@audioman58 (or @anyone else who cares to share) Surely, you’ve heard/considered the Metrum Onyx? Holo Spring 3 versus Onyx? which would you say wins? I’m asking because my Metrum Octave (transformer upgrade, external Audio-GD USB to SPDIF) still sounds really nice, I’m totally into NOS, and the Onyx receives great reviews. And yet, the Holo Spring 3 - also NOS - was just reviewed by GoldenSound (super smart guy!) and he thought it was awesome - see here: https://youtu.be/hhf9GpGC55w And finally, budget in the $2k to $2.5K range (assuming I don’t rekt with my crypto!) Impressed by your well-informed opinions on DACs! |
They sold different the new Holo spring 3 ,and has several trickle down technologies from their kt May dac for $3100 I heard it only for a few hours and sounded very musical , the Metrum Onyx I think a bit more neutral and very detailed they are Both very respectable,it all depends on your speaker and amplifiers balance , and your cables can change flavor also, get a audition if possible . |
Cool. Thanks for sharing audioman58! I suppose I could easily be happy with either... and yet there’s yet another NOS contender that might be worth considering - even easier to avoid any chance of buyer’s regret because it’s roughly half the price - the Musician Audio Pegasus - see here: https://headfonics.com/musician-audio-pegasus-r2r-dac-review/ PS IMHO, NOS as the ideal finally seems to be catching up... 15 years ago I configured my PC with bit-perfect, SPDIF out, sound card to pass through lossless FLAC and WAV files to a "Valab" NOS DAC. Since then, I can’t truly enjoy music unless I know I’m listening to bit-perfect NOS playback. |
PPS Fun stuff. I'm actually old enough to remember the introduction of digital audio and the conventional wisdom and sensibility that there were no sound quality differences between CD players... that was 30 years ago! And here we are... still continuously evolving the harware and improving the playback quality of digital audio, including music files that are now, themselves 30 years old. |
