Well, folks, I’m keeping this baby. All it needed was a proper break-in time. IMO,10 days of being on (night and day) is enough for the initial impression.
As of now those excessive highs are gone, and even though it doesn’t sound exactly tubey as we probably anticipated, it sounds very musical, great mids and tight bass with both tube and solid state electronics. It definitely has more PRaT than the Lab12 DAC I had a few months ago, and the vocals are more natural, not kinda in-your-face.
All I can say it went through very interesting transformation during these days and I really love the results.
And I still don’t have a new cable, next week I’ll order the Acoustic Zen cable.
Also, Vlad told me to use AES input when listening to CDs.
I have to say if you’re looking for a new DAC, don’t underestimate this device. Honestly it’s very good, and visually appealing, plus there’s an expandable (if needed) return policy, so you have nothing to lose.
Anyway, this is it for now. I know my words mean nothing to many, but it’s an enjoyable piece. Good DAC doesn’t need to have 10 tubes and weigh 50 lbs.
Thanks to everyone for your input.
One more thing - there’s no tube-rolling here. In my case if there’s Chinese 6Z4 rectifier then I’ll replace it with Soviet-made equivalent. The other two tubes don’t have plug’n’play equivalents.