Small form factor, budget DACs?

Bombaywalla,
all your theories and hypothesis are great.But you really need to hear it to understand where I'm coming from. The Audio Sector DAC has sufficient drive. Probably more than many players. I've never heard a player or DAC make a garbage recording sound good. It is what it is. I can assure you jitter performance is excellent with this combo. I do use a Superclock 3 in the transport.

There maybe nothing magical about the BVaudio SR10 output impedance but it's better than most players on the market o/p. The output impedance and voltage of the analog outputs do attenuate the signal in interconnects if not sufficient correct?

Maybe we're talking about two different things here. I'm talking about the addition of a buffer for people using passives or changing the preamp to one with a higher input impedance. Also the impedance does matter when driving long interconnects or passives. I would rather have more drive than not enough in any case. I wish you were closer ..I could quickly prove your hypothesis wrong. Anyone that has tried this knows what I'm talking about.

You must ask yourself. Why use a preamp between your Wadia and amplifier? Besides the need for other inputs. After all you are double buffering already. What do you gain when using the preamp/buffer than not using it between the Wadia?
I suspect you use the preamp because it sounds better to you than running the CD player direct to the amplifier...correct. So because you do this the Wadia must not have sufficient drive...correct? Ok I was being sarcastic with that one. :-)

What I'm doing is no different than you using the CAT preamp in the loop. Now do you understand?

There's a reason why APL,RAM and other modders concentrate so much on the output stage of their players. Which includes doing away with the negative feedback opamps in some cases. I noticed most of them use single ended designs with no negative feedback and powerful output transformers in their top players. I added the same thing ..just in a different chassis.LOL

I can imagine handling interconnect interactions is a walk in the park for such players. Never heard the APL..but just from what's used, the output impedance(should be quite low using a tube and output transformers) and high voltage should make one powerful sounding player! There's no denying it, the presence of power in the right place makes one hell of a difference in sound!

Oh yeah..the piper is one happy camper! ;-)

Gmood1,

>> You must ask yourself. Why use a preamp between your
>> Wadia and amplifier?
the answer is very simple: Wadia's digital gain control is the absolute pitts! Sonically, it stinks! I know I'm an owner but I will not prop up this unit just 'cuz I spent money on it. What I do is put the volume control to 100 thereby bypassing it. Now I have totally lost control over adjusting the volume. That is where my preamp comes in. Inside the Wadia they provide a set of DIP switches to adjust the buffer outputs from 4.25V all the way down to 0.25V for each channel separately. I believe that the user adjusts this output depending on the amount of voltage gain in his/her preamp.
Wadia claims to have a patented I-->V conversion technique & I wonder if these buffers are doing double duty of I-->V + buffering? I don't know enough about the Wadia design (& the DAC control PCB is multi-layered thereby making wire tracing nearly impossible) to make a useful comment.

>> There's a reason why APL,RAM and other modders
>> concentrate so much on the output stage of their
>> players. Which includes doing away with the negative
>> feedback opamps.
well, even if I try the BVAudio SR10 external buffer, there's no getting rid of the negative feedback opamps inside the SN DAC.
OK, I can understand negative feedback in the opamp-based output stage is less sonically than those outputs stages not having any.

>> Also the impedance does matter when driving long
>> interconnects or passives.
agree! How long is long tho? Not 1m interconnect! I think long would be in excess of 5m.
I would agree that output impedance is very imp when driving passives. A CDP having an output imp of 3K (as written in your orig post) would likely be an issue when driving a passive preamp. I agree!

>> I can imagine handling interconnect interactions is a
>> walk in the park for such players.
I believe that this would also be a true statement for a DAC using a Burr-Brown OPA627.
When I plug this SN DAC into my preamp, I have so much gain from this DAC that I have to crank down the volume knob atleast 3 clicks from where I listen to the Wadia. In the CAT that's quite a gain reduction.

>> I wish you were closer ..I could quickly prove your
>> hypothesis wrong.
well, my hypothesis is, for the SN Saru DAC+ which uses a strong enough output buffer than can drive my 1m interconnect + my preamp input capacitance, that badly recorded CDs sound terrible thru it 'cuz the dominant effect is poor jitter performance in the recovered clock from the input data stream. The poor jitter performance xlates to poor DAC performance as the DAC uses this jittery clock to perform a D-->A.

(Were I to additionally remove the negative feedback in the output buffer would I get even better sound? probably!
I think that in my DAC the jitter performance dominates over the negative feedback in the output buffer).

Fair enough my friend..at least we agree on something.LOL
I do understand what your saying. Maybe this is the problem you hear in your DAC or transport..I really don't know. Honestly I've never cared for the stock Sony 7700 players analog outputs, they are quite the ear bleeders in my book.
I never got a chance to try it as a transport..sold it off in a hurry.LOL

Wow your DAC really kicks the gain up. I can adjust the gain on my Single Power MPX3 Slam. This is what I use as a buffer not the BvAudio unit.
It does have gain where the BVaudio does not. 600 volts of clean quiet power in reserve really takes the sound up a few notches!

ATB,

Gmood1,
I think that we have been agreeing on almost everything all along & just didn't read close enough to recognize that.
I think that re-stating what my hypothesis could have helped clear the air a bit - I was/am looking for the dominant cause for my case.

>> Maybe this is the problem you hear in your DAC or
>> transport..I really don't know. Honestly I've never
>> cared for the stock Sony 7700 players analog outputs,
>> they are quite the ear bleeders in my book.
well, I think that you might have indirectly hit upon something I wanted to mention in my prev post but it got too long: the issue, I think, lies in my stock DVP-S7000 DIGITAL output (I'm using it as a transport to the SN DAC so the analog outputs do not feature). The S7000 digital outputs have very sloppy rise & fall times, which has the tendency to aggravate jitter issues. Sending it in for a mod to improve this should give me good ROI because it is the digital data stream that the SN DAC sees as its input & it is from this data stream that it extracts a clock & lights up the "lock" LED on the front panel. If an improved digital output buffer adds minimal distortion to the data stream, the performance is bound to improve.

I didn't think that the analog output of the S7000 was an ear-bleeder as much as it was very dull/flat sounding.

BTW, I wanted to clarify that your transport having the Superclock3 has much less to do w/ the DAC jitter performance compared to the quality of your digital output. What is making the bigger diff in your case is the mod to your digital output. Don't get me wrong - the Superclock3 makes a positive diff but it is 2nd only to the superior modified digital output. The Superclock3 would have a dramatic effect if you were using the Pioneer internal DACs i.e. using it as an integrated player, 'cuz this low jitter clock would be connected to the DAC, which would have kicked its performance up a few notches (iffff the internal DACs are good quality in the 1st place). The data stream that your Audio Sector DAC sees is just a 1-0 pattern. Whether it is correct or incorrect data, the DAC doesn't care nor does it know. The job of the Superclock3 in extracting the data from the CD is complete by this time & it is the quality of the digital output that will affect the overall sound.
It is no wonder that the websites of many 3rd-party modders lists the Superclock3 mod as a separate line item & don't always push you into getting it if you are using the unit as a transport. (or, maybe they still do 'cuz they want your money anyway!!)

>> There's a reason why APL,RAM and other modders
>> concentrate so much on the output stage of their
>> players. Which includes doing away with the negative
>> feedback opamps in some cases. I noticed most of them
>> use single ended designs with no negative feedback and
>> powerful output transformers in their top
>> players.
Another point I wanted to clarify - there isn't a single electronic device on planet Earth that can work without negative feedback! Trust me on this - I'm 110% certain! I think that you meant to say that the top CDP modders use output stages with extremely localized feedback to make them sound the best. I agree w/ that.

My sis-in-law lives in ATL. If I'm visiting her, I'll email you & we can probably get together & compare my SN DAC w/ your Audio Sector?
Like-wise, my friend, all the best & enjoy the music! :-)

Bombaywalla, What exactly is done to just modify the Digital out with no clock mod's? Just wondering, cause this would seem to be much cheaper to do than changing the clock.

Also, I have seen some Mods to NOS-DAC's that add a Re-clocker type unit to them, would this be worth simply getting the Digital out modification at the transport and more effective putting the Re-clocker in the DAC itself for the cheapest approch to handle the Jitter issues and get resonably better sound?

Thanks