mine or others that have thrown out the stock switched supplies that come with the RME, Chord and others. You can call us nuts and it will be your loss, not mine. RME does state they do not believe changing the PS will make a difference, and Nelson Pass of Pass Labs for years suggested in his nicely written manuals that changing power cords will not benefit the sound of his amps, but guess what? He’s now acknowledging they do. I own a Pass amp and I didn’t need Mr. Pass to tell me either or. I suspect Pass Labs and maybe RME are saying, or said what they did to claim their gear is so good there’s nothing to improve it... great marketing I think.

I run my RME flat, all settings locked with the sharp filter set and it doesn’t need any tweaking of the EQ, loudness or whatever you want to adjust in my system and I am running it direct to my amp. I think it’s great they offer all the flexibility on the ADI, but I prefer to take the more pure approach and change out the power supply which is what distinguishes quality gear over not so good is the power supply. Hopefully you get the chance or the urge to try a linear supply as I think you’ll be surprised, but it does require a revealing system and ears to hear the differences which hopefully you have both.

The stock RME does sound really good on its own but it does lack some weight and the stage is a little closed in. As mentioned by others, it can be a little forward sounding. I’m not sure any setting within the RME is going to adjust that but maybe you’ll get lucky. If you love the way it sounds out of the box, then that’s all that really matters in the end. Glad you are enjoying your RME.

@rtorchia

One of the arguments for upgrading, if that is indeed the right word, is that the fancy PSs are more robust. In the end I think upgrading a PS is like exotic cables--something that can be endlessly debated.

i disagree with this statement... power supply upgrades, especially from modern relatively cheap switching power supplies, can be very important to sound quality to both analog and digital gear... switching ps’s are well known to introduce noise into circuits they feed - makers of gear can do internal filtering and isolation and that minimize the damage done, but moving to a well built well filter linear power supply will usually have a positive effect, big or small

and for the record, rob watts @ chord vehemently states that their dacs will not benefit from after market lps units... but i have had 3 chords and they all sound better with one

naim rega modwright lehmann holo well tempered labs are just a few highly respected audio makers of various components from turntables to amps to dacs that offer upgrades for better sound quality through better power supplies

Adg101 I am going to take your advice on the settings. It’s very confusing about the power upgrade because one gets diverging opinions. But if you all hear a difference it’s difficult to argue with you. I see a Pardo in my future.

i think some of the good lps makers do offer a money back trial -- that makes the venture an easier one...

Teddy Pardo are made and sold direct out of Israel so I doubt with shipping they would do a return but the sBooster may be one from Upscale Audio that does. Can’t speak for the others but I’m sure they are close in performance. I chose the Teddy based on positive comments from actual users and I prefer the appearance of it over the sBooster. I’m considering a Teddy for both my ProJect Xtension 10 table and Parks Audio Budgie phono preamp. Probably start with the Budgie as I really question on a turntable motor it will make a difference but ProJect recently came out with a linear supply as an upgrade for my table so who knows?

Before I upgraded to the Teddy I was using a custom power cord I made to go to the switch supply from the wall and that made an improvement, which convinced me if a power cord on the stock switch supply can make an improvement then surely a different supply would do as well and it did. I would suggest trying a power cord first to see if you hear a difference. The cord I made is the same one I also built for my Bluesound Vault 2 which also made an improvement with its internal switched PS. There’s been many discussions on the Bluesound players on upgrading the C7 type power cord so you can find several recommendations by others there under Bluesound Node and Vault players. Another nice thing about adding a linear supply is most have the more typical IEC inlet for more common cords.